Memories

I'm still looking for a job, too often sober, where once I seldom was, and still miserable. This could be my song:



Mrs Gruff once came home at two in the morning, after being away for three months, and cooked me a roast dinner, as I snored by brains out on the bed, fully clothed and arms and legs akimbo and every which way. On another occasion she brought silence to the bar at Kings Cross station, at about nine in the morning, by shouting 'you drunken bastard' into her mobile phone. I vaguely remember the occasion, more because she reminded me of it than from personal recollection. Then there was the time I collapsed against the door of my 'study' and Mrs Gruff heard my neck crack as she forced her way in (it still clicks and makes grinding sounds when I turn my head), and the occasion I lay down to sleep on the cobbles of the shared courtyard, wearing only my underpants, and the Christmas Dinner I cooked after drinking two bottles of Plymouth Navy Strength gin; while sharpening the carving knife I hacked into the joint of my left thumb and sent a spout of blood into the open cutlery draw, three feet away. I wrapped a tea towel round the mess and declined the offer of a lift to hospital because dinner was ready and I did not want to spoil it. I still have the thumb.

Happy days. I do hope I can afford them again, some day.