Today
Today is a lovely day.
I like to say the word "lovely". It's one the first word I learnt to enjoy saying when I lived up north. I just thought for a while it spelt "loafely". A combination of bread and love. The story of my life. I would not do without any of them two. And I could not choose.
I finally realised that I could stop failing my morning coffee. As I tend to forget the moka on the hob, it boils.
I made tea instead. Nicely boiled.
With biscuits. Three.
About these biscuits. They make me happy. They really do. Lots of things make me happy, but the biscuits, particularly happy. And because I meet them usually for breakfast, they kind of make me happy first.
I felt this morning I needed to give them back a bit of joy and happiness, besides the obvious joy and happiness that is to meet my lips, somehow quite a valued destination.
Today, because it is a lovely day, the biscuits need dressing. I have crème fraiche. I have plain chocolate. I have Nutella. I have peanut butter. I have time.
The trick when attempting to seduce italian biscuits or any other italian items of fantasy, is to give up most a priori of what is right or wrong and mentally sing this. It works.
The biscuits, shaking shy and naked, want attention. They get swirled with nutella and peanut butter, the three of them, but one of them gets lucky and gets done both side and looks like a Daft Punk song. I pile them up. On top of each other they look nice and blithe.
The ganache is done. The biscuits want more. I dive in.
They dive in. They roll, in the ganache, they roll about. It is beautiful. It is perfect.
The fridge does the rest while I try to get dressed.
The Bullshit Patrol
It is a nice morning. It is not sunny here but I hear that the sun shines in some part of the world; the thought that the bastard has not resigned from sky duty makes me feel nonchalantly cheerful. It just needs to show up here and everything will be in its right place. I have herbs and plants that need photosynthesising.
I eat the obnoxious biscuits. It is delightful. It is full of calories. But I have an allowance and it won't make a difference. Not today.
On a boat with cracked ribs, it can be as smooth as homemade snickers.
It can.
It is possible.
I got dressed.
Graphically buoyant and touching. The pain remains.
I look at the day with hope and sincere fondness in my heart.
I think it is Saturday. I think I am going to walk along the canal. I think I am going to stay happy for most of the day.
I think if I stay away from more news about extreme right wings idiots who are ruining it for everyone, I will stay happy.
But these days, too many hatred, too many strong words of dislike. It is unbelievable. It is bullshit. We need a bullshit patrol.
To stand up and point the finger and shout "Bullshit" to the pricks; can I say pricks?
Bullshit is everywhere. It is in my fridge when I prepare breakfast. It is in my words when I try to avoid an argument I know I will lose. It is in me most of the time. I know it but I would not admit it most of the time.
That's bullshit, too.
But hey, I keep it for myself.
I would not tell people what they should do, unless they ask me for advice. I would not just because mostly whatever I think belongs to a moment around the coffee table with my friends.
Bullshit. Even though I am good at it, I won't go and preach it.
In fact, in London these days, it would be mostly preaching to converts so..
Hence the Bullshit patrol. A neutral organism ready to step in whenever bullshit happens. Just a thought...
My walk along the canal showed me few things, amongst others.
There is a huge increase in boats.
After four years spent on the canals I have on a few occasions, synchronised my cyclic routine with another boats for a few days, a couple of hours, a week... And it also became ritual to cruise and pass by some boats once every three months**. It was usually in the same spot. It was lovely.
Would follow a sort of decent and engaging conversation.
Before:
- where are you off to?
- west... you?
- east... where were you moored?
- King's Cross... loads of space.
- cool, that's where I am heading. Fancy a coffee? I've got italian biscuits.
- lovely
- swell
But things have changed... are changing. I am a man of my time; I am not afraid to change and I like hip hop.
But in a society, we get the hip hop we deserve, as Chilly would say.
The conversation has also evolved.
Nowadays.
- where are you off to?
- west... you?
- east... where were you moored?
- King's Cross... absolute nightmare... boats all over the place. Triple moored mostly...
- bullshit! That's where I was heading...
- and it's the same in Camden and Little Venice...
- yeah you might want to get going as well 'cause we haven't seen an empty space either for seven miles or so... it's mayhem in Broadway market... Some boats in Victoria Park haven't moved in months...
- I know... apparently one of them was there for so long they found a fossile on the hull.
- Bullshit... I would offer you a coffee, but I 've got to get going... and I ran out of italian biscuits.
An important and neglected fact is that the hull of the boat gets more damaged and altered by the water if the boat is stationary.
Moving is also a way of preserving the blacking applied on the hull and it makes life easier for everyone.
Another thing I see on the towpath, walking my ennui. Locks (une écluse, quoi!)
Beautiful mechanism. Archaical but beautiful. Work of art, really. Almost invented by Da Vinci. Very simple and efficient to build long stretchs of canal on an uneven land. Very usuful to regulate an impetuous river.
Simple to use.
But there are many ways to misuse them, apparently. Loads and loads of lost opportunities for the Bullshit patrol, here.
So, a lock, how does it work. To be brief, the boat goes in the lock, the gates get closed behind her, the paddles get lifted from the winding gears, the water gets in or gets out, the boats moves up or moves down and once completed, the bottom or top gates get opened and that's it.
The boat exits the lock, the gates need closing and the winding gears need winding down.
That is the part that isn't fun to do. It actually isn't because it means stepping out of the boat after exiting the lock.
And that is what most of boats seem to forget to do, at least on the stretch of canal I walked along.
Why not taking the time to do it? In a rush? Hey, if a person drives a narrowboat, they cannot be in a rush.
Lazyness? No, bullshit!
It is primordial to do it though.
It saves water. Canal water is not natural. It is contained within the boundaries of canal sections. Eventually the rain tops it up. If a gate stays open too long or if the winding gears are left up, the level of water will drop. Fast.
As a consequence, boats will end up sitting on their hull. And again that's not good for the blacking of the hull or anything else poorly balanced inside the boat.
And then
Well, I guess I am a bit revolted today.
It is not just about the locks;
not about the increase of boats, the lack of commitment to a certain good practice and the lack of space that results from this lack of commitment;
not just about the extreme right wing extremists pricks polluting my city and the country,
in which I am an immigrant, although I am as concerned about their presence as I would be of a pile of steaming hot excrements in my living room;
But there is a certain reach and range and I like things to be in a certain spot.
A bit like dating someone too tall. It might not work.
And I feel I don't need to say more because I'd contradict myself here. I don't want to say. I wouldn't like to start bullshittin' myself, and I am fickle enough to know I would. On the boat with cracked ribs, I can spend an afternoon being focused on the real important things, being in the mood to be happy.
I leave with this one
B.
*read the post Bruising for a Cruising for details if needed
**another important element of a good constant cruising practice: it is implied that a boat that leaves an area after having stayed for two weeks will not return to the very same area for a period of three months
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