{"id":2279,"date":"2025-01-04T20:30:03","date_gmt":"2025-01-04T20:30:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/?p=2279"},"modified":"2025-01-04T20:30:07","modified_gmt":"2025-01-04T20:30:07","slug":"returning-the-empties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/returning-the-empties\/2279\/","title":{"rendered":"Returning the empties"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf yer want my opinion,\u201d says Bill. He looks up at Alana, with his runtish face twisted into an intense expression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFrankly Bill, I don\u2019t,\u201d Alana interjects before he can launch into one of his tirades about the subject at hand, one of his favourites\u2014why elves would be better employed getting some time in\u2014and monopolise the conversation with tired but well-practised jeu de mots and superficially plausible conclusions that pay scant regard to any logical rigour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhy\u2019s that then? Yer got no answers, eh?\u201d Bill winks and for a moment he looks handsome, his runtiness banished to some corner of her memory which ekes out a living as a trash cart, something Hermann Ebbinghaus calls the forgetting curve; a repository for unwanted ecoica. He is quite a smart man, she reflects, dressing in an old-fashioned, button-up to the wattle suit, something the fashionably communist would call a Mao Suit, but Bill likens to the more counter-revolutionary apparel of Hong Kong opium dealers; a red velvet waistcoat, the only evidence of which are the brocaded fishtails draped over his trouser-tops; a silver, silk-neckerchief, knotted in the askew fashion beloved of poets and others of ill-repute; patent leather dancing pumps, and a jauntily placed homburg bearing the marks of a remarkable and possibly violent history. At his side, on the table, is his ever-present Makala yellow soprano ukelele, an instrument the demands of which he only has a casual acquaintance, a half empty cigarette carton, and a pair of antique duelling pistols.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNot really, Bill. As Plato said, opinion is really the lowest form of human knowledge. It requires no accountability, no understanding,\u201d she says. If she spoke in PowerPoint slides, the last discrete clause would be underlined and bracketed with Spanish exclamation marks. She positions herself near to the bar, one foot on the brass guardrail, her chin jutting belligerently. Bill takes this as flirtation, and if circumstances were different, he wouldn\u2019t be far from the mark. Alana likes rogues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAlrighty then. I\u2019ll keep my mind to me-self. So, what do you want to talk about? The weather? The price of dried toads? Or where I keeps me etchings?\u201d Bill chuckles at his less than subtle transition and Alana rolls her eyes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But she nods and offers her best temptress smile. \u201cEtchings would be good. Although, if you\u2019ve got other things to do\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She eyes the duelling pistols.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOh these?\u201d Bill picks up one gun and swings it around his index finger. \u201cThey ain\u2019t nuffink. I just gotta return a couple of empties to old Alex on Severn Road. Job done, proper like. I won\u2019t be more-un five minutes, tops.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cRun along then, and I\u2019ll go splash my face with some water. You can pick me up at three,\u201d she says, glancing at her watch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bill tips his titfer, swallows the dregs of his absinthe shandy, stubs out his cigarette and stands. \u201cRight-oh then.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cRight-oh, Bill,\u201d she says, nodding to her accomplice waiting by the door.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cIf yer want my opinion,\u201d says Bill. He looks up at Alana, with his runtish face twisted into an intense expression. \u201cFrankly Bill, I don\u2019t,\u201d Alana interjects before he can launch into one of his tirades about the subject at hand, one of his favourites\u2014why elves would be better employed getting some time in\u2014and monopolise […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"yes","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_10158782359051062_103813597863211":"","twitter_1225722811282530305_1225722811282530305":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1490,1491],"tags":[1495,637,8,20,167,919,148,1497,1253,14,863,74,1042,117,1496],"class_list":["post-2279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1490","category-january-2025-returning","tag-alana","tag-bill","tag-he","tag-his","tag-into","tag-looks","tag-no","tag-opinion","tag-says","tag-she","tag-some","tag-up","tag-why","tag-would","tag-yer"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbrNJE-AL","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2279"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2281,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2279\/revisions\/2281"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}