Omar's Diary to 20th December 2023

Since my last diary, 26th November 2023 passim, the rhythm of life here at Omar Towers has been somewhat distracted.

Most recently Man Servant has been diagnosed with prostate cancer. This came as quite a shock to everyone here and to family and friends as this news spread. Needless to say, there have been some very down days but those downs have been ameliorated as he has undergone various tests and scans. All of these so far have confirmed it has not spread from where it should be and will be manageable with regular check-ups, no play on words intended, and medications. He was at the hospital yesterday for a procedure to obtain some samples and once they have been cultured for a few weeks we will know if it is an aggressive form of cancer or not. Hopefully that is the last procedure he will have the indignity of undergoing for quite a while.

When he told one of his friends, who is a retired naval surgeon, the answer he received was “What a bummer”. Personally, I thought it was a rather robust and unsympathetic riposte.

And now on with the diary.

The Servants have completed decorating the baronial halls here and I must say they have done a jolly good job of it. My only criticism of how they have done it this year is that they have placed the Virgin Mary so far up the Christmas tree that I can no longer knock her off. Instead, I have to be satisfied with knocking off the lower hanging baubles. I start this exercise after the Servants’ lights have gone out and after a decent wait until they have both reached the third stage of non-rapid eye movement, aka non REM. There is nothing as satisfying as a well timed strike of the paw on a fallen bauble sending it the full length of the hallway as if it had been struck with a bat in the hand of a top class cricketer.

The quickest the Servants have reacted to this with “For goodness sake Omar…have you seen the time?” has been within three strikes of the bauble. If only they had used bigger baubles they would make more noise.

As for presents Beau and I have been working through our shared advent calendar. Sometimes there are five treats behind the door and sometimes there are six. If there are five I always let Beau have three while I have the other two. The best Advent days are when there are six treats so we can have three each.

Both Servants have been busy wrapping the gifts they have bought for each other. Their contribution to saving the planet is made by using brown paper for everything, even for presents destined for other homes. I think that is a very good idea and it is how presents used to be wrapped before someone, definitely not a character created by Charles Dickens in The Ghost of Christmas Past, invented glossy patterned and plasticised paper which ends up in landfill.

I think I know what I am getting. A new yellow banana stuffed with the highest quality catnip. My only concern about this is that I know the Servants have completed all of their gift shopping and for the life of me, I cannot catch a scent of catnip. While they have been out of the house I have searched high and low for it but without any success. Maybe this year it will just be a yellow banana without any catnip?

There appears to be an increasing trend with members of the servant species declaring that they are not going to send Christmas cards and will contribute what they would have spent on them and stamps to a charity. They make this declaration through various social media platforms. My own view on this is that this is a very sad and impersonal way to communicate with others at this festive time of year. I m sure that I agree with a lot of others that there is nothing nicer than receiving Christmas cards through the letterbox or any other cards and letters at any other time of the year. It must be especially nice for those who maybe not connected to the digital world or are tech savvy. A quick straw poll of the cards that have arrived to date here reveals that 50% are connected with charities. So, by sending cards by post it is possible to support a charity of your choice while concurrently keeping in touch using pen on paper.

Marvellous!

On reflection none of us here at Omar Towers needs very much if anything in the way of material things. The things that are much more important are of a totally qualitative nature. Health, happiness and the warmth of families and friendships all of which transcend the fleeting dopamine kick from consumerism.

Wishing you all a very Happy Christmas and New Year.