THEATRICAL HOWLS OF ANGUISH

The doctor's appointment went very well. All the tests came back good. So the issues seem to have been resolved, and I'm sort of completely recovered (except, of course, that I have a coronary stent and am taking bloodpressure meds). It looks like my nearest and dearest will have to wait quite a while before I stop tormenting them and they can divvy up my enormous pipe tobacco stash.

The fact that they aren't pipe smokers is only a minor problem.

I'm sure I can lead at least one of them astray.

Provided that I live long enough.

As I intend to do.


After leaving a hospital I went to a chachanteng for congee and a fried dough stick (粥同一個油條). Followed, as you would expect, by a satisfying pipeful of good tobacco.

There actually is no sealscript or jinwen variant of 粥 (congee), but it's what I had (just like after two previous medical appointments), so I created one. I'm fairly certain that it existed three thousand years ago, but it was probably called something else.
The character 鬻 (nourishment, children's food; childish; straightened circumstances) seems to be ancestral, but that's a bit of a stretch, although it does show 粥 as the phonetic element. 鬲 is a tripodal pot with squat hollow legs for cooking rice. 弓 on either side shows steam and cooking vapours. My guess would be that the character originally illustrated lamb pilaf being prepared, as the ancient version clearly shows a sheep 羊 inside the constructed word.

The theatrical howls of anguish, unvoiced but never-the-less very keen, came in upon my discovery that after my pipe smoke, bank visit, and shopping, the bakery where I wished to enjoy a cup of HK milk tea and a biscuit was closed. Which is most unusual. What with being tired after walking all over hell and gone shlepping stuff and being too warmly dressed for this weather, though not when I left the house when it was cooler, my legs hurt like billy-o dagnabit, and I was grumpy and kvetchy.

Please imagine purely mental foul language in every tongue I know.
One of which is Netherlandish. Which sounds like hairballs.
Coughed up by an extremely disagreeable feline.
"Caterballing", so to speak.


Headed home with grumbles.
No tea. Despondence.



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