Whilst waiting for my soup to heat up last night (Covent Garden brand of smoked bacon and lentil - sorry Avrilo your descriptive menus are addictive) some undignified, and furious group exhertions caught my eye on the box.

Me: What the flippin 'enry is that?
Maureen: Oh it's the winter olympics love - curling!
Me: Curling? Mo' don't be daft love - where do they plug in the heated rollers?
Maureen: (Sighing with a knowledgeable exasperation usually reserved for people who buy lladro figurines from Portugal) Curling is a precision sport similar to bowls or bocce, it's played on ice with polished heavy stones.
Me: (incredulous silence pervades, competing with the aroma of burnt lentils)
Maureen: (continuing on a roll now normally served with the soup): The level of precision and complex nature of the strategic thinking required to win in curling has led it to be referred to as "Chess on Ice."
Me: Chess on ice! Chess on ice! Mo' love, have you taken your tablets today? If that's chess on ice it's a bloody pantomime without the jester's shoes. It's lentil! (burnt soup pan is disdainfully hurled across the kitchen floor in a stroke of precision curling)
Maureen: (attempting to extinguish a small smirk) Ooh that's a check-mate love and you didn't even use the broom!

Interesting point - the ban on smoking in public places.

It's still okay to smoke in your own home I believe. Well that's very magnanimous of the government. Picture the scene......you've just indulged in a cosy bout of coitus and basking in the after action satisfaction of a shared fag (no! None of politicians mentioned in JD's blog) with your cigg-nificant other. Shag tobacco if you will.

Cigg-nificant grasps your arm in unfiltered horror. A noise disturbs the smuggy atmosphere. It's a burglar - Marlboro Man. He's just broken in and is thieving his way through the entire contents of your home. But it's you that's broken the law. You are smoking in his work environment. It's all gone menthol

"Roman Feast of Lupercalia - This ancient pagan fertility celebration, which honored Juno, queen of the Roman gods and goddesses and goddess of women and marriage, was held on February 14, the day before the feast began. During festival time, women would write love letters, also known as billets, and leave them in a large urn. The men of Rome would then draw a note from the urn and ardently pursue the woman who wrote the message they had chosen. (Apparently, the custom of lottery drawings to select valentines continued into the 18th century, coming to an end when people decided they'd rather choose -- sight seen! -- their valentines)".

And so on to today...............

Consumer Cupid is firing his arrows into sausages in the butcher's window, the take-away menu from Too Kan Choo, flyers from some filthy mini-cab office with a bloke answering the calls who is Shane McGowan's ugly brother. And pile cream from the local chemist. Oh the romance! Not content with love chips, arriva bus billets and smooch your pooch, there is "love your pin number". Love someone else's bloody pin number. Hopefully they will pick up the bill and coo!!!!

Black. They sang the song it's a "Wondeful Life - no need to run and hide". But I prefer my version - no need to run and dive. Picture the scene. A sharp January day. Bright not bleak. Windless but cold nevertheless. Love is a stranger in a bold, fast car. The road curving and sloping. The chalk white cliffs nudge both sea and sky.......

Approaching the summit the road runs parallel to the cliffs of Beachy Head. And there proudly and conveniently demarcated is parking. PAY AND DISPLAY parking. PAY AND DISPLAY!
Hang on a minute there mister. Hang on one Beachy Head minute. Are you kidding? A tormented soul, you've reached your final destination. You woke up one morning and instead of getting yourself a gun, got into your Fiat Panda. Beachy Head. Enough said.

Before leaping into the abyss of the unknown, would you really fumble in your pocket for loose change? Then tap gently on the window of the Ford Focus opposite, proffering an apologetic fiver in exchange for coinage. "Cheers mate, what size shoes do you wear?" What if still wrestling with your own expiry, the traffic warden slaps a parking ticket on your window screen. Your parking ticket has just expired.

It's a wonderful life............a wonderful, wonderful life. Really it is. Should you just change your mind, ergo choose life, the road lopes on down to Eastbourne - valley of the shadow of death.........