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And this is your 'comic diary,' Robin? Ah, through the mists of time you speak to us.... Doug On 14-Sep-07, at 3:33 AM, Robin Hamilton wrote: >> were you an unemployed hermit? confused > > No, not umemployed, Roger, at least not at first. I'd signed a proper > contact with the local big-wig, see, usual stuff, seven years on the > job and that, dead pukka. Proper victuals, bread, skittles, and rags > provided, luxurious fully-furnished grotto came with the job, next to > the gazzebo it was, dead posh like. But ... > > See, what got up the nostrils of me and the rest of the boys was this > particular clause the buggers kept on insisting on, no lushing it up > on a Friday down at the local boozing ken. "Out of character," it was > supposed to be, as if, I mean, what's *in character for a bleeding > English hermit in the middle of winter sitting shivering downwind from > the sheep browsing the ha ha while the only persons come to see you > are the local kids who if they ain't gawking are poking you with > sticks. > > Bleeding liberty, and the no rum bouse clause was the last drop in the > tankard, so to speak. > > So us all went on what we had to call a stand-up-and-walk-off strike, > stick that in your churchwarden we thought and puff on it. Serve the > buggers right, they'll soon be begging us back since after all what's > your bang-up eighteenth century garden without a deeply atmospheric > hermit in residence? > > So what did the rotten toerags do the minute they thought on it, the > horseblankets we'd been romantically sitting on to keep our arses off > the stonework barely cold? Called in the local stonemasons, they did, > commissioned a set of reproduction full-sized bloody stone > *sculptures, right, assorted poses as required, and stuck them in the > Hermitry instead of us. > > Bastards! Minute they realised that there was no overhead on a stone > hermit, and they were less likely to be caught groping the > maidservants, that was it for the profession. > > http://www.hermitary.com/lore/ornamental_hermits.html > > Anyways, in the course of time, what with large families and death > duties and that, your squire's descendents were as you might say > whittled down in their circumstances, shoehorned into a semi-detached > in Chelmsford, poxy wee patch of garden in place of the gazzebo. And, > naturally, the Stone Hermits went the same way, scunned down to fit > the reduced circumstances of their owners. > > Thus in the course of time, six foot tall Ornamental Hermit Masonary, > introduced into the English garden in the wake of our thoroughly > principled refusal of labour till we got us a better contract, evolved > into the tiny garden gnomies so familiar today, them as we all know > and loathe. > > Blackleg bloody objects they are, and no surprise, as Patrick pointed > out, that the father of the Grey Man was involved in the manufactuary > of them. > > Him As Was An Eremine Wunce > > > Douglas Barbour 11655 - 72 Avenue NW Edmonton Ab T6G 0B9 (780) 436 3320 http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/ Latest book: Continuations (with Sheila E Murphy) http://www.uap.ualberta.ca/UAP.asp?LID=41&bookID=664 People say they have to express their emotions. I'm sick of that. Photography doesn't teach you to express your emotions; it teaches you how to see. Berenice Abbott