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2001-07-24 - 6:36 p.m.

�I call him Mr Salesman! Nice to see you again! He doesn�t sell any gadget, every day every night, he�s got all I do want! What I got from you Mr Salesman, love and soul!�

This is going to sound like the intro to a bad stand-up routine, recounted by a man with a bad mullet and tassled loafers, but delivery people always seem to arrive at the most inconvenient times. (�Hey! What�s the deal with delivery people? And what about airline food? You�ve been great, etc�) This morning I was in the middle of the kind of dream (and this is probably more than you all wish to know) that (for boys) makes quick physical movement and instant presentability an awkwardly tall order. You�re cruising the backstreets of perpendicular indecency. I think you know what I�m saying. I forget who the lucky co-star was, though I have a nagging worry it was someone highly inappropriate, like a friend�s sister or a member of the Conservative front bench.

ANYWAY, I spring up as best I can and, gathering as much midriff-to-ankle clothing as I can muster, amble out to the intercom. �Delivery!� The sense of relief can only be measured in contrast to, say, an announcement that it�s a surprise visiting party of all my female relatives. �Just a minute,� I say, giving myself time to think of George Bush and, um, regain my composure.

At the door:

�You�re Martin?�

�No, I�m Pablo, Martin is my housemate. He�s away.�

�You�re not Martin?�

�No.�

�But he�s your housemate?�

�Yes.�

�And he�s away?�

�Yes.�

I�m thinking � either this is his first day, or it�s a crudely disguised drugs consignment, or we�re suddenly in a Samuel Beckett play.

�I need someone to sign for this.�

�Does it have to be Martin?�

�It doesn�t have to be Martin.�

�OK, why don�t I sign?�

�Yeah, OK, you sign.�

I knew I should have employed my Jedi mind-trick earlier on in this nonetheless riveting exchange. I wonder how much more TV I could have watched if these kind of encounters were erased from my life?

So what�s the deal with airline peanuts?

�Who called him Mr Salesman? So tender he really is! They call him Mr Salesman! How funny and hip! We call him Mr Salesman! What a classic guy!�

I went for my bi-annual jog around the park, and along the cruisey back stretch, there�s the usual same-sex-flora-enclosed intimacies going on. A young mother is walking her pram-bound mewling cabbage and its elder sibling. Startled by a sudden movement in the undergrowth, the kid notices these guys and shouts out, �Mummy! What are those men doing?� She came up with the obtuse (but not bad under pressure I guess) answer of �Oh, it must be where they work.� Judging from the smirks of fellow park-dwellers, I wasn�t the only to think that �jobs� is about right, but they ain�t the kind that are gonna get you no promotion, that�s for damn sure as hiccups.

�All what I finally got from you in my hand � Love and soul! Peace and truth! Luck and chance! Hope and light! Time and space! Smile and happiness! Past and future world!�

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