This podcast could be called excellent and ecclectic. I call it 'fecking brillant'.

Nodes:

• Twenty-three good things about pickles and dirt by junkpile, read by Lord_Brawl and Graceness
• I am the very model of a modern E2 editor by Demeter, sung by Wiccanpiper
• I hate this god damn robot by Artman2003, played by Junkill and numerous electronic effects

Available from http://e2podcast.spunkotronic.com/podcast210.mp3. Itunes or Gpodder subscribers will get it with the next update.

Good one, this one.

H.

Bugs on the fly paper and bottles on the floor, the overwhelming smell of sour alcohol dried into the floorboards, and there I was, ready-set to paint the walls like I had any idea what I was in for or even what I was doing there. There were two silver cats wandering the place, and one old woman with one dead husband. I was relunctant to talk to her, because I've played defense for an old sad woman before, and all it got me was crazy. Some things can't be fixed. Some wounds can't be healed. She broke her hip some weeks ago, was probably done for. You can't help death.

She wanted the walls painted but the place was a mess. She needed a live-in nurse and for all my altruism I couldn't stomach the stale-wine-smell or the thought of caring for her. It was too depressing. She gave me a twenty for my help, then needed to go to the bank because it was her last bill. I've got need of money too, sweetie. I couldn't tell her I didn't want it. I hated the suspicion that I was being manipulated.

My friend and I swept the floor, mopped it, sprayed the broken bed frame for bed bugs, threw out more trash than the job was worth, wrung the bleached clothes she had incontinently peed on, and washed her potty (which was in her bedroom). Then we zipped the mattress in the living room into a bed bug proof cover and transported it on to the bed frame. And none of it had a damn thing to do with painting.

She promised use of her apartment to us while she went over to visit her family in Conneticut. She lived in Greenwich Village. We thought it was a great deal.

My explorations to the far North

I was awoken this morning rather rudely by the sound of tiles being violently removed from walls. Next door is having a new kitchen and this means that they must wake the neighbourhood with their demolition of the old one. Unable to sleep any longer, i dressed myself and decided to go shopping in London. The train journey was not unpleasant and i arrived in Camden Town in the best of spirits.

Camden is one of the most interesting places i know. Certainly it is the most diverse. For those who have not been. GO. No description i can give will do it any justice.

I had never been on a weekday and it had a strange empty feeling about it. Many places were closed and indeed looked as if they would only open for the crowds at the end of the week. Shoes were the first item on my list of shopping and i knew what i was looking for. Androgynous knee high laced boots with buckles were the order of the day and i found these after some deep searching at the back of a drug shop. I have been on the hunt for such foot ware for over a year now and to find these gems was a good moment indeed. I was surprised to be attended to by an old gentleman of German decent. It was his age, more than his country of origin, that was most shocking. Camden is the domain of the young. It seemed queer that a 67 year old man would have any idea of the fashion trends of the modern underground culture.

Lunch was a pizza from the nice man in the food court of the stables and i wandered the near deserted area taking arty photos. (Photos that i considered arty anyway).

With my new look at hand and my commercial needs sated, my thoughts turned to matters of the heart. I saw Lily for the last time on Sunday and i was feeling rather low about the entire situation. I whipped out my tube map and saw to my delight that she lived near a tube station. It was a bit far out but i thought i would make it out there and back in time for tea. She lives at the northern most station of the network and the journey took longer that i had anticipated. I arrived around 1500hrs and thought of a plan.

I didn’t want to meet with her parents again, so i decided to ask her to meet me in a public place. She, and others like her, have often speculated that i would never randomly visit her, or show spontinuity in my affections. I was not out to prove them wrong; my motives were purely honourable. To make things more interesting, i decided to make her think that i was not going to turn up. This would then heighten the joy when i was there. But how to reveal myself after i had coaxed her in?

I settled on the idea of sitting in the branches of a great oak the was near our meeting point and having a series of love-letters in the form of paper aeroplanes to send to her in the hope she would read them and gaze up to me.

Sounds a bit too romantic for me… but i had never done anything similar to it so i thought i would like to give it a go.

I txted and rang her only to find she would be late coming back from school. Balls! It was freezing out there. She might be back around 18:30. With extra time to spare, i created other notes and attached them strategically to places on her route to the meeting point.

When she arrived, it turns out she took a different route to the one i had predicted. This meant i didn’t have time to ascend the tree and she didn’t see any of the messages. Instead i just walked up to her from my place of hiding and said hello. The conversation that followed is private, but otherwise happy and fully of cheer. We walked to her house at 1930 only to find that if i was to get back home in time to avoid a shouting from father, i would need to leave straight away. I was very upset, but couldn’t show it. This was the last time i would see her for a very long time. She packed me some food into a bag and we ran to the bus stop only to find that there was none coming. We then walked at a high pace further into town to the station to see the penultimate train leaving. ‘40 minutes till the next train’ were the words of the station master.

We sat in a dimly lit waiting room and talked. The talking seems like a dream. I remember no details or facts, only the sense that i was content and pleased to have her there.

She saw me off as my train pulled out and we went our separate ways. I didn’t cry or anything. The only way to deal with the situation became apparent as i was in an empty carriage with no stops for a long while. Wanking in public is always a good laugh and extra satisfying.

On a different note, Lily has bought a special belt with which to bind her breasts. The effect is that she has a more masculine torso. I think it is wonderful. I have never met or spoken to a female to male crossdresser, but she is doing the effort. Her motives are more socially orientated than mine, but i can see what she is doing. This Christmas we are going to go out as our opposite genders and dine expensively. It is going to be wonderfully exciting. I am to teach her how to be a man and she will teach me how to be a woman.

I will be reporting the events of this development with a zeal other subjects will have lacked.