Tales From The Town #241: Quiche: A Critique

“Whoever invented quiche is an idiot,” Claire announced. She wasn’t even eating quiche. She was just thinking about it.

“Quiche wasn’t invented,” Daniel said. He wasn’t thinking about quiche at all. He was too busy eating it. “It was discovered.”

“By an idiot,” Claire said, still thinking about quiche. And suddenly also celery. “Whoever invented celery is an idiot.”

“Celery wasn’t invented,” Tina said. She was both thinking and not thinking about celery at the same time. Also she was drinking a cup of tea because she’d already eaten all the celery she could eat and it’d made her feel a bit ill. “It was grown.”

“By an idiot,” Claire said, thinking about quiche and celery now. And suddenly also ravioli. “Whoever invented ravioli is an idiot.”

“Ravioli wasn’t invented,” Ethel said. She was both thinking about and eating ravioli. “It was born.”

“It was not!” said Claire. But now she would never stop thinking about ravioli ever again. Ravioli, and where, where it came from.

___________

Notes:

1. Written on August 10th, 2026

It used to be

It used to be you could find an audience on the internet
by making stuff for people to look at
And if they liked it, then maybe
they’d sometimes come back for more

Now no one looks at anything on the internet at all
and they certainly don’t like it

And the only things that come back for more
are the insatiable robots we’ve built
that’ll eat it all up
eat everything all up
again and again and again

So they can vomit it back up later
half misremembered and all incoherent
to save us the pain of ever having to see
what was originally said
in its own time
and place

__________

Notes:

1. Written on July 18th, 2026

Tales From The Town #239: Not The Last Day

“What’s wrong Claire?’ Agnes asked, opening the curtains at 10 minutes past ten exactly.

“Nothing,” said Claire.

“Well, you can’t stay in bed all day,” said Agnes. “The sun’s out.”

“So?!”

“So stop grumping and get up,” said Agnes. “You like the sun and you like the summer holidays.”

“I don’t,” said Claire. “The sun makes me sun burnt and the summer holidays make me bored.”

Agnes was still trying to think of some counter argument to those irrefutable facts when Claire interrupted the silence all on her own without even waiting for something to disagree with.

“And anyway Daniel said yesterday was going to be the last day ever and then it wasn’t,” Claire said. “He said there were going to be explosions and implosions and there weren’t any AT ALL!”

“Maybe they cancelled each other out…”

“Shut up Mum,” said Claire. “I’m already furious enough without you making it worse.”

She threw her hairbrush on to the floor and then crossed her arms over her chest and stared balefully round the room like some sort of fairy tale princess. Albeit a huge and particularly angry fairy tale princess. Maybe Goldilocks if she finished up by shouting at the bears until they all moved to the mountains.

“You’re furious because it wasn’t the last day ever?”

“YES!” Claire said. “I was looking forward to not existing AT ALL!”

“And what would that have achieved?”

“NOTHING!” shouted Claire, who wasn’t entirely sure what she was upset about anymore, she just knew that she was. “Urgh, fine, I’ll get up then. But you have to let me get an ice cream from the ice cream van.”

“Do I?”

“In fact you have to let me get TWO!” said Claire. “Otherwise I’m coming straight back to bed.”

It was, Agnes realised, going to be a long six weeks. It always was.

__________

Notes:

1. Written on July 17th, 2026

Tales From The Town #238: The Last Day

“Yes!” said Ethel, as the bell went for lunch. “We can go home now…” She paused for maximum effect. “Because it’s the last day!”

“The last day EVER!” said Daniel.

“No it’s not,” said Claire. “It’s the last day of school.”

“The last day of school EVER!” said Daniel.

“The last day of primary school ever,” said Claire. “We still have to go to the stupid big school next year.”

“I can’t wait,” said Tina.

“Because you’re an idiot,” said Claire. “Urgh, you’ve ruined the entire summer holidays Tina. I’m going to be thinking about that big stupid school all the time now. I bet they make us do homework. And schoolwork. And clubs.”

“You only have to think about it until the end of today, Claire,” said Daniel.

“Why?”

“Because then everything’s going to explode!”

“What?”

“And then IMPLODE!”

“No it’s not.”

“It is!” said Daniel.

“But why?” asked Claire.

“Because it’s the last day,” Daniel said, doing a handstand to celebrate. “I already told you that.”

“And how?”

“EVER!” Daniel explained, upside down.

__________

Notes:

1. Written on July 17th, 2026
2. In surprise that it’s the summer holidays already
3. Only about six months into this year’s infinite summer