Larry and Mick Reassess the Situation

'What are you doing there, friend Mick?'
'It is a spider diagram, friend Larry.'
'And what is the purpose of the spider diagram, friend Mick?'
'I feel it is time we reassessed the situation.'
Larry stepped forward, leaned over Mick's shoulder and breathed Nice n Spicey Pot Noodle into the general vicinity.
'Ew!' said Mick, in the manner of Grace from the popular U.S. sitcom, Will and Grace.
'Like, bite me, dude,' said Larry, in the manner of some other American fellow.
'What-evah,' said Mick, in the manner of an American fellow of similar aspect.
Larry then leaned in further, better to peruse the fruit of Mick's labour. Said fruit took the form of four plan sheets of A4 paper, sellotaped together in an oblong formation, upon which were circles and interlinking lines of varying hues, and, scribbled within and amongst, 'tasks' and 'activities' and suchlike. All of the above was situated upon the table before which Mick sat, and surrounding such was an indescribably vast array of coloured pens, pencils, marker pens and highlighters. Larry focused upon the largest, central circle, which was drawn in blue ink, highlighted in green and had the following words written very neatly indeed with one of those clever little pens which produces a gold border around everything:
The situation - it said.
Totally disregarding the hundreds of other bits and pieces which surrounded the central circle, Larry said, 'Very good,' but in truth he considered his friend to be something of a control freak and feared for his sanity.
'You see?' said Mick, tapping the diagram with a pen lid.
'Erm... absolutely!' said Larry.
'I detect a note of insincerity in your tone,' said Mick.
'No, no, it's not that,' said Larry; 'it's just' - he stuck his little finger in his gob and feigned the rummaging therein - 'I've got a bit of peanut in my tooth.'
'But you've never eaten a peanut in your life,' said Mick.
'There's a first time for everything!' said Larry, as he started to sweat, and rummaged more intently, in order to attempt to lend further credence to his point of view.
'But your mum said, when I spoke to her only yesterday lunchtime about appropriate snackage for our forthcoming visit to the Droitwich Theatre of Mimicry and Experimental Avian Performances, that you are highly allergic to peanuts, pear drops and white chocolate-covered raisins.'
'She's just being overprotective,' said Larry, as he clenched his toes and his eyebrows started to tingle.
'She said that the last time you ate a peanut, on March the twenty-fifth, nineteen seventy-six, your left ear swelled to the size of a space hopper, your right eye bulged and turned purple, and you had a rash that spread from the back of your neck, across both shoulderblades, then met at the front to form a dolphin-like shape which stretched from three inches above your belly button to just above (thank God) your wobbly parts.'
Tsk - went Larry. 'Mums eh?!'
'She said you were in hospital for a fortnight.'
'Okay, okay, okay!' - Larry removed his by now disgustingly damp pinkie from his gob. 'So I lied, I don't have a bit of peanut in my tooth, but I do find your diagram fascinating!'
'Fascinating?'
'Stupendously so!'
Mick quickly whipped up the item to which they referred, flipped it over so it was face down on the table, then turned to Larry and said:
'So what do you think of the point in the orange and violet circle at the top right hand corner?'
'I don't see the point.'
'You don't see the point of the point?'
'I don't see the point of reassessing the situation. As far as I can see, there is no situation to be reassessed.'
'You have a point there,' said Mick pointedly.
'I know,' said Larry. 'I'm off.'
'Where you going?'
'To re-point some bricks.'
'Righty-ho,' said Mick.
Larry buggered off, whilst Mick cleared away the table and did a jigsaw of some sheep in a field.

[ FIN ]