Under the moonlight

This is not going to be a romantic post despite the title. But there is romance involved. For others in the story. According to their interpretation of it at least.

It was a bitterly cold winter night at 11 pm and I was cycling back home. I had gloves and a hat on me but the cold was till biting me in the face. Sitting on my well-oiled bicycle, I was gliding smoothly down a path with a wide grass verge on either side. It was very dark as this path was not lit and the only light came from the stars and the full moon. There was just enough light for me to see a few meters ahead. I didn’t have any lights on my bicycle so I was cycling slowly.

It was very quiet at this time and out-of-the-way place and even a little scary because of the darkness and bushes and trees further away where anyone could be lurking in the shadows. In front of me and to the right of the path, I saw movement in the grass. There are often foxes coming out at night so I thought it was one of them. It was too low on the ground to be someone so I wasn’t scared.

Then in the full moonlight I saw a pale face, just like the full moon, looking back at me. I never stopped cycling although I had slowed down in case I hit any fox I thought was responsible for this movement. As I approached even further on my bike, the pale face under the moonlight took the appearance of a white smooth bum attached to a body. That body was that of a young man or boy partially undressed under whom was lying another body well alive! It seems despite my silent approach, I had disturb some activity in the grass.

I carried on cycling at the same relaxed speed and didn’t look back. They must be desperate I thought, as the cold spread over me even more.

An elusive hairdresser

How long have you been here? Where do you work? What do you do at work? Are you married? Kids? Grand kids? Ok, I made up the last one – I don’t even have kids yet but the only hairdresser I could find locally was probably the most talkative and curious. What will you have for dinner, she asked. I just had my lunch I replied. Do you like shopping? I prefer to do it online, I said, thinking about an article on men’s shirts and internet shopping I had just read.

My search for a hairdresser started shortly around Christmas and New Year when I decided to have a hair cut. It had been several months since my last one but since my last haircut was very short, I was not to be confused for a girl yet! My last haircut was also DIY.

Never would have thought that finding a local hairdresser would prove so hard. Actually, finding them was easy, finding one that was open was damn hard. Ok, it must be because they are all partying hard during yuletide, I told myself. One week after New Year, I resumed my search. One place looked still boarded up. I much later found out that there was another hairdresser just next to it that was open but at that time both were closed and one permanently. The next hairdresser was open but looked quite expensive and the person inside put me off with her attitude. Move on to the next one then. Next one looked frozen shut like it was not going to open anytime soon. I found another one on the internet via yell but it seemed to be a virtual hairdresser as I just could not find it on the street. It was supposed to be right on a round-about! Sounds like a Harry Potter novel to me.

I must have visited around 5 local hairdressers until I found an open one. All the others were shut. Maybe they open just for summer here! When I entered the only hairdresser open for business, the warm water vapour inside cause steam to form on my glasses and I just about saw a huge dog followed by a smaller one jumping at me. I also heard them barking very loudly; fortunately for me I recognized that they were not barking aggressively but rather welcoming me noisily. I asked for a haircut only to be told I needed an appointment. Damn, it’s getting harder and harder to get my hair cut here. I nearly resorted going down the diy route. I said I would call to make an appointment, thinking, yeah right!

But I did call and make my appointment. Somehow not finding a hairdresser made me more determined to get my hair cut by one of them rare breed. My appointment was for the next day and I turned up to find I was the only one there. Well, having an appointment does have its advantage then. But surprise, surprise, the two dogs were still there. And I thought they belonged to a customer who came to have her hair done yesterday. No they belonged to the hairdresser it turned out. At first I was ok with them, a nice distraction but I realized that having scissors held close to my eyes with a huge dog jumping around In a small cluttered room is not a good combination. An experience I will certainly not put myself through again.

Back to basics

I was recently reminded of my maths teacher back at school. Well, I had more than one, so I thought about all of them and how they shaped my interest in their beloved subject. I extrapolated this and thought how maths teachers shape the interest of all their students in this subject, and more often than not, their lack of interest.

It didn't start on a good foot for me. Back at primary school, I found maths difficult. That's not to say that I wasn't good at it but I had to put in a lot of hard work and the answers and concepts didn't come by easily to me. My teacher didn't help much either as she used to pile a lot of pressure on us on getting it right and understanding ideas and logic at the first explanation. Nevertheless, I managed to keep my head above water.

Move on to secondary school. I don’t have any particularly outstanding memories of my maths classes at the beginning so I guessed I did alright but my next teacher was a nightmare. A bully really and I dreaded his classes. Maybe he dreaded teaching me as well because I certainly did not let him get his way with me. I won’t go over this but needless to say that his approach did not inspire me to like his subject.

Come the next teacher. He is the one who changed maths for me from a dull subject made up of dead numbers to a lively subject easy to understand. His explanation made maths seem very easy to me and I would understand the first time about trigonometry and other topics. I then enjoyed solving problems as quickly as possible and I especially remember obtaining 100% in a small test, something that had never happened to me.

I will never forget this teacher. He didn’t have a great personality, able to inspire others nor did he try to befriend his students. He just taught maths. But he did it damned well and made it look easy and fun. I had a tough teacher after him but that didn’t matter anymore because I enjoyed the subject from then on and no teacher would be able to change that.

The final exam at school was supposed to be difficult but I had a lot of fun flying through it and finishing with spare time when I know many others can’t even finish it.

I don’t want to brag too much about how good I am so I will tell you about my artistic skills. Or the lack of it rather! It could be that I am simply not good at this like most people but to stay on topic, I never had arts teachers who made that subject appear interesting. None of them really taught me how to paint. They would just ask us to paint something, to draw something or to create/assemble something. Then give us low marks. No arts teacher ever taught me arts.