Posts tagged Sherlock

Then after 10 pm:

Let’s say you want to read “The Hound of the Baskervilles”. Maybe you want to read it because you like the BBC Sherlock Holmes, or you just like mystery in general. Maybe you read it because it’s a classic and you thought it would be smart to have it under your belt. Maybe you just saw it on the library shelf and thought. Aww, why not?

Let’s say you progress through the book at a good pace, remembering how much you like Dr. Watson and how much Sherlock Holmes’s stuck-up brilliance drives you nuts and you compare it to the episode scene by scene. The mystery has you totally mixed up and you have no idea what’s going on. Finally one night you snuggle in bed hoping finish the last few chapters and find the solution to the perplexing problems all before falling asleep.

Let’s say you decide tonight would be a fun night to try to read by candle light. (This is something you’ve wanted to try for forever.) You realize, to avoid hurting your eyes too much you must hold the candle chest high with one hand, and hold your book the same height with the other hand, that way shining the best light possible on the page.

Let’s say, for pure amusement’s sake, that as you get to the climax of the book (right where the huge hound is chasing the nice guy through the foggy moor) you absent-mindedly lean forward.

Let’s also say that your candle has been burning for a long time, and while giving off a warm steady glow has also been accumulating a pool of melted wax below the flame. Because of this as you lean forward in anticipation your hand tilts slightly and the nicely pooled melted wax shifts and ever…so slowly… drips down the side of the candle.

Let’s say hypothetically still, you know, just for fun, that you are sitting cross legged in Indian style. So the dripping hot wax just might hit your ankle, which just happens to be bare. May I remind you this is very hot wax.

Let’s say, although completely engrossed in your book, (thus the leaning) you do become distracted by the burning hot wax hitting your innocent bare leg. Because of this it’s quite possible that, gives the suddenness of the distraction, and the intensity of the book, you might experience sensations of THE HOUND IS REAL AND GOING TO EAT ME feelings. It would be understandable if at this point you may have overreact a tiny little bit.

Or you could forebear the whole “tiny little” part and go full on crazy and shriek like a banshee, throwing the book across the room before diving under the covers. 

Let’s pause for a second to remember that the hypothetical wax that started this whole banshee reaction is very hot melted wax. It therefore presents a burning feeling, which is painful. After hiding under the bedcovers to muffle your screams for a moment let’s say you are forced to hop about the bed and the the room on one foot, tripping over the book that you threw in the dark, while trying to get the hardening wax off your other ankle.

Still shrieking like a banshee.

Hypothetically, how pathetic would the person doing this be?

• 221B Baker Street
• P.Sherman 42 Wallaby Way Sydney
• Second to the Right and Straight on Til Morning
• And probably mine. If I think about it. Really Hard.

^Legitimately a line from the stage production of Sherlock Holmes I saw tonight.