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Temperatures are beginning to drop, late autumn turns to winter but there’s an earthy smell still in the air, no frozen ground and no snow yet. The leaves are lying on the ground, crisp and golden brown and waiting to be turned into that brown mash that precedes the winter and my watch says that there are a couple of weeks left before it gets seriously cold and it might be a good idea to have a wee break in sunnier climes. Here, sweating is confined to my sitting in the steam cabin once a day after which I run out into the garden starkers, no dip in the river though, too cold for that! Breakfast is had in Wimmer, too much as a rule and its three bread rolls instead of two. Back home and a little espresso before concentrating on the day’s news. In distant scenes, I thought I would relish the chance to read a hard copy of “Die Süddeutsche Zeitung” every day but it doesn’t work out like that. Online is where it is at and a big part of my life takes place in front of the computer. Not good for the foot I am afraid and the Chinese doctor did a decent job but he has neglected the ligaments a bit. Still, all in all, everything is sort of hunky-dory. In the evening there is the cup of coffee at the garage across the road, not in AGIP but in OMV, coffee used to be good in AGIP but now it is watered down, “segafredo” and anyway all my Slav friends have more or less disappeared. No more trying to speak my bad Bulgarian to Croats and Serbs who don’t understand me but praise me for my ability to speak a “language” that nobody understands. From time to time but not as a rule, I go into Munich, walk around, pop into the Türkenhof and talk to Charlie, drop by Scheideggers and say hello to Ian. Time has sort of stood still but look closely; everyone is a wee bit older, and after the Türkenhof or Scheideggers its into the Black Bean or the Deli; either the Deli in Amalien Strasse or the one in Kaulbach Strasse. Wireless internet you see and it all makes for a pleasant coming up for air, people watching, a little buzz, even if it is only a light buzz and the student population of Munich is not what it once was! However, the late autumn in the English Gardens still makes for a pleasant amble and then there are the bookshops. Is there a book in me? Probably not but maybe and I just don’t know, I get down and I look at some serious stuff and then I look at some serious stuff written about the serious stuff and I realise that I am just not that serious. Going on 53 and I have never quite grown up, football results are still important, mind you, I don’t cry if Rangers lose these days. Life is good for the time being and while it’s not all “carpe diem”, it is that a little bit, with the “que serra” and the past, recent and distant, taking a back seat….. still sense that I have a purpose but being the lazy shit that I am that purpose will never be realised and in the great scheme of things it doesn’t matter a “monkey’s” one way or the other. Of course, I am going to wake up one morning or look in the mirror one day and say …. “fuck” and then, of course, little deluded me should probably be doing that already. Doesn’t seem to matter though, there is the breakfast with the one bread roll too many every day, there is going to bed and snuggling up to the “missus”, there is getting up when I want to and then there are evenings in front of the computer and then there is writing shit like this every day and you know the that the “serious” job is round the corner because you have been here before and it doesn’t matter where and when because when it is all over bar the shouting, there will still be here, home!
The picture above shows the morning espresso, in the garden, at home.