BADGERS, BADGES, BELLS & ACCIDENTAL WORDS

Good morning universe, how are you today? There’s nothing much on my mind today, so here’s a few random bits of nonsense that came out of yesterday’s to-ings and fro-ings.

I did accidentally discover that I’d managed to “invent” a new word, or at least one that was new to me. I was writing one of those hasty “end of the day” emails and made a passing reference to some animation and hit “send” before I’d read it back to myself, hence my description of something needing to squech a bit. "Squech" my new word for part squelch, part stretch. I rather like it. It probably lurks in the OED as something utterly vile and is most likely to turn out to be the sort of thing that used to cause Victorian ladies to swoon with shock, but, for the moment, it’s my favourite new thing.

I suppose it was a day for small accidents, really. As I sat chatting in the hospital, my phone beeped with a text message, which surprised me as I thought it was switched off, and when I went to check the message, I did indeed find that the keypad was locked. Apparently my phone had decided all on its own to ring m’colleague and he’d got a lengthy old insight into the sort of chat our family have when we’re sitting around in a hospital ward. I guess I was lucky it was just him that it phoned, although I did spend some time fretting over who else it might have called as well as him, and on quite what indiscretions that I might have sounded off about whilst he was listening in. It’s all a bit Nixonish, M.I.5-ish or whistle-blower-ish, really, isn’t it, bugging your own conversations? It turns out that I had been in a bit of a rush as I headed out into the night and had flung both the phone and my Bluetooth gizmo into an inside pocket and it was the button on the earpiece that had been accidentally pressed, bypassing the locked keypad and dialling away. Oh well, I suppose it’s a lesson learned.

However, there was an accident avoided later on. As I was driving home from my evening duties last night, about a hundred yards ahead of me I spotted a badger crossing the main road and disappearing into the hedge on the far side. It was definitely badger shaped and not a fox or a cat and I suddenly felt all cosy and rural. I know that it’s supposed to be either ‘good’ or ‘bad’ luck if a black cat crosses your path depending on your cultural origins, but I never got the memo on what the situation might be with badgers. Still, it was probably very lucky for the badger that the road wasn’t any busier, although, with their wise old “Toad of Toad Hall” ways, maybe they’re more astute than I think they are and I should credit them with a little more road sense than I do.

It was a tough day to remain focused to be honest, as family matters loomed large in my thoughts as I tried to get on with my work. The phone seemed to be ringing all day as little bits of further information seeped out, but ultimately we ended the day in much the same position as we started it in, although the imminence of the change seems to be looming larger. I only mention this because I often mull over what a lousy fireman I would have made, for so many reasons, but the one that springs quite often to mind is that great big bell that they have in the dormitories. If I knew that there was even the remotest chance of that going off in the night, I know that I wouldn’t be able to sleep a wink. I once stayed in a B&B in Hay-on-Wye which was right opposite the town clock, and the knowledge that it was going to chime on the quarter hours meant that I barely slept for the entire duration of the stay. It’s not a recent development, either. As a student, living in halls, if there was even the slightest rumour that a fire drill was imminent, I would lie awake all night. I’m now starting to feel like this about my own telephone, and it’s really making it difficult to concentrate as any moment the call to the hospital might come.

I know I shouldn’t do it (I! Really! Shouldn’t!), but every so often, when I’m taking a five minute coffee break or munching upon my lunchtime sandwich, I let my weak-minded mouse-clicking finger hover over that fatal “Have Your Say” tab that lurks so invitingly on the BBC News Website, and, in a moment of weakness, I will sometimes click on it and release the hordes of madness into my brain. I must point out here that I’m only reading the stuff, and hope that the wireless waves of the computer would do a U-turn in mid-air and join together and focus on my forehead in order to drill a channel right through my head if I decided to actually contribute. Yesterday’s debate that managed to summon the screeching banshees from out of the woodwork was about the reform of the disabled blue badge scheme. The amount of bile, prejudice and downright hatred that this subject managed to draw out of people was astonishing to read. One of the members of my own family has one of these badges (although thanks to the Clemeron this is currently subject to review and causing much angst, but that’s another issue for another day really) because of a heart condition. Obviously this isn’t a very visible disability and not one that would be immediately apparent to the casual observer, but I mention it only really because it’s something to think about. We all are very capable of judging by appearances, I know I am, and maybe we should stop and think a bit before sounding off about all and sundry (says he, blogging away about  anything and everything…).

Finally, whilst I am trying to get out of my recent bad habit of the blog becoming about the blog (“Blog will eat itself???”), I did have a recent exchange of views with my fellow bloggist over in Bedford Falls. He told me that I write with a deep honestly that he marvels at which is ironic because I admire his abstract flights of fancy and his ability to find something life-affirming to say, even if he does mean it ironically, and many is the time I’ve thought “I wish I could have written that…” Oh well, I suppose it’s no different to people with straight hair wishing they had curls and vice-versa.

We do what we do.