I thought I’d found a clue in the Tobacco Factory – a trendy pub/café-bar/theatre in the Southville area of Bristol. ‘Aha! Here he is at last!” I said, upon spotting this sign:
I followed its arrow along corridors and through double-doors, fully confident that I would in some nook find the man himself tapping away at a laptop in consoling cowboy boots.
But alas, it was some sort of trick or red herring or diversion or prank, or else the Yard had fled before I got there, because after much walking I found nothing but benches, smokers and concrete slabs.
Blogdreaming, as we know, is one of the first signs of Blogmadness. This is where, in the words of Nige, one’s bodiless blog regulars become ‘shadowily present’ in one’s slumbers. But what happens when Bloggery, unbidden, begins to invade wakeful reality? Is it a tear in the fabric of The Matrix? Are these auguries, or auspices, or anything to do with the Ides of March (which I believe technically just refers to the 15th but which has, since Shakespeare, taken on an elusively sinister cultural significance)?
Imagine, if you can, the icy chill that gripped me as I pulled up on the pavement outside my house and saw this car number plate in front.
What is happening here? If these auguries aren’t something to do with the Ides of March then I don’t know what is. And if they are something to do with the Ides of March then I’m still not sure what is; it’s one of those difficult expressions.
I'm still living with the hope that it's seasonal and that he'll return from his winter nesting grounds in the spring.
ReplyDeleteRumours abound, one well informed source has the Obstmeister incarcerated in an Austrian cellar, the sex slave of a crazed, moustachioed Viennese restaurant proprietor called Klaus who occasionally takes the yard on shopping trips after warning him that any attempt to escape will lead to him sharing his cell with PJ Myers, forever.
ReplyDeleteThe other rumour is that Rupe has him at a secret location in Wapping, writing the Murdoch family history entitled 'The Twenty First Century's Beaverbrook's and their part in the death of the BBC.'
Allegedly a seven figure sum is being paid, in Rupees.
The News of the World story claiming that Bryan has secretly started a new blog is as yet, uncorroborated.
A cowboy boot becomes stuck in a grating. You become stuck in the cowboy boot. It's like the La Brea tar pits. You go out for a short walk, perhaps in search of a juicy steak, a wrong footing, kerchink, whoops, and no one sees you again for 15,000 years. That's the Ides of March for you.
ReplyDeleteThey say that there's nothing new under the sun, but we're the first generation that really needs to worry about our imaginary friends showing up on our doorstep unannounced.
ReplyDeletewv: aloci -- Something you order in a fancy restaurant without being sure what it is. "Our special tonight is braised short ribs of beef on a bed of aloci, with marinated marrow tempura."
"Ides" must mean something perfectly innocous in Spanish, like "halibut", or maybe it's a girl's name in Basque - I always find thinking like that takes the sting out of such menancing expressions.
ReplyDeleteI think Bryan's been doing some work experience as a guest editor at Heat magazine, covering london fashion week.
ReplyDeleteThese are all insightful and highly credible theories. I may send them to Bryan in the form of a questionnaire and ask him to tick the appropriate box. However, I will warn you that he normally only communicates with me in the form of extremely brief missives comprising direct quotes from well-known 60s hits.
ReplyDeleteNot me guv. And I have the posted alibi to prove it.
ReplyDeleteYou may have an alibi, Gaw, but does your virtual daemon or avatar (call it what you will)?
ReplyDeleteAs far as the Yard is concerned...
ReplyDeleteA line from a song drifts back to me down the ages...
"You can check out anytime you like but you can never leave..."
O.S.M.
(happens to me all the time...)