On Friday I visited ______ at Blundeston Prison. Hopefully it will be the last time I go there. He’s only got 6 months left on his sentence and hopes to move to a D cat prison soon. A couple of weeks ago he sent me a birthday card (pictured above). He painted it himself on card he had traded for packets of crisps. I don’t know if it’s an original image or something he copied. I think it’...
Tomorrow's episode of Hyacinth Duck may be delayed by several hours. To make up for it, here is a guest comic by backwards7 . Do not read the extra comic before tomorrow at 12 PM.
1st August, 2009 Way back in December of last year the family made plans to spend a week of the summer at my parent’s holiday cottages in the Yorkshire dales. My enduring memories of this region of the British Isles are the many precious weeks of my childhood school holidays that I spent reluctantly traipsing behind my parents across miles of desolate moorland and cow pat-strewn ...
Wednesday 28th July My recruitment pack for the PSC Genetics Study arrived yesterday. I tore the envelope open on the settee in the breakfast room like it was a belated Christmas present. Inside there was a couple of empty blood vials, some protective tubes to place them in, an explanation of the study, a consent form, a questionnaire and a tiny padded envelope to cram it all back ...
Cormorant designed by Michael LaFosse. Folded by backwards7. On Monday morning I woke up on the floor of my room, sweating heavily. My left arm had ballooned-up above the wrist. It was quiet alarming. I inspected the swelling in the bathroom and found two tiny puncture wounds which I assume were caused by a spider bite, as unlikely as that might seem in the UK. It’s Wednesday now and ...
Koi: Designed by Sipho Mabona. Folded by backwards7. Wednesday 8th July My okay, rather than sparkling, interview with chemotherapy yielded predictably okay results. These came phrased as a wordy email informing me that they will be looking elsewhere to fill the vacant position on reception. At the same time, in some wry stroke of good fortune, I won tickets to see Tinariwen at ...
Here we all are: The heaving, cash-strapped mass of 2.261 million employed united by the good weather, rising together on the upward swell of a heat wave that promises to last all week. Foggy mornings giving way to blue sky. People sitting on the beach looking at the sea. Groups of people perched on the sea wall, congregating around plastic pint glasses. The smell of warm beer. Plastic ...
February 21st 2009 La Gomera I was sitting out on my parent’s balcony, eating goat’s milk yoghurt with honey stirred into it. Looking beyond the palms and the cacti that filled the terraced gardens, and across the broad spread of the Atlantic Ocean; shallow coastal reefs revealed as patches of white surf; a three-masted ship anchored to the horizon. The sky had separated into even ...