The street in Ulan Bator where they have just opened a Starbucks

The weekend

I tackled Janice on the issue of Havoc Blythe over coffee at Blake’s on Saturday morning. Was she seeing more of him than at school? I demanded.  If so, when, and why hadn’t she told me?

Janice looked deeply shocked and troubled, and I realised I had got it wrong.  So, inevitably, we settled down to a discussion of what it was that gave me the creeps each time he talked to me.

Our list, written (as is our wont when we have matters of grave consequence to discuss) on the back of one of those paper napkins they always hand out with cappuccinos in Blake’s ended up with these headings:

1. LOOKS.    I said he looked creepy but eventually agreed with Janice that there’s not exactly anything wrong with his looks, but there is an issue with his tan.  It seems to be permanent, and a bit too perfect.
2. TEETH.   We agreed that just as with his tan, his teeth are also too perfect.
3. KNOWLEDGE.   Havoc-Blythe knows things – which although they are quite often things we want to know (such as the stuff written about us by the senior managers which he revealed in the week) we’re unhappy with the fact that HE knew it in the first place.
4. SMOOTHNESS.  Havoc-Blythe is Mr Smooooooth.   He’s never flustered, his clothes are always immaculate, never a hair out of place, never a shoelace undone.  I don’t like men who are a mess, but he would be more human if only he turned up in jeans with engine oil all over them once in a while.   Or a gravy stain on his immaculately ironed white shirt.
5. WHO DOES HIS IRONING?  If Havoc Blythe looks after his own laundry then he is spooky because no man does that – at least not to that level of sartorial perfection.  If he has a woman do it, who is she and why does he never mention her?   Does his mother come round every week to clear up?   Or (even worse) his sister?
6. WORLD KNOWLEDGE.   I am not as much against knowledge as Janice (who called Havoc-Blythe too clever by half) but it is unnerving that he knows everything.  When I suddenly decide that I am a fan of some pop star or other it always turns out Havoc Blythe knows everything about the man, the groups he is with, the albums, the movies…   If the conversation turns to foreign affairs and Janice mentions Outer Mongolia as her eternal example of a strange foreign place that no one knows about, he mentions the capital (Ulan Bator, according to HB), the weather in the autumn and the road on which they have built a Starbucks.   Which leads on to
7. HIS TIME OFF.   All that odd stuff about being held hostage in Venezuela at the start of term is funny once, but spooky thereafter.  Yet it happens over and over, and no one ever questions him – at least as far as we know.
8. UNFLAPABILITY.   We both agreed the head could walk in and tell Havoc Blythe he was sacked, and HB would look him coolly in the eyes and announce, “no Headmaster, I think you will find it is you who is sacked.”
9. HIS LACK OF FUN.   This was a major factor on which we both agreed.  He never fell over helpless with laughter.  He smiled, and seemed to appreciate the childish jokes that we share – especially after half an hour in the pub, but that’s it.  There were no tears of joy.
10. THE SIMPLE FACT THAT DESPITE ALL OF THIS, IF ONE WAS MARRIED TO HIM THE HOUSE WOULD BE CLEAN, THE CLOTHES PUT AWAY, THE CAR WOULD WORK AND THERE WOULD PROBABLY BE MONEY IN THE BANK.

We had lunch in the pub and went shopping.

This entry was posted on 01/06/2008 at 07:44 pm and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

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