Tonight I pack the car with supplies because tomorrow we set off for the fabled city of Dundee in the North East of Scotland!
Have you heard of it? I would be surprised if you had. It's a very small town, you could even say village. I think the population count is no more than several hundred.
My good lady hails from that small fishing village. Perhaps the best way to describe the place is to describe how in fact we first met.
Let me take you back some number of years...
I had been traversing the highlands of Scotland for several weeks. It was a cold winter and some of the hills had given me a bit of bother. I was running low on dried beef and knew that I would have to top up my rations soon. The problem was that I was far from anything that could be called civilisation.
I was limping somewhat. I was pretty sure I needed some medical attention from a scratch I had received the night before. An unfortunate encounter with a wolf. Of course they claim that wolves are extinct in Scotland, well, tell that to the stinking carcass I wore on my back. It had been a bloody encounter. The wolf might even had gotten the better of me if it hadn't interrupted me whilst I was doing a shit.
One thing they say about a Scotsman. Never interrupt a Scotsman doing a shit. The wolf had learned the hard way and was now a warm hide draped over my back.
Anyway I digress. I was limping and hungry and as I crested yet another of our famous purple hills I gasped in astonishment. Laid out below me was a small village. Hearth fires twinkling, beckoning like a siren song.
As I manfully scampered down the hill my eyes drank in the details below. The village was snuggled up against a river and what a river. Even in the dark I could see that it was easily a mile wide. I got closer and the smell of fish assailed my nostrils. Ah, fishermen then. I would be in good company here, being no stranger to the ways of the sea myself.
The smell of roasting meat and the sound of merriment drew me to a large hall in the centre of the village. I spat in my hand and quickly ran it through my blonde locks, teasing them into an alluring crest. Experience had taught me that the peoples of the remote north of Scotland were impressed by hair and I didn't intend to disappoint.
I strutted, peacock-like despite my limp into the lamplight at the doors of the hall. A fat drunkard clothed in wool raised a hand as if to stop me. I batted it away and stepped through.
What a sight to behold! All of the villagers were surely gathered here in this gigantic barn-like hall. There were flagons of mead everywhere and somewhere my keen nose scented roasting meat. I flicked my hair back and moved toward the end of the hall.
I don't know if it was the wolf pelt on my back or my machismo that silenced the music and made everyone stop mid-carouse and stare at me. I bowed with a flourish then rose. 'Good day and well met my fellows!'
There was silence. A slovenly but tall bearded man rose from a wicker chair and approached me menacingly. I was not cowed. I was a true son of Scotland and feared no man. He stopped, towering before me and spoke.
The sound was like rocks shifting around in a wooden box. 'Who the FUCK are you?'
The air was thick with tension. Everyone seemed to be holding their breath.
I smiled my easy smile. The giant before me breathed heavily, he seemed very angry. Time to pull out the big guns I thought.
I reached into my pack and gently took a small pouch, he watched me in puzzlement as I knelt to the floor before him and produced a shiny coloured marble. Then another, then another.
His brows unfurrowed and his eyes went wide as he watched me bat them about gently on the floor. The marbles catching the firelight of the hall. I scooped them up. and swiftly stood before him shoulders square. Facing him like a man. I profferred the pouch of shiny marbles to him.
'I bring you this gift!' I roared.
He stepped back, amazement lending his face an almost child-like quality.
'I bring gifts for you ALL!' I cried and reached into my pack and brought forth my emergency native supplies. Coloured ribbons, shiny stones, coloured marbles and sticks tied together with string.
The natives flocked around me crying with delight. I heard many things chanted that night. Hero and golden god being the most common. I must confess more than one of the village woman tried to woo me with their thick hands and ruddy faces. I had none of it although the flesh begged otherwise. After all, I was an urbane man of the south used to the clamouring of finely clad fillies with unbitten nails and smooth complexions.
It was much later I woke with a start, head pounding from imbibing too much of the local hooch. I groaned only to be silenced by a delicate finger. On my lips of course!
I looked up blearily and there she was, my good lady. Her unearthly beauty dazzled me. She whispered with less mangled vowels than I had heard so far.
'Rescue me. I can't stand it here!'
How could I deny her. Her flaxen hair cascaded down her willowy frame and beneath the crude sack-cloth of her clothing I could detect different hills from the type I was used to climbing but no less appealing for all that. I was snared. I was a fawn and she was the huntress. I gathered my things quickly and silently and stood ramrod straight.
'I can rescue you lass, but there's a price.'
She looked at me, a wicked twinkle in her eye and in a voice that sounded only slightly like a dog falling out of bed she squared her sultry hips to me.
'And what price would that be?'
Oh how the blood pounded in my nethers at that. But I, a true son of Scotland was a man of honour. A gammy was perhaps out of the question but a kiss?
'Let a kiss be the price,' I manfully declared.
And here we are all of those years later. I am packing the car full of shiny baubles and ribbons for the fair folk of Dundee. Even now they give me a hero's welcome when I stride into their fish-stained hovel of a town.
I took away their princess but I return them a QUEEN!