That Joke isn’t Funny Any More

I realised that I was essentially on my own right about the time that I noticed that you weren’t listening to a word I said. Oh, I don’t mean you were ignoring me, like the way the people do in a waiting room; or even just blanking me as if I were a customer in your shop that required the minimum amount of interaction- a text book Tesco tick card of hellos and helps and goodbyes. No, I mean really and truly not listening.

It was the conversation about the greenhouse, I remember it well. You are forever throwing at me in the heat of an argument that I’m pedantic, or I’m asking too much that people should be that precise in their conversation or in their responses, but in reality I do actually recall every word that is said. It’s more of a curse than a blessing, and one I often try to obliterate through sedative amounts of drinking, although inevitably I find losing the ability more frustrating than having it but not being believed. Oh, I know that there are careless words and times when people say things in the heat of the moment, but people tend to remember what they meant, you know? Rather than what they actually said? They forget the role of the listener in the conversation, and how the filters of their experience and emotions can completely skew the most innocent of remarks; there’s no such things as a flawless conversation.

Which leads me to the joke.

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That Joke Isn’t Funny Anymore

Hannah seemed to be on a roll. Yet another girl’s night out and she was flying high. Ever since her ridiculous split with Jack just a month before, she had made it her goal in life to make the most of every second of every day. There wasn’t a bar or a club that she hadn’t tried in her mission to get over that jerk. The Blue Angel, Los Cabanos, Heebie Jeebies,etc etc. She had also dined in practically every restaurant in the city that was anything above a MacDonalds, which is a lot of places. Whilst she had been with Jack he had been the best thing since Apple Macs, but what the hey, that’s the way the rolos melt .

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Gone?

Gone?

“How did I get into this mess?”

I banged a fist on the steering wheel, perhaps in some vain hope that an answer would jump out at me, but apart from a slight tinge of fear that I might set off the airbag, no thoughts came to mind. I had been having a quiet drink in the Bull, relaxing by the fireside after a stressful day in the office and now …. where the hell was I? Well I was driving down a dark country lane in the pouring rain and heading for trouble without a doubt. Continue reading