"We’re all following a strange melody
We’re all summonsed by a tune
We’re following the Piper
And we dance beneath the moon."

Let me tell you a story, you have heard it before no doubt, as a childhood fairytale, a rhyme or song. About a town in Germany, on the banks of the River Weser. A town plagued by vermin, an overwhelming infestation of rats, destroying the crops, eating the food supplies, killing livestock and bringing disease. And a townsfolk at the end of their endurance, starving, falling ill, unable to rid their town of this invasion of rats. You know how it goes: a stranger appears and offers to help, to remove the rats, to end the problem. His price is high, he wants payment in gold, but what use is gold when you have no food, when your water supply has been contaminated, when your world is being destroyed? So an agreement is reached and the mysterious man takes up his flute and as he plays the rats are mesmerised and slowly start to follow the sound, down the streets, past the fields, towards the river, where eventually they all drown. When the Piper returns to collect his dues the town’s people refuse payment, after all, their problem has been solved, the rats are gone, and they have no incentive to give up their gold. Later, when all the adults are worshiping in church, the Piper returns and plays his tune again, this time spellbinding the children, leading them away, over the hills and valleys, where they are imprisoned and left to die in a mountain cave.

So why am I blabbering on about a fairy tale? Am I notably deficient in the marble department today? Have my screws been loosened? Indeed not! You should know me better than that by now. For today is the anniversary of the day when 130 children were led out of Hamelin, never to be seen again. What’s more it’s a BIG anniversary – 725 years. I’m guessing that today is not the day to be a flautist wearing pied clothing in Germany! They say there is truth to the story, albeit allegorical, although the actual events are open to debate. One proposal is that the Pied Piper was a psychopathic paedophile who kidnapped 130 children from the Saxon village and used them in "unspeakable ways." Another relates the story of a plague that wiped out the infant population. But I like connections, links, the way experiences sometimes merge and so I choose to believe the more commonly accepted version in which some scholars suggest ‘the children of Hamelin’ means the people of the town, and that this is a story of mass migration, tempted by the lure of land and prosperity in Eastern Europe. And the connection I mention? Part of the ‘Eastern Europe’ in question was undoubtedly the land which we know today as Hungary. So maybe Gerda and the other people we met in Budapest last weekend are all distantly related to the children of Hamelin. I think I prefer that outcome to the paedophile version.

I have also this week been thinking about humour, not least because last night David and I had tickets to see Russell Howard at the Apollo Theatre. I’m afraid the iPhone didn’t cope too well with the spotlight and all you can really see is what looks like a blob of luminous ectoplasm. Sorry. I tried. But he was very good though. I love live theatre, be it music, comedy or play. There is a connection that you just don’t get elsewhere. We really must make an effort to see more shows. Comedy is especially good for the soul. I was quite ill yesterday, in a bad mood, and of poor humour, but I’m really pleased we made the effort to go to see Russ (I feel I can call him that now), as it did make me feel better.

They say laughter is the best medicine (admittedly probably not when you have stitches) and I can see why. In fact we have a whole linguistic code built around humour which I find fascinating. We often say, “In good humour”, meaning “In a good mood” or “being jovial, funny” and in fact the etymology of the word ‘humour’ is fascinating. We borrowed it from Latin, meaning liquid – it is the same root that gives us humid. The ancient philosophers believed that four liquids entered into the makeup of our bodies, and that our temperament was determined by the proportions of these four fluids, or humours, which they listed as blood, phlegm, bile, and black bile. The humours were themselves associated with the elements – fire, air, water and earth. (Blood has the qualities of being hot and moist, so is associated with air, whilst yellow bile was linked to fire, and an imbalance caused the patient to be hot and dry, and often ill-tempered!) These humours were supposed to be in balance and an over-proportion of one would cause certain behaviour. Someone with an excess of blood, the sanguine humour, is generally light-hearted, fun loving, loves to entertain, will be amorous, irresponsible, is affected by flights of whimsy and heated passion. Whereas someone with an abundance of black bile is melancholic so can become introspective, overly pre-occupied with the tragedy and cruelty in the world, thus becoming depressed. Hence, "In a black humour" or "Black Mood". Medieval medicine was concerned with returning balance to the humours.

I’m reminded of the Blackadder episode in which Edmund falls in love with Bob, and goes to visit his doctor for advice. The recommended ‘course of leeches’ would probably have been pretty close to the actual prescription at the time, as they would suck blood and reduce the associated humour.

We watched “Supersize Me” at the start of the week with Sue Perkins (she who I mistook for a brand of cigarettes - superkings), where they talked about medieval food and started me along this line of thinking. In accordance with the humour theory, most plants, food substances, and commonly found house items were specified as either cold, hot, dry, or wet so that they could be used to modify the amounts of humours within a person. The word ‘humour’, therefore was associated with imbalance and oddness, so eventually it took on the meaning of a humorous person, or a crank. Finally we adopted the current meaning of laughter, fun and good spirits.

My humour is being tested today though. Next door (not the invading Chinese army, but Chris and Debbie who we like), have had the decorators in. I’m not speaking euphemistically – we don’t know them that well to be able to predict menstrual cycles – that would be just too weird! Uhhhh I feel dirty just at the fact you had those thoughts! And anyway, Debbie is away in the States at the moment, obviously leaving Chris in charge of renovations. It appears to me to be a couple of women who arrive each morning and I hear talking about “getting it primed” and "giving it a good rub down" when I’m outside in the garden. Jeez, maybe it is me who has applied the decorating assumption here! Maybe when they talked about stripping they didn’t mean wallpaper! Maybe “That hole needs filling” has a different connotation to the one I had thought. “Don’t drip on the shag” “I’m going for another roll” “Wash it under warm water before it dries” “Of course it will go stiff if you leave it out all night” – HELP! It’s an orgy!

I digress. That is not the reason for my disgruntlement. (Not that I was aware of having been gruntled in the first place). It is this: The decorating dungaree dykes have, for the past three days, parked their car outside the semi (again, not a euphemism). But rather than straddling the curb, half on the road and half on the path, they have driven right up the path and are parked half on our lawn! Here, look!
The cheek! And this means that I can’t cut the grass. Each day I have had that in the back of my mind as a ‘must do’ job. And I’m thwarted. The eagle-eyed amongst you will also have spotted Chinese-Woman-Over-The-Road’s knicker display too – top right of the photo. You might need to click the image for the larger version.

I can’t let today go by without mentioning Michael Jackson who died last night. It would be very easy to poke humour at him, make accusations of paedophilia (even to the point of drawing connections with the story at the start of this entry - he DID record a song entitled "Ben" about a boy who befriends a giant rat! Weird how things connect!) I won't question his mental state or his grip on reality - you will have your own views on that. I grew up when his music was big (or bad?), and I guess I never really got into him (STEADY! Minds out of the gutter!). That’s the thing though, he was like Marmite, you either loved him or hated him. Still, at least Marmite has managed to stay brown!