Buried Charms, Blackbirds and Bossy Women.

I was in a shop today and heard a soppy pop ballad that was big when I was fourteen. I remember sitting in the bath singing it and feeling forlorn after having had my advances spurned by the girl of my dreams. Hearing it today I wondered how on earth I could ever have considered finding such a pile of dingo’s droppings worth singing, dream girl or no dream girl. ‘How much I’ve changed,’ I thought. ‘How hard edged and cynical life’s vitriol has made me. Where has my soppy side gone?’ And then I realised that the soppy fourteen-year-old is still in here somewhere; he just sleeps more soundly these days and it takes a different kind of trigger to wake him up.

Later I saw two female blackbird fledglings standing together on the edge of the bird table, being fed with much dedication and energy by their dad. Poor bloke was working himself to a frazzle, tirelessly filling eager, gaping maws with beakfulls of rolled oats. And it struck me as amusingly ironic that the two juveniles were bigger than him.

Later still, I discovered that Ellie Taylor has the same birthday as me. ‘Who is Ellie Taylor?’ I hear you ask. Well, by an odd coincidence, it was the very same question which led me to discover that she has the same birthday as me. So who is she? Still not sure. A celebrity of some sort, which is all you need to be these days if you want to be one of the candles on the birthday cake. And might I just add that I’ve never yet met a female Sagittarian with whom I could get on. Too demanding. (Which brings me neatly back to female fledgling blackbirds. I must be well tuned in tonight.)