Being of an artistic temperament, and prone to moments of absent -mindedness due to the kaleidoscopic nature of the creative mind, I managed to lose my backpack one evening.
(Ok, fair enough, you're right, I had been overserved at the bar...)
Anyway, the crucial part is that it contained one of my moleskin notebooks, which in turned contained the last twelve month's ideas, dreams, sketches, personal futterings and contact details - not to mention my diary of the time I spent in France planting the Wireman.
Choked I was.
Fast forward two or three weeks and I'm having a pint with an artist chum (couldn't afford absinthe, even though it makes the parts grow longer ) and in a moment of Karmic harmony I bought the barmaid a drink.
When Artist chum questioned why I was chucking the currency around when we had barely enough for our own lubrication, I told him the tale of the lost notes, and how by spreading a little pleasantness I might offset the fact that my precious book was lost forever, abandoned to a hideous fate, and in all probability being used to line some miscreant's ferret's cage.
The Good Bit:
Artist chum then recalled a mysterious, garbled message he'd received, which had mentioned my name.
A quick check through his call history, contact with the caller, a trip across town and The Tale of the Lost Bag comes to a happy, misty eyed conclusion involving a charming, thoughtful taxi driver, a scrawled number in the back cover and a great deal of coincidental luck.
Or was it....
(Dramatic pause)
So, here's few sketches from it that might otherwise be lost on the storm tossed tides of misfortune.
Sorry about the florid verbosity of the epistle - I've been reading the biography of Dickens and it rubs off a bit.
