Knicknacks for macaws

In our modern world--inundated as it is with internet auctions and credit cards, not to mention cold, hard cash--we lose sight of the very essence of reciprocity that governs all ouf our economic interactions. What made me write that was an unusual event yesterday which re-introduced me to the underground, and dare I say much more human, world of bartering.

I've already mentioned how they chopped down my tree, those demonic city workers. Well, today one of our neighbours talked to me and asked if we were doing anything with the wood. I should mention, just as filler, that he was an Italian, one of those fellows who is surely named either Luigi, Anthony or Gino, (It would be inconceivalbe that his mother woudl have named him anything else.) I said that we had no use for the tree, at which point he offered to take our wood. He would, of course, offer something for our minimal trouble: a bottle of whisky.

I guess it's not that unusal, what with the price of firewood being what it is (I have no idea). He decided to make the most of the resources he had to work with, to bypass the huge box-shaped stores and surly delivery drivers and whatever else.

So, I guess I'll mourn for my tree with that bottle of whisky. Funny how things proceed sometimes.

Consider: "It is better that a man should tyrannize over his bank balance than over his fellow-citizens. And while the former is sometimes denounced as being but a means to the latter, sometimes at least it is an alternative."