Plastic water bottles and worm holes in space time

Did a little personalisation here this morning. No doubt the penguin will change it all back when he returns but you like to put your own little stamp on things, don't you?

Do you ever wonder whether there are inviduous, secret, unseen forces at work in your life? Now don't get me wrong, I'm not some delusional, paranoid maniac, as like as not to take an axe to your head; I know the rest of the world is out to make my life a misery :) but a strange thing happened this week.

I'm fairly hot on recycling and my local Council make a collection every Wednesday of materials for recycling. So, on Tuesday evening, I go to the back door and pick up my (plastic) bag full of plastic water bottles etc and put it somewhere nearer the front door, while I get my rubbish bagged ready for the bin men who come the same day. (Strange, we still call them bin men even though no-one uses dustbins anymore - and they would not empty them anyway - if it is not bagged in a black plastic sack, forget about getting your rubbish collected.) I put the rubbish out but cannot find the plastic bottles. They are not in the flat, they are not where I thought I left them, they are not out front with the glass for recycling. Where are they? I had and have absolutely no idea! It's as though a worm hole opened up in space time and my Volvic water bottles just disappeared into another universe. My wee flat is small, it's hard to hide anything. I have gone round and like A A Milne I have 'made the kind of noises that plastic likes to hear'; but to no avail. Where on earth can my Volvic bottles be?

Oh, I hear you cry, a surfeit of vino collapso/Milk of Amnesia! But no! I could not find them on Wednesday morning (6.00 am for the Paul Simon freaks among you) either. It cannot but make you wonder whether the reality we perceive is not all the reality that there is to perceive. Perhaps the mice have evolved to eat and process plastic. Perhaps if only I could catch one, my financial future would be secured. I could breed whole farms of mice who feed on plastic and use their droppings to generate electricity, thus solving the world's energy crisis at a stroke and thereby providing me with a f*ck off ocean going yacht and the wherewithall to buy fuel for it as well as poking my finger in Putin's eye. I'll leave poking him elsewhere to you!

So, if you have any theories about the fate of my water bottles, please email me at info@mice-energy-stuffs-Putin.com.

My upstairs neighbour of nine years finally moved out before Christmas and, while it seems uncharitable, I can only say 'Good Riddance!' A less considerate neighbour it would have been hard to find, I think. Many's the time the strains of 'Will you shut the f*ck up, it's 3am!' have been heard wending their way skywards from my kitchen. It's hard to feel any kind of 'human bond' with someone who considers it de rigeur to crash through the front door at 4am, slam shut said door and then make his way upstairs in a manner not unakin to Juggernaut. A herd of elephants would have been tiptoeing mice by comparison! Any complaints about unwarranted noise were usually met with accusations of homophobia, the last resort of a scoundrel? Ah well he's gone now. :)

Not sure quite what the arrangement is now. I met one occupant just before Christmas at around 11pm and she seems nice enough, tho' it's difficult to tell if she's the sole occupant or not. Bar gaggles of Mwa Mwa Girlies :) turning up on the doorstep most evenings, it's all been as quiet as one could possibly hope for in such buildings as these (Edwardian terraced maisonettes prone to the transmission of structure borne noise having wooden floors and solid walls). Mugwump and I live in hope of an existence which is more in keeping with the peace and solitude we prefer. I'm quiet, except when blasting Wagner out during the housework, and I never could see why other people couldn't be the same.

Still there is a downside. I suppose I'll have to clear the jungle that passes for a garden in the spring (too damn cold at the moment). I may get complaints if the howler monkeys don't stop their early morning chatter and if they ever see the leopard, well..........