Hope sprains eternal

So, I’m out of a job again, and moping about it.
The last couple of days I’ve been hooked on job sites, international and national. The international are clearly more interesting – but I seem to have chosen the wrong career to be a player on that circuit.

The national are a bit more discouraging careerwise, (Sure, I could be a English tutor for 2$ an hour, but it wouldn’t cover my transport cost of going in to Manila) but the do offer a smile now and then.

Here are some of the positions offered:
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13. - Technical Writter(Proficient in Adobe Framemaker)
-Graduate of any IT related course -at least 1 yr experience as a technical writter -Proficient with Adobe PageMaker - Very Good oral and written English
Location: Makati - Manila Salary: 20k-35k

They do need one, don’t they?

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39. - Guidance Head
BS/AB Psychology graduate; with MA units; effective counseling skills; 3-5 yrs exp. as Head
Location: Molino 3, Bacoor - Cavite Salary: Upon Interview Date: 16 January 2007

My head has 32 years of experience, are you sure I need a psych grad as well?

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14. - Mixed Signal Equipment Engineering Engineer
REQUIREMENTS: Candidate must possess at least a Bachelor's/College Degree in Engineering (EE/ECE) or equivalent. Knowledgeable in Basic Circuit Analysis, Test Methodology, and Basic Test Equipment Maintenance. Proficient in Test Debugging, Test Equipment Operation, Handler and Prober Operations, Use of Test Instruments, Word Processing and Spreadsheet, and Unix Environment. Willing to relocate to Laguna Location: Calamba - Laguna Salary: negotiable Date: 5 January 2007

OK, I’m not an engineer, but I’ve lived in the Philippines for over a year, should make me as good with mixed signals as anyone. Too bad, I hear engineering engineers are the best (as opposed to the low-life non-engineering engineers)

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4. Ilustrator
Those who can provide illustration and image for the children's English book
Location: Makati - Manila Salary: negotiable Date: 13 January 2007

Three words. ”With a melon!?”.

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6. House Parents
Couple to work together as house parents for former street children and orphans in a cottage at the South Campus of Christians' Haven. Man and wife must be dedicated, active, born again Christians.
Location: Manticao/Northern Mindanao - Near Iligan City - Misamis Oriental Salary: 7K + 5K/month Date: 28 December 2006

Well, as long as I don’t have to actually gice birth to it…

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48. Part-time Tutor for Computer
We are looking for professional who would like to teach the following computer applications: 1. Autocad 2. Adobe Photoshop 3. Visual Basic 4. C++ 5. Corel Draw Interested applicants may send their resume via email : xxxxxx_xxx@xxxxx.xxx
Location: Paranaque - Manila Salary: negotiable Date: 18 January 2007


Thanks, but no thanks. I was a teacher once and had an Abobe Photoshop in my class. I can’t teach those bastards anything.
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74. - Native Speaker(part time or full time)
Qualifications: 1. Preferably with teaching experience 2. Hard-working and dedicated 3. Competent to train ESL Teachers 4. Punctual and with high sense of responsibility
Location: Cebu City - Cebu Salary: very competitive Date: 13 January 2007

If it only hadn’t been in Cebu. I speak native, like, fluently…

/J.

Txt u l8r

I have a hard time throwing stuff away, so before I go ahead and delete the messages from my inbox, I will share some of my favourites with you:

List of 5 outstanding text messages sent to me

5. Category: Most obvious denial of the t9-function
Sent to me by one of L's acquaintances before a meeting in Mega Mall. It's just unusual 2 c a txt usin an xtra lttr her n d pilipins.

- wat name of backery?-

4. Category: Most creative use of umlauts, occasional uppercase letters and grave accents.
Sent to me from yaya C when she obviously thought I needed some cheering up. Well, it worked, maybe not in the way she intended though.

As thè
möön winks
at ü
t0nite,
ì wish
SWEETDREAMS
embrace
ü tight
i HöPe
ür dAy
wäs Qüitè
aLryt..
f0r n0w
i bid ü,
A LöveLy
Gudnyt..ü

(The runner-up for that one was: Ängels usuälly shöwer gräces eärly in the mrning, sö i göt up erly 2däy 2 ask dem 2 täke cäre öf u,guide u in whätever u dö & prötect u whrevr u gö.Gudm0rning!!)

3. Category: Necks of kin who hates hip hop
Sent to me when I was trying to reach helper G

- Sory sir’dis not [G],I’m knees of [G].nd I’m nt n d house -

2. Category: Priceless Portmanteau.
Sent to me from above mentioned helper G

- Ok norblem by. [G]. -

1. Category: Don't ever give your number to people you don't know.
This was sent by a guy named Alex. I met him and his friends at the town park when I'd just gotten here. They were students from San Pablo, talked about their lives, played some with my kids, were generally nice people. After a while they asked if they could have my number. After a week or so, Alex sent me this, totally unsolicited text.

- I oftn catch myslf constantly wondering hw u r, sittn alone w/ my mind set s0 far..Reminiscin abt ur smyl, ur voice, Oh my!…im missin u 2 much!-

/J.

Time to cut your hair and get a job

Sometimes a single word changes your understanding of a different culture.

My youngest son, 2,5 years old, goes to a toddler school. Their theme for the week is "Community Helpers". We happen to have an "educational poster" of community helpers. (Educational posters are very common here, we have stuff with plants, musical instruments, national heroes, numbers, letters, fish, you name it)

Yesterday my wife L asks my son J how school has been.

He goes "Fine."

She turns to the poster and points at a police officer and says "Do you recognise this guy?"

He goes "Pig."

I'll tell ya, them kindergartens in the Philippines teach the kids at a completely different level.

/J.

Politeness, epilogue

Small item, in reference to an earlier post.

I wrote some on my book today, and had to look up the word fuckup in Wiktionary to see how it translated into other languages. The only available translation? Sure enough, it was the Russians.

/J.

New costume, same shit

I was going to write something funny about radio in the Philippines, but ended up with a reminder of the governing methods of the country I'm living in who ousted their dictator in a spectacular non-violent revolution 21 years ago. Apparantly Malacanang put out a press release from the Cebu Citizen's Press Council with regard to the ASEAN Summit being held in Cebu at the moment:

Cebu Press Council appeals for sobriety among media, local officials
CEBU CITY – In an effort to show the best side of Cebu province, the Cebu Citizens Press Council (CCPC) called on the media and local officials Tuesday to show a greater sense of responsibility for an excellent media coverage and a successful hosting of the four-day 12th Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit which opens here Sunday.
In a resolution, the CCPC appealed to media practitioners to show a deeper sense of community in reporting and commenting on the news during the four-day summit and for public officials to show restraint in their disagreement with what it called specific media lapses or practices.
“The CCPC hereby appeals for greater sense of responsibility on both sides, the press and the government, for excellent media coverage and for a successful hosting of the summit,” the resolution said.
Meeting en banc for their fourth quarterly meeting at the MBF Cebu Press Center in Lahug, the CCPC noted the vast importance to the country in general and Cebu in particular of the 12th ASEAN Summit.
It also cited the major stake of the Cebuanos in the event which is expected to provide unprecedented opportunity to showcase the best of the province to foreign visitors.
“The Cebu media can greatly help in presenting Cebu’s rich heritage, culture and values; its advances in governance, education, and technology; and the attractions of the province as tourism and investment destination,” the CCPC resolution said.
The CCPC likewise pointed out that public officials should also put off public discussions of their grievances and misconceptions about the summit so that their actions could not fuel negative reporting by the media.

More here.

/J.

Merry Xmas to All

Or whichever holiday you prefer to celebrate. Or if you do not celebrate, I hope you have a good time anyway, and get what whatever you wish for in life.



Cheers.



/J.

'Tis the season

Jolly Santas smile from every frosted window

Snow covered Christmas trees sparkle with every imaginable decoration you can think of

Red-nosed reindeer relentlessly pull fake sleighs filled with fake presents over a fake winterland

And, oh yes,

This is a picture from my car after I left it on an unshaded parking lot for 30 min.

/J.

Almost Famous

If you read the PR-folders from the Swedish Embassy in Manila you get a picture of Swedish society, culture, industry, nature, climate and celebrities.

Yet they missed the most common thing Filipinos know about Sweden. It is not the Nobel Prize or IKEA or Greta Garbo or Ingemar Bergman or Ingrid Bergman or Björn Borg.

Definitely not Ingemar Stenmark or Peter Forsberg.

Not even the Swedish Muppet chef.

The two things that come in close of our winner is ABBA and Ericsson phones, which everybody knows of in this karaoke- and textmessage crazed country. But they don't necessarily know they're from Sweden. (To be honest, I guess most Ericsson phones are from China, but anyway)

What they do know is Swedish Massage, something most Swedish people never heard of (and I say this with confidence since I'm Swedish and can speak for the entire Swedish community, really)

/J.

Birds of Spray

Where there's people there's vendors. The sell all kinds of foods or products you can think of. And some you hadn't thought of. Last week I joined a school outing* with my oldest son to Manila Zoo. Outside the zoo there was a man selling - I shit you not - tree sparrows that had been spray painted red or green, in a vain attempt to make them appear more exotic**.

/J.

*I find school outings very educational. A month ago it was Sports day, which meant a 7am Saturday morning assembly to have the four-year-olds:

- go marching up and down the square

- pray

- sing the national anthem and

- take an oath of sportsmanship

before starting with the sports, which included things like peeling quail eggs and tossing water balloons to each other. This time it was the Zoo and a stage production of Aladdin. Mostly, though, it was waiting. Out of a 10-hour trip, 7,5 were spent on the bus or in a queue. The Aladdin show was great. The kids loved it. Manila Zoo, not so great. But of course, the kids loved it (and the outing was for them, not for me). I just have hard time looking at animal confined in a space so small they can hardly move - like a 3-foot Rufous Hornbill confined in a 1 m3 cage.

** Really, selling birds in the street is bad for a number of reasons (especially if you are the bird). On the flip side of this though, trade with endemic and/or rare species is a problem in the Philippines and elsewhere, so, given a choice, I'd rather see the introduced (as often regarded as pest) tree sparrows being fenced than a Philippine Cockatoo or Luzon Bleeding Heart

Storm Debris

- This is sort of old stuff -

Durian (Reming)* is gone. It left 1200+ dead (latest I heard was 1266) and over 100 000 without homes and/or crops.

It was supposed to hit us.

Not until 3.33 pm on storm day there was a report from that a high pressure area over the South China sea was pushing the typhoon south, out of the way of Metro Manila (and thereby Los Baños) . It would probably have hit Mount Mayon (where most people died) anyway, the eye going slightly north of the mountain instead of slightly south.

The days preceding Durian I thought about this entry, how I could interlace it with experiences from Xangsane (Milenyo)* after which we had a brownout for 15 days and I didn't write any entries. I never got around to really finish anything but the general thoughts were these:

It was striking how Milenyo sharpened the alertness of Reming. (A very remote allegory would be the annual Swedish epiphany that snow is slippery. Each year with the first snow there's total chaos, leaving 4 people dead and 50+ without their cars, at least until the insurance company can replace it, not really in the same league as this). Last time I heard and read about Milenyo but didn't think much of it - would probably mean a day or two or brownout and some extra cleaning in the garden. Before Reming came it was a totally different story, and not only for me. A brief summary:

Preparing for the Storm Xangsane (Milenyo):
1. Wrote witty blog entry (in Swedish) on what a piece of cake typhoons in the Philippines are.
2. Failed to buy even the basic extra candles, food, batteries, medicine.
3. Failed to charge batteries and spare lights.

Preparing for the Storm Durian (Reming):
1. A good two days in advanced we stocked up on food, batteries, candles, medicine, put gas in the car, got cash, an extra gas tank for the stove, three extra 5-gallon water jug ( in addition to the six we already have)
2. Wrote two not so witty blog entries (on the Swedish blog) on how intense typhoons in the Philippines are
3. Invited all the people I knew (and some I didn't know) living near "our hill" to stay in our house during the typhoon because of the risk of flooding and landslides (one family who accepted the offer had water up to their waists last time, but this time it was going to be worse)
4. Removing all loose objects from garden, carried anything that might be spoiled by water upstairs.

Even if it was going to be the worst storm ever, our house was fairly secure - out of the way for landslides, the flooding had to be at least 12-14 feet to reach our second floor, we had supplies -including water, food, medicine and lights - to last us for at least a week.

Storm Day Xangsane (Milenyo):
The day before a neighboring school was closed - orders from the HQ - while my kids school was open. I had contact with the president of our school and asked about tomorrow; will the school be closed tomorrow if we're on signal 2? (=class 2 typhoon 60-100 km/h sustained winds). Yes, no school if we're on signal 2. Next day I woke up at 6:30. L was already downstairs with the breakfast, and the typhoon was already at signal 3. Beside there was no way we where going to get out anyway, since the street had turned into a creek. The kids came down and were pleased that there was no school, but not so pleased they couldn't watch TV instead. I stood by the screen door watching the spectacle and jumped half a meter when a Pomelo (large grapefruit) was blown onto the screen bouncing back four meters onto the lawn. 20 minutes later one of our Durian trees was blown over the door. The Typhoon was now on signal 4 (more than 185 km/h sustained winds)(from what I heard later, not that I went outside and measured wind speed myself). . The wall facing the wind turned into a small waterfall when the rain was pushed through the closed windows by the wind. It looked like something I would like to think you would find in a upscale Japanese home and would have been great if the water was diverted back out again instead of turning the tile floor to skating rink.

What do you do under circumstances like that?
Bring out the camera of course. And the video camera (and putting towels on the floor and reading stories to the kids). I was aware that people probably were fighting for their lives about now, but there was no way I could get to them anyway. This is some of what I got:

• This picture shows the view from the second floor. It looks out of focus, but the distortion is from the rain.

• This is the same picture when the eye passed

• This is our street during the eye

and the tree that fell on our screendoor

Storm Day Reming:
After a morning run of getting the last supplies I went briefly to work for a couple of hours. Schools were already closed even though the typhoon would not pass for another 18 hours. Kept a close eye on the development (As close as I could PAGASAs homepage went down around 10 am). At 2 pm we were e-mailed a memo that said that work was suspended from 2:30 onwards. We left only after securing plastic over all computers and printers (which we did not do before Milenyo). Went home, secured everything in the house and garden, sat in front of the computer trying to get information. At around 4 pm I read an article on Manila Times that said the typhoon would miss Metro Manila. Still, it was a category 5 typhoon, the early reports from Catanduanes were terrible. One interesting thing in all this was that one of the best places to get information was Wikipedia - they already had information on windspeeds, landfalls, forecasts etc - all the regular weather sites were almost impossible to enter due to heavy traffic. We had 13 guests that night. Had some dinner. Electricity went at 7 pm. By this time we were pretty sure that Reming would largely miss us, but in the dark you never know. Got a report from my brother in Sweden who confirmed the typhoon was going due west, passing around 85 km south of LB. Power came back briefly around 9:30 pm. Went to bed at 10. Slept most of the night, and when we woke up it was all over.

Aftermaths -Days after Milenyo
First Day: Went zig-zag trying to get cash, gas, food, candles for ourselves and for those in greater need than us. Succeeded on the two latter.
Day 2-15: Continued the search for cash (got it day 3) and gas (got it day 4, when I was running on fumes). Helped out as good as we could. Received rumours that new typhoons were coming (each day from 1-6, it was even in the papers, but it never came). Spent sweaty nights trying to get some sleep and hush equally sweaty kids. Trying to get information on when the power was getting back . When it came to most of Los Baños we were still without, first the rumour was that somebody stole the power lines, secondly (when the power had come back to almost all houses in our subdivision except for ours) that a transformer had blown. Got jealous and felt worse stricken when everybody else had their power back except for us. Fought a lot. Got sick of it all and went to spent a night at a hotel (and eat their marvellous breakfast).

Aftermaths - Days after Reming
First Day: Went to Manila to spend the day with L who's flight had been delayed 11 hours (After Milenyo they were all cancelled). Made to the airport on record time (after Milenyo an office mate spent 15 hours going the 50 km to the airport, if it weren't for the bags you'd probably walk faster). When we came home the power was already restored.
Second day: Went to the beach with some friends, all back to normal

I would like to have a poignant finish to this one as well, but I guess there isn't one (and that's why it took me so long to finish it).

Win some, lose some.

/J.

* Typhoons are named by the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) on a rolling scheme where all nations around SE Asia get their turn to name Typhoons. This time it was Thailand who submitted Durian, last time Lao PDR with Xangsane. However, when a typhoon enters the Philippine Area of Responsibility it is given a name by PAGASA, Milenyo and Reming, respectively. It seems even if the Philippines submit the name such as for the severe tropical storm Bilis in July, it is still given another name 'onli in the Pilipines' (that time Florita)

Never Never Land

Once a month or so we go to a shopping mall halfway to Manila to stock up on crisp bread, ham, whole grain flour and other necessities of life.

Gopher Jrs love this. Not that they’re fond of shopping, but the mall also has a place called FUNLAND, where we take them for an hour or so while one of us gets some extra shopping time.

FUNLAND includes a trampoline…

…slides…

…big plastic cars

…basketball hoops…

...a child-friendly assault course...

…a big container filled with plastic balls (a.k.a. The Germ Pit)…

Even I have fun there. But not all is mindless running and shouting. FUNLAND also have a place for reflection and contemplation. The Reading corner.

The sign says:

Children's Reading Corner will take you to never never land,
to the magical world of princes and princesses and many other faraway places,
but please observe the following house rules:
- This area is strictly for reading books only

- Playing is not allowed in this area

- Do not bring the books outside this area
- Request for an adult to keep you company
Our crew attendant are most happy to help you

And please return the books to its proper shelves
Thank You and Enjoy Reading

(Sorry about the poor shot).

Just a quiet place (as quiet as they get in Filipino shopping malls) to enjoy a good book. I personally think it's a great idea. But the again, the book shelves looks like this…

The sign under the "...No playing is allowed in this area..." sign is this...

And what they’re really doing is this...

/J.

The Filipino Experience

As of now, I will fail to post entries on two blogs instead of one. You will find a blog dedicated to my expat's eyes here

/J.

You want to go where everybody knows your name

The last phrase of the theme of my favourite sitcom growing up has stuck with me as a description of a sense of home throughout the years. And being expat it is something you ponder about a lot. If you want some thought on it in proper English, the munificent Secret Wombat has had some entries on it.

This morning it happened again. My Yaya (nanny for my kids) told me there was a woman outside who wanted to sell me a fish.
- "She knows your name" C. said, which is code for "You'd better go out and talk to her"
So I did (and bought the fish)(and it was tasty).

I had never (knowingly) seen her before, but she knew who I was.

This particular incident is not hard to explain: I usually buy food that people bring to my doorstep. I figure I'm giving more back to the community that way. There's a good chance the woman knew someone who had earlier sold something to me. Maybe cucumbers. But it is part of a pattern.

Two weeks ago in the supermarket a man whom I've never (knowingly) seen before comes up to me at the check-out and says:
-"Sir, your lights are on"
After a split second of considering and dismissing the thought that this might be code for "Your fly is open" or "There's a huge bugger hanging out of your right nostril", I thanked him and said I'll be out in a minute to take care of it.

Now, did this man see me get out of my car? Probably not, why would he wait forty-five minutes to tell me? Then how, out of the hundred cars in the parking lot, did he match the one with the lights on to me?

A month ago my water distributor went out of business so I went to one of their competitors to ask them to start delivering water to me. I walk in to an office of a company I have never had anything to do with before, addressing a man I have never (knowingly) seen before and asked to have water delivered.
- “How many, sir?”
- “Five, please.”
- “Round?”
- “Yes, please.”
I pay him and sign my name on a receipt. When I start to fill up the address-part I am interrupted by:
-"It's OK, sir, I know where you live"

Not in a threatening way. Just pure service. But you do start to wonder why: Is it “It’s that guy that screams at his children all the time” or “It’s that guy that bought cucumbers from my cousin” or “It’s that guy that walks in the rain without an umbrella”.

Whoever you are, you are not a stranger, you can’t be. There is no such thing as anonymity (with a few exceptions, I know). This IS the land of "Hey Joe"(Which, by the way, is close enough) where you get cheery greetings from every Tom, Dick and Jhun-Jhun, but among these are also an impressive number who actually know who you are.

And it leaves me with a feeling of reassurance since I know there are people out there who obviously are looking out for me, but also a feeling of sadness because I realise that being home is not just where everybody knows your name.

You know theirs, too.

/J.

Power to the People

It was one of those Hollywood moments where everything seems easier and cooler than life itself. I was slowly coming down our street when I saw the truck from the electricity company coming round the bend. I buzzed down my window, held out my left hand, thumb up. The driver of the truck held out his left hand, thumb up.
Then he slowly drove away.

Some of the men sitting on the back of the truck started cheering "You got power!"

And, from afar, there was violin music.

/J.

I'm beginning to see the light

Before the li-et comes, there shall come a truck
and it shalt be a big ole orange truck with the divine letter marks and a skylift
and it shalt be parked in front on the building of the supreme being known as DG
it shalt be there on the fifteenth day after the darkness came
around lunchtime
and it shalt contain a small man
and the man shalt say: "Yes, sir, we go there" when asked if they are heading towards the valley of darkness, where few men dare to tread
and there will be much rejoicing
and the men will prepare to slaughter the pigs and chickens and fish found in the big freezer at south supermarket
and once more will there be edible products similar to dairy products
and the hand of the privileged yet annoyed expat shalt come upon the small man and the markings he represent should the annoyed expat find out the small man was bullshitting him

/J

Tally-ho?

In the absence of real friends and collegues to send me mails with not-so-important information to give flavour to everyday life, (with a few exceptions, of course, i.e. the reader's of this blog; I would like to thank Mom, Dad, L, A, Y, G, E and C), I've subscribed to a number of newsletters with more or less important information.

One of these newsletters informed me yesterday that today is the international Talk-like-a-pirate-day. Apparently these two guys were playing squash and then decided to talk like pirates (theory 1: One of them got a ball in one eye and had to cover it; theory 2: One of them (the one with the idea) had a racket smashed in the head. Really hard). Their website have a glossary to start with, consisting of no less than 5 words (all beginning with A). If you want to go to the advanced section there's another 7 words there. Amazingly complicated, this pirate stuff.

As a special there's soundclips where you can learn how to talk like a pirate in German, Mandarin chinese and Swedish. The swedish clip is a man with a growly, but otherwise perfectly normal and grammatically correct, voice saying (in swedish) " I, I am a pirate. I steal from the rich and give to myself. Hee-he-he-he-he-hee-heee".

So that's how you do it. I'll get right on it. Hee-he-he-he-he-hee-heee

/J.

DUI

Apparently bats die at windmills. But the USGS scientists are on it.

"One research tool that is particularly well-suited to studying the origins of bats killed at wind turbines is stable isotope analysis. USGS scientists recently pioneered the application of stable hydrogen isotope analysis to the study of migration in terrestrial mammals and proved the efficacy of the technique for studying the continental movements of bats. Coincidentally, this groundbreaking research focused on the very same species of bat (the hoary bat, Lasiurus cinereus) that is killed most frequently at wind turbine sites across North America. Because of this, the USGS is in the unique position of having an existing framework of stable isotope data on which to build."

Coincidentally, later research revealed the hoary bats’ inability to detect windmills while stuffed with stable isotopes.


/J.

Magic

Thanks to R. I finally scored a job after a year of joblessness (more on that later).

Part of the job description is use Google Earth to obtain some data (no more on that later here). Anyways, I've used GE before to pinpoint my house and that sort of thing but never realised you could tilt Earth (mock me if you must).

To me that is absolutely magic. I can somewhat grasp that you can do that, computerwise, but the feeling of actually being somewhere else even though you're just staring at your computer is (to me again) totally amazing. Nineteen years ago I played "1942" and "Winter Games" on a computer with a 64 kb memory, because that was as much as anyone needed anyway. Now this. I am able to go anywhere and do anything (well) in the world.

Here's some of my best tips:

- Climb Mount Everest and enjoy the view. No frozen feet. No dead buddies. None of that media hazzle when I get back. Just me, a beer, and a view.

- Crash into buildings on Manhattan. This one is probably not polically correct, but how would it feel?

- Take a helicopter ride over Sahara. See how long you can go without noticing any buildings, roads etc. Then go to Paris. See how long it takes before you're out of town.

- Take a helicopter ride through Grand Canyon. Rich folks do it. Why shouldn't you?

- Zoom out as far as you can. Set our planet to north. Tilt it 9 degrees. Spin it carefully. Contemplate life universe and everything.

/J.

Hospital Song

So anyway,

I got sick and went to the biggest hospital in town, which would be this one:














But they told me to go somewhere were they admitted common folks.

/J.

Sneak preview

I spend my writing time with the novel now, but I thought it might post some sneak previews here to get some feed-back on the stuff, and also provide you with some fun reading in absence of proper blogging. Here's a conversation the main character has with a dying man on domestic trouble:

- But it'll go away, right.

- Of course it won’t. It’s domestic. I can’t survive in the wild. If trouble gets in your house it will stay there. You can try to throw it out but it will come back howling at your door begging to be let in again. Sooner or later you give in to the howling and open the door. Then trouble rush in and starts to mess everything up, leaving dirty stains on your favourite chair. So you put it out again, but the stains won’t go and trouble is still smouldering in the garden, just waiting to spark again. Before you know it you have a party and trouble puts on a false moustache and sneaks in behind your fat aunt Alberta. Then you'll have trouble spreading to all your friends and relatives. I’m telling you, domestic trouble is the worst kind.

- Sounds like you know trouble.

- We’re like this. The dying man held up his right hand with the middle finger on top of the index finger. If you’re looking for trouble, you’ve come to the right place. He did the impersonation really well.

- So what do you do about it, Elvis?

- Keep it on a leach. Treat trouble like a dog and you’ve got the best ally you could ever want. You sit at a coffee shop with this big trouble tied at your chair. Some annoying prick comes up and wants to sell you something. You’ll just nod at trouble and it’ll scare away that bastard instantly. People with their trouble in check are not good consumers.

- Convenient, really.

- Then this girl comes up and say ‘Oh, it’s soooo cuuute – can I cuddle it’ and you just give her the ol’ blue gaze and say ‘please’. Then she turns to her girlfriend and whispers ‘He’s taking so good care of his trouble, he must be a good father’, pretty soon you’ll have a threesome going.

- What about trouble then?

- On occasions like that trouble will have to wait outside. A ménage à trois is my limit. Kinky is OK, but I’m not a pervert.

/J.