The Mystery of the Green Thing

This week, I are mostly been learning about gardening, it's that green thing behind the house, didn't have one before. In the previous place I mean, obviously this house always had a garden. Well, it's not obvious from the front but that's the question about a tree falling in the forest and not making a sound. I mean I haven't seen the enging in my car but I'm pretty sure it's got one.

But back to the garden, it is green so that's already a good start. It's got grass, a tree and lot's of little things that could be shrubs, bushes or just plants, I'm not that clear on the technical terms. The previous tennant didn't put names on anything, bugger, so I'm going to have to give them new names. There's a prickly one I'm going to call Rosey because roses have thorns but I was never really sure whether they put the thorns on in the factory or if they are born like that.

That's as far as I've got. There's a nifty electrial lawnmower which is quite noisy so that's fun, I'll be doing that a lot. I wanted a ho to get between the bushes with but I couldn't find one in the garden section of Brico. Insead I bought a poisonous chemical, some gloves and a spikey diggy thing - not quite sure what its for but it looks like it could cause a nasty injury so it must be something to do with gardening.

There was already some equipment here so I've been trimming the bushes, they were getting a bit, well, bushy.

I've already got a baseball hat so now I just need a six pack and a barbecue and that should be it. I can invite The Germans round for dinner al fresco, we had a chat about money today. Not a financial discussion, we were talking about the slang terms for money, we say 25 quid is a "pony", 500 quid is a "monkey" etc The Germans are not that creative with their slang, they have some but it's more on the level of "fiver" for five poinds. So a funfzig note would be called a "fufi" and a hundert is a "huni". We've had better conversations.

Language is funny anyway, even before you start talking pony. What's the language of diplomacy? They talk about it on the tv but they don't say which language it really is. Some people say French is the language of love, garbage, Hindi is the language of love, I know, I can speak both, a little. When I was a school they explained diplomacy like this; "talk quietly but carry a big stick", but that was during the cold war. The big stick was supposed to be a nuclear weapon I think but at that age all could think of was "penis".

Not much has changed, the cold war had cooled off but now that rascal gasPutin is stirring the pot again. And I'm mixing metaphors in a pot so it must be getting late, sorry about that, next time I'll try take the pips out of my writing. "Writing" is a bit grandoise, what else can I call e-Penning? Maybe it's just word masturbation.

Bye then.

Bye.

It's finished, really. I know it's not a smooth finish but that's all I've got.

Goodnight!

JJ

Kiss Off

This kissing business is just not making any sense at all. Isn't one enough? It's a kiss hello. Ok, one on each cheek, maybe the second one is their hello to you but three? Why repeat the first one? Isn't that like saying hello to someone, they say hello back and then you say hello again?

But even that I can manage if it's with a complete stranger, it's just kissing. But when it's friends, someone I've known for a long time, it's too much. There are feelings behind any contact, especially that one, and not always good feelings. But if they are good feelings, that's not good.

And those guys who do it, the southern Europeans mostly, that's just not happening. Not two or one. None. Hello and a handshake is all the contact I need with a man.

I often introduce myself as English and I see people stopping short of the kiss hello, it's an uncomfortable moment but frankly it's better than the option. Nothing personal, it's not you it's me.

It is interesting how quickly people make these judgements, "English, no kiss", "Indian, karma sutra eerrrm... best be careful". I have been told before that I am associated with the Karma Sutra simply for having an Indian background. In reality I am very uncomfortable even kissing cheeks.

So where does that leave us? Stop importing continental culture, I don't mean yoghurt, I mean habits. You can't trust people who don't eat a proper breakfast. Ok, I have Pepsi Max for breakfast and I live on the continent but that's not the point. The whole isn't the sum of the parts, the people are still the people even if one lives in Belgium.

I didn't want to live in Belgium, who ever thinks of migrating to Belgium? I thought Australia or Western USA but extraneous circumstances happened to me and now I'm here. I'm not crying, I'm just saying I could have learned to surf and had a barbie cruising the strip or whatever it is.

We have got a loverly garden though. More about that soon.

JJ