My taxing social obligation of yesterday afternoon left me spent and reeling. My compatriot’s loathesome nattering was incessant. It was all I could do to not end his pain and my own with the implement at hand. I retired to the library with a crashing headache. With the aid of a tincture mixed specially for me by the good doctor Richter, I was finally able to slip into the netherworld between sleep and reality.

My thoughts drifted back to my childhood, as they often do.

O wasted youth! A time unfettered by the understanding of the cares of life. Although I do not toil as a common peasant, I sometimes long for a spot of hard labor. An aching back would be a welcome distraction. Let my muscles sing their song of sadness, let my mind be blissfully blank.

Now where in blazes is Emil? The privet hedge needs a good pruning. It is simply frightful! And the polo field could use a soil rotation. Emil! You lazy cur!