FIRE!!

Being an old git, not particularly interested in travel, I normally circulate around cafes and hotels to satiate what's left of my social instincts. But cafes in winter are probably not the best places to remain healthy, as the windows drip with germ laden condensation and bovine diners cough and sneeze through their record breaking grease platters. For that reason, I migrate more often to the wider pastures of hotels, where multiple large rooms and high ceilings make viruses work much harder for a living.

It was during such an excursion that I stood in a warm lounge surrounded by the decaying splendour of a Victorian mansion. Life size portraits of stern ancestors, heavy brown furniture, huge fire places, crumbling old books and one massive long case clock with a curious tinkle every hour; all sedated me. Through a mullion window, I regarded a timeless vista of rolling hills and grazing sheep.....

The spell was broken, as the hotel manager staggered in, followed by three women who were apparently fire prevention officers, giving the hotel its annual inspection. They sat down and spent the next forty minutes grilling the unfortunate manager with all the expertise of medieval torturers. Page after page of questions were fired at him, as he ducked and dived like a goal keeper trying to save penalty kicks from the entire opposition team simultaneously. His face blanched, his speech stuttered and the sweat rolled.

But, finally, they rose to their feet to actually view the hotel.

"Crash!"

Oh, no. It was the crochet club's weekly meeting. In trooped thirty old ladies in tweed and lace, howling like wolves on speed, some moving heavy chairs into a circle around the fireplace, each with the strength of ten men. A waitress walked in and helpfully lit the fire. Within minutes, the room filled with smoke, chimney apparently blocked, and three or four ladies coughed violently.

The waitress quenched the fire with a jug of orange juice, and the fire inspectors watched with interest.

I walked back to my car.