"Where is Mr Brown?"
Asked the Queen, perturbed.
"He should have been down
by six fifteen." She demurred.

The First Lord, sat
not wanting to be disturbed.
"Primus inter pares! Crap!
I'd swap Darling for his bird."

At the time,
she was not, the President's wife.
And, at the time,
he was not, the President.

The lens clicked and captured,
candidly, a moment.
The picture: a place
in time, forever stands.

At that time,
X-Corp's stock was trading, at ten dollars, ninety-four.
And, at that time,
Commodities were trading lightly.

Shares fell. Then, increasingly,
the markets tumbled.
The things, on which
"real" value can be placed, stand.

Today,
She is the President's wife.
Today,
X-Corp's stock trades at a dollar, twenty-five.

"Sold!" The auctioneer's gavel crashes.
And so, into the night, with hands barely
covering her modesty, motionless
walks the President's wife.

Well, thank you for asking. It is a pleasure. So, here we are again and I am requested by my adoring reader to give further insight into the world of Hektor Hamulec of Warsaw. Today, the special information relates to my favourite books. I have many favourite books, but listed below are ten (10) that I consider to be my most favourite or indeed, even, my favourite ten (10) books.

1. "The Sorrow of Mr Raven" by Malcolm Crabs

2. "Harry Potter and the Wizard's Sleeve" by J.K. Rollinginit

3. "Sideburns are not the only fruit" by Olive Goose-Christmas

4. "Whispering Marbles - My Autobiography" by Sir Chive Sinclair

5. "Pincher Kitten" by William Goldfinch

6. "Festooned in Grief" by Margaret Sword

7. "Oak Christopher - The Ballad of My Soul" by Wellingborough (via Bedford, calling at Luton and Luton Airport Parkway)

8. "Atmospherics - The key to successful party planning" by Sir Russell Abbot

9. "A Fist Full of Hamsters" by Gerry Adams

10. "Martin, Martin" by Martin Seahorse

Perhaps others can also inform me and the world of their favourite books or, perhaps, not.

Greetings from Afghanistan

****
Hello! Hello to you my covered barnacles! We have spoken in the past about a future exploration of the silver screen and, within its birth a place for the noble tree of talent to spring forth onto our rose garden like a big dog in a tent - all wet and amorous, smelling of pond water and moles. So now it happens that in the tenth month of mustard seed we have eloped into this false fancy of Tuesday and begun a spot within a talcum powdered oven that is called "interest".

****
Plastic practising the unkind word of one thousand cheese sandwiches signals a break from the past. We are here in Kandahar and my guide is called Mr Trilby, who is an engaging character who hails from the Hindu Kush. We talk in rhyming couplets this morning - which seems inevitable, given that our mutual friend, a peregrine falcon named Fancy Bassoon introduced us at a Pam Ayers seminar last August.

****
My language teacher's son, Vendredi, is holding forth at the back of the escape slide. I can barely hear his light whisper over the throng of the traffic laden cardboard subways that glisten in the night air under the factory sound tonic that accompanies this morning's cloud catastrophe accordion. A parsnip named Duke of Fountain has walked into a crisp packet and there is trouble. Barns Soup, the group captain of the local Otters attempts to calm the situation with a packet of Fruit Polos.

****
It is our last day at the Sunshine Hotel, Madrid Sunshine, the hotel's owner has agreed to meet us on the sundeck for breakfast, which consists of dried egg, a ball of wool, some goats cheese and a dagger. Madrid tells us something of the history of this hotel and its significance to the region. This story is forever lost in the wilderness of my own fringe, as I am swept from the ground by a giant eagle and my body is buffeted by the wind of this most incongruous armchair rapscallion dances forth on a blind brim of my own clouded toadstool.

****
It is almost time for a nap, I think.