"Robert Rankin - Knees Up Mother Earth" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robert Rankin)

this time nearly dislodging his wig.
"Nothing, dear," said Norman. "And I'm almost done with the
numbering."
The numbering.
Norman viewed the figure upon the front page of the Brentford Mercury.
The figure of the debt. The millions owed by Brentford United Football Club н
surely such a sum could be raised if everyone in Brentford dug into their
pockets. They'd only need to fork out ... Norman's Biro moved about upon the
blank area of newssheet where the theatre review would have been had the
Mercury's inebriate critic, "Badger" Beaumont, got around to filing his report.
Norman's Biro moved and many figures were written (many, too, were
crossed out and rewritten). Many more were also crossed out. Norman, for all
his love of numbers, wasn't much of a hand at sums. He really did need a
computer. Norman flung the now defunct Biro aside.
And Norman took to leafing again.
Page two had little to offer Norman, other than an advert announcing the
arrival of Count Otto Black's Circus Fantastique, presently pitching its big top
upon nearby Ealing Common. This at least had Norman doing so-so
movements with his head, for he harboured some fondness for the circus.
There was also an article penned by local guru and self-styled Perfect
Master Hugo Rune, extolling the virtues of Runesthetics, a spiritual exercise
programme of his own conception that promised, for a fee, to enlarge that
certain part of the male anatomy which teenage boys generally sought to
enlarge through methods of their own, sometimes with the aid of tapes rented
from the video section of Peg's Paper Shop.
Norman raised an eyebrow to Runesthetics and then lowered it again. He
had once invented a system of his own to further that particular end. It had
involved Meccano. And, later, several jars of Savlon.
Norman leafed on. It was, as ever it was, and ever it most probably ever
would be, the same old, tired old news for the most part. And for the most part
Norman took as ever he had, and probably ever would take, a certain pleasure
and comfort in its same old, tired old sameness. Flower shows, fъtes, functions
and funerals. And car-boot sales.
And Norman leafed on until he came to the page before last. And there for
a while he dwelt, amidst the small ads.
And there Norman's right forefinger, its nail sorely in need of a nailbrush,
travelled down column after column ...
 Until ...
It stopped.
And the shopkeeper took from the top pocket of his brown shop coat, a
pocket that was in need of some stitching, a pencil which was, as it happened,
not in need of a sharpening. (Norman's spell in the Navy had taught him, in
addition to the importance of a well-polished shoe, to keep his matches dry,
his underwear clean and his pencil sharp, for obvious reasons.)
And Norman took up his pre-sharpened pencil and encircled an advert
with it:

I HAVE A LARGE COLLECTION OF UNWANTED COMPUTER PARTS
AVAILABLE FOR DISPOSAL.
FREE TO FIRST APPLICANT. TELEPHONE THIS NUMBER FOR DETAILS.