THE LAST HUNT

I need a wee.

I could use the litter tray, but I prefer not to. OK, I’ll admit it. I want to go outside to hunt. It’s just getting light and that’s a good time for hunting. I’ll just go upstairs and wake someone up to open the door. (Don’t know why they won’t get a cat flap. It’d save them always having to get up.)

The door’s closed. No use going to the boy’s door. He never gets up for me. I’ll just scratch at the adult’s door.

Ah! Someone’s moving. It’ll be her, I expect. He never comes to let me out if he’s in bed. I don’t think he hears me scratching. Here she comes.
‘What do you want, Kim?’ she says to me. ‘Do you want to go out? Come on then. I’ll open the door.’

We go downstairs and she unlocks the door. I rush out into the dawn. It’s cool, but pleasant. Now for that wee.

That’s better. I wonder what’s about this morning? I’ll go over to the common I think. There’s always more game over there. Over the fence and down the next garden path. They’ve got a fishpond, haven’t they? I’ll take a quick look. A nice fish would be good for breakfast.

Hmm! Fish! Sit quietly, Kim and wait for them to come up. Here’s one. Quick flash of the paw and scoop it out. Ha ha. It’s flapping all over the lawn trying to get back to the water. Can’t understand why they want to live in it. Nasty wet stuff.

One quick jump and there’s a tasty snack. Now to see what else is about. A quick sprint across the road and onto the long grass. Quiet, now, Kim. You don’t want to frighten everything away before you’ve had your fun.

The birds are starting to sing. I like birds. They’re fun to try to sneak up on, but they’re quick and can fly. It takes great skill to catch them. Much more than mice and voles. Squirrels are fun too, and frogs. I like the way frogs jump about when I let them go briefly. Toads are horrid though. They don’t jump and they taste foul.

There’s a blackbird pulling up a worm on the cut grass. I can probably sneak up in this long grass until I’m near enough to pounce.

Missed her. I remember the time I did catch a blackbird. I’d been out early, like today, and managed to get him. He made such a squawking that She came out. She shouted at me to let him go and ran after me. I fled with my prize under some bushes but she came after me, grabbed me by the scruff of my neck and pulled me out.

Oh the indignity of it! I opened my mouth to tell her that this wasn’t how to treat a cat, and the blackbird took the opportunity to escape. He flew up into the nearest tree and sat there laughing at me. That hurt my pride somewhat.

I can’t understand humans. Why do they make such a fuss about birds? They don’t eat them. At least not the ones in the garden, but they get very cross if I chase them. They don’t mind if I catch mice or voles though.

Except for one occasion, I remember. I’d caught a baby vole. It was small enough to fit in my mouth and I took it home for the humans. When I got to the door it was closed and so I made a little chirrup, which I could do with my mouth shut. They should have known that that sound meant I had something in my mouth, but no, it seems not. Sometimes humans are so stupid. Anyway, the boy opened the door. As I went in, I suppose he saw the little vole’s tail sticking out of my mouth and he grabbed me, saying, ‘No you don’t. You’re not bringing that in here.’

Of course, that made me open my mouth and the baby vole jumped out and ran. I ran after it, but it disappeared under the boiler.

I sat there for a time while the humans poked under the boiler with sticks, brushes and whatever else they could find to try to make it run out, but it climbed up and they couldn’t get it. I could see that there was no chance until they had stopped their fussing so I walked away.

‘Oh no you don’t,’ He said. ‘You brought it in, you’ll get it out.’ And He picked me up and carried me back to the boiler. I stayed there for a few minutes and then went away again.

I suppose they got the little thing out again eventually, but they couldn’t see that the problem was of their making. If the boy hadn’t grabbed me I wouldn’t have lose it like that. Oh, well, so much for memories.

Now what? I’ll just listen for a while, I think. See if I can hear anything underground.

Squeaks. Mice probably. Where is the entrance to their nest then? I think that it‘s a mouse family, judging by the number and pitch of the squeaks. Now for my nose. That should tell me where their run is and lead me to the entrance.

Here it is. The entrance to the nest. Now to wait.

Here she comes. Ready to pounce. Quiet now, I think she’s suspicious. Tail lashing then—jump.

Got her! I’ll play with her for a bit first before killing her. That’s always good fun. Right, carry her away from the hole so she can’t run back into it. Now to let her go. See her run, crouch and—pounce.

I think I’ll try throwing her up in the air and catching her. Hear her squeak! She’s truly scared now. Let her think she’s getting away again and—pounce. Ha ha. This is such fun. Throwing again, letting her run again.

I think that’s enough for now. One quick bit and she’s dead. What’s that? I think She’s calling me for breakfast. All that hunting has made me hungry. What She gives me is better than mouse so I’ll leave that and go home.

Run quickly across the road. What’s that? A car? Can’t get across in time…

If you enjoyed this story, (or even if you didn’t) please feel free to make comments. Constructive criticism please. The other kind is useless.

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I have often wondered how it comes about that we start the year 10 days after the Winter Solstice. This doesn’t seem to make any sense. It is not on any obvious astronomical day, so why then? It would be more logical to start it on the solstice when the days are beginning to get longer, or at the Spring Equinox when things begin to grow anew. Even the summer solstice could be considered as at that time the daylight is waning and that could be considered an ending. Autumn Equinox too could be thought of as an ending of the old year as all the crops are gathered in ready for the cold winter ahead.

Similarly, why start the day at midnight? That too seems illogical if you look at it closely. To me it would seem more logical to start the day at dawn.

I considered these things when deciding about how time was to be measured on Vimar and came up with the system you can read about below. I have kept the hour as I did not want to make completely wholesale changes to confuse my readers too much and so I kept the hours and minutes as they are on Earth.

The World of Vimar

Vimar circles its sun in almost exactly 360 days. This leads the people to have divided their year into 12 months of 30 days. Since it is not exactly 360 days, but in fact 360 days and 4 hours, this means that every 6 years an extra day is added to the year. This is added at the end of the year and is called the Day of the Gods. It is a holiday for everyone and as it comes just before Grillon’s Day, also a holiday when the New Year is celebrated, everyone looks forward to this time.

Because all the important astronomical timings are 6 or multiples of 6, the people of Vimar have come to believe that six is a holy number. Thus when they came to devise the timings of the day, they decided to divide it into 24 hours, much as we do on Earth, However, they begin to count their day from the time of dawn on the 2 equinoxes, unlike Earth, where timing is taken from the mid-point of darkness at this time, more or less. Once every place began their day at dawn, regardless of time of year or place on the planet, but this became somewhat confusing as trade increased, and so the standardised time began. Thus what on Earth would be 6am, on Vimar it
is 0 hour, and Earth’s 12pm is Vimar’s 6th hour.

Vimar has 2 moons, Lyndor and Ullin. Lyndor is slightly nearer to Vimar than Ullin and appears to be a gold colour. Ullin appears more silvery. It is considered propitious when the moons are both full together, and if both moons are dark, that is considered to be the least lucky time for any ventures. The best times for starting any venture is when both moons are waxing, and conversely, if they are both waning, that is a bad time, although endings are good at this time.

The world has 2 large continents, The one featured in the Wolf Pack is the continent of Khalram. Grosmer is the largest country on this landmass and has a climate ranging from Mediterranean in the south to cool temperate in the north. To the west, beyond the Western Mountains is a vast plain on which live the nomadic people known as the Horselords for their mastery of the beautiful horses they rear. It is said that a huge ocean lies beyond this plain, but no one knows for sure.
Beyond the Mountans of Doom in the east are the lands of Pelimar, a loose coalition of city states, Erian, ruled by an elected Master and the elven land of Rindisillaron. The lands to the south are largely unknown to the people of Grosmer, Pelimar and Erian, although trade does occur occasionally. The Great Desert is largely to blamed for this lack of contact. There is a large, mysterious continent to the far east also that occasionally comes to the attention of the people of Khalram because of the Raiders who come for plunder and slaves.

Once, the elves and humans  all lived together in Khalram, but soon they began to fall out and so the elven land of Rindissillaron was founded in the east of the continent. Here the elves could live in the way they wished, close to nature and disturbing the natural world as little as possible. The dwarves have always lived in the mountains where they can dig for the ores and gems they are so good at working.

The other races, such as orcs and trolls, were banished to the far north, as far as the mountain range known as the Roof of the World and even beyond, it is thought, although no one has ever managed to cross this range and return.

If you liked this post, or have any questions about it, please contact me.

The Wolves of Vimar books 1 and 2 can be bought from http://amazon.co.uk/, http://amazon.com/, or http://smashwords.com/

I have written poetry as well as prose during my lifetime. Unfortunately some of them have gone missing. In fact, all but one of my very early ones have gone to that great poetry book in the sky.

Here is one I wrote recently, I hope you enjoy it.

Autumn in Sussex

The Downs are wreathed in mist, like smoke
From a dying fire.
The leaves are turning red and gold
Like flames upon a pyre.

Spring’s little lambs are grown to sheep
The swallows they have flown.
The blossoms that the summer brought
Their petals all have thrown.

Now autumn’s bounty fills the woods,
The hedgerows are ablaze
With hips and haws in colours bright
The senses to amaze.

The smoke from wood fires fills the air,
The scent of autumn true
The autumn sun is cooler now
And mornings filled with dew.

The cobwebs shine with dewdrops bright.
The spider in her lair
Thinks nothing of the rainbow hue
That scatters in the air.

And children kick the fallen leaves
As laughingly they run
To gather conkers, shiny brown,
Gleaming in the sun.

We gather blackberries from the hedge
And apples from on high.
Up in the tree they ripen now
To turn into a pie.

But autumn sometimes has a kick
And the rain lashes down.
The wind, it howls within the eaves
And through the trees doth moan.

Sometimes Jack Frost, with fingers cold,
Paints upon the glass
Pictures of fern and leaf and tree
Flower, bush and grass.

Then suddenly the trees are bare
And autumn’s bounty’s past.
Winter’s cold has now arrived.
With its arctic blast.
.

If you enjoyed reading this poem, please make a comment, or ‘like’ it.

Someone recently said that they thought that my cover for The Wolf Pack would look better darker.

I would like to gather some opinions on this. What do you think?

Please let me know by posting a comment.

Thanks in advance for your trouble.

How well can you spell? Go back to school and take our spelling test to find out – BT.

I got one wrong! How shameful is that for an author?

There are a number of words that are frequently confused by people. In this post I hope to clarify nine of these pairs.

 Bought and Brought.

Brought is the past tense of ‘to bring’ and means to fetch something.

e.g. The dog brought the ball back to me.

Bought is the past tense of  ‘to buy’ and means to purchase something.

e.g. When I went to town I bought a new blouse.

The mistake is always using brought for bought and never the other way round.

 Fewer and Less

This is a very common one. So many people will talk about ‘There were less people at the match than last week.’

It should be ‘There were fewer people at the match than last week.’

Less is used for things that you measure (like weight, temperature, volume,etc)

Fewer is used for things you count (like people, goals, items in a basket at the checkout, etc)

A simple rule of thumb can be: If it only comes in whole numbers, then it’s fewer, but if it can be in fractions, then it’s less.

 Literally and Virtually

Literally means that it actually happened.

e.g. It was literally snowing a blizzard.

In this case, there would be no visibility to speak of and snow falling as if it were in the Arctic or Antarctic with a strong wind blowing it almost horizontal.

Virtually means it is not actually that thing. It is used when a metaphor is used.

e.g. The footballer was virtually flying down the wing.

If the speaker or writer said ‘The footballer was literally flying down the wing’, that would mean that he had somehow sprouted wings!

 Infer and Imply

I recently heard a broadcaster on the radio use infer when she meant imply. These people ought to know better. Most, I assume, are journalists, or at least have a ‘good’ education with a degree. They should know the difference, and if they don’t, in my opinion, should not be in the job.

Imply is what someone says when they want to suggest something without actually saying it in so many words.

e.g.‘He implied that he was going to come with us.’

Infer means that someone has drawn a conclusion from a statement.

e.g. ‘From what he said, I inferred that he was going to come with us.’

  Lose and Loose.

This is one for the written word.

Lose is when you misplace something.

e.g. You are going to lose your purse if you don’t put it away.

Loose is when something comes undone.

e.g. My shoelace has come loose.

 Tragedy and Travesty.

A Tragedy is something very sad.

e.g. It is a tragedy that he died so young.

A Travesty is to make something ridiculous.

e.g. The dogs runnign onto the pitch made the football match a travesty.

 Effect and Affect

Effect is a noun. It is the result of something.

e,g, What is the effect of mixing red and yellow together?

Affect is a verb. It says what something does.

e.g. How did the accident affect you?

 Popular and Common

This is one I heard from young people when I was teaching.

Popular means well liked by a lot of people.

e.g. Dean was always full of fun and so was very popular with his team mates.

Common means that there are a lot of them.

e.g. Herring gulls are very common in Brighton.

In this last incident, many pupils would say that the herring gulls were very popular, but if you asked the car owners of Brighton, I think you would get a very different view.

 Defective and Deficient

Defective means that a thing is broken in some way.

e.g. I sent my new vacuum cleaner back because it was defective. It was failing to pick up the dirt.

Deficient means that there is something missing.

e.g. The new wardrobe I bought was deficient. There were not enough screws to put it together.

Please feel free to make a comment on this post. I will endeavor to get back to you.

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I am now starting to blog on this site as well as my current one on Blogger. I ask you to please bear with me while I get the site up and running to my liking. This is taking longer than I thought it would.

I hope that I will eventually be posting at least once a week on Tuesdays.

Please feel free to make comments about the blog and my books.

I am shifting to WordPress from Blogger. The problem with Blogger is that I can’t seem to read any comments made by my followers. This is a big disadvantage as I want to make contact with my readers. You are all very important to me. If I can’t read your comments then I cannot improve my writing to meet your wishes.

I hope that you will continue to read my posts here and that others will join you.

I have just started this blog. I have been on Blogger for a while, but am not satisfied that I can’t read any comments made. I have been posting on blogger every week and intend to do so here too.

I will run the same post on both, at least for a while then probably discard Blogger for WordPress once I get used to it.