Took Daniel and Holly to a swimming party yesterday.  Bit of drama when the fire alarm went off and they had to empty the pool.  Turned out a baby had been sick.  They wouldn’t have bothered in my day.  They’d have just got Mr Bates to come along with his bucket and fish it out.  Mr Bates was a swimming instructor – scary but good.  He knew when you were ready to swim and he made you do it: I didn’t think I was ready but he made me go – and to my astonishment, I swam half a width!  It was  one of those moments when you feel a great change in your life.

That was in the old baths.  Treaty Rd, Hounslow – all bottle-green tiling, small and very noisy.  Next to the old library.  Remember?

Ah.  Maybe you had to be there.

There was an old hospital too, before they closed it down – full of nurses bristling with hostile efficiency.  Then they knocked it down and you had to go to West Mid.

Finished the Ian Rankin I was reading.  Want to start another but the plots tend to get mixed up in my mind. The blurb on the back says “Rankin weaves his plots with menacing ease”.  Sounds good.  I asked Owl, and he says that’s what he weaves them with.

I need a loom for mine.  And I haven’t got the right sort: I need a literary loom and I’m stuck with this old romantic one.

All of which is a way of saying, I’m no good at writing plots.  First I get an idea, then a philosophy, then some characters – and finally, if I’m lucky, something like a plot emerges.

I’ve been going on too long this morning.  Woke up too early.

Happy Sunday

Kirk out

PS no links this morning.  The bastards have defeated me.