Lurking on page 123

I have been ‘tagged’, though not in the same way in which a criminal is tagged in order to track their whereabouts when they’re released on early licence. No, not that sort of tagging. Instead, I have been tagged with a meme. Gosh, in all my years of bloggery I don’t think I’ve ever been meme-fied. I have come to regard it as a badge of honour, to be honest. I’m too good for memes. After all, this isn’t so much just any old weblog, but more a way of life. Or something.

Except. Not only have I been tagged, but I have been tagged by The Goldfish, and it’s with a literary meme that allows me to finally post something new in this rather neglected corner of An Unreliable Witness. Somehow, it is too good an opportunity to resist.

1. Take the nearest book and go to page 123.
2. Go to the fifth sentence of the page.
3. Copy down the next three sentences and tag three people.

“The glow of real life was missing. My makeshift, phoney muscles were only going through the motions. I was a puppet, to be used in some sacrifice.”

Those lines are from Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman, the latest collection of short stories by Haruki Murakami. Yes, I know, I’m far too predictable; it’s him again. It’s a book that, sadly, I haven’t yet got round to reading, because currently resides atop one of the two huge pile of novels I’ve still got to catch up on having not read a single thing during my five months in hospital.

Under the international rules of blogging memes, apparently I now have to, er, ‘tag’ three other people. And because I am deliberately awkward, I am going to nominate a trio whom, like me, I suspect wouldn’t normally be seen dead doing such things. So step forward Andre, Cheerful One and Jack.

I’m just not playing the game, am I? Sorry about bringing this particular meme to such an inglorious end.