dolores666's photos with the keyword: Family

Bird and Wraith. Wandering with her familiars in the twilight gardens of the Elusive Zones, Tribulata, the flightless, four-legged Bird of Paradise Misplaced, has been ambushed and buttonholed by a small but perfectly formed nonconformist wraith who claims he is, honest-to-Bumba, genetically related, if very remotely and even more nebulously. The wee sprite, whose name is Bagatelle, is not seeking any worldly gain or advantage, he says, just a spot of pleasant interaction and intelligent conversation. He claims that interaction with other phantasms is, well, kind of flimsy. And that family is family, regardless of how far-flung and blurry the connection might be. Tribulata is not quite convinced by the little phantom's evidence. The familiars are all for a good old get-together, not to say a merry chin-wag and, ideally, a jolly old riotous tea party. The familiars like tea, bless their furry socks. We wish all the parties involved a maaaaarvelous time. Life is short.

This is for my nieces, the Terrible Twins, know at home as the morochas, which is what you call girl twins in Venezuela, where they were born. May they stay as groovy as ever and give the male species a good ticking off. Or an in-depth dressing down, whichever they fancy best.

Traditions are like everything else, some are good (National Shoggothood Day is lovely) and some are crap (nationalisms of any and all colours are a mug’s game). And some, like female genital mutilation, are downright revolting, to say the least. But here is a nice little family custom: Zorro the Wonderdog, absent from these pages for far too long, has come back to us to fulfil the specific task of inducting his great-granddaughter Morgana into the ineffable and infinitely fun art of Worm Charming. Everybody benefits from this practice; the young wunderkind pooches learn the art of extreme persuasion and the wee worms get charmed into a symbiotic partnership with the spiffing canines. The perritos must have someone to cherish and protect at all times, as it’s in their nature to care for and guard the weak and the helpless, and the gusanitos are forever shielded from all harm, as their vulnerable nature requires. I love happy shindigs, don’t you? PS. This is a bit of a spoonful of sugar to pre-coat the palate for what is to come. With the autocratic designation (NOT democratic election, I must emphasize!) of the neo-Nazi* Quim Torra to the presidency of the Catalan Generalitat, I can feel the rage and the bile and the fire and the fury raising once more in my belly. Expect vicious ad hominem attacks soon. *And if you don’t believe me… elpais.com/elpais/2018/05/15/inenglish/1526373293_276622.html

A riotous, joyful scene at the Inn of the Nine Boons, in the Southern Borderlands. The Siamese Jaguar Twins are about to give birth to yet another batch of chubby Hippopoids, much to their cousins’ delight. The parturition is only relatively painful but the Twins are natural born drama queens and simply love to make a great fuss and as much noise as their little lungs will permit. This is for my mate Mario, who hails from Honduras and from whose heritage I’ve borrowed (and done things to) these here chappies. The originals that so tickled my imagination and inspired this can be seen at the Maya ruins of Copan. And so much for Cultural Appropriation. :-) NB. I must remember to have a go/rant at this latest folly, Cultural Appropriation and its "discontents". Ah, me. The smaller and more united and homogeneous and powerful the 1% becomes, the more the 99% of slaves beneath their fascist boot become fragmented and waste their limited energies in fighting amongst themselves. Robert Hughes, you were a sodding prophet, you were…. (See: Culture of Complaint. Oxford University Press. 1993)

Watching an old episode of New Tricks the other evening, I came across a name I could not resist. Almost at the same time I remembered that I had the perfect likeness to go with it in my hard drive for nearly two years. So, here is Lenny "the Lump", the South London golem. Famous for his poetry reading soirees and his award-winning window boxes, he's also a dab hand at scaring the local bullies, as he is 1) bigger than any of them and 2) almost completely intolerant of this particular breed.(I wonder if he could be persuaded to "have a little chat" with David Cameron...). Here we can see him hanging around Bermondsey Sq. with two of his bosom pals, Gary the Trouble Teddy and Betty "Hopping Mad" McCann, the two-legged berserker of Peckham Rye, of whom, rumor has it, even “Mad” Frankie Fraser used to be scared of. And this one makes four golems so far; three boys and one girl: Lenny, Jake, the lapsed East End golem, Blott, the Badlands golem and young Sarita. We could start a pop group and call it Perishable Clay, couldn’t we? Or Proclaim a brand new tribe: the Golemim. Rabbi Loew, eat your heart out, mate!