Truths and Half Truths

Parti Acadien Ce Soir!

We ought to live each day as though
it were our last day here below.
But if I did, alas, I know
it would have killed me long ago.

-  Piet Hein

Tonight, I'm going to a party. 

I'll jump in my car around 7:30 or so and make the hour-long drive to the Evangeline Region of Prince Edward Island, the centre of Acadian culture in these parts.  There, in the town of Wellington (how odd that the principal town in the Acadian Region should be named for a British oppressor!) I will park my car behind a long row of others and wend my way up a driveway to the side porch of a gorgeous century home on the main drag.

I've been to this house before, but I can never remember whether it's the second or third house after the intersection. That doesn't concern me at all - from the moment I step out of my car, I'll just follow the sound of the music.  When it comes to finding an Acadian kitchen party, you can play it by ear.

Once I get to the porch, I'll have to navigate perilously stacked beer cases and snow-filled coolers, stopping for a few minutes in the inevitable "smoking section" to greet friends I haven't seen in months or even since last year at this time.  I'll dump my case of Diet Pepsi in a snowbank and head in, dropping my shoes in the huge pile at the door before I deliver my spinach dip to the hosts, assuming I can find them in the jam-packed kitchen.  That done, and with drink in hand, I'll head for the parlour ... and the music.

Ah, the music. 

The music will  fill every room and resonate through the walls - Acadian fiddle, with a unique, incredible, foot-tapping tic-a-TAC, tic-a-TAC rhythm that is so infectious you can't sit still.  There will be piano, several guitars, perhaps a button accordion or two, maybe even some Uillean pipes, and at any given time eight, ten, fifteen fiddlers, all playing the same tune in perfect unison, bending their bows into it while those of us mere mortals sit on the sideline and either whoop and shout encouragement or provide percussion.

The percussion might come from a bodhran or two (Irish drums), perhaps some spoon players, and almost certainly the most ancient form of drumming, pedal percussion - the feet meeting the floor as one dancer, another, another, two, three six at a time all step-dance in perfect time.

The food will be plentiful and unusual, the conversation lively and in at least two languages (three, if you count the bastardized dialect that is called chiac, wherein you might "... venez au deli pour acheter un ham sammich et un cup of coffee"), the laughter will ring out from every corner, and the music will fill everyone's soul to bursting.

I'm thinking it's going to be a good night.

Cue Willie Nelson ...

For whatever reason(s) (and I have speculated about this before), most of the people who travel in and out my door here are women.  If you're a woman, and this is one of your stops on a regular basis, I'm just going to guess it's because you either like what I have to say or like the way I say it or some combination of both, and whatever the reason, you're always welcome.

Now, go away.

Well, don't go away away.  Go here.

I'm doing you two favours with this.  First, I am sending you to one of the wittiest, most literate, and most thoughtful writers I have stumbled upon in my travels on the Internets - her name is Linda, although thousands of readers know her as Miss Alli from Television Without Pity. 

And secondly, I am sending you directly to the latest entry on her personal weblog, which - if it doesn't save your life - ought to at least change it in any number of ways, all of them for the better.  Yes, it's that good.

Now, shoo.  Nothing more to see here.  Read the entire post, then come back and thank me when you're done.

Only Two More Sleeps Till ... Holiday

And so this is Christmas.  And what have we done ...?

Well, a quarter of a century has come and gone since John Lennon left us, and this year started with a tour in England, accompanied by the entire family, where we took this picture for our family Christmas Card:

Points for guessing the locale and what we were doing.

And the year ended with a visit to the suite where John Lennon recorded "Give Peace a Chance". Fitting, all things considered.

Every year we send out one of those annoying letters with our Christmas Cards.  When the kids were young, I would compose the letter, but now they're all growed up, so they take turns and each year try to outdo the year previous.  Here, with occasional editor's notes framed by square brackets, is this year's version (and if you don't appreciate good doggerel, you are dead to me):

Merry Christmas from the Lings, we hope this finds you well.
It’s Erin’s turn this year to write the letter, can you tell?
We’ve had an action-packed twelve months – I’ll try not to be long-winded,
A lot of you heard our big news (well, at least all of our kin did).

[Oh, come ON.  How can you not love that?]

The four of us, plus Matthew, went to Britain this past May.
We did Scotland, England, Paris – it was great, what can I say?
Dad was doing shows, and brought us all just for the ride,
He played in lots of small towns through the English countryside.

We rented our own vehicle and we drove the wrong way ‘round;
I’m a bossy back seat driver (and Dad hates that, so we found).
Besides the driving, we had fun and we barely ever fought
(if they don’t read this letter first, that lie can not be caught!).

[Let me quote directly - and I do mean verbatim - from Allison's trip journal from one such excursion:   

DAD:   Blah blah blah, jerkjerkjerk, blah, blah, blah.
MOM:  Shut up, fuck off, eat shit, and die.

Seriously.  I'm hard on navigators.]

We saw Glasgow, up in Scotland, and Paris, down in France,
Saw Brooke Shields in a London show … who knew that she could dance?
We did the basic tourist stuff, what everybody’d do,
We got to see Stonehenge and Bath - the month just really flew.

Matt and I went on our own to see my friend in Porth
(that’s in Wales, just so you know, from Cardiff, it’s just north).

The highlight of my trip, I guess, was on the final day,
Matthew popped the question and I had to say, “OK!”
What high school sweethearts do you know who have the bragging power
To say they got engaged at the base of the Eiffel Tower?

[Suck it, Tom Cruise.  Two weeks before you.  This is the exact moment Erin told her sister.  I love this - the shared joy is everything I believe sisters should be.]

So that’s our biggest news this year, I’m getting married in July –
The sous-chef at the nicest spot in town … now that’s my guy!
I had jaw surgery in March, part of the deal with braces,
It kind of sucked, but my teeth are fixed – and see how nice my face is

[Allie on the left, Erin with her new face on the right, on the London Eye]

I’m subbing music tons this year, running ‘round and getting dizzy
My 19 private piano students keep me very very busy.
I teach karate four times a week my time is never free.
But here’s what Allie’s up to – you’re likely sick of me!

Allie graduates this year – she’s an Honours English Major.
She’ll finish at the top and win awards and things, I’ll wager.
On top of all the schoolwork she does, she somehow finds
The time to work a part-time job, teach fiddle to young minds,

She helps out at the pet pound, helping dogs and cats and birds,
She’s such a fine young woman now, we’re proud beyond all words!
She’s still with her guy, Trevor, that handsome golfing pro
(We think that they should tie the knot, but she says not yet, no).

Mom and Dad keep busy (well, Mom does more than Dad).
Golfing’s over for the season and that always makes them sad.
Mom still works with clay – she’s our (talented!) own potter
She’s thinner than she’s ever been and she never has looked hotter!

[Strict picture and name embargo here.  But Erin's an honest kid.]

Border Collie Roxy, who is 60 pounds and gaining
Has joined fly-ball with Mom and they are really good at training.
Dad is working hard and has a project underway,
I think it is a secret, but it’s for TV, I’ll say.

If you haven’t seen him this past year, you won’t believe your eyes –
He’s down more weight , you gotta see, he’s nearly half his size!

[Yeah, but they still call me to play Santa.]

That’s mostly it this year, I guess – we’ll likely be in touch
Happy New Year, Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and such!

- The Lings

So, that's our year.  It's been a good one, on balance. 

There were setbacks - there always are.  Letters like this always stress the rosy side of things, but nobody goes through a year without pain and anguish and sadness and anger and fear and doubt.  They're there, but they don't make it into the Christmas letter.

If you've had what feels like more than your share of the bad stuff, I hope you can take a few minutes to write yourself a Christmas letter.  Pick out the best of this past year and, for a few days at least, make that the focus of all your thoughts.  Remind yourself of everything that is good in your life, and let the rest live behind the page for just a short while.

The bad won't go away, for any of us.  And if it does, rest assured there will be other bad to rush in and fill the vacuum.  But the good endures, too, and there's more good just waiting round the corner for its chance to fill your soul.

Endure the bad, but be especially ready in heart and soul to welcome the good.  It will come.

Merry Christmas.

Peeker-Pants

Two very disturbing posts - here and here - remind us all that this is the time of year when the Scourge of the Season, the Christmas Peeker-pants emerges to wreak havoc on the rest of us.  We innocents, who only want to make it a wonderful, delightful, surprise-filled Christmas morning for all our loved ones are, as always, in danger of having our Christmas dreams dashed by these cruel, heartless, insensitive people.

I've been ready for Christmas since, oh, mid-September.  This year, as always,  I started shopping in the early summer, and I’ve been gradually building up inventory until now I’m long since ready to face the season.  I’ve got presents hidden all over the house.

The question: Can I remember where I put them all?  (Correct answer: “Of course not.  What are you, new?”)

And I’m afraid to go on a search, because my wife is also one of those people who always has her Christmas shopping done early, as are my daughters. So when I’m rooting around for everybody else’s presents, I’m afraid I’ll find some of mine. 

I would hate that. 

I’m not a Christmas present peeker.  Haven’t been,  ever since the Johnny Seven® incident.

I was twelve years old, and it was a couple of weeks before Christmas.  I was filled with excitement, because I had been dropping hints the size of Guam that all I really wanted for Christmas was a Johnny Seven®.

You can’t buy a Johnny Seven® any more.  I suppose it wasn’t a very “enlightened” gift.  But back in the mid-sixties, it was all a ten year old boy could want. 

It was seven - count ‘em- seven (!) lethal weapons rolled into one compact package.  You had your rifle.  Your machine gun.  Rocket launcher.  Pistol.  Bayonet.  And a two other killing tools I can’t for the life of me remember.  All in one gun.

Suffice to say that with that little beauty in my hands, I would singlehandedly become the dominant force on our block in terms of sheer firepower.  If I got a Johnny Seven® for Christmas, the balance of power in our neighbourhood would shift dramatically.  It would have much the same effect as if Denmark one day announced “Oh, by the way, the whole nuclear thing?  Yeah, we’ve got the bomb.” 

My parents had one hiding place for presents - a crawl space behind their closet.  They thought none of us kids knew about it, but kids know. 

One day, egged on by my brother,  I crept into their closet, peeked into that crawl space …  and there it was. 

A gorgeous, authentic Johnny Seven®!  I was ecstatic.  I couldn’t wait until Christmas. 

Problem was - I had to.

So there I was - three weeks to go - and no surprises on the horizon.  We weren’t a rich family, so I knew I had seen the sum total of my Christmas.  Oh, sure, there would be ugly polo pyjamas, slippers - what my brother and I disdainfully called “soft presents”.  But nothing really cool.  The more I let that rest on my mind, the more depressed I got. 

By Christmas morning, I couldn’t even feign surprise or delight.  So not only did I ruin my own Christmas, I also put a dent in my Mom’s.  And she put a dent in my brother, because she knew I wouldn’t have snuck around into their hiding place on my own. 

All things considered, a bad Christmas for everyone, and all because I weakened and became a Christmas Present Peeker-Pants.

Since then, my peeking days are over.   I’m almost neurotic about not finding out what I’m getting.  I hide my eyes whenever somebody comes into the house carrying shopping bags.  I keep them hidden while I call out: “is it safe to look?”

“Dad, I was at the drugstore.”

“Did you buy me any presents?”

“I guess that depends on whether you’d want something in the way of a women’s personal hygiene product.”

“No, I’m good, thanks.”

So, given my terror that I might ruin Christmas,  I’m afraid to poke around looking for the gifts I bought and hid months ago. 

My plan is, we’ll have a “Christmas Treasure Hunt” -  like an Easter Egg hunt, only without the eggs:  “OK, kids ... Daddy bought you some nice presents.  All you have to do is find them.”

Of course, maybe they already have.  They could be Christmas present Peeker-pantses, just like their mother.  I guess we’ll find out soon enough.  The test is simple.  If they can actually locate all their gifts - we’ll know they’ve been snooping. 

And if not ... well, nothing wrong with having a head start on Christmas 2006.

Some Random Thoughts

1. This past week, I've been suffering through a flare-up of a recurring back ailment.  It kicks up when I do something dumb, almost always involving splitting and loading in firewood. 

I'll be fine.  Being married to a Physiotherapist, I know that whenever I suffer an injury, I have quick and easy access to a mind-numbing fucking lecture about how stupid I am. 

(I just thank God I didn't marry a Dental Hygenist - not that they're not nice people, but have you ever gone to get your teeth cleaned and NOT suffered through the "Floss Lecture"?  God.  I get it, already.  I should floss.  Now STFU.)

Anyway, when the problem first cropped up a few years ago (yes, I had been stacking firewood at the time), I went to my wife for treatment, because hey, it's her area of expertise.  She was delighted I'd gotten hurt, because as it turned out she was organizing an in-service about back pain and was a bit short on people with acute back injuries to serve as guinea pigs. 

This was a Thursday, the course was on Saturday, and she was quite happy to let me suffer excruciating pain for two days in order to provide a more useful demo for her damn course.  Such is the joy of marrying medical professionals.  Always the greater good, never MY good.

Anyway, the ship has sailed on making this long story short, but suffice to say I was helped by the expert and still follow his course of exercises which, I promise you, will absolutely rid you of common lower back pain.  But this week I had a flare-up and it's been inconvenient and by times it has slowed me down, and meant I was less inclined to be at this desk.  That said, I'm here today ...

2.   ... although I almost wasn't, thanks to an encounter this week with some of the local wildlife.  This is a story in which I invoke many images from a childhood spent watching cartoons.

I live out in the country in a 150 year old farm house which I adore.  It is filled with character and charm and exquisite workmanship, and for over a century and a half it has provided comfort and joy to many different families.  And if, along the way, it has occasionally suffered the indignity of a half-assed renovation or poorly-planned DIY project, it's still a lovely place to be.

But it is a farm house.  It has the original stone foundation, with gaps that need filling and holes that need plugging but which still provides plenty of opportunities for local fauna to set up residence.  So I've carted away skunks, humanely trapped mice (when the cats slip up on their job) and fought an ongoing battle with squirrels that makes me feel sometimes like Donald Duck vs. Chip n Dale, and yes, I know they weren't squirrels but whatever.

I fight these battles with a live-and-let-live mentality.  I don't begrudge these varmints (oops, channelling Yosimite Sam there) a place to live.  I just differ with them on sharing my home.  What I'm saying is, by and large, I'm more likely to spot one of them and go "Awwww, look ... ain't he cute?"

Except rats. 

I'm sorry, my equanimity towards the animal world does not extend to rats.  I fucking loathe rats.  They give me the absolute heebie-jeebies, and were they not on the face of the planet, I would not mourn their passing for one nano-second.

Well, the other day I went out to my wood-shed, because I hadn't done anything that day to hurt my back and it seemed like I was overdue.  And as I was loading some wood onto a dolly for transfer into the house, I heard a scrabbling sound coming from a big garbage pail.  I looked over the rim, and there, trapped in the bottom, was a rat the size of a cocker spaniel.  We're talking ROUS.

Well, okay, perhaps not QUITE that big, but still.  It was rat sized.  And rat ugly.  And it looked up at me from the bottom of that bin and you could hear it thinking, "Let me out of here, you human bastard, and I will bite you and give you the Bubonic Plague and poop in your flour bin and chew your insulation so you freeze to death and then I will happily gnaw on your frozen corpse for the rest of the winter and lay my five dozen little rat babies, conceived by sex with my brother, in your entrails."

Well.  Quite the conundrum I was facing.  Because if I just tipped the bin and clambered up the wall and clung there by my fingernails like Sylvester until the rat scurried away, I just knew it wasn't going to take that kindness as a sign it should embark on a trek across the fields to go live somewhere else.  No, sir.  That big honkin' rat would scurry directly under my house and continue living its ratty little life only inches away from me.  Which, yuck.  Yuck Yuck Yuck.

So, not going with the catch-and-release thing.  The rat would have to die.  And I know how painful this must be for some of my animal-loving friends, but I'm sorry, he was not fucking Bambi, okay?  Hate me if you will, but I decided with surprisingly little internal debate that by the end of the day, either that rat would be dead or I would be.  And believe me, if my wife came home and found that I had caught a rat and released it, death would not be the least attractive of the various possible fates I would suffer.

So, I had motive.  I had opportunity.  I had a location.  Now, all that was required was a murder weapon and the deed could be done.  (Tess, you may want to skip this part.)

I have a rat trap.  It is huge and powerful and just a couple of weeks ago, when I spotted a rat (quite possibly the rat in question, although rats don't have much in the way of distinguishing features) around our bird feeder, I went out and set the trap in hopes of catching it.  I baited the trap with peanut butter and left it under the feeder.  I checked it a few times, but it was still waiting, jaws open, for its prey when we had a snowstorm.  It now lies buried under two feet of snow.

So, I could go out and try to get the trap, but have we not all watched enough Roadrunner cartoons to know exactly what would happen were I to start rooting around in a snow drift for an unsprung trap?   Please.  The only question is whether my fingers would throb and glow, or whether I would yelp in pain, stand up too fast, bonk my melon on the feeder, sit down in the snow, and have little birdies circling my head.

And were I to somehow find the trap without suffering injury, and attempt to lower it into the can, I just KNOW the rat would scamper up the whole works, including my arm, bite me on the lip, poop down my collar, and leave me for dead.  And even if that didn't happen, there was no guarantee the rat would do anything more with the trap than use it to fashion some sort of rat launching pad to escape and terrorize my house.

So, no rat trap.  I looked around my wood shed.  Hmmm.  What could possibly be found in a wood shed that might be useful in these circumstances?

If you're not there yet, take a moment ...

Okay.  So, I'm not a bad person, really I'm not.  And I'm sorry, but once again let me repeat that this was a fucking rat, not a kitten or puppy or baby bunny rabbit.  And if you're a person who doesn't draw those distinctions, I commend you - you are indeed a better person than I.

For the record, I wasn't any more cruel about it than I had to be.  Not like I used a hatchet or anything.  I got out my eight pound maul, held it at a height, and released it.  The first drop may have done the trick, but I wasn't taking chances.  By the time I was done, the rat, she was flat.  And dead.

I can't feel that I'll suffer any great karmic shift from what happened.  It was totally self-defense.  Survival of the fittest.  Well, best armed and least rat-like, anyway.  My conscience is clear.

Buh-duh-buh-duh-buh-duh-buh-duh-That's all, folks.

We (or Typepad, to be more specific) Are Experiencing Technical Difficulties

It was the charming and slightly dangerous, ought-not-be-given-the-sharp-pointy-scissors  Bucky Four-Eyes who alerted me to the technical melt-down being experienced by Typepad, the blogging application of choice here.  She e-mailed me plaintively last week, concerned that her bawdy comments might have blown some sort of fuse on my blog because the most recent post - and all the accompanying comments - had disappeared.

The Typepad people were having one of those special moments that anyone who owns a computer has had, and their system folded like a cheap lawn chair.  They appear to have the system back in place, but some of the comments to the last post seem to have evaporated, including the one from Bucky where she promised the Internet as a Hole a peek at her assless chaps.  But you can trust me.  It was there.

Anyway, I'm back - more or less - and will have something more interesting than technical difficulties to talk about in the next day or so ...

S.Q.* = 3

* Suckage Quotient (Where 1 = Rocked and 10 = Bit the Big One)

So, it wasn't so bad - not my best performance ever, but I sucked less than I might have.  I was working with familiar material, and my performance was smooth but, I felt, not particularly inspired.  You take it as it comes, I guess.  The audience seemed to enjoy it just fine.

There were some other terrific performers on the bill (Tracy MacDonald, Scott Falconbridge, David Pryde. Maynard Morrison, and Bette MacDonald, not to mention the iconic host, Lorne Elliot), and I didn't feel out of place.  I'm never happy with a show, and I have about the worst seat in the house, but all in all, it felt ... okay.  That's as good as it gets for me.  I was told later I did just fine, so ... whatever.  Nobody died.

Thanks to all my friends for your kind wishes - I don't know a performer worth going to see who doesn't feel the need for some good vibes when the lights come up.  You know going in that you probably wouldn't have been hired to do a gig like this if other people who are supposed to know stuff didn't have faith in you, but there are any number of reasons why you can step out onstage and suck rhinos.  Good luck never goes to waste.

The best part of the weekend was being put up at the Queen Elizabeth in Montreal.  This was the hotel which, back in 1969, hosted a "Bed-In" by John Lennon and Yoko Ono in Suite 1742 from which they recorded "Give Peace a Chance".

On December 9, 25 years and a day after he was shot dead, I couldn't NOT go up a few floors and get my picture taken in front of the very suite where he'd recorded the song.

I'm not big on ghosts or spirits or such.  In many ways it just felt like a room in a hotel in a strange city.  But knowing what had happened there - and believing, as I do, that political change is so often triggered by cultural events - it felt somehow like hallowed ground.

I don't think I'd be happy with myself if I hadn't done this.

Best line of the weekend came from Lorne Elliot, via Irwin Barker.  Irwin is one of my favourite comics - who has such gems as "So, I'm dating a Buddhist ... because hey, you only live once ..." . 

Well, with the radio show winding down, Lorne gets asked time and time again what he plans to do next, and having been in that position, I know how annoying it can be.  You finally come up with some sort of glib, clever answer to kill the discussion.  And the response Lorne has settled on is "I'm planning on launching a fragrance."  Cute.

So Irwin asked, and Lorne answered, and Irwin looked at him for about three seconds and said "Hmm.  Never heard it called that before."

Deadly.

I Have a Certain Je Ne Sais Quoi ...

... which will serve me well in Montreal, which is where I'm heading for the weekend.  Off to perform in a national radio show called "Madly Off In All Directions".  I'm hoping not to suck too bad.  Wish me luck.

Update: I (Sorta) Rock

Well, let's just say if I were a plumber, I would be either out of business in a week or the single most expensive tradesperson on the planet.

In fairness to me (always a noble goal), any job in a 150 year old house is not going to be routine.  You're always dealing with 150 years of other peoples' faulty measurements, jury-rigged solutions, and plain "close enough for gummint work" construction techniques.  Add to that changes in technology (ABS plastic pipes instead of steel or lead, for example) and you have a recipe for turning any half-day job into 12 hours or more.

The part of the job I expected to be the most difficult was actually a breeze.  Taking out the old toilet was quick and easy - a couple of screws, a little force, and it came right out. 

That was the first time I said "Oh ... shit." 

Because where it had been was now an ugly hole.  Generations of half-assed home repair dorks had essentially laid a succession of sub-floors and floors around the old doll, rather than disturb the plumbing.  Which is fine if your new toilet has the same footprint as your old one. 

Mine didn't, of course.

So before I could install anything I had to go out to my shop and faithfully shape a plywood patch to fill the gaping wound in the floor, complete with accurate hole for the piping.  Then I had to put the terlet in place, make sure everything was properly sealed and watertight, and hook up the waterline.  It was fussy work, took several trips back and forth to the hardware store to match new and old technology, but finally, just before supper, I was done.

As it happened, my plumber - the aforementioned Cecil - dropped over right around then because we've had a persistent leak in our outside faucet and it required his specialized tools and knowledge.  I got him to look over my handiwork and he pronounced it "Just fine."

So, I rock.  I rock slowly, and methodically, and you couldn't afford to pay me to rock by the hour, but I rock nonetheless.

The only real excitement of the day came when Cecil got to work putting in a shut-off valve for the outside faucet.  To do that, he had to close off the water, which he did - but nobody thought to check and see who might be, say, in the shower at that moment.

It was Allie.  She was not impressed. 

Cecil, a God-fearing, decent, quiet-spoken man, may have learned some new words today.  Honestly - I have no idea where she gets that potty mouth.

We Who Are About To Commit Home Repair Salute You

I live in a 150 year old farm house.  It was learn to do home repair or learn to live with the giant sucking sound of money being siphoned out of my bank account and into the hands of tradespeople.  I have chosen the former, and have, over the last few years, become quite handy.

There have been adventures, to be sure.  And some of my repairs would provoke knowing smirks or condescending pats on the head from the pros.  But some have come off alright - in fact, one year I built a deck that won an award for "Best New Deck on the Island".  It's still standing, too.  I'm proud of that deck.

Anyway, this past week one of my daughters asked why there was a puddle around the upstairs toilet.  My wife's first guess - having to do with my aiming abilities - was wrong.  In fact,  the toilet had sprung a leak in the cast iron pipe that connects the tank to the bowl.

Oh, yes.  A cast iron pipe.  Did I mention the house was 150 years old?  The toilet has been around for - best guess here - 80 of those years.  It has performed admirably over that time, but all good things must pass, and I guess enough bad things have been passed into this toilet for enough years that it has finally succumbed to old age and metal fatigue.

So, today I stopped in at my favourite place in the entire world, my hardware store, and purchased an American Standard Cadet III.  It is, by all accounts, the pinnacle of modern toilet technology.  And in a few moments, I will go upstairs, take out the tired old toilet, and put in a new crapper.

80 years old.  I'm guessing that taking the old one out will involve much colourful language, much WD40, much grunting, and more than a few moments when I will fervently regret not just calling Cecil, the best plumber in the world, and saying "Dude, have at it and send me the bill."

But in the end, I will have a new place to do my thinking.  And with any luck, a better toilet will mean better thinking.  It will certainly mean less water on the floor.

Assuming my aim improves.

OK, off I go.  Here's hoping this doesn't become a scene from a sitcom.