The Anglo-Saxons had some real brutal ways of punishment. One of them being to tie up the limbs of an accused and weighing him down with a stone and then throwing him in water. If he managed to stay afloat, it was assumed he was guilty, fished out of water and boiled in oil. If he drowned, well, he was innocent and could not summon all those evil powers to rescue him. The dead body was then taken out and given a proper burial.

One of Aesop’s fables is about an old man and his son taking their donkey to the market. Trying to appease all people they meet on their way to the market-place, they end up tying the donkey to a pole, the end result being that the poor ass manages to break free and drown himself conveniently in the river they were crossing. I am that donkey. I am a lot of things at the moment. I just hope I remember what frame of mind I am in these days to prompt such a gruesome re-telling.

It says something for the sorry affairs you have landed yourself in, doesn’t it, when your inbox announces new emails in excess of ten and all of them useless updates from sites you are not even remotely interested in, not now anymore. Nothing at all from people you once thought you can’t live without. Well, you can and are. So there.

What else was there I wanted to kvetch about? Laters. Then.