Thoughts for the Week

So this week I’ve been thinking about health. Not a thrilling topic I know but it had never really dawned on me before how easy it is to take for granted something so fragile. These reflections are of course spawned from ill health, stomach cramps and crippling sugar highs and lows brought on by stress, sleep depravation and a diet based solely around the plastic packaged products of the aforementioned unnamed coffee establishment.

So my body is running down into a state of general disrepair with a flabby gut and sunken eyes and a snappy temperament, not something that has ever happened to me before. As I feel good health slip away from my grasp I realise just how precious that elusive state is. How many people I wonder live with health problems, however minor, and plod along in pain or discomfort. I’m one of those people who has always been able to eat anything, with little weight gain and absolutely no digestion problems, so this sudden junk food binge has caught me a little by surprise. I’ve started drawing up food schedules and buying rice cakes in a desperate bid to feel somewhat like myself again.

What I’ve discovered so far is that staying fit and healthy is an awful lot harder than you think. Finding the time to sleep more than six hours a night is hard enough in itself without also cooking a decent dinner, preparing tomorrow’s lunch and factoring in time to get up and have breakfast. I never knew that eating could be such a chore. I get home from work, take one look at my dingy rented-accommodation kitchen, see the teetering pile of crusty plates and the mouse droppings behind the microwave, and turn right around and march out to the chip shop. In the morning it’s even worse, I trade a bowl of cereal for a banana on the run and a croissant at work just to snatch ten extra minutes away from the bleak view of the city dawn.

I don’t know how many of you have seen Cardiff at dawn; it’s not a pretty sight. This city though lovely on the surface seems to take a great deal of night-time maintenance. In Cathays the world is silent and still, the last of the student revellers having long since fallen unconscious and the roads are ruled by the seagulls, enormous, ferocious beasts that tear bin-bags to shreds. They stand atop cars watching you pass before taking flight, shrieking and squabbling over a half-eaten kebab.

In town the streets are alive, a few people make their early morning way to work, but mostly the place is full of council cleaners. People empty the bins and pick up the rubbish and scrape the chewing gum off the pavements and power hose away the sick, the urine and the excrement of the Friday night clubbers. An unseen, unknown army cleans up the city, washing away the drunken debauchery of the night before, like a parent tidying up behind an unruly child.

I digress. So basically I want there to be some kind of neighbourhood soup kitchen where all of us overworked waifs and strays can sit down together and eat casserole and feel like we’ve gone home to our parent’s house and had a home cooked meal. I want a haven for each and every person trying to defrost a one person-sized portion of chicken tikka masala, all those peeling back the plastic on a single-serving ready made lasagne. At the risk of sounding like Jamie Oliver I just wish there was a way we could all club together, all of us trying to cook a meal for one when we’re tired and grouchy and poor. If we could all take it in turns and cook for everyone on our street say once every few weeks I think life could be so much easier. This is a plan I intend to introduce in my utopian state, cleverly uniting my aim to get everyone eating healthily and to eradicate the majority of social problems by making people sit down together at dinner time (although this is an entirely separate rant for another time).

In the mean time I shall have to continue spending my already sparse free time getting my housemate to show me how to make veg-rich, low fat soup while trying to serve customers at work without looking at the fat-jammed goodies laid out before me. Either that or cave into waning energy levels and persistent nausea. It is strange I think that signs of prosperity can have changed so. Only a century ago it was obesity that marked out the wealthy, now weight gain is the mark of the malnourished poor and the rich eat wheat-germ smoothies and oily-fish salads. How are we failing so dramatically to divide up the food produced in the world? The majority starve, most get by on processed rubbish and only a few manage to eat well. Are poison or starvation really the only choices?

The Curious Case of the Dried Squirrel: Part 2

Here follows the most singular account of the murder of Lady Hubert.

Two weeks ago Lord and Lady Hubert were breakfasting at their stately home in the Peak District. It was a warm morning in early spring and the happy couple, who had been wed only one year, ate in contented silence. Halfway through the meal the butler James entered with the day’s post. Lord Hubert set about opening his letters while Lady Hubert unwrapped a neat package wrapped in brown paper and tied with plain string.

‘Who has sent such a parcel, my dear?’ enquired the Lord.

‘I’m sure I have no idea Robert. There is no card included and the postmark is from America.’ She had removed the paper and had begun to open the box. Suddenly the fair Lady let out a piercing scream. Lord Hubert jumped to his feet, scattering crumpets in all directions.

‘What on earth is the matter Gloria?’

‘The Squirrel!’ She shrieked, ‘The Squirrel! They’ve found me!’ And with that she fainted away and was insensible for a full half-hour. Only when the doctor arrived and administered a sedative was the Lady calm enough to be escorted to bed and left in the care of her maid. Lord Hubert and the doctor went downstairs and examined the contents of the box. Inside there was no note of any kind, just a whole grey squirrel, dried and stuffed, his beady eyes starring up out of the box. Making neither head nor tail of the curious message they took the whole disturbing package outside, far from the house and burned it.

A few days later Lady Hubert was well enough to leave her room and was escorted by her husband down to the drawing room where she sat by the window watching the ducks paddle up and down the lake. Lord Hubert watched her anxiously as her eyes drifted slowly in and out of focus. He had not dared to mention the distressing parcel. Turning to him suddenly the Lady said;

‘What did you do with it, Darling?’

‘With what?’ the Lord asked taken unawares.

‘The squirrel.’

‘That revolting thing? I had James destroy it.’ She nodded gravely, her eyes closed.

‘The next time one arrives dear, you must leave it on the doorstep.’

‘You’re expecting more? Good God Gloria, who would do such a thing? We must call the police this instant, someone is harassing you.’

‘It is nothing Robert, just a practical joke. You must not open the next parcel; you must read nothing they send to you. Just put it out on the doorstep. They will stop coming.’ For days the Lord tried to coax the names of his wife’s tormentors from her lips, but she continually insisted the prank was nothing. Desperately he watched her vigour slip away and she became weak, nervy and pale. One week after the first incident a second package arrived. The Lady pushed it away from her at the breakfast table without even turning her gaze upon it and her husband resignedly rose and himself took it outside and left it on the doorstep. The couple spoke no more of the subject and the next day the package had gone. Lord Hubert rejoiced, perhaps this was to be the end of the matter. For one week he lived exactly as he had before, the only mark that that terrible squirrel had entered their lives was the continuing sickness of his wife.

Exactly one week after the second package a third was delivered, smaller than the first two. Once again Lady Hubert pushed it away, although this time her hand shook as she did so and Lord Hubert could have sworn that the box shook too. He deposited the parcel on the doorstep and this time it vanished in a matter of hours although no person was seen in the grounds or on the road. To his lordships dismay a fourth parcel was delivered that very night and the same again the following morning. Lady Hubert grew weaker and weaker until, finally she was forced to take to her bed. On the morning of the fifth parcel Lord Hubert entered his wife’s room to find her with Mr Gibbins, the family solicitor, signing her will. Aghast the Lord protested but the Lady soothed him saying it was only a precaution, something she had been meaning to do for some time. When Mr Gibbins left she asked her husband to bring her the sixth box to be delivered that night.

‘No my dear,’ said the Lord, ‘I absolutely must protest. It is completely out of the question. I will not allow these fiends to harangue you any longer.’ Lady Hubert looked up at him with large round eyes.

‘Please Robert,’ she said, ‘I am grown so weary by it all. I would just so much like for it all to be at an end.’

‘I wish for nothing more myself dear but nothing can come of you opening another revolting package.’ Gently she took his hand.

‘No Darling, I am sure, these people want to deliver something to me and I had better open it and have done with it or they may never stop.’

That night the Lord reluctantly went downstairs and fetched the small brown box from the pile of post. His nerves were wound to the limit, the box practically quivered in his hands. Taking the evil thing into his wife he found her sat up in bed, neat, flushed and waiting. He handed her the box and her hands shook. Something inside slid from one side to the other. Lord Hubert sat down on the edge of the bed.

‘No Robert. You must wait outside.’

‘Damn it Gloria I won’t.’

‘You must.’ Lord Hubert stood quivering with rage.

‘This is the last thing you are going to have your own way in Gloria, once all this is over, you’ve got to let me start taking care of you.’ He stooped and kissed his wife and left the room. Pacing up and down outside the door Lord Hubert heard only silence for the first few minutes. Then quietly, very gently the key turned in the lock.

‘Gloria!’ Lord Hubert pounded on the door. ‘Gloria don’t you dare lock this door! Gloria, open up at once. Gloria, as your husband I demand you open this door this minute!’ Suddenly there was a long piercing scream followed by a terrible choking sound ominously cut short.

Half the household had since gathered on the landing due to the terrible racket that was being made and James had succeeded in breaking open the door. Everyone rushed in and drew back in horror at the sight before them. Lady Hubert lay sprawled across the bed; her head thrown back was lolling off the side. She was pale as a ghost and still as a stone, it was obvious from a glance that she was dead. The worst thing however was a mark at her throat. The box lay open and empty beside her, the window was open and there was no sign of what had killed her save two large marks where she had been bitten by some terrible fangs.