Off on my morning walk this morning, excited to chat with Horace once more.

I had been on medication for years but some mornings I just plain forgot which pills I’d taken and so often doubled the dose by mistake. This sometimes made me a little fuzzy but usually the morning jaunt cleared that up. I was shaking the cobwebs from my mind as I approached the gate by Paddy’s Puddle. Rounding the corner I looked down and saw two “Horaces” or maybe it’s “Horacei“. Must look that up when I get home.

“Er…”

“You must be the writer fella” said one.

I took a deep breath closed my eyes and opened them once more

“Well?” the other one asked.

I’d never had this kind of reaction to the pills before but then again maybe there were really two of them.

“Who are you?”

“I’m Maurice”

“And I’m Boris”

“Horace is our dad”

“Oh, that explains it then. Is he around?”

“Oh yes thank you” they both said in unison.

There was an uncomfortable silence for a few seconds before they copped on that I’d like to see him and so off they skipped as I sat on the wall. Horace joined me a minute later.

“Whatzup man?”

“Horace, good morning. I was wondering if you knew anything about world events . . . I mean, er . . . can you read?”

Horace tilted his head sideways before busting into merriment,

“Read? Me? Off course I can read! You’re not the only species that can you know? Typical humans, think they know everything there is to know . . . ha.”

“Okay then. What do you think is the solution to . . . er . . . Ukraine . . . the Islamic state fundamentalists . . . The Ebola problem . . .”

He put his head on his hand while removing a pipe with the other from his oversized waistcoat.

“Well . . . ” he said puffing away like an elderly history professor I used to have in college.

“As I see it, you kidnap a few Russian extremists from eastern Ukraine, march them through Liberia and Sierra Leone making sure they meet many people on their journey and then dump them into northern Iraq and Syria.”

I pondered that gem of wisdom for a few minutes, before busting into laughter.

“Brilliant Horace, brilliant. Thank you, I think I’ll put that on my blog.”

“Later dude!” said Horace as I headed back down the lane.