Face To Face

So I found myself back, for the weekend, in the city I called home for ten years. It's mildly disorienting, perhaps even disorientating (which is a lot like disorienting, but one syllable worse). You have to quickly get used to all of the things that changed while you were away. For instance, Market Square had been stripped of its only attraction, and according to Kenny, the Green Party had finally succeeded in its year-long campaign of "saving a tree".

Thus the mighty juggernaut of Lancastrian politics rumbles on.

But the principal attraction of returning is, of course, seeing familiar (and mostly friendly) faces. I ran into countless characters from the past, both by accident and design, and the warm, cosy air of familiarity started to surround me. By the time I heard a group of out-of-towners in the pub arguing over how "Quernmore" was pronounced - with all of them getting it horribly wrong - I was honestly wondering why I ever left. (Of course, I then recalled that I left because Lancaster is roughly on a par with Chernobyl for growth industries, and the likelihood of me getting another job there was slimmer than a bulimic whippet. But I wasn't about to let annoying facts shit all over my nostalgia-binge).

So I indulged memories of times past, in the pubs of the future, with people who seem perpetually present. But the best face to see, on getting back to the old house, had to be Logan. Logan, Logan, Logan, Logan, Logan, Logan. Has any other subject appeared so often in my blips, and with such little complaint?

Go on, have a pat on the head. You've earned it. And since "earning" is very much a foreign concept for cats, make the most of it.