HOBBY

Ask not about whom the hobbyist scribbles.

Lovely catch-up natter with visiting pal, the commotion recollected in tranquility.

Drinkies this evening with le tout corfou and I am going along as her guest. Also attending is a pompous skula simperer who fell foul of me at a party oop 't Nisaki way when she berated me for describing gardenry as one of the selfish hobbies of our time.

The cow corrected me on my neologism 'gardenry' but I corrected her by explaining that it was my umbrella term for the whole dreary gardening experience as suffered by non-hobbyists:

• the actual physical treadmill
• the gab gab blah f***ing blah that goes with it, oft conducted in mixed company, no permission requested if they may bore the table, often proceeding to hog the meal.
• the farcical charade of 'misplacing' tools, tripping tumbling cutting bruising scraping ...
• la-di-dah lending and borrowing of books, rarely read, never returned.

But I'm rambling and boring myself and not getting to the core of the post.

• I dispute gardenry's right to intrude so. She points to the vase on the table and asks, "And you don't enjoy that flower?" Me: Indifferent, but that is not gardening. The fruit of, maybe, but not the drear and torture for the non-gardener hobbyist of slogging.
• "So what is your hobby?", as if omfg, if you havent got gardening what have you got? 
• They're listening and my mother is looking away because she knows the selfishness she imposes.
• I mention my guitar playing - but I dont ask anyone to change my strings or keep the Ovation tunèd - my blogging and general surfery - but I don't ask anyone to check for dud links or look up how to make î (alt-0238, if you're wondering) 
• "I also like to write. Stories. Take an idea and wrestle it into words."

Fat booming bovine bully.

And she says to me, my visitor and gently mocking comforter: "And all the time you were getting material for your stories."

Hadn't thought of it that way.

Oh do look at that photo up there, all me, at Villa Thefti. How amusing to have one of me with Ovation, Fender, and the 'lectric axe.

Gorgeous day. Walked us round the jardin, Sam panting and peeing and sprinting - then curry lunch at Noah's Caff, chapatis and northern accents. Every fifth man who entered, his eyes lit up and over he'd come for a big smooch.

"Have you had them all?" I ask with petulant moue.

"Let me see ..."

Tease.

Niko is on at the 02 ce soir and she can make it. Might. So I go easy on the sauce and we drive home, where she grabs the puter and checks her email.