Sad Man, Happy Meal, Corduroy Pants

Earlier this evening I cooked a pasta meal with sausagemeat and cream and garlic and onions and nutmeg and white wine and pepper and chilli. It was fucking amazing. It made the best meal that Jamie Oliver has ever cooked taste like colonic irrigation.

But before serving it, I had to go out into Grimstone to find more wine. Alma said I would be lucky, meaning she didn’t think I’d find anything open. The fact is, just about everything closes at 5.30 here. In London, most wine and chocolate shops don't close till 9 or 10 at the earliest. Some of them even stay open all night! Here: no. So I ventured out, on foot – Heathcote is off-road and broken in London – and eventually I found a dingy little general store with a few bottles of wine and spirits behind the till. Also behind the till was a lugubrious Sikh who answered my breezy queries with a monosyllabic grunt. At first I was slightly miffed by his lack of appreciation for my breeziness, but by the end of our brief transaction, I started to feel quite concerned. He was barely there.

‘Are you OK?’ I asked, my wine in my hand, my body on its way to the exit.

‘Hmm?’ he asked.

‘Are you alright?’ I repeated, standing still. ‘You seem a little... sad.’

‘I’m just feeling a little – ’ He shrugged. ‘ – low,’ he said.

‘Oh, no!’ I replied. ‘I’m sorry to hear that. Well....’ There was nothing else to say. ‘Good luck,’ I said. ‘Take care.’

And as I made my way back home, I felt sad and I wondered what might have been wrong. Of course, it might have been anything. Someone close to him might be sick or dying. He might be homesick. He might feel guilty because he accidentally poisoned some children, and they died. Or he might just be depressed at the quotidian thanklessness of eking out a living on the outskirts of one of the most racist conurbations this side of the next place.

As for myself, I'm feeling surprisingly chipper. I'm getting properly settled in, in the spare room. I'm helping Alma wade through the death administration - the finance, the codicils, the personal effects. And I'm having lots of smashing ideas. Oh, and I'm getting excited about the book. It's getting properly close now, and some people have said very nice things. Unfortunately I am predisposed to disdain all compliments and despise all flattery. Nor, nor, nor, Arnie Kiddenman. Gannon an flatterers.

Yes. I am finding the accent up here absolutely delicious. They have their own words and everything! I met one of Alma’s neighbours last night – let’s call him Wilbur – and he referred to me as ‘a corduroy’. Apparently it means ‘a young ‘un’. See also ‘whippersnapper’. A corduroy! I’m a corduroy! When I quizzed him on the etymology, he pleaded ignorance. Later, after he’d gone and Alma let it slip that she’d never heard the word before, I began to think it might not be a Grimstone or Northern word at all. It might just be a Wilbur word. Still, fuck it. A word’s a word. I’ll take it.

And the sausagemeat, as I say, was a treat.

Thank you, come again.