Cheering Up Through Gritted Teeth

I've posted this before in a previous life, but I need it...



...and Stephane Grappelli and Django Reinhardt for extra comfort.

Work work. Apart from the intense strain of having to take life Seriously after nine months of la vie d'un flaneur in Ukraina and Hove, there is

• paying good money to reside in Croydon five nights a (Croydon!!!) week
  

• a single room in a B&B hotel and no hope of getting Laid and the green-lilac striped duvet and the Picture
  

• the lack of seagulls

• the lack of sea
  

• illegal to smoke in English hotel rooms any more, so I have to lean out of the window like an old Frenchman on a third-floor balcony down a sunless side street in Paris
  

• the policemen, the... noooo, in fact everybody went and got younger every year. After nine months on my tod I notice this every five minutes in my populous office

• the Stationary cupboard: some things never change

• likewise the girl in charge of the Stationary Cupboard

• and the Last Stapler In The Stationary Cupboard, the rattly one with "Viv" tippexed on the head
  

But I hope you are awed by the bullet points. I got boxes of 'em. As a Project Manager, I get to apply them like a poxed jade her beauty-patches.

---

Stapler - this is more than you ever wanted to know about staplers, including a last paragraph headed "The Future".

---

LESSONS OF THE WAR

To Alan Michell

Vixi duellis nuper idoneus
Et militavi non sine gloria

I. NAMING OF PARTS

To-day we have naming of parts. Yesterday,
We had daily cleaning. And to-morrow morning,
We shall have what to do after firing. But to-day,
To-day we have naming of parts. Japonica
Glistens like coral in all of the neighboring gardens,
And to-day we have naming of parts.

This is the lower sling swivel. And this
Is the upper sling swivel, whose use you will see,
When you are given your slings. And this is the piling swivel,
Which in your case you have not got. The branches
Hold in the gardens their silent, eloquent gestures,
Which in our case we have not got.

This is the safety-catch, which is always released
With an easy flick of the thumb. And please do not let me
See anyone using his finger. You can do it quite easy
If you have any strength in your thumb. The blossoms
Are fragile and motionless, never letting anyone see
Any of them using their finger.

And this you can see is the bolt. The purpose of this
Is to open the breech, as you see. We can slide it
Rapidly backwards and forwards: we call this
Easing the spring. And rapidly backwards and forwards
The early bees are assaulting and fumbling the flowers:
They call it easing the Spring.

They call it easing the Spring: it is perfectly easy
If you have any strength in your thumb: like the bolt,
And the breech, and the cocking-piece, and the point of balance,
Which in our case we have not got; and the almond-blossom
Silent in all of the gardens and the bees going backwards and forwards,
For to-day we have naming of parts.

Henry Reed, "Naming of Parts", 1942.