This Sort of Thing - May 2024 - Up to the Oche

 

Introduction

Here, in the twenty-first century, people who lived a lot of their lives in the twentieth century choose from a variety of ways to keep their minds active. These might be online word puzzles, Sudoku, eating lots of fish, working way past retirement age or electric shock treatment. My method is to write exactly 100 words each day. It keeps my brain in order most of the time but, on occasions when it’s slightly out of order, I have my daily scribble to look back upon to refresh my memory and anything else that may need refreshing.

My May words…

 

1 May, Wednesday

Five years ago today Priyatelkata and I met and formed our double act, protecting each other from the madness that blights the planet. We celebrated with a bit of dinner at restaurant Sevastokrator in Arbanasi, not inviting any other members of the planet’s population because they are the insanity that threatens our utopianism.  

International Workers’ Day’s a public holiday so no international workers were working. Also the day of St Jeremiah the Snake King when Bulgarians show respect for vermin-eating snakes by clattering about their gardens making a fierce racket with metal implements and pans. Apparently the snakes love it.

 

2 May, Thursday

We had a day of relaxation to celebrate the fact that today is one of the few days this month that isn’t a public holiday in Bulgaria. However, everybody else in the country appeared to follow our example.  

Membership of our feline pack seems to have swelled to 8.5. A black Tom, often seen lounging in our garden, invited himself inside for the afternoon to lounge in our lounge and avoid inclement weather. We fed him, dealt with potential parasites (though he could be considered one himself) and named him Jacques… because he’s blacque… perhaps we should do it again.

 

3 May, Friday

Apparently, guitar legend Duane Eddy (the King of Twang) died yesterday in Tennessee. Although saddened by this, my heart was lifted slightly as I thought he had died years ago. I finished reading The Dead School by Patrick McCabe. Funny and depressing in equal measure, it mirrored my feelings about Mr Eddy’s passing.

In Eastern Orthodoxy land it’s Good Friday which we marked (like every day of the year) with a trip to the vet who said he doesn’t have time for Easter because of attending to all our scabby animals. We’re going back on Monday with a chocolate bunny.

 

4 May, Saturday

This is the sixty-seventh Easter during which I’ve known the weather to be non-stop piss-pouring rain, though I vaguely remember there being a bit of snow one year. Strange that Bing Crosby didn’t sing about that. Our Muslim neighbours were bragging because the end of Ramadan was sunny.

A man at the bus stop said to me, ‘The proletariat is a mule but it cannot work until the thorn of Capitalism has been removed from its hoof by a handy implement.’ I replied, ‘It doesn’t look like the bus is coming’ and stood up to wander home through the thunderstorm.

 

5 May, Sunday

There was no noise. No chainsaws, strimmers, motorbikes in the forest, Gypsy music, kids playing in the street. Even the dogs that bark perpetually seemed to be resting. In Bulgaria Easter is a much bigger event than Christmas. There’s virtually no chocolate or consumerism. Eggs painted with vegetable dye are smashed against each other. If your egg doesn’t break you’ll enjoy good health and if it does you can eat it.

Hristos Vas-kray-see (Христос Васкресе, meaning ‘Christ is Risen’) they say as they eat kozunak (козунак) the special Easter bread, and lamb roasted over the garden fire. It really is a joyous day.

 

6 May, Monday

Ederlezi, originally celebrated by Roma people as the day on which the prophets Al-Khidr and Elijah met on Earth and when spring turns to summer, was adopted and adapted by Christians who rebranded it as St George’s Day in Bulgaria and across much of Eastern Europe. Sadly, it’s now a public holiday for honouring armed forces and those wonderful ancient Gypsy traditions are largely forgotten.

The song Ederlezi has many versions. Bosnian Goran Bregović popularised it beautifully. When I hear it sung by Maria Mazzotta the hairs stand up on the back of my neck and my blood becomes Balkan.

 

7 May, Tuesday

Yesterday was a public holiday because it was St George’s Day but it was also Easter Monday. It’s not possible to have two public holidays on the same day so in Bulgaria Easter Monday was moved to last Thursday which was the day in between International Workers’ Day and Good Friday but I didn’t know that until today. I was expecting today to be a public holiday (but it wasn’t) so I expected car parking in town to be free (but it wasn’t) so, to cut a long story short (but it isn’t), St George cost me a lev (45p).  

 

8 May, Wednesday

I was kept awake for much of the night by twelve things; they being two terrified dogs, eight damp cats, a mighty thunderstorm that had festered in Hades since the dawn of time and respiratory discomfort resulting from a whole day of inhaling my petrol strimmer’s exhaust fumes. I had actually been strimming a large area of land and not just snorting up the dodgy emissions.

Wet grass and great tiredness put paid to any further garden work today so I read What Becomes of Us by Henrietta McKervey, an excellent read about the fine women of Cumann na mBan.

 

9 May, Thursday

We collected Desislava Daihatsu and her shiny new brakes from Nikolay the mechanic and left behind Tatiana Toyota and her strange noise (we think it’s an age thing).

No matter what is thrown at us by the meteorologists (and it rarely includes a meteor), I need fresh air and daylight so, wearing February’s clothes, I sat on the terrace with a book, a fully loaded djezve (coffee pan) and an assortment of domesticated animals (some of which were ours).

Ireland’s Bambi Thug has qualified for a European Final whereas Bayern Munich’s Harry Kane has failed. He could sing Cliff’s Congratulations.

 

10 May, Friday

We met our favourite vets, Doctors Tatchev and Dimitrova, to discuss Snezhinka the dog’s biopsy results. Cancer cells had been detected and the bottom line said ‘prognosis is guarded - risk of recurrence’. With glum faces we resolved to keep eyes out for further symptoms. Little else can be done.

Beside the veterinary clinic sits the chainsaw shop where the proprietor looks like Ed Miliband and so does his brother. In minutes he changed our strimmer’s filters and hopefully removed the risk of recurrence of my petrol driven phlegm.

Mechanically we’re all up and running again, but oh poor Snezhinka!

 

11 May, Saturday

Hypoallergenic cat food prevents cats from becoming scabby, but only if they eat it. And if they don’t eat it there’ll be less cat for the scabs to grow on. So it’s a win-win situation. We had such super fun making this discovery.

Sunshine returned as the rain abated and there was enough work to do on the land to provide employment for the population of Middlesbrough but they couldn’t get here and, for once, we couldn’t be arsed so we relaxed on the veranda which is a spot from which we can see only tidy bits of our garden.

 

12 May, Sunday

We almost watched last night’s Eurovision Rigmarole but dibbed out because the Britain to Bulgaria time difference would render us too tired to function normally today.

It also would have meant lying to the BBC when asked if we have a television licence. They never ask for proof. Do their detector vans visit the Balkans?

A YouTube preview confirmed there were no songs that we liked. Bulgaria doesn’t enter because it costs too much so we couldn’t even wave our own flag.

And it’s too political. For me, allowing Australia to enter but not New Zealand is blatant racial discrimination.

 

13 May, Monday

We were at the vet with both dogs but only for vaccinations. Dr Tatchev laughed as he remarked that we’d managed to hold out until 3:30 on Monday afternoon before making our first visit of the week. The man who owns the adjacent chainsaw shop asked how Snezhinka was as we passed by his door.

I planted our last two baby trees on the new territory. Also a dozen small ricin plants which will look gorgeous by August, and they’re handy to have should we ever need to lace our umbrella tips with poison to take out a western spy.

 

14 May, Tuesday

Don’t tell President Radev but we’ve annexed some land that’s the property of the Republic of Bulgaria. This sizeable wedge-shaped plot between our garden and the road was a disgusting mess until three years ago when we cleaned it up and planted trees, which are flourishing fabulously.

People say we’re crazy for doing the work of the local council but, if it’s not kept gorgeous, the land’s prone to returning overnight to its former landfill site status.

We refer to it as the public part of our garden. The original garden and our legal new territory are our private parts.

 

15 May, Wednesday

Slovakian Prime Minister, Robert Fico was shot today. Surgeons are fighting to save him. Last summer in Bratislava we stood within 100 metres of his predecessor. Politics are scarier than arthropods.

Priyatelkata’s website’s technical problems are on the mend now she’s found Techno Rosen (Росен, a Bulgarian name meaning ‘burning bush’). All she has to do is pay him. She recounted to me every word of their discussions. Very impressive but arthropods are more entertaining.

I bought a kilo of cherries for 3 leva (£1.35). A bargain despite some of them being dead wasps. I love our market in summer.

 

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Click on the link for beautiful busic:

Ederlezi, sung by Maria Mazzotta.

https://youtu.be/hkM3SZBDVeQ?si=VCZSaQOo_6BaCSL-

 

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Image:

An Eastern Orthodox Easter egg laid by a goose, sucked by a granny and hand-painted by a friend.

 

Click on the link for part two...

This Sort of Thing - May 2024 - Three Dart Finish