… last night, I suddenly awoke, with another one of these quite dramatic awakenings.
And about five seconds after I awoke, I received a message on the telephone. It really was an astonishing coincidence, almost as if awakening five seconds before the message was in anticipation of its arrival.
It wasn’t all that much beforehand that I’d actually come to bed, after another one of the slow, depressing evenings that I seem to be having these days. And I was so tired, yet again, that I must have gone off quite rapidly to sleep. It’s a shame that I couldn’t have remained asleep, though, but then that’s what usually happens.
It took an age to go back to sleep too, but once I’d slipped into the arms of Morpheus, there I stayed until the alarm sounded. And that woke me up quite dramatically too, I can tell you.
At that moment, we were back in World War I when the Germans were storming a trench full of Greek soldiers. They had launched a few shells into a few Greek pill-boxes and stormed the trenches. There were piles of dead people around, so they went through, identified the wounded and shot them on the spot. There was one person who was a British officer leading a Greek troop. They questioned him about a few different things but as he didn’t have the correct answers to what they wanted, they shot him too. But we were working somewhere behind the lines, watching a captive balloon or Zeppelin or something that had escaped from its moorings and was flying at a very low height around the edge of the cliffs. We were worried that it would collide with the church steeple, so we were trying to work out a way, if we could, of diverting it away because if we were to fire at it, it would explode and that would make more damage. In the meantime, we had been repairing a few watches and things like that. We actually had one working, but then we decided that we weren’t happy so we dismantled it to have another attempt. At this moment, the girls came along and looked at what we were doing. They couldn’t understand why we had decided to do it a second time. I was talking to one of the guys about new technology and how powerful it was. He was saying that how he wished that he had bought a new 2GB memory stick while their prices were low, because a new 2GB one these days would cost $64. I replied that a 64GB one would only cost $2, the way that technology is going these days.
There’s a bit of everything in there. The bit about colliding with the steeple relates to a discussion that I had the other day with one of the taxi drivers, when we were watching the Nazguls flying around near the spire of the Eglise Notre Dame de Lihou. As for the rest, it seems to relate to little snippets of conversation that I’ve had now and again with different people.
After the bathroom and the medication, I came back in here to transcribe the dictaphone notes, but as you have already read them, I needn’t have bothered mentioning it.
The nurse was next, still in his cheerful mood, and then it was breakfast and a new book.
While I was reading COLONEL CARRINGTON’S TESTIMONY, I noticed that he had written several others and so I began today to read his BATTLE MAPS AND CHARTS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION.
Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that IN 2013 and 2014 I roamed up and down the Hudson Valley in Upstate New York visiting the sites of the battles of the Revolutionary War and also of the Seven Years War of 1756-1763, including the site of Fort William Henry, the fort that featured prominently in Fenimore Cooper’s LAST OF THE MOHICANS
One of the places that I visited in 2013 was Fort Ticonderoga, and I noticed from Carrington’s description of the siege of the fort that "The Americans neglected to fortify Sugar Loaf Hill", a prominent eminence overlooking the fort, strong>"deeming it inaccessible.".
You probably noticed just now that STRAWBERRY MOOSE and I walked quite comfortably to the top, and so did several other people. And there’s still a British cannon up there that the British Army managed to drag up the hill.
After breakfast, I came in here to begin a new radio programme, and in fact I’m currently working on two of them right now because, halfway through choosing the music for one, I realised that I’d missed one. Still, variety is the spice of life.
When my faithful cleaner came down to apply my anaesthetic cream, she brought with her my electronic drum kit. That was a one-day wonder, that was. I bought it as a challenge, something to do during lockdown, but my legs gave out before I was able to master it.
It was the boss who came to fetch me today and we had quite a quick drive down to Avranches. I was connected up quite quickly too and then I could concentrate on Y Barri v Y Bala.
Y Bala had only conceded four goals all season up to date, but Y Barri doubled that total with comparative ease and could (and should) have had a bagful more except for the inspired performance of former Salford City goalkeeper Joel Torrance.
It was nevertheless an exciting game and you can see the highlights HERE if you are of such a mind.
Although I finished my dialysis earlier than usual, I had to wait to be unplugged, and then finally the boss brought me back in the most astonishing rainstorm that was engulfing Avranches.
Ironically, it wasn’t raining at Granville when I returned. It was a nice, leisurely walk back to my apartment in the howling gale, which has now been blowing for several days.
For a change, Tea tonight was a burger with baked potato – one of those luxury burgers that are really delicious. And now, I’m off to bed in the hope of a good lie-in tomorrow. I need one after all of this.
But I forgot to mention my ‘phone message from during the night. It reads "(we) will see you Friday November 7 for a few days fly back on November 11.". This visit from Canada looks as if it may well be happening.
But seeing as we have been talking about Ticonderoga and The Last of the Mohicans … "well, one of us has" – ed … it was at Ticonderoga where I told my famous story to one of the American tour guides.
Sent on a spying mission by Colonel Munro to find out about the French forces in Fort Ticonderoga, Hawkeye and Chingachgook approach the fort very carefully
"How many soldiers do you think there are in the fort?" asked Hawkeye.
Chingachgook lay down and put his ear to the ground. "About 300" he replied
"And how many cannon?"
Chingachgook lay down and put his ear to the ground again. "About 30"
"And how many horses?"
Chingachgook lay down and put his ear to the ground yet again. "About 60"
"And how many native allies?"
Chingachgook lay down and put his ear to the ground once more. "About 200"
"That’s incredible" said Hawkeye. "Can you tell all that by just lying down and listening to the ground?"
"Ohh no" replied Chingachgook. "If I lie down here like this and turn my head so that my ear is to the ground just like this, I can see right underneath the gates of the fort"
The response of the tour guide was "that’s incredible! I never knew that Hawkeye and Chingachgook came to Ticonderoga. I shall have to amend the tourist leaflets."
Which just goes to show, as Alfred Hitchcock and Kenneth Williams once famously said, "it’s a waste of time telling jokes to foreigners."
