Sleeping dogs

Upstairs, in the kitchen, on what the real estate industry would call a breakfast bar though I have never eaten breakfast there, stands a pad of Post-it notes, their colour pink.

In Wairarapa for a holiday.

"Tell me a story," I said.

This may be the first ever column about the Sudanese postal service of the early 1980s, but I doubt it’s the first ever column about the way a chance encounter can steer a life.

Fear and desire are the twin poles of the universe, the yin and yang of action, the push-me-pull-you forces of existence.

Repeat after me: the pub is a good thing.

My mother has no tombstone.

A sign on the gate said Beware of the Dog.

And they’re off.