Pittsbull

I have just escaped a conference in Pittsburgh. It was a big enough convention to upset the natural balance of the city: apparently Subway ran out of bread and the restaurants and bars were rammed to bursting with goons recycling their stories and in-jokes, while nervously eyeing the locals. Inside the cavernous conventional centre, the surfaces were covered in a thin layer of silvery mucous, which on closer inspection turned out to be members of laptop club. It is one of the human race's crowning achievements that so many of their most highly educated members will spend a large sum of money on registration, travel and hotel rooms, so that they may check their email in different city for a week.

Sometimes people did enter one of the many meeting rooms to hear a presentation, or to check their email in the dark. Talks varied from the really very good to the really very surprising that no one stood up and repeatedly punched the speaker while demanding to have those ten minutes of their life back. As required by tradition there was a plentiful supply of people coming into rooms late. This is acceptable given that some may have just been in another talk on the other side of the building. However I found it difficult to have empathy for those many who stood holding the doors open, letting the hall's ambient cackling, tapping and clicking drown out the mumbling speaker, while staring at the projector screen with all the acumen of the newly lobotomised, their jaws somewhere around their ankles, before turning around and leaving anyway.

Overall I had a positive experience (especially because I got to see some old friends and meet a pirate who claimed to work for the petrochemical industry) but time spent in the company of 7000 of my fellows in one building is much like Hell, without the comfort of sulphurous fumes to mask the scent.

Our intrepid band's journey across the dark continent to the venue was accomplished through the medium of car and facilitated by the use of roads. Travel time was about six hours and I know you will be thrilled to hear that I took a brief turn at holding the reins of the four wheeled metal beast.
Memorable scenery included billboards for "Pig 'n' Steak" and turkey vultures chewing contemplatively at the side of the road.

My Grandfather died on Monday, fairly suddenly, but after a recent period of decline that meant his memory had failed and he could no longer look after himself. He was a softly spoken, polite, genial and kindly man; after meeting him people always remarked on how nice he was. It may then astonish you that he was a relative of mine. However there are clues in his sense of humour. In his late eighties, he surprised us all by responding to one of many queries from my mother as to whether he had been warm enough the night before with the admission that he had been warm as toast between the two girls in bed with him. This was surpassed at a later date when mother asked if he wanted anything from the shop and he requested 'a black girl'.

I also remember an excruciatingly embarrassing fifteen minutes of my childhood, watching tv with him while Rabid Attenborough explained in detail the sexual behaviour of chimpanzees, including their regular bouts of homosexuality, incest and rape. At the end of the program, as I prised my fingers from their grooves in the arms of my chair, he turned to me with a grin and said, 'I'm glad I'm not a monkey'.

I'm glad he wasn't too.