Is Something Burning?

In the distance was one of the greatest cities on Earth at the time. However, it was shut. We had set out on our journey across the great wastelands, forgetting that it would be early closing day when we arrived.

We had fought our way through bandits, crossed the swollen river and forsaken the pleasure spots of many lesser cities in order to end up here, stuck outside the closed city gates.

‘Oh, bollocks,’ we wailed at our misfortune and in our grief and mortification set about burning down a few of the peasant hovels that lay outside the city gate. It didn’t help much, but setting fire to things sometimes does help, as the great philosopher Albert the Moderately Singed said upon the occasion his wife set fire to his beard when she refused to believe it was – as Albert claimed – yet another philosopher’s holiday.

Anyway, Albert was packed off out of the house to go and do some philosophising so they could have some money for food, even though his regulation philosopher’s beard still had one or two embers still alight in it.

This all goes to show that things are not really as straightforward as we hope and this world often throws trials and tribulations in our paths and that often the one wise answer is – as wise old Albert said - to find someone else to take the blame for it… and then to set fire to them.