The First Bee Of The Year

I saw the first bee of the year today. He looked confused. I looked confused.

We will remain confused until the warmer weather comes. 

Valentine's Dragons

I may have said it before. Dragons aren't romantic. We have a tendency to set fire to things, and not in a "hey baby, you're on fire, come back to my place for a drink". More in a "hey, that baby is on fire. I SWEAR I HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH IT".

This is how you imagine dragons are at Valentine's Day

This is how dragons actually are at Valentine's Day.

Note the difference between the first and the second pictures. The first one has a cutesy dragon curled around a heart. The second has a dragon holding the still-beating heart in his curled talons. It's a big difference, and if you're planning on dating a dragon, it's one you really should think about. Seriously. I cannot stress that enough. Breaking up because you were growing apart is one thing. Breaking up because you've been ripped apart is another.

But let's be honest, even dating other dragons is complicated.

I'm going to stay in this Valentine's Day

Year of the Dragon

Xin nian kuai le!

You have no idea how much yoga it took to get myself fit for that photo. 

Here we are, in the Chinese Year of the Dragon. This means there are a lot of babies born in the last twenty-four days that are claiming to be dragons, which is both incorrect and quite impressive for an infant. Those born in the year of the me will never have the overwhelming craving for gold, or tasty charred human flesh that a true dragon has. But they may share some apparently common characteristics of dragons.

Like being strong, powerful, intuitive and artistic.

Of course, loath as I am to admit it, there are downsides to being a dragon. We are stubborn, ferocious, and terrible at romance...

Whatever our negative points, though, it's better than being an ox. No-one ever said "wow, guys, did you see that film with the really impressive ox in it? Man, I wish ox were real. I would totally get one as a pet. I would have such a deep emotional bond with my ox it would be like it could read my mind!". No-one says that.

I feel a bit sorry for the ox now.

Oh, the unbearable agony

The First Christmas

This time of year makes me reminisce, in the best tradition of Christmas sitcom specials. Everything goes a bit wavy and then I flash back, which could be Memory Lane, or could be the cheap cooking brandy I've been drinking to dull the pain. Let us travel back in time to an age where dragons were fearsome and I was less drunk...

The date was... many years ago. King Arthur was no longer on the throne, but Twitter hadn't been invented yet, so it was somewhere inbetween. Now, dragons aren't exactly sociable creatures. We don't live in large family groups, because putting so many of us together is spelling spontaneous combustions with a capital spon. But there are still some traditions that we uphold. The birth of a baby dragon, for instance, was always marked with a goat, and a dragon's coming of age ceremony was something quite spectacular. It involved virgin princesses, but who can find those in this day and age? I did think of starting an online import/export company, but the outset cost of tiaras was ridiculous. But I digress. 

We celebrated Christmas in a rather different way, as dragons. For many, it is the birth of the Messiah. For us, it is a mooing, bleating, lowing feast served in the rustic way (i.e., a stable). We'd probably pause before we ate the baby Jesus, since we've learned our lesson as a species after the St. George incident, but every winter we commemorated the deliciousness of all the beasts and celebrated another year we hadn't been stabbed by overeager heroes. 

This particular December, the family had flown in, the cattle were panicking, and the local villagers had retreated to their cellars as we caroused. Nothing carouses quite like us. My Aunt Adelinde limboing is a sight to bring a tear to the eye, and the bile to the throat. Bends in ways I can't stomach remembering. Anyway, as a young dragon, I was expected to keep quiet and sit in the corner playing with the discarded hooves from dinner, until everyone had roared themselves hoarse and fallen asleep on the treasure hoard. 

But this year, my Uncle Knucker had been invited. He wasn't like the rest of the family. Most of the conversation then was about slaying and eating and possibly, if there was time, more slaying. Uncle Knucker was what my father called, with a sneer, modern. This meant he didn't eat more livestock than he had to, he read improving books, and he kept the leylandii trees between his and the neighbouring gardens nicely pruned. Nowadays, with our numbers declining, the idea of trying to blend in is sensible. Back then, it was insane. 

Living so closely with people had given Uncle Knucker strange ideas about our winter festivals. That year, he suggested that we might adopt a human pastime and play something called charades. 

Anyone who has ever played a family trivia game can guess how well this went. I shan't paint the full gory picture, because there isn't enough red crayon in the world to accurately depict how bloodthirsty a game can get when both teams have short tempers and firepower. We were scraping scales from the walls well into the new year. 

Every time I see the box for Trivial Pursuit, I get cold shivers. 

Festive goodness

Decline and Fall

There are many addictions in the world. I admit, I'm not the most strong-willed of beasts. If it comes to treasure, I tend to go a little bit hazy around the edges with gold-lust. For the most part, though, I manage to push on through my everyday life, even if those Cash 4 Gold adverts tempt me with the idea of warehouses full of ex-catalogue nine carat wonder. Even talking about it is making my talons twinge.

But in the past few months, I may have slipped. Not a little slip, like an alcoholic who licks the Christmas pudding for that sweet brandy taste. No, I took one step onto the road and found myself four months later in a catatonic state in a rehab facility in a quiet mountain location.

It's all Blackpool's fault. Las Vegas may be renowned for it's gambling facilities, the brilliant lights against the desert backdrop, but Blackpool is known for it's three-lightbulb illuminations and knock-off Eiffel Tower. I thought I would be safe there. I hadn't reckoned on the two-pence machines. You put one in, and sometimes it knocks another one out, so you put another one in, and it looks so close to teetering and giving you a sixpenny jackpot, and another, and another, and another...

Effie said that when she finally got me out of there, all I could do was move my pathetically wasted arms mechanically and twitch every time I heard a metallic noise.

I'm not allowed back now.

It's hard to type when you've only got three fingers and huge claws

Just because I'm a mythological  reptile, that doesn’t mean I can’t keep up to date with modern technology.  And dragons seem to be vastly under-represented in the blogging world. I suspect it’s because not many of us can type accurately with our claws. I've solved this by dictating to my helpful neighbour, Effie. If I were to type this myself, it would be something like this: 


Henlno ui am a dRAgon.,


You can see my point. 

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