Now it’s your thirtieth birthday, one supposes,
You’ll destroy that portrait that decomposes
(Like Dorian Gray’s) up in your attic,
Now the Grim Reaper’s summons grows more emphatic.
Approaching senility brings lack of agility,
Diminished virility, reduced capability;
The sags and the bags,
The wrinkles and crags
Can only be patched by Botox-wielding physicians,
While your narrow waist and broad mind swap their positions.
Father Time’s theft of your zest and your vigour,
Gravity’s remorseless assault on your figure,
Hairs that sprout from your chins’ dormant follicles,
Are all signs you’re dissolving to your constituent molecules.
So with the utmost sincerity, characteristically humbly,
I salute you, O Ela! now you’re officially crumbly.
(In homage to William McGonagall.)
(Last Updated on 7 June 2005)
Here’s Tong and Masako who have announced their engagement and will be married in Thailand in April. Masako is a lovely Japanese lady who was a saleswoman for Bell Educational Trust (for whom I worked in Thailand) and fell for the thoroughly disreputable, thoroughly loveable dude-around-Bangkok, Tong. Tong was a gameshow host on Thai TV who we met down the pub. Or somewhere. I don’t recall. I have many happy-but-dim memories of Tong’s house, deep in the maze of sois in Lad Prao, where we would drink way too much beer and Tong would cook up shellfish on the barbeque to eat with chilli sauce (and snog Masako when they thought no-one was looking). Congratulations! I better start saving for flights…
(Last Updated on 3 May 2005)
At Marina’s birthday party on Saturday, we wanted to take a photo but found
that the film in the camera was full – odd because I usually remove them immediately.
When this one came back from the developing lab today, we were surprised to
find the entire roll full of accidental self-portraits of James, our two year old, taken
in different rooms.
Obviously, they’re all works of great genius, but these are the best four. Thank goodness he thought to leer straight into the lens.
(Last Updated on 3 May 2005)