16
...remember to say you saw it in the SOL TIMES
SOLTIMES APRIL 2013
The Authority of the Orange Clip I was sitting peacefully, covered in a red gown while Bobbie snipped and Maggie made tea and conversation. All was calm, all was bright, until the magic spell was broken by the entry of two Gentlemen of the Law. Armed with the obligatory guns and handcuffs, and brandishing a threatening piece of paper they homed in on Maggie. Maggie is built along the lines of petite, but she stood her ground, like a heroic kitten faced by a pair of hunting hounds. Sensing Maggie’s peril, but with no thought to her own safety, Bobbie abandoned her scissors and rushed to the aid of her compatriot. At least now it was two on two, but the dynamics were still small and harmless women against the King’s armed enforcers, who were insisting on speaking to the establishment’s owner, not at that moment present. Maggie’s heroic kitten had been joined by Bobbie’s valiant puppy, but they were still facing two hunting hounds dressed in green. The whole situation was beginning to resemble a Walt Disney cartoon – all it needed was Bambi to wander in. For some josbiggs@hotmail.co.uk reason the
By Jos Biggs
Upholders of the Law seemed to be unable to understand any part of ‘no aqui’. No matter how many times or in how many different ways Maggie and Bobbie told them, the fact that the person to whom they needed to speak was not there simply didn’t register. The encounter was getting nowhere. Time, I felt, for reinforcements. With my red cape billowing around me I joined the fray, 5ft 7 of implacable authority. The effect was immediate. Silence fell as the eyes of the Law turned towards me. I was the focus of their 100% attention. I am not easily cowed, either by guns, handcuffs or even pieces of paper, so I drew myself up to my full height and fixed them with a steady return gaze. ‘The owner’ I informed them firmly, ‘is not here. You will have to come back later.’ They exchanged a let’s-get-out-of-here look, and I knew I had them bested. Victory was mine. I had mastered the Force. With an apologetic mumble they left. By sheer force of personality I had triumphed. Or could it have been the effect created by the large orange clip holding my hair up in a haystack on the top of my head? Was the triumph due to my authority, or was it due to the Authority of the Orange Clip?
The Weird Ritual of Shopping
I hate shopping. No wait . . I hate shopping with other people. Nope, not right either . . . Ah. I hate shopping with women! When I’m on my own, I can indulge myself if I wish and buy a natty new shirt or another pair of summer slacks (although I know full well there will be consequences later at home). “Not another shirt!” she’ll say or “You have plenty of slacks already.!” I can stop for a coffee and a big wedge of cake when I feel like it
(although I know full well there will be consequences later with my waistline). And when I’m fed up, I can get in the car and go home. Look it’s a scientific fact.... women are hell to shop with.! I spend most of my time being dragged from shoe shop to jeweller to fashion outlet and have you noticed how a woman just has to touch everything even if she has no intention of buying? It’s like a weird kind of ritual. But if I dare look away for just a nano-second, she’s gone. Completely.
Women have this amazing ability to disappear from the face of the earth the minute you turn your back and then you spend the next half hour trying to locate them, because you know as sure as hell they won’t come looking for you. So I go to the end of each aisle and peer down – nothing. I do a complete clockwise circuit of the store but still no sign. Then counter clockwise with the same
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result. I am now giddy, but then lo and behold, with not a care in the world there she is, in more or less the same spot when I last saw her – and what does she say? Where have you been? Where have I been? WHERE HAVE I BEEN? Three times round the bloody shop looking for you, that’s where I’ve been.! But I don’t say it and leave it to ferment in the darker recesses of my mind where I store all the other unspoken comebacks. I know when to keep quiet. And listen, because every bloke out there can attest to this . . . You are both in the supermarket and your wife tells you to take the trolley to the checkout while she goes to the toiletries for her favourite something or other. She’ll be two seconds she tells you. So you do, even though you know from bitter and frequent experience what two seconds to a woman actually means. Of course it turns out to be the precise moment in the day when there is virtually no one in front of you except some weird bloke in an AC/DC shirt, a bad haircut and blackheads. He is obviously single, and his purchases amount to half a dozen bars of chocolate, two cans
John MacDonald (El Sordo) - www.caratacus.eu
viewpoint ALQUERIA - The flyover
The weather hadn’t yet turned. That magic day when the rain stops and a precipitation free summer is promised was still a week or so away. A long shadow began to stretch across the village. Poyato hummed to himself as he walked to the Bar la Casa Devante for his morning coffee. Stopping in his tracks he noticed an iron girder some fifty metres above and coming from the east while another encroached from the west. The outline of giant cranes could be seen busily hoisting elements of the structures into place. Poyato hurried into the bar indignant and extremely verbal. Spanish drivers had long complained about the diversion around the secure borders of Alqueria. Many kilometres had been added to journeys. Any unwary drivers trying to drive through Alqueria are stopped at the border and their vehicles searched. Anything which isn’t bolted to the bodywork is confiscated and auctioned in one of the Alquerian bars during the evening. The situation became intolerable when the Camino de Alqueria, the only unrestricted route south of the village became a toll road over night. Alquerian mobile toll booths appeared along a three kilometre stretch. Individuals from the village with an eye for a profit simply set up their own booths. One unsuspecting driver paid more in tolls than his car was worth, another had to re-mortgage his house simply to get to his place of work. Questions were asked in the Spanish parliament. Funds put aside for the Distressed Politicians much needed Erotic Dancing and Strong Liquor Fund were re-allocated for the construction of a bridge spanning the whole of Alqueria. If Alqueria had had an air-force they would have scrambled it but they settled instead for hurling cobblestones and insults at the construction workers. Poyato and his colleagues raised the issue with the United Nations. That illustrious body regarded Alqueria as one would regard a troublesome verruca and took no action. It was left to the good people of the Pueblo to take the law into their own hands. Before the Winter weather breaks the strange Alquerian mist usually puts in an appearance and this year was no exception. The foul smelling green fog descended reducing visibility to a few metres. The people of Alqueria seized their moment. A midnight visit to the road builder’s site-offices and a few alterations to critical coordinates was all that was necessary. For the next two weeks the eerie sound of construction work drifted through the dense fog. When the green haze finally lifted the results of the sabotage became apparent. The two ends of the bridge took a neat ninety degree turn to the north and disappeared into crevices in the sierra’s cliff face. The first cars to use the new route thundered past, never to be seen nor heard of again. The legend of the Alquerian Triangle was born. More of that later...
of beer and a microwave dinner. His appearance indicates that he is certainly eating alone tonight and is destined to do so until income tax is abolished. The point is, he is obviously only going to be a few seconds checking in his acquisitions and paying. You will your wife to appear and even offer up a little prayer, but of course now that there is a free run at the till, there is no sign of the little lady. A decision is needed and naturally it is going to be the wrong one, because you decide there is no point in checking through twice and so decide to wait. Huge mistake. As you back off to wait for the light of your life to put in an appearance, there immediately appear three thousand shoppers who converge on the only two checkouts that are open, all with trolleys piled two storeys high with groceries and supplies for the Orihuela Fiesta.Your better half arrives at this point and now it’s only a question of whether you will miss lunch or dinner. And of course, it’s your fault. Then there are the dreaded sales.
Hitherto there has been no mention of the need for a new dress; a sensible pair of walking shoes or even the desire for another handbag. Not until you get to the shops where that magical SALE sign resides tantalisingly to all women in the window and burns like a white hot brand into every long suffering husband’s brain. More touching and feeling ensues – not with me unfortunately, but the shop goods - but this time there are gasps of surprise and joy as bargain after bargain is unearthed on the endless racks, shelves and cabinets. Then with debit card in hand, the words that I have become all too familiar with . . . “You can’t go wrong at that price!”
By Colin Bird : badbirdnow@gmail.com