Hey, have you ever

Laughed out loud in an empty house because you've realised that something you thought was a secret is actually more likely as plain as day to everybody who knows you?


'cause guess what I just did!

It's terribly funny.

http://www.plicity.org - if you haven't seen it, make it your business to. Got nothing to do with my laughter.

Chapter Three

Chapter Three - Expositions

Author's note - I researched the small English town my heroes are about to enter extensively and arrived at the conclusion that it was too boring for the needs of my story. I thought about this for awhile and just like Thomas Hardy and his Wessex I have created a place loosely based on some real details but broadly fictional and much cooler than the real thing. I have taken similar liberties with the naming of said town. Please, no imbecile correct the spelling of said town lest I have to kill you with your own enormous stupidity hurled at a great speed from a catapult of some kind.


"Rise and shine Jeff!"

Giles was now fully dressed. He stripped the blanket from the near-comatose form of Geoffrey Finbar Limpweedle and looked down with distaste. By the cold light of an October afternoon in South of England the comically oversized head lost its novelty and began recalling to Giles certain unpleasant memories which we shall expand up on in due course. Giles himself was in the region of six feet tall and of a slim build which didn't preclude athleticism but didn't exactly advertise it either. He wore a white shirt and grey trousers, set off undramatically by jet black shoes. His shirt was tucked in, showing a modest, refined belt with a thin brass buckle. His hair was cut in a manner reminiscent of Paul Weller in the Wild Wood video. If this is unfamiliar to you then permit me to elaborate. His hair was thin, just long enough to have a little bit of flop to it. If Giles were spun around at high velocity for some reason it would give about five inches of vaugely horizontal blur either side of his wildly spinning head. His hair was a light brown colour often referred to as "mousey". It was the colour of a light-brown mouse, that much was true. But the term didn't hold true for the countless other varieties of mouse and their repespective complexions. It was the kind of clumsy, inefficient language that Giles himself was all but campainging on the streets against. So he resisted mousey at all costs and made treat with light brown. He wore small oval glasses with thin black frames.

"What d'you call doing that to a person? I know what I call it, bloody inconsiderate, that's what." Jeff sat up.

"We'll have to get you some clothes before anything else. Didn't you bring a bag?"

"Of course I did, it's in storage at the airport. I just like the suit. What? You don't like the suit? It's a fine suit!" said the idignant Jeff.

"Indeed. We'll pick that up then, get you changed and have a think about where to go from here."

"Oh, all right. Any chance of some breakfast?"

"You missed it. Come on, we'll pick up lunch on the way back. Do you have any money?"

"Not really, no, not actually money." He had the decency to look sheepish. "But when I get me back I'm sure we can earn plenty as entertainer-twins."

"You know, you and Finbar have had different experiences since you split. You're no longer the same person. Do you understand? You, Goeffrey, stayed dancing in American while Finbar was manhandled across the Atlantic against his will and forced to build a time machine here in London for reasons unknown," said Giles, "- don't you think he might harbour some resentment?"

"Oh I never would. I knew. I've been thinking about the London thing. What's in London? Why here? And I got to thinking, what's the link between London and Time? And then it hit me. I almost woke you up, but you looked so peaceful..."

"What hit you Jeff? What are you talking about?"

"London . . . Time . . ." he said deliberately, "don't you see? What's the connection? It's so obvious I can't believe I didn't think of it sooner. There's only one place they could possibly be in the whole of England!" Jeff lept up, back straight, cane in hand and placed his hat on his head. Aside from looking a little crumpled he seemed full of vim and vinegar, or whatever means energetic in this bizarre vernacular.

"Tell me, Jeff, tell me for Christ's sake!"

A smug expression crossed Jeff's abnormal head and head looked up, directly into Giles's stern brown eyes. He spoke a single, glaringly-obvious word and watched understanding bloom in Giles's features.

"Grennitch."

"Of course! It's almost too obvious . . . The start of all time. Time everywhere is measured according to the time in Grennitch."

"Exactly. And here's what I didn't understand, but evidently one of O' Malley's goons figured it out. It's almost something a child would think of. If time stops in Grennitch-"

"-It stops everywhere. Jeff, this is amazing!"

"But also very troubling Giles. Let's get my luggage and some luncheon to be going on with, and I'll fill you in on a fuller stomach."

"Very good. Let us away."

The pair made their way to the basement carpark, Giles in a wonderfully "detective" trench coat and Jeff in the wrinkled, nevertheless impressive, tuxedo. Giles stopped at a Renault 5 from 1984. I don't know whether the reader will be familiar with the Renault 5 in general or the 1984 model specifically, but this was a good example of what a car should not be in 2004. It was built from what appeared to be pure, uncut Ugly. Ugly wheels supported an ugly chasis painted an ugly shade of week-old-shit-green which was fighting a hopeless battle against some ferrociously ugly old corrosion. It was as if (and given current plot developments this may not be impossible) somebody had taken a modern car (say a Ford Fiesta) with all the curves and things therein entailed and applied angles to anything that was smooth. Ugly mirrors clashed unnattractively with uglier door-handles.

The interior was month-old-shit-beige sticky plastic. The kind that on hot days welds itself to your skin and you must peel yourself out of the car. Assuming, of course, you can get it to run. The skill required to start the engine of a Renault 5 is an idiosyncratic art and only consistantly available to a select number of highly-adept monk-like creatures who live under a small go-kart track in France and do nothing but start Renault 5s and cackle menacingly at little kid racers. Now you know.

"You told me this was a chariot of inquiry for the modern detective's every need. It turns out that was Gilesian for heap of bollocks shit-ferry." Jeff kicked a tyre in disgust. The car rattled something at him in a threatening response.

"Be nice to her," said Giles, dropping to a whisper to add, "I think she may be haunted by the ghost of a Porsche 911, so never mention that she's anything else or we don't know what might happen. On the upside I don't need to change the battery any more . . . It's the ectoplasm. Does wonders. She may look like a Renault 5 - but that's where the likeness takes a hike. She drives like a Porsche."

"That's messed up, Mister," said Jeff, but resolved to be careful never the less, lest he set the obviously unstable Giles off on some kind of wobbler. That wouldn't do anybody any good.

They got into the vehicle, so-called simply because it held together, by some miracle, long enough to carry its passengers the required distance. About an hour after they left the city - Jeff suffering from a bad case of the freak-outs as the car pushed 70 mph on the motorway and he worried that it would disintegrate, then stall and propell him through the windscreen and across lanes into the path of a Bell truck that was pulling past them on the right-hand side in a recklessly illegal maneouvre - they arrived in the charming small country town of Grennitch.

Or at least, they passed a signpost saying "Welcome to Grennitch - it's about time!" and chuckled a bit before realising they were five miles further than they thought. Giles reversed about ten meters and was back in front of the signpost.

"What," said Giles, "this all about?"

"They've done it."

"Done what?"

"What they shouldn't have done." Jeff sighed. "Grennitch is gone."

Cue dramatic crescendo and end of chapter.

I sit me

. . In a netcaf in Dublin with a page on my mind. It's one that has been written on so many times and in so many languages that nothing makes sense. Words crowd the page, struggling with each other, some occasionally fight a space clear for themselves and beg to be noticed before they become swamped by the constant tide of scribbling that happens here. Scrawl upon scrawl, nightmare literature nestles up to to cozy memories of slow days full of simplicity. Journal-thoughts obscure public outcries. Scrawl upon scrawl. These words fight, even the nice ones written in calm times, fight for attention because this means survival. If words aren't read they are just ink here. And new letters get dug in over old, the pen presses so hard now to make an impact. Small tears and creases litter the page, it is full of words. Sentences that make no sense now all have become unreadable.

Nothing to do but tear this out and start again. This time to write more orderly, in paragraphs and chapters, left to right, line by line. Headings, sub-headings and footnotes. All laid out so pretty and none of it meaning anything. So tear this unreadable mess to pieces and stop the fervent jostling and violence of these words. If they could kill each other there would be none left. And by the constant scribbling, they have done something worse. Words on words on words, and none of them understandable. Words on words on words. All still alive, none capable of life.

Tear this out and start again. Breeze in shade on cool grass. Suicide is so melodramatic these days. The only real way to go is fighting for every last word, knowing you won't rescue them all and that those you do won't thank you. Nothing to do but close my eyes, tear them out and start again to see.

Wilt got no shame

Some say, "Mr. Flowers - you spell so poorly, puncuate so randomly and leave letters out where they should reside, how can you justify such nonsense?" To you, oh great unbeliever, I ask the question WHY SHOULDN'T I, FUCKER? If I don't care to spell-check like a little pandering Microsoft PANSIE then that's my choice. I'm a revolver. A resolution. A revolution! A revolutionolver! I'm a resolutionolver and that's why I fly my way, not bound by rules left in archaic dictionaries and pathetic grimoires. I don't even know what a grimoire is but I'm sure they SUCK. I am not going to bow down to Gatesian English just because Word puts a little line under something. I don't even use word! So shut up. Shut up. Shut. Up.

And let there be no more of this foolish behaviour, you hear me?


You guys. You guys. You guys need to chiiilllll out. That's what you need to do. Look at me. You ever see me all freakin' out and losing it for no reason? No, that's because I have control. I have inner piece. And I have a selective memory.

So srew your DEMOCRACY that's what I say, away with the whole cotton-pickin' lot of it. I want to see the real men in charge. I want to see Johnny Knoxville run the country for a week, I want Zane Lowe in charge of foriegn affairs. I want Charlie Mc Creevy to give me a large Chicken Royale Meal with no mayo and a Fanta WITH ketchup and salt and a baffling number of unessential napkins. I want to be President. But nnoooo. We have to let people who are QUALIFIED do jobs. Greedy people. People who want to be on top of the heap shouldn't be allowed to be there. We should all have jobs we hate and not be happy. You capitalist fuck. You snivelling, whining little ad-break muppet-face. You, you. You greedy money-chasing pill-popping frog-eating SHOCK of a person you. You think I'm crazy, don't you?


Well you WOULD. Fuck this.

And the secret to inner peace is not outer joy and fulfilment. The secret to outer joy and fulfilment is inner peace. Find your centre and let no-one else mess with it. You have the power. You are the power. You are DEVINE. And in Hell you can whore your soul you pathetic non-being.

Yours in unfathomable rage and yellow spandex,

Wilt N Flowers - Brings value HOME

On politics

I think that all political discourse should take place on the Johnny. Imagine a cabinet filled with hygeinic toilet facilities side by side.

Bush meets Blair, they sit trousers-down seperated by a modesty screen up to stomach height on opposite latrines.

"Hello Tony, my little lapdog, who's a good boy then?"

"Woof, woof, me! Me! It is me, right?"

"Yes it's you. Now, I'm gonna need to kill some more of your army dudes 'cause I got this election coming up and all so you know, looks better than Americans getting shot. So you're on the front! How you like that?"

"Great work sir. We'll so Muhammed al-Jihad what's what's, by George."

"Heh. Funny. So you're - excuse me a minute while I - uhhnn - lay a little cable here - nnnnnyeeeah, huppp, awww yeah. That's the stuff. So. Are we pulling out of Iraq and signing the Kyoto treaty or just sitting around like dicks?"

"Out! Out! Sign! Sign! *pantpant*"

There you have it.

I'm telling you that's how it would happen.

Chapter Two

Chapter Two

A month previously in Chicago, Il.

Geoffrey F Limpweedle, entertainer for a living and a keen inventor in his spare time, adjusted the tilt of his bowler hat and checked the shine on his shiny red shoes in a mirror. Deciding that all was acceptable he clicked his heels together thrice for luck, got a firm grip on his cane and issued the command to start his journey through time. This was it, the culmination of years and years of testing and research and getting pies thrown at him. He was now about to use his all-new time machine for the first time. Every nuance was intricately calibrated, and the date was set for the 1950s. He had the suit. He had the gait. He had the cigars. He was ready.

"There's no place like home," he said.

It may be worthy of mention that he was standing inside his wardrobe at this point, which he had patiently converted into a time machine earlier that week. A fine, stout wardrobe it was, made of dark, heavy wood and perhaps a hundred years old already anyway. Somewhat like my grandfather. After he said the words into a little computer panel he had installed, various whirring sounds were audible around him and the world filled up with a brilliant, blinding light. He opened the door cautiously and marveled at what he saw once the purple spots had gone away. He stepped out of the wardrobe through a small amount of inexpensive theatrical smoke in disbelief. After all his time, effort and money had been poured into this project, this was something. He couldn't find words for the sense of elation he was completely not feeling as the machine simply hadn't worked. At all. Not even a bit. He looked around his own room in sheer desolation. He whimpered. He sagged. He turned around and banged his fist on the wardrobe door, followed closely by his head.

The door began leaning outwards, pushing against Geoffrey F Limpweedle's dejection and scaring the absolute shit out of him too. He took a step back and watched himself poke his head out of the wardrobe. He stood facing his own person of a few moments earlier in confusion.

This tableau remained in-situ for about five seconds, resembling how a cat reacts when it first discovers a mirror.

"This is weird," said he.

"I'll plug it out then?" said the other one.

"Do yes, good idea," he replied. A sharp tug at the wire trailing from the wardrobe to the socket near the bedside lamp put a halt to the low background hum of a computer in the top drawer.

"You're me," one of them said.

"I am you," said the other.

"It didn't work."

"It did something."

"We're in trouble."

"That we are."

They each sat down on the end of the bed and sighed.

"What happened?" they asked in unison.

Before either got a chance to answer a knock came from the door.

"Hide!" each told the other. One ducked under the bed while the other took off his hat and fidgeted, which made identification a lot easier, not that it was going to matter for much longer in any case. Another knock arrived, in a more insistent manner, as if the fact that it hadn't been answered the first time was an unexpected affront such as to plant a seed of doubt in the mind of the knocker as to whether he had, in fact, knocked at all. This was the knock of somebody who was used to not having to knock more than once.

"Are you going to let us in, Mister Limpleweed?" a thick, American accent. "We got business to discuss, unless you'd like your whole building to hear what I have to say?"

"A second, give me a second." Jeff's hair was short but surprisingly curly. He left the bedroom, closed the door and then went to the front door and opened it. "Oh, no." He was lifted about a foot and a half from the ground, meeting the eyes of an angry-looking gentleman in a sharp business suit. He let his bowler hat fall to the floor.

"It doesn't work, does it? You fucked up. I can't believe this. Listen buddy, you are gonna come with us to England, rebuild that heap of shit in London like you should have done in the first place and you are going to make it WORK this time or else it's curtains for you, you understand that you little Charlie Chaplain fuck?"

"But I don't - I didn't - it was only the first - mmhumphlarkumphfleah..."

Jeff II or perhaps Jeff I listened in cowering horror from beneath the bed as his doppleganger was taken rudely away with a bag over his head, legs flailing amusingly. He heard footsteps on the hardwod floor from about three men. That could have been me, he thought. That IS me, he amended and decided he had to sort this out. This was the very beginnig of Geoffrey's long and unusual quest to find himself.

It took a few weeks before he saved enough cash from his entertaining antics at office parties and weddings to get a ticket to London, but that's how it was that he rolled up outside Giles's apartment at 4.15 in the morning that wet October.

***

Giles leant back in his chair.

"Well that was convenient," he said, " - very effective."

"I do my best," replied Jeff.

"You know the men who took . . . you?"

"Of course, a time machine is not simple or cheap thing to build. Certainly not within my budget alone. But I was so consumed with being the first man to make a time machine that worked that I agreed to funding from a certain . . . international multi-level criminal organisation working under the business front "Mc Donald's" in exchange for sending them back in time to score several coups in the crime world. They wanted to bring Al Capone to the 21st century, at least eventually. But the project ran long and in the end they lost patience. I was banking on it working first time." Jeff sighed. "I still don't understand what happened. It made a kind of loop in time, localised inside the machine. I think. We stopped it before there was time to see if ANOTHER me would have turned up. So will you help me?"

"The case is interesting. I have one stipulation. We give the other you a different name, for the sake of the narrative," said Giles. And he was interested, detective work has always been the dream. Half the books he owned were Private Eye stories.

"Like what? He's me!"

"Roger?"

"Roger? You want to call me Roger? What's wrong with you?"

"Well you pick one then. Or we'll use your middle name. What does the F stand for?"

"Well, it's for Finbar, but . . ."

"Finbar it is!"

"Aw, Giles!"

"You want my help, we call him Finbar."

"Fine."

"And I must buy a pipe."

"I thought you didn't like smoking that filth?"

"That was then. I'm a detective now. One has to preserve a certain impression."

"I'll take your word for it."

With that, it was done.

"Can I stay here?" asked Jeff.

"Just for tonight. Tomorrow, I will squirrel you away in a safe house and search for clues as to who might be your kidnappers."

"I know who they are, I told you."

"Yes, it might take days, weeks, months or even years but I promise to track them down and come to you with a name within the decade or I'm not Chester A Lampwick!"

"You're not Chester A Lampwick."

"Figure of speech, figure of speech."

"They are lead by a man named Mark O'Malley, 3rd generation American but insanely Irish."

"You knew this all along? And still allowed me to assemble ardour for the search? Ooh, you fiend you."

"Shuddup, y'crusty old idiot." Jeff sat forward, meaning business. "Look, all we need to do is find out where I'm building the time machine, why in London, and when it's going to start working. If it goes wrong again all hell could break loose. I have no idea what might happen. Are you with me?"

"I see. Yes then. Let us get some sleep, it's almost bright outside. Your woeful timing aside this has been most intriquing. My tea's gone cold. Dammit Jeff. You know I can't abide cold tea." Giles was perturbed by the fact that he'd forgotten to drink his tea. He stood up and pulled the bed back down. "You're on the couch, here's a blanket."

"Posh," said Jeff.

"You are lucky I even let you in the door. I haven't forgotten what happened last time you were in the country. Did you think I had?"

"I had sort of hoped . . ."

"Well now you know. When I find you, you're going to have some serious questions to answer. Good night to you."

"Thanks Giles."

Giles turned off the light and got into bed.

"Giles? Could I have a pillow?"

..

Thud.

"Now go to sleep, shortarse." Giles had been waiting to say that all night long. It felt good. Like narrowly escaping death, then watching someone else do just the thing that you didn't do and die. You don't want to be happy, but you whistle and skip anyway. Just one of those things.

The twitchingist guy

I'm awful twitchy lately. Prone to random outbursts and unexplained monkey-theft. The number of things that I go crazy when I think about is getting higher and higher, and pretty soon the whole structure is going to start to lean and require ugly, awkward lead weights on the south side to balance it and keep it from goin kaput, which would probably do just fine anyway.

Sometimes I wish I could take a few people I've met over the last few years and just sort of . . . un-exist them. Not like killing them. But wouldn't it be basic politeness for somebody who gets under your skin to not exist when you're around? I mean, I'd do it for somebody else but unfortunately I am flawless and loved by all. It's a burden, let me tell you. But one I shoulder with grace and style that makes people love me all the more.

Hugs'n'kisses,

Wilt N Flowers - Today's BEST bread.

PS Intolerable Cruelty is very good, George Clooney is a splendid comic actor who was wasted on ER for too many years. Cohen Bros. Hardcore. Obviously my screenplay will be slightly funnier, but we can't lower our standards any further I'm afraid. In constant sorrooooooow ... all through his days.

Great Expectorations

Chapter One

Giles awoke surrounded by darkness. Not in a vindictive way, it wasn't like the darkness was there to beat him up or something, it just happened to be hanging around on account of it being the middle of the night. He rubbed his eyes and checked his digital watch, pressing a couple of random buttons before he found the backlight. 4:15. The doorbell rang again. Ah, so that was what woke him.

"Excuse me a moment, you roused me from my slumber and I shall be with you as soon as I am suitably oriented and attired!" he shouted.

The bell rang again. Just as it would if somebody inconsiderate was standing outside ringing it like a complete bastard.

"Just a SECOND!" said Giles, clambering into a robe and hurriedly putting on his thin glasses. He moved dizzily towards the door of his studio apartment, where he reached an undignified halt with one hand on the door jamb. Steadying himself he took a deep breath to calm down and right in the middle of the slow, satisfying in-breath the doorbell rang a forth time. Giles turned the handle, viciously tore the door open then got angry when its course was cut short by the chain he'd forgotten to unlock. With a grunt he slammed the door shut again, yanked the chain from its rail and finally opened the door a little more calmly, as if the preceding simply hadn't happened.

His eyes travelled down to meet those of a uniquely proportioned man. Blue eyes peered up from under a bowler hat and above a very large nose indeed. A moustache, if we are to continue downward and why shouldn't we, followed, close-shaven and dark, framing his lips and pointing to a sharp chin. He word a tuxedo with a red bow-tie that matched his shiny red shoes. But this man was unique in that the head abovementioned was about half-again the size that fit comfortably with the rest of his body, speaking aesthetically. Add to this the hat and the hallway light above his head and if he hadn't been looking up he would have been swathed in a deep shadow, two red shoe-tips poking out at the bottom. He was about four and a half feet tall and carried a cane with a tacky gold-painted ball on the top.

"What," Giles felt entitled to inquire, "do you want?"

The tacky gold-painted ball prodded him in the chest. "You, you daft bugger. That's why I rang the bell just now."

"Oh that was you was it? Indeed. So what can I do for a man such as yourself at four in the morning?"

"You can give me a cup of tea and listen to my story, or shall I just stand out here like an idiot?"

"Fine, come on in Jeff," resigned Giles. He hit a light switch and closed the door after Jeff, blinking away the sleep from his eyes. He yawned.

"Ah, don't start that, you'll get me going and all," said Jeff with a little stretch. He then yawned. "That was your fault, y'pillock."

"My sincerest apologies. Have a seat, I'll put the kettle on."

Jeff sat on a green couch in Giles's tidy living room/kitchen/bedroom arrangement. There was one of those folding beds you always see in films but never in real life that just seemed to vanish into a wall. One even saved the life of James Bond in You Only Live Twice. Folding it up, as he was now doing, always called that scene to mind for Giles. "You only live twice, Mr. Bond," he would say to himself. He didn't this time, because Jeff was sitting right there. But he really wanted to and felt as if Jeff was purposefully denying him the oppertunity. He went to the sink and filled the kettle, placing it on a small counter at the kitchen end of the apartment and hitting the on-button like the nose of a puppy that had misbehaved in some minor way.

"It'll just be a minute. So what news from the world of being Jeff? What brings you to my home after all these months out of the blue in the middle of the night ringing my doorbell like it was getting you off?" asked Giles, settling in to an armchair facing Jeff's side of the couch. With the bed gone the room had a pleasant sense of space. It was sparsely furnished, the main feature being a bedside locker and two big, full bookshelves. A coffee table sat in front of the couch. Jeff eyed all of this critically.

"Still no telly? Tsk, someday you'll wish you had one," he said.

"Slim chance, unlike the rest of England, it seems, I can read." A fact Giles held very dear. He took a weird pride in not owning a television set. Why exactly was anyone's guess.

The kettle made the universal click of all kettles everywhere to let you know that another job has been well done and it would like you to consider promoting it to a toaster or something, no pressure. Giles got up and made the tea in an uneventful manner. While he did this Jeff examined the ball on top of his cane, considering that it didn't really look all that authentic and he should probably get a real one.

His musing was interrupted by a cup of tea, with "World's Best Mum" written charmingly on the side, blocking his view.

"Thanks, Giles."

"No problem. You didn't answer my question. Why exactly was it that you went to the considerable trouble of waking me up at four in the morning to tell me a story? It better be a good one."

"Well remember a few years ago you told me you were thinking of becoming a private detective? I think now's the time. And I'm your first case. Cigar?" Jeff had produced a pack from inside his jacket.

"No thank you, and please refrain from smoking that filth in here."

"Right, right, whatever," he said pocketing the pack, "Sorry for trying to inject a little bit of class into proceedings. Anyway, do you still want to play detective?"

"What? Not now, no. I have a real job, I consult for the college, remember? You're talking about a long time ago. I'm sorry Jeff, I've grown up."

"Look, I need help and you are the smartest person I've ever met. I need *you*. At least hear me out, then decide whether or not this is childish," pleaded Jeff.

"Okay, fine. You may as well fill me in now that I'm awake. What's your predicament?"

"I've been kidnapped."

"But your sitting right here!"

"There's two of me. This is where it gets tricky. We should probably go to a flashback, come to think of it."

"I agree, best not to weigh the narrative down so early with cumbersome dialogue."

The pair having sensibly agreed on the manner of the next chapter then sat back to observe events as they had unfolded previously and brought Jeff to seek the help of Giles at such a satanic time of the night.

Bloggy

I haven't blogged in years.

I mean actual years, not those fake years we have nowadays, since a project called Phasual. I wonder if anything came of that in the end.

I shall perhaps ramble here from time to time. Occasionally I shall quote from the novel I intend to spend the rest of my life writing.

I'm a hostage. I'm maroonded. Poem good on here. That's Jean's page. She's nice, but small. And, if reading, probably angry that I just called her small and intending to slap me quite hard at some unexpected juncture.

Expectorations of the finest sort be with you all.