Back to the soil and its squatters. The root systems of stinging nettles run like the Tube, criss-crossing each other and wrapping around the knotted tuber terminals of doc leaves. As I wheeled the 37th barrowful of yanked out roots off to the bonfire to cremate I wondered which grew first. The doc or the nettle. And how long was it until the second one sidled up?

The betting banker in me says nettle got there first and then up strolled doc. But I’m usually wrong about most things so that means the Doc Leaf landed and took root, for the sly nettle to then pass through, linger awhile and taunt the doc into medical action as soon as a clumsy child toppled into the stinging trap.

Or maybe there’s a third more beautiful possibility. Simultaneous arrival and growth. These two weeds are the salt and pepper of horticulture. They season our soil and bring balance to the sense of touch. They share the same patch because like us, they’re social species (is species the plural of species?).

As Valentines day approaches, show you’re someone who understands the full gamut of timeless love and give him/her a wild bouquet of doc leaves and nettles.

He could concoct characters.

He could make you die on a sword for the underdog.

And still does.

I’ll leave you this morning with his last words:

“Be natural my children.

For the writer that is natural

has fulfilled all the rules of art.”

Charles John Huffam Dickens

born 7th February 1812

Shock-shock, horror-horror, shock-shock-horror (so sang Space in The Female of The Species).

The truth is there is no surprise. Irrespective of the cost, they feel that life studying in an institution might not lead to much. So they opt out.

The other truth is this might yet lead to something.

If dropouts can save America, (Gates, Jobs, Wales, Brin et co) then maybe opt-outs can save Britain and the rest of Europe.

Just for a minute think of an unruly, feral, failure-happy university of the street that channels its insurgent voice towards an underground Parliament. One without a Mr Speaker directing the traffic and salutations as strange as the Rt Honourable Gentleman.

Imagine, like music, it just took off and people warmed to it.

Imagine it’s led by women, young women, young black women, and they don’t play the feminist card. They just happen to be women, and young, and black, and critically, anticipatory. Yes, they have a hunch for what’s right, ahead of those who are still trying to fathom what’s wrong.

Wouldn’t that be nice to wake up to?

A smart young sisterhood for all of us. A counter-cultural movement to rewrite the rules of modern life so we start to get our house in order and our morals ironed out.

Yes, I’m in.

Are you?

We sidetrack. The news is only interested in scandal. Thankfully, this can be prevented by a voluntary doping samples of all eleven London Olympic worldwide sponsors to track-test the doping laboratory for 2012. Which of the starting line-up will test positive? Stay tuned for full commentary and analysis.

How long before broadcasters look to individuals for ad revenue and mainstream TV is the shop window for lonely hearts and groins?

Everything comes from somewhere, consciously or subconsciously. We are but a few billion magpies in denial.

This post came from watching Newsnight. Does this mean Gavin Esler will be at my back door with a chainsaw within the hour?

By reading this post, you’re now an accomplice to piracy.

I have an idea.

It’s called Idiotic Property, and protects the mundane drivel that populates our sullied brains and hearts in 2012. We should all sue the shit out of each other for stealing each other’s thoughts, feelings, observations and movements. This might agitate the economy and send us back into lala land where money can pretend to be worth more than it is but we’ll all go along with it and smile.

Only sight can tell them apart.

Irrespective of the outcome of the Terry/Ferdinand case, the truth is it needs some absurdity thrown into the ring to free up the conservative tension.

Something as absurd as a new form of community service that does some good.

Something like this:

1. An anything goes abuse-off in aid of charity (I’m thinking a 50:50 split between Amnesty for freedom of speech and Runnymeade Trust for racial equality)
2. Every footballer gives a 1% donation of their week’s salary, agents give 2%, FIFA coughs up a token million as comeuppance for Sepp Blatter
3. Sky/News International cover it and give over the broadcast rights and advertising revenue to aforesaid charities
4. Any other substance/validity/absurdity you’d like to add yourself and pass it on

“Marry me” she thought but couldn’t quite find the words.