Tuesday 18 December 2007

Madeley Restored

The sparrows were not at fault.

I should have known all along that they could not be culpable. It shouldn’t have taken my ringing up Bill Oddie to bring them back and install them back in the eaves for me to know they do not boost a WIFI signal. According to Fry, the reason my broadband failed was because the line had been ‘severed by either a vengeful rodent or a sullen wife’. Judy claims she knows nothing of snipped cables, though if you were to put her on a lie detector, I’m sure the truth would come pouring out of her. She’s been oddly happy today and, if I didn’t know better, I’d say that my broadband was sabotaged in order to get me out of the house.

If so, then I need to thank her. I sometimes forget how good it is to get away from this office. I spend relatively little time in London and I sometimes forget how much it frees the brain of the cobwebs that accumulate over the weeks and months of labouring with words. Writing the scripts for the next series of The Richard&Judy Show, along with writing much of the material for Dick Justice, I have become like the proverbial candle lit at both ends. Yesterday, the two flames met at the middle and there was no more. I could barely rouse myself to write a word, despite their being an episode from Sunday that’s worth relating as it’s both festive and involving Clarkson at his most argumentative.

Now I’m home, I’m eager to write and I’m burning white hot with ambitions and ideas. You might have to give me 24 hours or so to catch up. I’m also working my way through a copy of The Angry Island that began as pristine and slowly getting dog-eared.

I’ll end this update here. I can hear the sound of a ladder being propped against eaves. It will be Oddie, back to remove sparrows for the second time today. Hopefully my broadband connection will hold up and I’ll be able to post this.

9 comments:

Selena Dreamy said...

I have become like the proverbial candle lit at both ends.

Burnout!

Which, I do hope, will not impair your future intellectual contribution to the life of our nation!!

(But that apart, gosh, don’t I know the feeling).

Selena Dreamy said...

I’m also working my way through a copy of The Angry-Island.

A careful study of this oeuvre will, I guarantee, give you an unparalleled insight into Britain’s mental geography. Rarely have I found someone in England who understands the British mentality and her working classes better than this particular Scotsman.

Uncle Dick Madeley said...

Burnout? I think so. I feel intellectually thin and need to engorge myself on good books over the Christmas break. Oddie wants me to go birdwarching but I'm taking the indoor route. I've started the Gill (and already I think he's better in this longer form where he can breathe more) and I've some Wodehouse lined up. If that doesn't do it, I wouldn't know what will.

bertas said...

Oh Wodehouse, thanks for the idea Richard... :)
I hope the lovely wife has not locked herself in the bathroom again now that broadband is back, may I suggest some Decleor cosmetics as Christmas stocking stuffers? That should get her in a better mood, although I would avoid anything to do with wrinkles... that might have the opposite effect :)

lee said...

Oh, that judy should be slapped. Very hard :).

Smoke said...

I hope you've offset the carbon you'e generating by burning the candle at both ends. For the sake of future generations of sparrows and all.

Anonymous said...

I hope that you will not forget to tip Mr Oddie - he is off our screens until 'Springwatch' unless he can find another mad relative to go on about - and unless you tip him well will have to go back to those infamous Carpet Warehouse ads...

Uncle Dick Madeley said...

Roberta, I would definitely go with Wodehouse this Christmas. I find that he can nullify the horrible misery I feel over the holidays.

Lee, please don't joke about slapping Judy. I'm this close to going back to jail...

Ethel, oh, not you as well! Oddie has already complained about that simile. You environmentalists take everything literally.

Mutley, Oddie is rich beyond measure. Do you know the government give him 50p for every sparrow currently living in the UK?

Anonymous said...

glad you got your internet sorted out, your blog is (as ever) a source of deranged insight in a sea of crap.