It is therefore something of a surprise that Tycho recently refused his affections to the lady dog belonging to a rich old Dutch party called Mrs. Van der Zee but that is what he did and there is no accounting for taste. Looking at Mrs. Van der Zee’s dog I would have said there was nothing to object to. Certainly Marta—this being the name of the lady dog—is a more obvious friend with benefits than two kilos of Michelin-starred fish on a bed of shaved black radish but I am not judgy. Tycho and Marta did not make it and that is that but it is not that for Mrs. Van der Zee. Mrs. Van der Zee takes a dim view. She sees the absence of dog fornication as a slight upon Marta, and any slight upon Marta is a slight upon Mrs. Van der Zee, and one does not slight Mrs. Van der Zee. As a result of the nonfucking by Tycho of Marta there had to be an owner-to-owner meeting in a truth and reconciliation mode at which I was present purely as mediator and it was not a good meeting at all. Mrs. Van der Zee lives in a big place by the sea, and it has gardens and tennis courts and two heated pools and thousands and thousands of deluxe ultra-premium rare tulips.

In fact the whole place smells of sickly tulip stink because Mrs. Van Der Zee chooses to wear a customized perfume made by a guy named Jort. Jort is present at this exciting gathering in a sort of Roman short shorts playsuit. He is from Den Haag and has no body hair whatsoever and I am fairly sure Mrs. Van der Zee keeps him as some sort of quasi-sexual pet. I do not want to know what she does with him and I do not think Jort wishes to talk about it. He works with both ancient wisdom and sophisticated modern techniques to create a unique signature scent experience using whatever you give him, which in this case of course is ultra-premium deluxe rare tulips. I am not a perfume guy but when I was the cardinal of coffee I developed a sensitive nose because if you cannot tell when someone is trying to sell you basic sawdust arabica for Hacienda La Esmeralda, you will get fucked in the civet hole, and this perfume smelled like someone had done that with violet to a perfectly innocent vetiver and then shaken the whole thing with turpentine. It is dis-fucking-gusting and it is all over everything in the house, and when she shakes your hand it goes on you like she’s a plague vector and it will not come off your clothes, so I may not have been entirely at the top of my game during this encounter and it did not go ideally well.