The Sudoku Book

I lie on the plastic sun bed by the pool as crisp as a red tomato it creaks in protest as I adjust my position with too much rich food and cheap alcohol the reason to blame. Factor 8 daubed carelessly all over my body, my hair lightening rapidly in the sunlight from the first week of my 2 week vacation. Sunglasses balanced on my head in a precarious position. Somewhat bored now of the seriously desperate although mildly amusing shag, marry or kill game which has kept my mind largely occupied thus far.

Let’s face it there could have been some very lucky ladies this week if only they knew the results of my thoughts (wry smile) but now I’ve actually resorted to scraping the bottom of the barrel in desperation and I’m currently filling in numbers haphazardly in my new Sudoku book

Sitting alone trying to get comfortable, my towel covered in body sweat trickling down my back like a waterfall from the intense Greek sun or is it the Greek sun isn’t the sun the same everywhere? Why do people say Greek sun or Spanish sun or Mexican sun there is only one it’s surely the same for all? It’s dilemma after dilemma though does that number 4 go there in the middle or in the top right corner? My mind relaxing for a moment and then a thought enters my head “Oh god did I remember to turn the boiler off before I left home”? Thinking I can’t actually do much about it now as several uncontrollable beads of sweat falls from my face and land in the middle of the page of my Sudoku book.

So if the 6 goes there and the 1 goes there where does the 7 need to go? I ask myself as an old lady hauls herself out of the pool, loses her footing and falls back in creating a splash which splashes my legs providing me with some entertainment and respite from this sweltering heat I kick my legs for some reason to remove the excess and think to myself why do people bother to dry off as the heat of the sun will have them dried off in 2 minutes anyway.

Suddenly there is movement as some new blood arrives and the shag, marry kill game is reinstated briefly at least for now. Two women appear in near matching striped bikinis with their hair and faces shadowed by brimmed hats both armed with those big daft shoulder bags tossed in a carefree manner over their shoulders.

The game is on is it sisters? Is it two friends? or is it a mother and daughter? I get curious and for now Sudoku is the last thing on my mind. Sunglasses are lowered, belly fat sucked in, fingers quickly run through damp hair, a quick innocuous self breath test with the cupped hand as they head towards me and place their towels on two nearby sun beds and start to make them selves comfortable and place the big daft shoulder bags under their sun beds.

By now naughty scenarios play in my mind and I just adjust my shorts just in case they look over at the handsome man with sunglasses on taking a seriously unhealthy interest in what they are doing. Women never look like this at home I think to myself why do they both look like sure fire shags and that a holiday ménage et trios with a mother and daughter would be very nice.

All of the sudden the silence is broken by a chirpy male scouse voice shouting “Karen, Becky do you want drinks girls?” I look over and across by the bar are their partners one donned in an Everton shirt and one in a Liverpool shirt.

The ladies respond in kind replying in a broad scouse dialect “Yes please Dave” and shout their orders over to what obviously are their partners and for me the moment of hope of a holiday romance is over again, totally extinguished and my hopes dashed.

Sunglasses up, belly relaxed, hair tousled, Sudoku book picked up again and in taking that action more sweat runs down my face and back but this time I use my towel to take the worse of the sweat off. I move my knees up and create a table again to rest my book before getting back into puzzle mode. There are more big decisions to be made. Does the 8 go there and if that is the case where does the 9 go it can’t go in that row because there is a 9 there already?

As a final insult as the two luckiest guys currently in the world bring the drinks over to their partners I overhear one say to the other in a Bootle brogue voice “I think we’ve picked the wrong hotel mate it’s so lifeless that fella there has resorted to doing Sudoku” before the four of them burst into a chorus of giggles and chuckles at my expense.

At which point I suddenly realise that Sudoku is in so many ways actually very similar to life just a load of jumbled and pointless numbers you have little or no chance of ever working out and with that I decide to return to my room to cool off and as I pass the wasp ridden waste bin tentatively the Sudoku book is discarded finding a new place to reside in the great dustbin of life.