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emotional puncture kit, it is at this emotional juncture.
    Unfortunately, I need to locate several parts to build the puncture kit, and despite many pleading telephone calls to various ironmongers, greengrocers, bookmakers, stationery shops and butchers, I am unable to assemble the kit.
    I look out of the window, and notice that tumbleweed is blowing past the house. The sight adds to my increasing depression, and I hasten to the town to actively seek the parts I need.
    A pawnbroker’s catches my eye, and I step inside the musty shop. I explain my predicament to the papery man behind the grille, and he shows me a box that houses some small rodents. The pawnbroker tells me that the rodents may not replace my love-life, but they will love me if I love them. And if I fail to love them, they will punish me with their sharp teeth.
    Not quite knowing why, I buy the rodents and hurry home. Once there, I tell them sweet things, and get them a saucer of milk.
    Later, my husband returns. It seems that he has successfully sold my old diary to a major publisher. I am oddly unmoved, but then, I have my rodents.

Statue
    I am commissioned by a wealthy opera singer to carve a marble sculpture of her torso. Without shame, she disrobes, and I make preparatory drawings, noting the lines of her voluptuous curves and the weight of her voluminous tresses.
    An enormous block of marble is duly delivered to the velvety chamber where I am to carry out my trade. Confidently I take up my mallet and chisel, and begin to rough out the statue.
    Days pass, then weeks, and after a period of many months I announce to my patron that the work is complete. She stares for some time at the fruit of my endeavours. Something is not right. I sense that she is displeased in some way. I shoo her from the chamber, order another block of marble, and begin again.
    I am enshrouded in dust, I work through the night, until my fingers are raw and my breath comes in harsh rasps. Again, my employer is unaccountably dissatisfied.
    I continue to order marble, and continue to carve statue after statue, while the years pass.
    When, eventually, I create a marble likeness of the opera singer on her deathbed with my own wizened and arthritic fingers, she at last nods, smiles, and abandons herself to the relentless pull of eternal sleep.
    I place my chisels carefully on the floor, and lie next to her, placing my dusty hand in her cooling fingers.

Seaside Town of Vampires
    My holiday takes me to a resort for which I have distant but fond memories of innocent pleasures and fine bars. I wander the littered streets until I find my favourite cantina, now flyblown and murky. The proprietor fails to recognise me, and I order a coffee.
    Sitting outside in the wan sunlight I am depressed by the changes that have taken place in this once-beautiful seaside town. Many shops are boarded up, the youth seem preoccupied with the dusty ground, and the cinema has been transformed into a seemingly unpopular bingo hall.
    Worst of all are the diminutive vampires who bowl along the promenade biting the legs of passers-by. The only way to deal with these pointy-toothed parasites is to kick them viciously into the harbour. I entertain myself morosely in this way for about half an hour, sustaining only slight scratches from the fangs of these riviera nosferatu.
    Things are not what they used to be around here. The thought reminds me uncomfortably of my ageing body, and my own desire to live vicariously the lives of others.
    I realise that although I can understand the sad plight of the vampires, I cannot resist the urge to kick them, flailing, into the grey ocean.
    I return to my room, and sit at the window. If there were an observer, I imagine that they might see the cloud-scattered evening sky reflected in my dark pupils.

Laboratory
    I obtain a poorly paid job in a dusty laboratory. The afternoon sunlight falls into the room through yellowing venetian blinds, and I pass the time making tea and answering