Life Beneath the Lash

In the last poll, fully 75% of you reported smelling cheese while reading Wide Island. Were I a less trusting man, I'd say that was probably a lot of crap. Please remember, as you answer the newest poll in the sidebar, that market research is a serious business. Imagine living in a world where little boys and girls were abandoned to the mercy of fiends who lie to opinion researchers.

I'm depressed, not a novel sensation but one which I'd managed to sidestep for the few brief weeks of my summer holiday. But now it's all over, and I've gone from festivals with entertainment like this

and hanging around after dark with my little girl eating frozen treats like this

and lolling about like a drunken circus bear in clear, swift mountain streams as depicted here

to a return to this, the Senior Two teachers room.

This picture should relieve you once and for all of your image of Japanese Interiors as an endless round of clean, minimal constructs of bamboo, straw matting and a winsome teapot simmering alongside a seasonal flower arrangement. This is the real deal, brothers and sisters. Anyone up for a stiff drink?