A Week of Homs

Feb 23rd

Dear Diary,
why do you never write back? Why is it always me who must constantly be jotting down his exotic scrawlings without you ever putting your pen to my willing paper. For years I have longed to feel your ink gushing through my pages as my eyes thrash back and forth, back and forth across the line. I want to read you!


Feb 24th

Dear Diary,
sorry about yesterday. Feel I might have stepped over the line somewhat. I assure you I am quite happy with our current arrangement and have no desire to change the situation. Maybe I had been drinking. Of course I am more than happy for us to remain in this platonic relationship. Perhaps, in future, we should talk about other things. like what's been happening in my day of life.
For example, today I saw a group of deer. One of the little idiots was called Giacomo. What a stupid name for a deer. What's wrong with Custard or Quackles or Crispin or other sensible names like that? He thinks a lot of himself, I thought, and I'll be quite surprised if he isn't dead by the end of the day.

Sure enough he was.
See, that was pretty good, huh? More of the same tomorrow!


Feb 25th

Dear Diary,
A woman telephoned my residence to ask for my help in a little detection work. I said I had no idea what she was talking about (you never know) and insisted that she was a forty seven year old man. Of course I knew she was nothing of the sort but it's all part of the game.
After two or three hours I phoned her back and offered my services to her. She said she needed help finding out just where her husband was. Apparently he said he was going to the Karakum desert to look for some sort of mythical giraffe who breathes murcury and possibly is made of tungsten.
I set off for Turkmenistan tomorrow!


Feb 26th

Dear Diary,
started out on my journey to Turkmenistan. Commandeered plane enroute to Peru. Passengers not happy. Arrived at 17:46 (local) by which time it was rather too late to walk out into the desert, so instead I started a fight with a local man about his dog.


Feb 27th

Dear Diary,
went out into the desert with my new dog - his name is Kalim Gerald Barkleton Twing. He is a faithful companion and forgot about his dead former master in no time at all. We walked for some time, enjoying the scorching heat and deadly lack of water, before spotting a man lying not too far away. As we approached it was clear the man was dead, died of thirst or starvation or trampling from a Giraffe made of tungsten (possibly). So when we finally arrived at the place where he was it was quite a surprise to see him alive and well. He said his good-days and we said ours and I asked him if he had a wife who might want him looked for. He said no and that the man I was looking for was dead. At which pont he motioned to a man lying on the ground next to him who was dead.
The man explained that recently he had been dressing up as a titanium giraffe and had accidentally breathed murcury all over the fellow. I asked the fellow if he owed me £17.
He said he didn't.


Feb 28th

Dear Diary,
flew home. Brought Kalim Gerald Barkleton Twing back with me. He doesn't get on too well with my old dog, Isambard. Phoned woman. Informed her of dead husband. Asked for fourteen thousand pounds.


Feb 29th

Dear Diary,
mmmmmmmm! Sunday lunch today! Isambard was delicious.