BarryHutchison.com

As we’re now coming towards the end of our second full day in Ireland, I thought I’d do a quick blog update, for the handful of you who may be even remotely interested.

We arrived on Saturday evening after a mammoth two-day journey in a jam-packed Renault Laguna Estate. The back suspension was creaking under the strain the whole way, and every time I nudged the speedo over 50mph the whole car began to shake wildly, but we made it to Stranraer safely on Friday night. The drive from Belfast down to Wexford on Saturday – while taking over five hours – was uneventful enough.

It’s odd being in a foreign country, even though Ireland is the least foreign of all the foreign countries. For starters, the Fanta tastes different. It’s also slightly more orange. I have no idea why.

Also, you don’t get Dairy Milk Caramels in the shops. You get Dairy Milk Caramello, which is almost exactly like Dairy Milk Caramel, but a tiny bit different. They also come in foil and paper wrapping, which has been outlawed in the UK for years on health and hygiene grounds. This means I’ll be able to once more participate in my favourite childhood game of unfolding the foil wrapping, licking the back of the chocolate, then placing the rewrapped bar back on the shelf. Ah, happy days.

Not all my observations have been about high calorie foodstuffs, though. I’ve noticed other things too. Like the fact they use Euros here. Yep, nothing gets past me.

When you move to a new country, you can’t help but give out the impression you have learning difficulties. Take my first trip to the supermarket, for example. I walked in, nodding confidently to the security guard standing just inside the entrance, and then went to get a basket. Shouldn’t be too tricky, right? Walking into a supermarket and picking up a shopping basket shouldn’t be a problem for a man of my intellect and experience.

Four minutes. That’s how long it took me to get my basket. Four fricking minutes.

The problem was, I expected a metal wire basket. What they had were large red plastic baskets, not unlike the ones you can buy for stacking toys and the like in. This immediately caused me great confusion. I stood there for upwards of thirty seconds just staring at the things, trying to figure out if they were shopping baskets for customer use, or if they were storage items for sale.

I glanced around the shop, but everyone else seemed to have trolleys. That was no help. At last, I bit the bullet and decided that yes, they were shopping baskets, and yes, I was going to take one.

At this point the handle began to cause me some concern. I took hold of it and lifted, but the basket didn’t move. Instead I found myself unfolding a giant plastic handle – easily two feet long – from around the basket’s edges. I quickly let go and stepped back from the stack, frightened and confused. Had I lifted a handle, or was it some kind of clamp holding the baskets in place? Would they lift into the air and gently float away if I pulled it again? I had to find out.

With the suspicious eyes of the security guard boring a hole in my back, I lifted the handle a second time and discovered that it was definitely attached. It had grooves for fingers, so it was also definitely a handle. A handle which made no logical sense whatsoever, being attached to just one end of the basket. Any attempt to lift the basket with this handle would immediately cause the contents to spill out onto the floor. Still holding it tightly, I stood for a few more moments, trying to force the jumbled mass of information into some sort of order. I had almost reached the point of going for a trolley when I noticed something else. Something which almost blew my mind.

The basket had another handle! I’m going to say that again for emphasis. THE BASKET HAD A SECOND HANDLE!!

Reading this, you may well be thinking ‘Yeah, so what?’ but trust me here, people, this was earth-shattering stuff at the time. I had ventured into whole new territories of basket-related weirdness. One basket. Two handles of entirely different shapes and sizes. I felt like that probe thing in that episode of Star Trek when Shatner asks it to define love. I was trying to apply reason and logic to something which defied both. One basket. Two handles. Even now, my brain tries to shut itself down just thinking about it.

Anyway, to cut a long story slightly less long, I put the basket back, still watched by the security guard who by this point had probably activated the silent alarm. A few minutes later, while pushing my trolley round the shop, I noticed an elderly woman pulling one of the baskets along behind her by the long handle. It was on wheels. The fricking basket was on wheels! Genius. Why didn’t I think of that?

On another note, there are some great bookshops here. I spotted Wow! 366 in one of them, despite the fact it’s not out until 4th August. Just as I feared, I’m right next to Tom from McFly.

Oh, and Eoin Colfer lives somewhere in town. I haven’t kidnapped seen him yet, but I’m sure I will.

Two words into the title of this post and I hit a stumbling block. I don’t know what the correct term for a group of spiders is. I received my ten author’s copies of Spider Swat today and so was cleverly going to call this post A __________ of Spiders, with the __________ being replaced by the correct collective noun for spiders. It would have made me seem both knowledgeable and witty. Instead I look like a frickin’ idiot. Way to go, me.

I’ve just looked it up. It’s a clutter. A clutter of spiders. It doesn’t feel right. It feels like someone just made it up without giving it any real thought. But then, if I saw a pack of spiders descending on me I wouldn’t spend much time trying to find the perfect word to decribe their amassed ranks either.

Spiders, of course, aren’t really worth being scared of, and yet lots of people are. In order to compound this irrational fear, I’d probably have called a group of spiders ‘an onslaught’. Imagine telling an arachnaphobic that there was an onslaught of spiders approaching, then watching them melt into a puddle of pure terror on the carpet. I might do that anyway.

I’ve also realised that such is the power of the internet, I’ve taken ‘a clutter of spiders’ to be correct solely on the basis of a random site pulled up in a Google search. Reading further down the page, I’m not so sure the person who compiled the list isn’t just a random loony with too much time on his hands.

For example, I’m reasonably confident that the collective term for birds is ‘a flock’. Over at this site, though, they’re claiming a group of birds is ‘a volery’. Sorry, a what? No, I’m pretty sure it’s a flock. Unless there’s a different term for when they’re on the ground, maybe? A flock when they’re flying, a volery when they’re milling about looking shifty. Come on, all birds look shifty when they’re not in the air.

Going further down the page, things get even weirder. ‘A bazaar of guillemots’. ‘A murmuration of starlings’. ‘A fling of dunlin’. I don’t even know what a dunlin is, let alone why anyone would want to see them flung together.

I think my favourite is reserved for thrushes, though. A fairly harmless little bird, you’d think? So why, then, did some elect to call a group of them ‘a mutation of thrushes’? That’s just plain offensive. Well, it is if you’re a thrush. Who understands the English language.

Actually, I’ve changed my mind. ‘A mob of kangaroos’ is my favourite of the lot. I love the idea of kangaroos hanging about in mobs, drinking Castlemaine XXXX and shouting abuse at Koalas.

Oh, and for those of you wondering what to call that group of unicorns that are always hanging about outside the corner shop, it’s ‘a marvel’.

It’s definitely worth taking a look at that site, if only to realise how many animals there are out there you didn’t know existed. I also love the fact that under ‘invertebrates’ they’ve listed ‘a troop of mushrooms’. Either the person compiling that list is bowel-shatteringly mad, or I am. All things considered, I’d rather not find out which.

Anyway, what was I saying?  Oh, yeah, my author’s copies of Spider Swat arrived. The book’s out August 4th, and is pretty good, even if I do say so myself.

Here’s another pic of Dan Green, the lead character in GANGRENE, the comic I’m working on with top artist fella Neil Chenier.  Click here to see some more of his work, and revel in its brilliance.

Neil Chenier, the penciller working on my comic script, has sent over a bundle of sketches he’s done of various characters in the series.  I don’t have time to show them all at the moment, but here’s one of my favourites to whet your appetite …

Isn’t he lovely?  I’ll post some more later, along with a link to some of Neil’s other work.  As I’m sure you can tell from the above, he’s a really talented guy.

I was busy on Saturday night, so recorded the last in the series of Doctor Who and watched it on Sunday, as I couldn’t wait to see what was going to happen after the series of cliffhanger endings the previous week left us dangling over.

Absolute rubbish, that’s what happened next. The Doctor’s regeneration didn’t happen. Despite he himself announcing ‘It can’t be stopped!’ the previous week, it could, in fact be stopped. Quite easily, in fact. He just had to point at a hand in a jar.

At the end of the penultimate episode, Sarah Jane was trapped in her car, facing extermination at the hands (well, whisks and plungers) of the Daleks. It looked like there was no escape.

There was. Two minor characters (who hadn’t been seen in ages) teleported in with big fancy guns and blew the Daleks to pieces. Hurrah for humankind. Commiserations to skilful plotting.

The high drama over at Torchwood HQ was brought to a swift end by yet another Deus Ex Machina. Two characters (whose names escape me) were facing sure death, as a nasty big Dalek blasted its way into Torchwood’s secret underground lair. Just as things seemed at their worst, a never-before-mentioned Time Bubble security device kicked in, saving the characters from a fate worse than extermination. Well, maybe not worse. I think extermination is about as bad as it gets with the Daleks.

Which brings me to my next point. Davros’ plan was to do what, exactly? Obliterate every single piece of matter in all dimensions, excluding the Daleks themselves. So, what? They’d just be floating around in a vacuum with very little to do, and no-one to shout at? As evil schemes go, it seemed a little grand for the sake of it. Yes, Davros and the Daleks believe themselves to be the ultimate race in existence, but to wipe out EVERYTHING – all stars, planets and galaxies – seems like something they’re only going to regret in the morning.

I wanted to enjoy the episode, I really did. I wanted it to deliver on all the promises the previous episode had made, but it didn’t. It didn’t even come close. The best bits of the episode were the smaller, more personal moments – the Tardis dragging planet Earth several thousand light years through space not being one such moment – and for me this is what Doctor Who is about. Russel T Davies’ script touched on the essence of the Doctor a few times in the episode, but in a surprisingly cack-handed way for someone who has brought so much to the series.

Most important of all, though, there was something else missing from the episode which I’ve only just put my finger on now. Where was that Dalek who repeats things in a much higher voice than the other Daleks? You know the one. One Dalek says ‘Exterminate’ and then he chimes in with ‘Yes! Exterminate!’ in a much higher, electronic whine. He popped up every few minutes the week before, but this week? Nowhere to be seen. Maybe they’ve found out his hydraulics were filled with Helium or something, and he’s been sent in for fixing. More than any other Dalek, he will be sadly missed.

‘Yes! Sadly missed!’

Okay, switching off geek mode, now. Normal service will resume shortly.

Barry

PS – Oh, and the last episode of Heroes was guff an’ all.

PPS – And there were spoilers in the above post.  If you haven’t yet seen the last Doctor Who of the series, please forget everything you’ve read.  Like Donna does at the end of the episode.

PPPS – Forget that last bit, too.

17 days. That’s how long’s left until we leave these fair shores and relocate to County Wexford in the Republic of Ireland.

We’ve found a house, so now only have about 499 other things to do before we go. The main one being finding a way to transport all our stuff several hundres miles into a different country. Still, I’m sure if I have a nice sit down and a cup of tea, a solution will present itself soon enough.

There’s a lot to think about when moving abroad, not least of all how long it’s going to take to get broadband up and running. BT Ireland seem to offer the best deal, so it’ll be interesting to see if the company’s woeful incompetence in the UK can be repeated in Ireland.

I’m also trying to sell my car before I go, so should anyone be interested in buying a Mazda Xedos 6, do let me know …

Yesterday, my proper job called for me to go to Inverness – a 140 mile round trip along some of the most rubbish roads in the UK.

While there I found myself with some time to kill, and so headed out to the multiplex on the outskirts of the city, where I watched The Incredible Hulk.  It was all right.  Not brilliant, but all right.

The best thing about the experience was that for the first time ever I was sitting on my own in a completely empty cinema.  Not another living soul was there in the room, so I managed to watch the film without being subjected to the coughing, whispering, munching and bag rustling of the mindless plebs who always seem to congregate around me during my cinema outings.

I emerged, blinking into the sunlight afterwards and immediately checked my email on my phone, because I’m obsessive compulsive when it comes to email.  If I don’t check it once every twenty minutes I break out in red, swollen hives all over my body.

Anyway, sitting in my tiny, hand-held inbox was an email from my agent, Kathryn.  She was writing to let me know that a major publisher is interested in one of my manuscripts. It’s early days, but it’s encouraging all the same.

So far my day’s good/bad ratio was heavily in my favour.  I was cruising.  It felt like one of those days where nothing could possibly go wrong.

And then something went terribly, terribly wrong.

I lost my wallet.  My wallet which contained all my cards, my driving license, and over 300 lovely quid in cash.  Somewhere between the cinema and the town centre, I misplaced it.

Frantically, I retraced my steps, but there was no sign of the thing.  I’d taken a bus back into town, and the realisation hit me like a sledgehammer to the groin:  I’d left it on the bus.

I phoned the depot, explained to them that I had no idea what number of bus I’d taken, what time I’d got on it at, the number of the bus stop, or any of that, and then asked them to find my wallet. 

After two and a half hours, it became apparent they weren’t going to track it down, despite the best efforts of a lovely man named Graham.  Or possibly Graeme.  I didn’t catch the spelling.

None of the dozen or so buses I stopped and searched had the wallet on board, either.  I had to accept it.  My hard earned pennies were lost.  Gone.  Forever.

As a last resort, I called the police, on the off change someone had handed it in.  They hadn’t.

And so began the task of sorting through the wreckage.  I’d have to get a new driver’s license organised ASAP, as that was going to be one of my photo IDs for opening a bank account in Ireland.  And the bank cards would need to be cancelled, of course.  That was the priority.

So, with the weight of the world firmly on my shoulders, I trudged off in search of a branch of my bank, eventually spotting one down a narrow side street.

With my head hanging somewhere around my abdomen, and my feet dragging along the ground, I headed down the side street.

Half way along it, I spotted a bus stopped at traffic lights.  At the exact moment my mind translated the big silver shape into the word ‘bus’, I heard a sharp knocking on glass.

The driver of the bus was chapping on the window and pointing urgently in my direction.  Then he did something wondrous.  Something which has given me a taste of what it would be like to beleive in the divine.

He held up my wallet.

I never got a chance to ask him how he’d found it, or even to thank him properly.  As he handed me the wallet, the doors began to close with a hiss, and the lights changed to green.  With a friendly wave, he drove off, leaving me standing there, agape but delighted that I had my wallet back.

So I make that three out of three on the Good Things chart.  Empty cinema, positive book response, miraculous return of lost possession.  That’s definitely three.  Losing it doesn’t count, as that could have happened to anyone …

To make things even better, though, when I got home and checked my email I discovered I’ve won half a million pounds on the Nigerian lottery – and I’ve never even entered it!  Talk about a lucky streak.

I’ve sent off my bank details, date of birth, Mother’s maiden name, and colour scans of my passport as requested, so I expect to get my winnings any day now!

Things are definitely looking up!