Another self-imposed rule needs breaking.
But then as Véronique -- that blonde chick Sam planted at my table, if not quite in my lap, last Friday -- swiftly and intuitively noticed: "You're very hard on yourself, aren't you?"
She's not the first, because it's true.
However, we are a-mused.
Which means that we are not amused at all.
Factors conspire against me, and thus you, dear or detestable readers alike.
First, to find yourself suddenly on vacation (interrupted by working for a very nasty Africa news day in the Factory on Sunday) brings the "oouff!" and "aahhh!" that come when it stops and the usual discovery that you're tired.
Secondly, it feels like that part of the month. Checking confirms that it is: the moon "disappears" on Thursday, my energy and inspiration levels waning with it. The Faithful Five ¾ know that however sunny it is (and it's fine today), the New Moon = a blog slump.
Thirdly and by far the worst, E. has gone without trace.
She's a very long way away and I've been without word from her or about her for a week. This has become an awfully long time.
She hasn't completely vanished.
I think I know more or less where she is, all the things she has to do and how extremely demanding and exhausting they are, but even words of what I hoped were encouragement and entertainment have met with silence.
The self-tortured time of "have I said something wrong and/or hurtful and/or thoughtless and/or clumsy" came and went over the weekend.
I know the lovely creature -- what kind of "beast" is came to me recently with very near but not total certainty, but it's a shaman's secret -- is quite capable of looking after herself.
However, when I told the Wildcat, who 'phoned me late last night about her latest travels and adventures, the woman offered me little reassurance by pointing out that "I'm also quite grown-up and strong enough to look after myself, but then ...well, you know."
Indeed I do.
 The selfish side of all this is that I'm sad.
I miss E like mad.
The patience I need ran out yesterday and I ignored all experienced, wise, kind and well-meaning advice and wrote to her again.
Even the Wildcat, swept up and alarmed though she is by a most blogworthy (if I dared) tide of passion such as she has never experienced before, counselled me to leave E in peace.
From somebody who has fallen totally in love and found that it can come with the rare but sometimes complicated bonus of being reciprocated, this was so restrained that I managed it for another 24 hours.
Not, however, without calling the Wildcat rude names. My reward for that was to learn that "I like E. very much already, without knowing her, but you I like even more."
Nevertheless, I would much rather be savagely clawed than left in ignorance, by somebody who dislikes the word "complicated" and finds "difficult" more meaningful and manageable.
I say all this because a journalist told me that I really should write something daily. I think that no blog entries are far better than dull ones, but the veteran Barry said: "Could you imagine AFP going for a day without news?"
I can, yes.
The idea fills me with joy, since while the news agency puts out good news as well as all the bad, almost all the receiving editors who then package it for media audiences and the papers use a cheerfulness checker more effective than most spam filters.
I'm also revealing this because I fear for my sanity.
It is "not normal" so acutely to miss somebody whom, in theory at least, you've barely met and have only begun to know a little, even if you both get on famously and with ease.
It is "not normal" to be sure you have known them forever.
It is "not normal" to feel complete trust and kinship with and in a "stranger".
Enough, one of life's lessons evidently being that there is no such thing as "normal".
If I went too far with E, this is truer still of the sky-rats.
Two pigeons in particular have taken up semi-permanent residence on the windowsill. One of them frequently folds up its legs and falls asleep. This morning, the other marched over and began doing something with its beak which looked like the sky-rat equivalent of apes picking the fleas off their partners and young.
I have never seen that before.
Yesterday afternoon, I was sitting here catching up on numerous belated e-mail replies when both little buggers strolled cheerfully and curiously through the other room and into this one to see what I was doing.
I ordered them out and they left.
On further observation, I found that they have assumed the right to hop into the room overlooking the garden and wander around when they like. They look at me with bemusement when I say "Your place is outside!", but oblige.
They have neither shat on the floor or the carpet nor taken to the air, except to fly in and leave. They mind the furniture and go nowhere near anything they could break. If pigeons are capable of politeness, these two are.
I know what my mother would do.
She would turn into a gibbering wreck and it's scarcely her fault. Since infancy, she's been cursed with a phobia about birds. She has a love-hate relationship with a robin, finding him friendly but unpleasant to have around when she's gardening, which is one of her favourite activities.
By behaving themselves, however, these "filthy, statue-wrecking, disease-ridden pestilential vermin" have won my affection. I don't give them just anything for their breakfast, which they have decided should be in two sittings. The early birds include the cheeky pair and their mates, then comes a second flock led by a handsome specimen with white wings.
When I saw a squashed pigeon on the street at the weekend, I found myself hoping it wasn't one of my visitors.
For E's flower, I'm grateful to newly discovered blogger and fellow-believer in Creative Commons principles Andy J.W. Affleck of northern Virginia, who keeps his "Webcrumbs" in a Ragged Castle.
I briefly mention CC licences again for the benefit of one or two Factory hands. The other day, we had what could have become a very heated debate about copyright.
I was unable to find any work by some US cartoonist whose name I've already forgotten. It seems my ignorance of his work is a serious gap in my pop culture. However, a hole it will remain because the man has politely but systematically had all unauthorised use of it removed from the Web.
If I have no idea what I'm "buying", I'm damned if I'll pay for it.
Last, in an entry almost devoid of links and no intended explanation of the title, I must thank Tony for pointing out that I gave him a laugh.
He wrote:
"Your blog: '...she kept her eyes lowered as she walked. Until recently there were three of them....' I know the positioning of the lines made it jump out @ me, but the antecedent of 'them' was so gloriously the lowered eyes that it made my day."
His e-mail was called "Mlle Cyclops".
Thank you, mate. I'll still have lunch with you tomorrow, but if you're expecting to be paid or otherwise rewarded for grammar policing, think again.
I have vainly sought to console myself for the silence of E. by taking advantage of a special offer the video rental shop downstairs is making on used DVDs for sale. I can't afford them, but picking up three absolute musts made me feel better for two minutes.
And I've just thought to enquire after another one.
5:33:01 PM link 
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