Pull It Back And Watch It Go (Forever)

The pressure is building. Time is running out. The heat is on. Whatever cliché I choose to use, the fact remains that if I don't get updating this thing soon, I may very shortly be on the receiving end of a menacing look. I know. I was terrified, too.

There's only one problem: after a big gap, it's hard to know where to start. I could just summarise all the stuff that's happened recently that I've failed entirely to mention, but then I have to decide what to put in and what not to and remember things and all sorts. Alternatively, I could just talk about some big stuff in a bit more detail and let the rest be, but I've never written about anything significant here before and I'm damned if I'm going to start now.

So, instead, I'm going to tell a story from a long time ago. Now, the chances are that if you're reading this you've heard this story anyway, not because I tell it to many people but because I'm reasonably confident I know my rather paltry readership, particularly my even paltrier post-gap readership. Anyway, here we go.

When I was little (I don't know how little) I had a little pull-back Postman Pat van. It was tremendous fun, pulling that little thing back and watching it speed back to deliver letters to the good people of Greendale. Or at least, the good people of the kitchen floor, which was the only surface I could easily get to that it would run on. I loved that little thing. But one day, something terrible happened: I was playing quietly with my little van and, thanks to a moment of uncontrolled driving madness, it trundled away into the dreaded darkness Underneath The Fridge. I was distraught, as I'm sure you can imagine. Over the years, the wound healed, but I never forgot that toy. It sat in the back of my mind, telling me to be patient, assuring me that it would return one day. And then, finally, the promised day came. Our fridge packed in and had to be replaced. That, of course, meant taking the old one out, and that meant that I could get my beloved Postman Pat pull-back van back! Oh, what a happy day it should have been.

But it wasn't.

You see, somehow, in that unforgiving realm twixt fridge and floor, that van had disappeared without a trace. Vapourized by aliens. Stolen by pixies. I don't know what happened to it. I just know it's gone, and it's not coming back.