Bring on the Solstice

Well, it seems I’ve finally shaken off the stray cat. I locked the cat-flap and dispensed with the milk-saucer over a week ago and there’s been no sign of him since. Usually, taking this action has no affect because he normally comes banging at the flap with his paw and mewing loudly, but this time he seems to have taken the hint. Like all stray cats he’s probably found someone else to take him in and right now he’s no doubt curled up on a sofa somewhere in this town, purring. I hope so anyway – I wouldn’t like to think of him squashed under a bus somewhere.

I’ve found someone who might want to turn my hypothesis about Rumpelstiltskin into a play – if I write the script. You may remember that I wrote here about this fairy tale some time ago; about how I view Rumpelstiltskin as the only one in the story who behaves with any honour, surrounded as he is by a cast of duplicitous, scheming, selfish and weak characters. There’s a guy I know who runs a theatre production company and he has been thinking for some time about staging something in which we don’t cheer when Rumpelstiltskin loses, but where we see him as the maligned hero instead. This guy has suggested that we collaborate on putting something together from a story I wrote some time ago called ‘The Tattoo’. My story is an allegorical version of the fable set in Nottingham’s clubland, where the Rumpelstiltskin character is portrayed as a guileless youth called ‘Young Tony’; the Queen as a chavvy, selfish tart; and the King as a ruthless drugs baron. It could work.

I’m getting quite excited about things now, although not for the reason that many people will be getting excited. Today is the 1st of December and of course, it’s the day the first chocolate of the Advent Calendar gets eaten (I don’t have one, by the way). This simple ceremony will inevitably instil excitement in millions of people throughout the land as they build towards the festival held here on 25th December. I hate this time of year, and if it weren’t for the fact that I’m a person who believes in non-violence, I’d rip the very head off the next person to utter that most ubiquitous and banal of enquiries: “Are you ready for Christmas?”