In a World Gone Mad: Thursday 2 July 2020...2

Teagan is a nightmare, Teagan, and Arthur together—well there aren’t enough adjectives in the language to describe what it’s like. I caved and took him with me the other day. There is a vets on the corner three doors up from us and because people aren’t allowed inside because of Covid19  there is often a queue outside.  Teagan is at her most embarrassing and is well known among the staff. The other day one of the nurse was seeing to somebody outside when Mama-T bounced on the end of her lead, barking, and straining and just about turning cartwheels. The nurse had the sweetest voice and sounded so sympathetic.

‘Oh Teagan, no, no Teagan. Be a good girl, sweet Teagan.’

My dog is infamous.

Arthur, Teagan, and I were level with the vet. Tegan was putting on a performance and the people with their perfectly behaved and well-mannered dogs were tut-tutting and shaking their heads at the devil dog in the big muzzle. What does Arthur shout at the top of his voice while jumping off the kerb and into the middle of the road?

‘Get a stick. Get a stick.’

I don’t know if he was going to hit me, Teagan, the Yorkshire Terrier she was barking at, or its owner but why is there never a big braying stick around when you need one?

I have finished the first of the five book series that I’m editing. After the horrible rape scenes and nastiness of the last one this couldn’t have been sweeter.  Girl meets Prince and married him to become future queen—aw.

It was shite

 But it didn’t leave me feeling dirty.

There was no description in this book. However, every single sentence had one or more of four default phrases, beginning, middle and end.

He smiled.

He tilted his head.

He sighed.

He cocked a brow.

He had cold, icy blue eyes and she had warm hazel eyes, both mentioned hundreds of times.

It’s a cool way to write a book. You imagine what the mood of that sentence is, and if they’re sad you sigh and cock a brow and if they’re happy you smile and tilt a head. For anything in between you just tilt a head or cock a brow.

I know why people do this. They work out what they want to say in that sentence. That is all they are thinking about and, because the mind knows it needs more, it has a selection of defaults and randomly picks one to fit the mood for the writer. The result is that every character has repetitive neck injuries, oral rictus and a squint.

One of two things has happened. Either I’ve pissed her off and we will never hear from her again, or, she’s taken my advice to remove the defaults before sending me the next book saving us both time in the long run. Either way, I’ve had a few days off and have had a chance to write my diary, catch up on housework, do some gardening and spent time with the family. It’s quarter to one, Max can be up any time from one, so if I have time I’m going to do some reviewing on the writing site I use.

Anybody reading my diaries on the writing site will think I’m so full of bull. ‘What right does she have to edit other people’s books? Have you seen the state of her writing?’  I post in first draft because I’m too lazy to edit it before putting it on there. And, if I had to edit it first, it’d probably never get done.

I write in three sentence blocks before the inevitable; ‘Hello, hello, is there anybody there?’  And from Max, ‘Sarah, Sarah, where are you? Are you coming out of there?’ And from Andy,’ Sarah, can I get a lift to the shop?’

I post in a rush within three minutes of writing it with Sarah, Sarah ringing in my ears. And my stopping time is not determined by running out of things to say, but by being guilted into stopping when life gets in the way.

I do edit after posting and I have to say, my first draft rushed writing is a lot better than most of my client’s first drafts.  Ridged rather than rigid haunted me this week and apparently Arthur is a pin in the bum—a pin? He’s a bloody poison dart spear.

Teagan’s spray came yesterday, it has two names. The brand name is Leucillin, but to Teagan it is called Nice-nice. Already, if we ask her if she wants some Nice-nice she rolls over an presents her belly-belly.

I’m impressed; it gives her instant relief and after application and a good rub into her skin she stops scratching. However, the magic has a life of three hours before she scratches again and this morning she was as bad as ever before her first application.

I found some time yesterday for gardening and transplanted some stuff from the back to the front. I could be all technical and informed and name plants with their Latin and common name and by genus and other labels—but the most technical I get is ‘stuff.’ I have this purple thing. We bought it from B&M and Max insisted that I pant it in a tub with twenty-five other varieties of stuff—it was only three other stuffs but I’m the queen of exaggeration. The damned thing has grown into Jack’s beanstalk. It is dark green with teardrop leaves and throws purple flowers like those white lamb’s tail things that were everywhere in the seventies. I’ve transplanted that bugger.

Max bought a mini-fir tree. I asked him not to, it will grow enormous and we are limited on both light and space. I’ve chucked that in a pot with some other stuff, but I’m guessing that will take over too. Outside our house, the street is lined with established cherry trees. These are eons old and protected and the council will not prune them. For one week of the year, when they are in bloom they are stunning. The rest of the time they are just a bloody nuisance. The branches of the two either side of my lounge window are almost touching. We get no light and no sunshine at the front of the house at any time of day. The back is better but that is shaded by the shadow of the house and outer wall. I long for a bigger space and a sun trap.

The front has a bright red pot with some long things and a beautiful red flowering plant at the front. I have my orange pot with orange stuff, and one with greenery and yellow—get this, I know a name, Dianthus. The flowering ones are all stunning, but I fear for them in the dreary front with no direct sunlight.

I was hauling the last pot out of the front door at eight o’clock last night when a lady spoke to me.

‘Now then Sarah, what are you planting?’

Hi, oh just some stuff that had overgrown the back.’

‘Oh, look at her.’

We have a glassed front door and Teagan had jumped up—she makes well over five feet at full stretch and she had her front paws on the glass going mad to come out. I felt awful because I have no idea who this lady is, but she knows me. Don’t you hate it when that happens?

‘Would you mind if I let her out to see you? She’ll bark like mad, but she’s friendly after a couple of minutes.  Just stand back away from the wall until she’s got the barking out of the way please?’

The lady was so good with her. Teagan went berserk and I’m not sure that it wasn’t aggressive. I tell people she’s just saying hello, but I’m believing that less with every day.  Teagan barked herself out with me trying to stop her, and her ignoring me. Then we got to the hand sniffing. I worried when the lady extended her hand to her that Tegan would take it off.  But she wagged her tail and sniffed and barked some more. We progressed to stroking.

‘Can she have a sausage?’

The lady pulled out what I thought was her chippy tea.

‘No, don’t give her your dinner, love.’

‘Oh, it’s not. I work in the chippy and bring the sausages home for my dog. I’ve got ten of them in here.’

Well—Tegan’s got a new best friend. This wonderful being brings her sausage and makes a big fuss of her.

Teagan has a date tonight. We’ve been told to be outside at eight when the lady finishes work, and she’ll bring her another treat. Now, while I don’t want Teagan thinking that every person walking past our house is going to stuff her with deep fried sausage, getting her used to people walking past being a good thing—is indeed a good thing.  I must ask the lady her name tonight.

How lovely.