Nearly exactly a year ago, at the tipping point between early- and mid-December, I forgot to go Christmas shopping. There must have been something good on TV.
Every year, faced with the prospect of engaging in pitched battle with my fellow shoppers throughout the month of December, I seem to make the resolution to do all the shopping in July, thus freeing myself from active duty and sparing myself more bloodshed.
Of those topics, four are about the traffic on the highways which has become a nightmare IN ANTICIPATION of the much hyped road works. [Kosovo] Seven of the topics relate to government – but how boring is that? [Kosovo] Our new government has not triggered the much anticipated scandal-mongering spree from our glorious Yellow Press yet, and far be it for me to change the diapers of that particular tar baby. [Kosovo]
Usually I am a little cynical and snide. Usually I attempt to undermine its message. On occasion I have been sappy about it. But like it or not, every year, Valentine's Day gets some sort of bloggal response from me. I have to say I am a little tired of it.
When a driver struggles and attempts to parallel park five times on a busy Belgrade street, he may also wave to the accumulated traffic. As if to say, "Thanks for being patient and not killing me."
The ugly truth is that I have been here for nearly a decade and communicate like a Balinese coconut-picker landed suddenly in the middle of a Parisian dinner party. In the court of Louis XVI.
Of a Tuesday afternoon.
Ten years ago, on 9/11, I was in Paris. I was sorting out lots of sportswear overstock and trying to place it enticingly in front of my client's eyes. My client's eyes, however, were glued to the television. I was annoyed. I had just arrived from Rome (he from Belgrade) the night before, we had one day to make this deal, and he was watching TV. I grumbled.
"Something happened in New York," he said.
Ever, however, is way too long. There are not any evers in life. Ever belongs to the church, to mythology, to fairy tales. Our world, the real and tangible and smokable world, is about increments of time. Time since my last cigarette. Time before my last cigarette. Time it takes to smoke a cigarette. Time I need to suck on my electronic cigarette to make up for the time it took to smoke my last cigarette.
Having now invested a significant amount of cash into the Delta Money Pit (this is the technical term for the garage where my perfectly operating car has been transformed into a terminal patient), I am now investing my time.
Yesterday, as a kind of joke, I was informed that my car was "ready" to pick up. Two weeks ago I had stupidly brought it here to have a check-up – oil, filters, and yada, yada, yada. I should have immediately seen the sodomy in their eyes when they said I had to leave the car for two days even to get an estimate.
For reasons of confidentiality, I am unable to reveal the whereabouts of The Home. Suffice to say that it is a rather large and stately affair ensconced in a semi-rural area, detached from the rest of the world, where the residents live out normal lives far from the prying eyes and fingers of fans, paparazzi, and prosecutorial investigators.
And it has a very nice sound system, too. Oldies mostly.