The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2987 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

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This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
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“Was that the pleb who made us late this morning, Mummy?” asked Trish.

“I beg your pardon.”

So she repeated the accusation. “Was that the pleb.”

“What d’you mean, pleb?”

“We did ancient Rome in history and the plebs were the peasants. Yeah the rich were the Patricias.”

David snorted behind me which didn’t make this any easier. “I think you mean Plebeians and Patricians.”

“I prefer Patricias, sort of sounds right.”

“Yeah a right nana,” called Livvie who then ran off with Trish hot on her heels exchanging pleasantries.

David made both of us a cuppa and I sat down at the kitchen table to enjoy it. “Was it the same man?”

“Yes, he accused me of causing him to be sacked.”

“He made you all late didn’t he?”

“Yes but it was his attitude I didn’t like. He could have moved it and I’d have not been happy but I wouldn’t have done anything else. He took his time getting to his lorry and we were then late, I complained and he lost his job. Now he’s been arrested as well. Doesn’t he know the adage, if in a hole stop digging?”

“Perhaps not.” We drank our teas and he told me what was cooking for dinner. Before the attack I’d felt quite hungry, now I felt a bit sick. I don’t like violence, never had, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be able to defend myself. I did that short course in total fighting which means you use anything to hand, including an opponent’s body, as a weapon. Everything has to be seen as an opportunity to attack and used as such. In reality, such methods aren’t appropriate in most encounters, because in that sort of fighting people get killed. It happens to be somewhat illegal, except in self defence when believing your life to be at risk. But it is extremely effective and I’ve used it and beaten three men, all larger than me and presumably stronger.

I suppose I learned it because the opportunity arose to do so. There was a course run in Bristol and one of the girls who used to knock around with Siân was going and persuaded me to go with her. At least we didn’t have to wear pyjamas like they do in judo and karate, it was just loose ordinary clothes. Then it was anything but Queensbury Rules, elbows, knees, head butting, anything you could pick up that was harder than a skull or could be used to disable someone. If someone had a knife, try and push someone else on to them, especially if it’s a friend of his, then strike while they’re disentangling themselves. If the wrong person has been stabbed, while the knife is still in them, get in one or two decent blows to the knife wielder. If he goes down, make sure he stays there.

The girl I went with was called Rae and she was a total psycho and the course stopped when she fractured the skull of the main instructor in a mock fight. I think he decided that teaching boys might have been safer. Of course they all thought I was girl because of my long hair and the clothes i was wearing, jeans and top were both girls’ wear. My hips were broadening slightly and boy’s trousers were tight across the bum, besides I didn’t need any excuse to wear the appropriate clothes. Obviously, I didn’t turn up in a tight pencil skirt and stilettos because I didn’t have any at that time but also because they’d have been useless for fighting in, too restrictive. Mind you stilettos could be used to stamp on feet or kicking at knees and doing quite a bit of damage.

I guess I learned the principles quite quickly since we only went about four times before Rae hurt the instructor, the week after I broke his assistant’s arm—that was an accident. I’d swung a fire extinguisher at him—one of the big ones with water in—and it slipped out of my hands, too heavy I suppose, and it hit him on the shoulder, knocked him down and the fire extinguisher landed on his arm, breaking it above the elbow. See, I don’t know my own strength, it’s more feeble than I thought.

Until I used it as a woman, I’d forgotten most of the moves but remembered just enough to turn defence into attack as in the time we rescued the smuggled sex worker and then Stella from the two thugs, one of whom had hurt her and I just saw red. It was really strange that as a boy I’d have avoided getting involved in anything much but as a girl I felt empowered, especially defending another female or as they became, my children. Then I not only felt empowered but also merciless.

At times I wished I’d done a course on plumbing or something similar because that’s both useful and profitable, more so than chasing dormice. The value in that, is about conserving a species on the edge of its range, which dormice are and which happen to be cute to the nth degree. They’re also an indicator species which show us when things are wrong with the environment. They do little if any economic damage and don’t carry any discernible diseases so they are harmless unlike rats and mice, though they’re not really mice and the name is a misnomer as they are closer to squirrels. Genetically, in terms of classification by DNA, they’re something of an enigma, so no decision has been made in that direction, or hadn’t the last time I read up on it.

DNA analysis when it works is obviously the most accurate way of grouping things be they plants or animals or bacteria. However, it can also cause upset when something turns out not to be what it was always thought to be. It also provides an ironic view of racism. White supremacists or those who refer to people as Neanderthals probably have black genes in them and most Europeans have Neanderthal genes somewhere in their makeup, oh and the latest ideas about the Philistines may also be shock to those who describe the uncultured as such. It seems the original people of that name buried their dead with bottles of perfume and jewellery. Apparently, one way to measure cultures is how they deal with their dead. Caring for their deceased tend to imply a reasonable level of sophistication and was demonstrated in the graves of Neanderthals as well.

It’s nothing new for us to leap to judgements which are ill considered or plain wrong. I was inclined not to think too badly of Tony Blair because he introduced the Gender Recognition Act but when I thought about it, he only did so because the European Court made him and up until then, his government had resisted the idea and gone to court over it several times. Now I begin to see him as someone who got us involved in a war for spurious reasons and cost the lives of 180 British service personnel and thousands of Iraqis.