Island Hideaway 33 - Dodo love
By Terrence Oblong
Sat, 18 Jan 2020
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2 comments
The dodos loved Mo and everywhere she went she was surrounded by them. She didn't even need to bribe them with nuts.
It was helpful for me, as I had work to do so was happy to leave Mo in their care.
A mainland politician had hired me to write his blog, which was intended to portray the minister as a more normal human being, with the same day to day issues as his voters.
"I'm not the right person for this," I'd said to my agent, "I live on an isolated island, I never see anybody, I never go to the movies or theatre, I rarely watch TV or read newspapers, I’m completely isolated from the everyday world."
"You're still more in touch with reality than the Minister," he said. "He's surrounded by politicians, journalists and billionaires, he never meets normal people, just write about the mundanity of life, you must know about that."
"Oh shit yes." So I wrote.
And Mo played with the dodos. Her language skills were quite remarkable, in no time at all she was fluent in the dodo language (I would say dodo tongue, but no tongue is used, the language is silent, like sign language, based entirely on wing position, or in Mo’s case arm position. Every time I saw her she was deep in conversation with them.
"What do you talk about to the dodos?" I asked her one time.
"I dunno, stuff. What do we talk about, what did we ever talk about?"
"What did we used to talk about? It all seemed very important at the time. What one of us felt about what someone else had said or done, or what we had seen. Is that the sort of thing the dodos say?"
"You should learn dodo," Mo said. "Then you could talk to them yourself. After all, you do share an island with them."
"I try. I just can't master it."
"You flap your arms helplessly. You don't pay attention to them, you can never learn without watching closely. What are you writing, I'll translate it for you and you can tell the dodos."
"I'm writing a blog for a government Minister. I'm currently describing his fruitless attempts to find a barista that makes coffee as good as he used to get from Julie in the coffee shop round the corner of Portcullis House. She moved to Scotland two weeks ago and he's not had a decent cup in all that time."
"Jesus, make it easy for me why don't you. My dodo doesn't run to 'barista', 'Portcullis', Scotland' and 'government Minister'. There's not even a dodo word for coffee, I just have to say drink. Okay, this is how you say 'I am writing'*. Her arms went to ten past eight, and then to 25 minutes past six. I copied her. The dodos watched on. Amazingly up to this point they'd had no idea what I did for a living.
It was helpful for me, as I had work to do so was happy to leave Mo in their care.
A mainland politician had hired me to write his blog, which was intended to portray the minister as a more normal human being, with the same day to day issues as his voters.
"I'm not the right person for this," I'd said to my agent, "I live on an isolated island, I never see anybody, I never go to the movies or theatre, I rarely watch TV or read newspapers, I’m completely isolated from the everyday world."
"You're still more in touch with reality than the Minister," he said. "He's surrounded by politicians, journalists and billionaires, he never meets normal people, just write about the mundanity of life, you must know about that."
"Oh shit yes." So I wrote.
And Mo played with the dodos. Her language skills were quite remarkable, in no time at all she was fluent in the dodo language (I would say dodo tongue, but no tongue is used, the language is silent, like sign language, based entirely on wing position, or in Mo’s case arm position. Every time I saw her she was deep in conversation with them.
"What do you talk about to the dodos?" I asked her one time.
"I dunno, stuff. What do we talk about, what did we ever talk about?"
"What did we used to talk about? It all seemed very important at the time. What one of us felt about what someone else had said or done, or what we had seen. Is that the sort of thing the dodos say?"
"You should learn dodo," Mo said. "Then you could talk to them yourself. After all, you do share an island with them."
"I try. I just can't master it."
"You flap your arms helplessly. You don't pay attention to them, you can never learn without watching closely. What are you writing, I'll translate it for you and you can tell the dodos."
"I'm writing a blog for a government Minister. I'm currently describing his fruitless attempts to find a barista that makes coffee as good as he used to get from Julie in the coffee shop round the corner of Portcullis House. She moved to Scotland two weeks ago and he's not had a decent cup in all that time."
"Jesus, make it easy for me why don't you. My dodo doesn't run to 'barista', 'Portcullis', Scotland' and 'government Minister'. There's not even a dodo word for coffee, I just have to say drink. Okay, this is how you say 'I am writing'*. Her arms went to ten past eight, and then to 25 minutes past six. I copied her. The dodos watched on. Amazingly up to this point they'd had no idea what I did for a living.
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So nice to see Mo and the
Permalink Submitted by Insertponceyfre... on
So nice to see Mo and the dodos getting along
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