Twilight

I SEEM TO have been a little delinquent with my blog for the last few days; my only excuse is that my own routines have been somewhat upset, as well as my sleeping hours.

My Good Lady has been a bit out of kilter, too – so much so, that I seem to have done quite a lot of the cooking this week.

On a more positive note, we’ve finally got our hi-fi unit repaired and returned – it’s taken nearly a month, mainly because Curry’s right hand doesn’t know what their left hand is doing.

Anyhow, we stop by the Pub coming out of town, and we find there, in the Geriatrics’ Corner, a character I always dread to see.

We call him “Twilight”.

He must be in his late sixties or early seventies by now, a crumple-faced, hollow cheeked man with long, thinning, untidy grey hair and who, I’m convinced, always wears the same clothes – mainly shades of grey in all their dreadful, crumpled familiarity.

He somehow seems to think that I enjoy his company; whenever he sees me he makes a beeline for yours truly and parks himself next to me.

In fact, I tolerate his presence, and not always with the best of grace: I mean he’s not a bad man, he’s just such a bore!

He’s full of endless, long-winded stories which he fondly believes are of consuming interest to me. Often he’ll start a tale and half-way through it he’ll have forgotten the beginning. Nor does he believe in sparing me any tortuous details – not for Twilight is the virtue of cutting a long story short, oh no!

But that’s not the worst. He has an annoying habit of interrupting my conversation with someone else, and insisting that I pay him exclusive attention. If I try to ignore him, he’ll tug at my sleeve or my trouser leg until he has my full concentration again.

And he just will not let me go!

Now I hate being rude or making a scene, but I’m really biting my tongue today with this deeply irritating – if unconscious – rudeness.

I’m quite convinced he’s not “all there”, and no doubt he is a lonely man – but why, oh why, does he have to pick on me!