tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84542596459137033172011-11-25T09:00:20.929ZNoonnoreply@blogger.comBlogger91100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8454259645913703317.post-15214384806767196932008-05-16T00:06:00.002+01:002008-05-16T00:23:53.695+01:00

We sat down for a chat in the smoking room. Although the air was clear, after the ban, they kept the stags heads and antlers, and the soft leather seats; it was a non smoking smoking room now. In the main hall the dancers were pounding the floor while the yachties (stripped of their dayglo yellow dungarees) clapped and stomped their beers on the much dented tables that ringed the floor. She was

Noonnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8454259645913703317.post-29485176096538990342008-04-29T22:04:00.002+01:002008-04-29T22:29:57.929+01:00

Flying back on Virgin airlines, playing Tetris on the back of seat screen, I pressed a button and a polite woman brought me a glass of red wine. It was dark except for the screen and I was wrapped in a clean blanket I would never wear again.Before I had left India, I had updated my CV with the new Microsoft qualifications I had gained, and posted it on all of the major job sites. My phone was

Noonnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8454259645913703317.post-4191226660662483372008-04-23T06:16:00.002+01:002008-04-23T06:43:33.733+01:00

This place would be the perfect setting for a whodunnit. Twelve of us here from the first world on a trip to India, eleven men and one woman. The plot practically writes itself. The victim (An Irishman?) is stabbed in the Bazaar; No witnesses come forward.Was he trying to find a prostitute (N.B. the guy who complained that he got a urinary tract infection, and wasn't sure how), or perhaps some

Noonnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8454259645913703317.post-50689081788345027322008-04-15T15:53:00.003+01:002008-04-15T16:16:06.365+01:00

Question 7 of 42You are studying for an MCSA exam in Shimla, northern India. You wake up at 3a.m. in your hotel room and find that you have fallen asleep revising questions on your laptop, which is still powered on. The lights are off, but you have been woken by the sound of a fight between a pack of stray dogs and the troop of monkeys that inhabits the town. How would you best resolve this

Noonnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8454259645913703317.post-16974720643925480222008-04-08T07:08:00.004+01:002008-04-08T07:35:21.321+01:00

"...But the car came back,..."one of the women in the group had taken over "...Beeping its horn and flashing its lights...". I was squeezing my fingers and scrunching my toes, trying to keep the blood flowing ."...until the fenders were touching and he was ramming her car!".It was going to frost over that night and I prayed that this would be the last story. It was fifty feet to the nearest cover

Noonnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8454259645913703317.post-22837129825960349132008-04-01T18:46:00.002+01:002008-04-01T19:41:32.842+01:00

Down by the waters edge there was a human, howling. He was flinging his arms up and then beating them on the ground, spinning from side to side as he let out a two tone cry; first deep and booming, then stepping up to a middle-pitch that made his howling crack with strain.As I drew closer to him he began to glow with an odourless light, like the moon, and the strength of his howl dropped down low

Noonnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8454259645913703317.post-54954111477745647342008-03-27T07:07:00.003Z2008-03-27T20:40:23.236Z

Last time I was out, the cold lay on the trees, huddled except for the slight churning of the days heat, still drifting out of the reservoir. As a human it would have passed unnoticed, but as the wolf the warm breeze smelt like hand pressed wine, left breathing. All the life of the day, one of the last before the start of the new-years spring, had left its sweat and flavours in the

Noonnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8454259645913703317.post-9390098649188442572008-03-19T20:31:00.003Z2008-03-27T07:07:48.262Z

Most of the time I think of it more as a hobby than a curse. A little more exotic than birdwatching; but probably less exiting than paintball or potholing. Sailing is the closest analogy I can think of: an unnecessary trading-down to a less advanced, if more picturesque, mode of transport.When I go out, which is normally once or twice a week, I like to keep a fixed route. Sometimes I've thought

Noonnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8454259645913703317.post-27072939942825205072008-03-15T23:07:00.000Z2008-03-16T00:34:36.688Z

I have started breathing through my nose again, the way you do when your lungs stop hurting, and the stomach cramps from gulping down too much water from the tap are fading. I have showered off the clammy sweat that stuck me to the kitchen lino I was lying on after squeezing myself in, gasping and sweating, through the dog-flap.All in all, I am just starting to feel human again, which is why I

Noonnoreply@blogger.com0