I did it, I did it, I did it!
Not that it has been easy, you understand.
But I have now successfully escaped from Orkney and relocated to the English mainland. So no more tales of derring do about battles and sunken treasure, Neolithic stone botherers and Viking
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I'm astonished by the heat. I'm astonished by the sheer distances you have to drive to get to Tesco. I'm astonished by the traffic. And the fact that everyone speaks in a comedy accent. I find myself in ee, by gum country. And it feels like home. After a quarter of a century living in an archipalago that looks like dog droppings scattered across the sea from the window of one of Loganair's old rust bucket World War Two planes, or, to the less poetically inclined, the tops of a drowned mountain range, I'm back in the county where I were born and raised, lad. In my beginning is my ending. But not for a bit yet.
There's been a lot of cleaning. And painting. And unpacking. When my dad was busy bringing peace to Berlin and cleaning out the concentration camps, he found much to deplore in the habits of the Russian soldiers who were also bringing peace to Berlin, much against the will of the Berliners. When the toilet broke in their requisitioned rather grand house, the occupying Russians made no attempt to get it fixed, but simply dug a hole in the garden and squatted. When the shower head fell on my own head the other day and I discovered that the fitment was broken long ago and cunningly disguised, I was convinced the previous owners of my new house had something of that same Cossack spirit of derring do.
Sorry for absence in these stirring times- I hope you haven't all run off and left me.
There I was, bowling merrily along the winding, tree-lined (Trees!!) country roads, on my way to IKEA for a design consultation to purchase a PAX system. My friend and I set out at 1.00 for a 3.00 pm appointment, thinking plenty of time, can get to B&Q for painting supplies first. Constant need for painting supplies. Off we went, in ferocious heat, down the aforesaid wind-ey country roads. A great big truck loomed up behind me, pushing me to go faster. Everytime I glanced in the mirror, there he was, a bloody great malevolent truck, straight from Duel.
I eventually lost him after overtaking the tractor that had been slowing me down, leaving him to deal with the tractor. So I resumed the merrily bowling until I became aware of a car behind me flashing its lights. Here we go again, thought I, fuming and swearing, enduring the flashing until a convenient lay-by allowed me to pull over to let the car pass. You can imagine my terror when the car pursued me into the layby, again just like Duel (which is the most absorbing and terrifying piece of nonsense ever filmed. Steven Spielburg in his 1971 feature film debut, with Dennis Weaver as a traveling salesman pursued through rural California by a sentient devil truck with an extreme case of road rage.) The flashing car pulled in behind me. Thinking quickly, I offered up my friend to the mercy of the enraged, entitled road hog - well, some duties fall naturally to the bloke. As usual, I had drastically misread the situation, and the kindly lady driver explained that she had started flashing me when she saw my number plate drop off in the road. So I had to turn around and go look for it, with no idea where it had come off. After driving for about two thousand years, I turned round again, covering the same ground, and spotted the plate. I pulled in as soon as I could, put on the hazards and sent my friend out on bloke duties. He went back, picking his way through the long grass - no verge, uneven ground - countryside, innit. Watching him in the rear view mirror, I saw him take a detour. He retrieved the plate and returned rather more briskly, to report that the detour was to avoid the large and rotting corpse of a road-kill deer. No deer in Orkney. Lots of road-kill cats - it is a competetive night time sport among Orcadian young drivers to destroy cats strolling across country roads. And shooting seals. Honest, not invent. The South Ronaldsay seal rescue sanctuary sign is peppered with bullet holes. Next best thing to popping a seal in the head. Seals have the annoying habit of regarding salmon farms as an outdoor larder.
We then had the problem of sourcing tape to stick the number plate back on again. Good news, though - we did manage to get to the appointment in time, taking 2 hours on a 40 minute journey, and my new wardobe is being constructed on Tuesday.
Whilst I've been enjoying myself, it seems there's been a big football competition. And Scotland lost. Oh dear. What a pity. And the politicians have been amusing us as ever.
I wish I'd seen Starmer's resignation speech - he believes he has saved the Labour Party and the country. And now it is the turn of gorgeous, pouting Andy Burnham, he of the sincerity and eyelashes, to be War Leader with an unfunded defence budget. Seems we are replacing our defence capability with drones.
There are four splendid anthologies of the writings of stanislav and mr ishmael, compiled by his friend, mr verge, the house filthster. You can buy them from Amazon or Lulu. Here's how:
Honest Not Invent, Vent Stack, Ishmael’s Blues, and the latest, Flush Test (with a nice picture of the late, much lamented, Mr Harris of Lanarkshire taking a piss on a totem pole) are available from Lulu and Amazon. If you buy from Amazon, it would be nice if you could give a review on their website.
IIshmaelites wishing to buy a copy from lulu should follow these steps
please register an account first, at lulu.com. This is advisable because otherwise paypal seems to think it's ok to charge in dollars, and they then apply their own conversion rate, which might put the price up slightly for a UK buyer. Once the new account is set up, follow one of the links below (to either paperback or hardback) or type "Ishmael’s Blues" into the Lulu Bookstore search box. Click on the “show explicit content” tab, give the age verification box a date of birth such as 1 January 1960, and proceed.
Link for Hardcover : https://tinyurl.com/je7nddfr
Link for Paperback : https://tinyurl.com/3jurrzux
https://www.lulu.com/shop/ishmael-smith/flush-test/paperback/product-9yjvn7.html?q=Flush+Test&page=1&pageSize=4
At checkout, try WELCOME15 in the coupon box, which (for the moment) takes 15% off the price before postage. If this code has expired by the time you reach this point, try a google search for "Lulu.com voucher code" and see what comes up.
With the 15% voucher, PB (including delivery to a UK address) should be £16.84; HB £27.04.
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