Your blog is about to be recorded into an audiobook. If you could choose anyone — from your grandma to Samuel L. Jackson — to narrate your posts, who would it be?.

What a good excuse for an experiment!  (Not to mention a WordPress Upgrade) Bear with me, this has all been done a bit quickly. Tha answer to the question?  I can’t afford Sir Tony Robinson, so it’s going to have to be me!

Includes ‘Some Old Cat I Used To Know’, written & played by J P Horsam & His Imaginary Friends

Someone comes into the shop. That’s always surprisng, but even more so given that there’s no door. I think he’s a monk of some sort, possibly Japanese. ‘Welcome!’ I say ‘please make yourself comfortable.’    Frank shouts, I jump. ‘Irasshai mase !!!!’      Yes, he speaks Japanese, I’d forgotten. I speak it too now because the machine taught me. The traveller smiles

Cheerful warm welcome    (5)

Is the best indication     (7)

A really good inn   ( 5)

He seats himself comfortably at a low table that has just been installed. Frank folds himself down with natural ease. I scrunch and fold my knees clumsily. I know this man.

‘Mr Basho-san, you are welcome to our inn. What can we serve you?’ The machine is ahead of me. There’s three cappucinos and a plate of those small sweet cakes. Petit fours, I think, but there’s at least six of them.  Basho bows, a slight nod of politeness. ‘Thank you very much. I always love the coffee here!’

We drink the coffees in silence, but it’s a warm, comfortable silence. It’s the companionable quiet of three travellers just come in off the road. After a drink we’ll have the day’s journey to talk about.  Basho explains,. His old friend Sora showed him the cafe some years ago. When time permits, they drop by for a coffee. Even the great trading centre of Nagasaki cannot offer a decent cappucino in 1674. The Dutch make coffee, but they let it stew too long. The petits fours, he says, are excellent. Poems have been written about them. I understand this, entire books have been written about our madelaines.

More Frank

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