Cats In Places They Should Not Be

There were cats in places they should not be. On shelves, in drawers, stretched out asleep on the computer keyboard and curled up asleep on the record player turnstile and the dashboard of our car. There were cats in my backpack and in Mum’s handbag. They were in the bath, in the shower, on the toilet seat and in the sink and the cupboard under the sink and the one above the sink somehow too. I don’t know how they could fit in there but they could and they did and there was nothing we could do to stop them.

There were cats in our pockets and cats in our sleeves and there was a cat curled up in the hood of my coat even though I was wearing the coat and the hood was up but still it was in there purring and doing that thing cats do with their claws when they’re happy until my entire scalp was pinpricked with blood.

We tried to phone for help but there was a cat sat on the phone and then we tried to call for help but there were kittens in our mouths by now and they looked out at the world with cute unblinking eyes from the middle of our faces.

There was nothing we could do but acquiesce to their demands.

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Notes:

1. Written on October 14th, 2022
2. There is no finer sight in life than a cat in a place that it should not be.

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Unwanted Conversation Generator

Please note usage of the Unwanted Conversation Generator is undertaken at the user’s own risk.

1. Opening Gambit (please select only one topic from this section)

a) Is it okay if I sit there?
b) Is anyone sitting there?
c) Is this seat taken?
d) Mind if i join you?

If the answer to your question is Yes, sit down and proceed to section 2. However, if the answer is No, sit down and proceed to section 2.

2. General Topic (beginners should choose only one from this section, though more experienced players may wish to select multiple possibilities in a combination of their choice)

a) What are you drinking?
b) What are you reading?
c) What are you listening to?
d) What are you typing?
e) What are you talking about?

3. Response Strategy (please select one strategy from each section, to be deployed in order)

3.1 (Initiation Phase)

a) Listen to answer
b) Don’t listen to answer
c) Interrupt answer
d) Yawn
e) Laugh

3.2 (Groundwork)

a) Actually…
b) Well, the thing is…
c) See, where you’re wrong…
d) Nah…

3.3 (Placement)

a) Just my opinion on things.
b) Not that I’d expect you to understand.
c) Course you can’t say that nowadays.
d) Only joking.

3.4 (Detonation)

a) Mate
b) Love

4. Closing Emotion (freeform round)

a) Laughter
b) Anger
c) Indignation
d) Abuse
e) Apologetic Ingratiation
f) Eye roll
g) Yawn
h) Hurt
i) Confusion
j) Ostentatious concentration on own phone
k) Other
l) All of the above

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Notes:

1. Written on November 15th, 2022

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Whisky

There’s an empty bottle of whisky on my desk. It’s been there 10 years now, maybe a little bit more. Longer than the desk, in any case. Longer than any of the furniture in the room.

Johnnie Walker. Red label. Old enough to be measured in fluid ozs and percentage proofs.

I don’t drink whisky and never really have. I don’t drink at all these days. I assume my dad drank all this one and then I kept the bottle for some reason, because it’s nice and old, because it was there, because it gives me something to look at more interesting than the wall.

We got it fifteen, twenty years ago from the cupboards of a neighbour’s house after she’d died and we were helping clean up, this and various other archaic bottles of unopened spirits. I have no idea where they went, or what they were.

Shamefully, I don’t even remember her name. Maybe I never knew it. I used to talk to her in the mornings while waiting for the bus. She was kind of funny. I think she thought I was odd, weird.

I was odd, weird. I still am. It’s too late to change. Some lack I’ll always have.

I don’t know why I keep it, the bottle. But I couldn’t imagine throwing it away. If I’d left the top off it’d be full of dust by now.

Next to it there’s a milk bottle with a feather in it. No memories attach themselves to those.

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Notes:

1. Written on the 17th July, 2022

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Menthol

I still remember sometimes my friends smoking menthol cigarettes when we were 14 or 15 or so. I don’t know exactly, but round about then. Walking through fields in the dark, sitting on the sea wall, or the swings in the park, the only light the fading glow of the town behind us and the flicker of cigarettes in their mouths, occasional match bursts of flame between cupped palms. Practised movements copied from older brothers, older sisters, older kids, parents, films.

“They make your lungs bleed, you know?”

That’s what I remember. Not who said it, not any discussion of the point, no disputes to its veracity. Just the claim that menthol cigarettes make your lungs bleed.

Not even the smell of the cigarettes remains now, the taste of the menthol, how it affected the smoke. My memories are visual, verbal. Non linear. Patchwork. Collage. Who knows how much of this is true, how many memories its stitched together from, how many lies I’ve told here that I no longer remember are lies.

“They make your lungs bleed, you know?”

Across the river, the nuclear power plant hums in the dark. Sound of boats in the distance, ropes slapping against metal masts in the winds and on the tides.

Sometimes I wonder if they still make menthol cigarettes. Think about buying some in the newsagents to see what the medical warnings might say.

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Notes:

1. Written on the 15th July, 2022

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The Dreams Of The Waiting Prince

Now this morning I woke to find the doors to the Palace had been opened, for the period of solitude was to begin, the date having been set for my Lord’s ascension to the throne. Here in his solitude, only upon his rising in the morning shall he speak, so as to recount to me his dreams of the night before.

Now to me did my Lord hand this pen, and the scrolls upon which I am to write, and though he was not yet permitted to speak, he said to me, “My dear Scribe, last night as I slept, I dreamt. And as I dreamt, I slept.” And then he took to the chambers of his solitude for a moment of rest, and lay down there to sleep…

The Dreams Of The Waiting Prince, Before The Occasion Of His Ascension, During The Period Of His Seclusion, In The High Palace Of Eternal Solitude, Above The Clouds Of The Empire’s Reality, Beneath The Many Moons Of The Empire’s Imagination is the story of a lifetime and the history of an empire told entirely in dreams.

Written by David Guy, and with illustrations and artwork by Virginia Frances Sterrett (1900-1930) and Frances MacDonald (1873-1921), it is available to buy in a beautiful, fully illustrated, pocket book edition.

Product Details:

Title: The Dreams Of The Waiting Prince
Price: £6.99/$12.99 (plus postage)
Pages: 112
Binding: Paperback
Illustrations: 12 (b&w)
Dimensions: Pocket Book (4.25×6.875in / 108x175mm)
Paper Quality: 80gsm

A PDF/ebook version is also available (with full colour illustrations) for free/pay what you want.

The One Hundred And Fifty Dreams Of The Waiting Prince

Illustrations – Notes, References and Acknowledgements

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an accumulation of things

stories

Cats In Places They Should Not Be

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Unwanted Conversation Generator

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Whisky

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Menthol

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The Dreams Of The Waiting Prince

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