Remember, remember!

    The fifth of November,

    The Gunpowder treason and plot;

    I know of no reason

    Why the Gunpowder treason

    Should ever be forgot!*

. . . I went bell ringing.

It does amuse me that there were eight native-British Fustian ringers who would rather ring bells than watch any of the gazillion firework parties laid on by every two-dog village in the entire country.  New Arcadia has a good one every year—viewable from either Peter’s spare bedroom window or my attic**—and if I’m not doing anything else I will give a cursory glance out of the appropriate window at the end of the show when they throw everything they’ve got left into the sky at once.***  But it’s not important.  Bell ringing is important.

I’d spent too much time today rushing around†;  Penelope rang up out of the blue this morning, suggesting we get together for a cup of tea†† and since I hadn’t exactly got out of bed early that kind of was the morning and the rest of the day has been an up the down escalator experience.  The hellterror has had the semi-squirts††† so that cancelled the training visit to the vet’s waiting room since I don’t want to stuff a dodgy tummy with treats.  But that is somewhat counterintuitively a further drain on time because she’s not the slightest fussed by lower intestinal irregularities and still needs hurtling:  ten intense minutes doing sit-down-stand-paw-otherpaw are worth at least twenty merely barrelling through the hedgerows.

Having no sense, and also because it was a beautiful day I wanted the excuse to go for a country hurtle, I pursued another fruitless scheme.  The Undesirable Repercussions of Running Out of Money, subparagraph seven:  by renting your second house with the bigger garden, you no longer have anywhere all three of your hellcritters can riot properly, including room for Darkness to run away.  I think it was Southdowner who suggested a riding school‡;  so I went out to see Jenny.  Remember Jenny, you long-time readers?  Who has a yard‡‡ in Ditherington?  Who let me ride her fabulous Connie?  Before the ME got so erratic (again) that I had to stop.  I know I could go back just to hang out and hug a few horses and even though I miss horses more than I miss riding . . . it’s still really too discouraging.  So I don’t go.

Well, the riding school/ hellcritter thing isn’t going to work;  the footing’s all wrong and the door doesn’t close properly against something the size of a hellterror.  The space doesn’t have to be critter proof because even the hellterror has a not-bad recall and they’ll only be there, supposing we ever find a there for them to be, with me in full supervisory mode.  But the fencing has to be recognisable as fencing from a hellcritter perspective.  And none of Jenny’s fencing is.  Rats.  But I did get to meet a few of the current yard residents. . . . Siiiiiiiigh.

But we had a lovely hurtle.

And I came home and sang.  Mozart is necessary:  see previous entry.

I was too tired to go bell-ringing.  But what was I going to do, stay home and watch the fireworks?  I went.  I think I am going to learn to ring Cambridge before it kills me but I admit I’m not sure.  And Fustian’s tower secretary came up to me at the end and said that I was invited to the tower Christmas dinner, that he’d send me the info, and did I want to bring my husband?

Whimper.  This is really very nice of them;  it’s generally only worthwhile regular non-member visitors who are invited to the Christmas dinner, and I’m only taking advantage of their twice a month extra practise for the [extra] stupid.  But I wasn’t even planning to go to Forza’s dinner—and a whole evening of being sociable?  Two whole evenings if I go to both?‡‡‡  And that eating in public thing?  Whimper.

I’m sure it’ll be good for my character.  Both dinners.  Maybe I’ll just bring some carrots§ in a bag.

* * *

* For any Americans out there who think that the 4th of July is the only legitimate day for fireworks:   http://www.potw.org/archive/potw405.html

** If Third House’s future tenants want fireworks, they’ll have to buy a ticket and go.

*** But I’ve never seen a dragon.  Let alone one that rips overhead like an express train and bursts over Old Eden.  Okay, is anyone else bothered by the express-train-like firework dragon in the first chapter of THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING?  I remember noticing it for the first time on my approximately 1008th reading when I was probably about twelve.  Shock horror.  I’m totally unpersuaded by the theory that this is an aside to the modern reader;  personally I think Tolkien screwed up.  But he was a notorious control freak—could he possibly have missed it?  Can he, his family, friends and other readers and his publisher have missed it?  Alternatively, can a meticulous Anglo-Saxon scholar have deliberately stuck a plonking great anachronism in his own story-telling?^  I don’t like either answer.

^ There are at least a couple of others, I think, but my memory is doing its vague and mushy thing again.  If they all concern the hobbits, then there is reasonable support for the theory of hobbit society as a satire on English society sharp enough to contain a few anachronisms successfully.  I think I remember that the Shire has umbrellas and pocket-watches.  But they’re smaller and less obtrusive.  Express trains are large and noisy.

† I should be packing boxes at Third House.  Don’ wanna.  Sigh.

†† What wins, a cup of tea with a friend or packing boxes?  Guess.

††† My life with hellcritters.  Well, at least it was only semi.

‡ I can no longer keep my Yank/Brit jargon straight.  I think I mean riding ring in American.  The place, probably with a fence around it, where you do your training/schooling.

‡‡ Stable

‡‡‡ Peter would only go if I put him in chains and hired a forklift.  There are some advantages to being 86:  you can just say ‘I’m/he’s 86’ and everyone gives you lots of lovely slack.

§ Yes, I eat carrots.  Whinny.