The Steaming Rants of Ernie Wight

Late Marks, strains, and current Sparks

I was woken up by a cat nuzzling determinedly under the quilt and into my face. I knew it meant trouble. The last time this had happened, Marks was dead, and Sparks was saying good-bye.

I got Marks and Sparks from a farm about 10 miles away. I had got several cats from there, they produced polydactyl (many-toed) cats that were very sociable. I picked up two twin tabbies, both female, in the pet-carrier and headed for home. It was early November 2000, the trees were brown already and the roads were covered with leaves. I was still a few miles from Mere, when a horrible stench filled the car. One of the kittens, obviously. I darted into a lay-by beneath the chestnut trees and wound down the window to get some untainted air. Magically, an elderly couple materialised beside the car, the lady trying to sell me a remembrance poppy.
"I'm sorry, I'm in a bit of a rush", I said.
"Oh, you are, aren't you", she said as the smell hit her.

I called the two kittens Marks (for an obvious M on the forehead, and Sparks (because she would regularly be found sleeping in the ashes of the fire). They were 5-toed, with the characteristic thumbs on the fore-paws of the "Dorset-cat". They played together endlessly, fighting in and around cardboard boxes, ignoring Winnie unless she had brought back a particularly interesting animal, such as live rabbits or squirrels. Their antics kept me cheerful while I was working at home; spontaneity is something hard to create in a home-office environment. (In how many offices do you have to break off work to catch a terrified bunny or furious squirrel that a large black and white cat has smuggled in through the cat-flap and let loose for the other cats to chase?)

One day, I came back from the car stores to find Sparks crouched on the platform, motionless and terrified. It took me a while to see where Marks was, but eventually I realised that she had been killed by a train. Sparks was inconsolable, and early one morning woke me in the darkness by nuzzling under the quilt, and then, in the daylight, was nowhere to be found. A week later I finally tracked her down, living in a tunnel under the blackberry bushes by the ruins of the old Porters hut, her fur soaked and matted and riddled with ticks.

I got a replacement kitten from the same farm, this time a black 6-toed manic bundle that would take flying leaps of four feet to attack the other two cats for no reason at all. Sparks detested her, and I realised I had made a bad mistake, it would have been better to have not tried to replace Marks, Sparks could not accept a substitute for a lost twin. It was too late to reverse the decision. The little black kitten pranced sideways like a spirited horse and would sit on its hind legs like a kangaroo to box with the other cats. I named her Skippy.

It was Skippy who had woken me. I sat up straight away, and saw the alarm clock's red digits, 4:xx something. I had overslept and was at least two hours late. I knew before even getting out of bed what had gone wrong, I had forgotten to arm the alarm before tumbling into bed the previous evening.

I took the time to feed the cats before I left, after all, I would have been even more behind time if I hadn't been woken by them. The mobile rang just as I was negotiating a set of reverse bends, gently increasing the throttle to get more forwards than sideways motion as the car slid out to emerge from the last bend on a decreasing arc. The mobile rang a second time as I slowed and entered Westbury, so I stopped to answer it, only to discover it was the answer phone service telling me someone had just tried to call me. I shot off again and arrived at the dairy to get loaded.

It was a Saturday, the worst possible day to be late, because each Saturday I carried 20% more white stuff to supply the garages and nursing homes who worked seven day weeks. As I loaded up the Transit I tried to marshall the drops into those who could be visited late and those who had to be visited early, and realised that no matter which order I visited them in, someone was going to be unhappy with my arrival time.

The mobile started to ring with depressing regularity, the dairy telling me that such and such a customer had just rung, and when would I be there ? As I clambered from the cab and turned to the flatbed on a particularly rough carpark, I felt a ripping pain in my left side, and completed the rest of the round in agony.

Being late at a customer's office or an appointment is bad enough. You apologise, accept whatever it is that is being heaped upon you due to your earlier non-appearance, and get on with it. Being late on a delivery round is a constant repetition of this, and I fully appreciated the phrase "I can't apologise enough" by the time I had visited the last customer and got back to the dairy.

I drove home slowly and soaked the muscle in a hot bath. Sick pay is not obligatory, and I was certain that the dairy did not have the resources to pay for me to have a week off while the pulled muscle mended. For the next week I hummed deeply as I laboured painfully. The therapeutic power of humming is something I learnt from the sea, where a pulled muscle or cracked rib was something you took care of yourself, they wouldn't take the boat home for trivial events.

I still have my cats to keep me entertained when I sit at home, half-dozing after the round has finished. Sparks has never recovered from the loss of here twin sister, and needs special treatment to persuade her to stay inside the house when Skippy is in high-sprits. Three cats might seem excessive to some, after all, one ought to be company enough, but three cats keep each other entertained when I am not around. However, the food bill is high, and I have considered in the current climate whether or not to outsource them: I could apply for fast-track-visas and get an Indian Mongoose or two. The cats could fend for themselves, couldn't they? It is a sensible business decision after all, and what do I owe my cats? Why should I be lumbered with them?

If I could outsource anything at the moment, it would be the government and the countless administrative functions that eat away the taxes we all pay. Local councils, DVLA, even the Inland Revenue, they could all be run from Delhi for a fraction of the current cost. Already the call-centres from the northern towns that gave the wives of redundant miners, shipbuilders and steelworkers some small way to bring the bread back into the house are being moved to Bombay and Delhi. To add insult to injury, I would expect the children's newspaper rounds to follow next.

You ! Yes, you, in the office! Look out, we're keeping an eye on you ! You're not indispensable, You'll be next!

If you don't buck your ideas up, your job will be in jeopardy!
But I don't want to work abroad
(Hancock's half-hour)