I shared a cup of coffee with him in Rome years ago. He couldn't afford his own coffee so we took a sip in turn from the same cup. It was at one of those open-air restaurants with tables and chairs out on the side-walk. It was owned by Al Fresco.
We talked about our school friends, Harry Tosis, Eileen Dover, Ivan I Full, Duncan Dees-Orderly, Henrietta Ratt, and Ivor Pigeon.
Then he took me to his home. It was sparsely furnished because of his poverty. The curtains were all drawn; the rest of the furniture was real. He said he drew the curtains with a felt-tipped pen. I could see he was not good at drawing curtains because in some places they were not drawn together and they let in the lights. In fact, they let in the light everywhere because they were not real curtains. Just drawn ones.
He took me to his bedroom. He said he'd changed the double bed to a trampoline and his wife hit the roof. That's why she left him.
He used to practice yoga by standing on one leg to improve his balance. His wife told him to stop acting like a flamingo. So he had to put his foot down. He claimed that he usually was a well-balanced man; he had a chip on each shoulder. He thought that the whole world was plotting against him; so he joined them to make it unanimous.
I pointed out a large spider in one corner of a room. He told me he was a web designer. Being a house-spider he worked from home.
He had a pet dog he had bought from a blacksmith. As soon as he got him home it made a bolt for the door.
He told me he was a zoological scientist. When he worked in London he had managed to cross-breed a homing pigeon with a woodpecker. It not only delivered messages, it also knocked on the door.
He also managed to cross-breed a cow with a chicken and a pig; and got sausages, eggs and bacon.
He tried to breed a turkey with six legs so that everyone could have a leg at Christmas and Thanksgiving. He was successful. Unfortunately the turkey ran away and was too fast for anyone to catch.
He also told me that he once witnessed a naked woman rob a bank. When the police arrived on the scene nobody could remember her face.
