Wilt

– I wonder if it is set to continue, this late burst of summer sunshine we have enjoyed recently. Or are we about to be plunged into a damp and depressing autumn?
 – I guess we have been lucky with the summer; although it seems to have gone by quickly. I remember making so many plans for what I'd like to do: places to visit, that sort of thing.
– And?
– And I don't seem to have achieved much; if anything.
– It can't be helped, when you're busy enjoying the sunshine with your feet up in the garden.
– But that's the point: I didn't do much of that either.
– But then the cat doesn't help: the way she comes outside when she sees you relaxing in the garden; and complains.
– I've never understood why she does that. After all, she spends most of her day likewise lounging about. It's difficult to see why she should become so self-righteous when someone else has a go.
– Maybe it's a territorial thing: you are invading her personal space.
– You mean the entire garden?
– Yes.
– As well as the entire house?
– Sometimes they just need a lot of space.

Bake

– At least it's edible. In places.
– But you wouldn't want to eat much of it?
– Maybe not a whole slice, no. But it has an intriguing flavour. Apple, did you say?
– Perhaps I should give up with baking. It is just one failure after another.
– I am sure you are making steady, if slow, progress. Remember the lemon drizzle cake?
– I'd rather not.
– There you go: you've moved on significantly from those dark days. It is just a matter of time, and frequent practice.
– But that's the thing: the more I practise, the more I accumulate these unpalatable slabs of cake that nobody wants.
– I am sure you could find a good home for them. Or try baking something smaller. And anyway, winter will be here soon: think of the hearty nourishment your cakes will provide to the garden birds.
– I suspect they will turn their noses up at them.
– Or at least their beaks.

Poll

It is a historic occasion: not the sort of thing that happens every day. Indeed, it may never happen again, depending how the vote goes. And note, by the way, I prefer a historic rather than the commonly encountered, but unsettling quaint, an historic. Just as I tend to refer to a history exam, or at least I would if I was unfortunate enough to have to sit one. It has been many years, incidentally, since I last sat a history exam. And I only got a C, which was disappointing, and rankles to this day.

Getting back to the point, today has seen the momentous referendum on whether Scotland should be an independent country and separate from the United Kingdom. After years (if not centuries) of fervent discussion, the poll has come and, in the last few minutes, gone. The results may start to come in at any moment, or, more likely, during the early hours of the morning, when hopefully I will be fast asleep. The polls have narrowed over the last few weeks, with perhaps only a couple of percentage points now separating the two camps. So either the final result will turn out to be very close, or we will discover that the Scottish people do not take opinion polls seriously and deliberately give misleading answers.

Either way, the future composition and governance of the whole of the UK will change after tonight. Potentially Scotland will go its own way, leading to several years of a difficult untangling and prising apart of Scotland from the rest of the UK. The Yes campaign has the advantage of a certain romantic idealism about it, whereas the No campaign has inevitably a negative pallor: it's difficult to sound positive when recommending the status quo, especially in the current economic climate. But we shall see. No one has asked my opinion. Probably because I don't live in Scotland.

Silence

– Haven't you forgotten something?
– Have I? I don't think so...
– What about the last two months? The absence of posts? No apologies or heartfelt farewells, just silence.
– Oh that. Yes... I was busy...
– For two months?
– Well, not for the full two months. But you know how it is: holidays come along, and you decide it would be nice to have a break from the relentless drudgery of having to churn out deeply meaningful posts ever other day. And then, before you know it, the holiday is over, and you've kind of got into the habit of enjoying the absence of blogging – the long summer evenings are still beckoning, you feel the prime of your youth slipping silently away...
– Wasn't that quite a while ago – the prime of your youth?
– Well, in my case, probably, but I was trying to speak more figuratively. I think. But you get the idea: when you are trying to extract the utmost meaning from life, to suck out all that marrowy stuff, and you don't want to get bogged down in the dull and humdrum.
– And did you?
– I don't know. The summer seemed to disappear before I realised. Not sure there was ever that much marrowy stuff left to suck. Apart from which, I've never been all that fond of that sort of thing: pumpkins, courgettes...
– I'm not sure that's the same marrow that the quote is referring to. But I see your point. They all get a bit soggy when overcooked.