Dispatches from the Void. X.VII. Visa Edition.

Mowgli: Ascends to Higher Plane of Nip.
Experiences Full-Body Enlightenment in Kitchen. Renames Himself ‘Floating Leaf.’ Forgets Basic Motor Functions. Attempts to Interview a Teabag. Recovers with Chicken.

Akela: Conducts Silent Protest Against All Liquids.
Hears the Word “Drops,” Leaves the Room. Returns Only to Knock Over Glass of Water with Unflinching Eye Contact. Sleeps on Passport Documents. Issues Threatening Blink.

Poe: Offers Blood Sacrifice to Secure Visa.
Murders Second Butterfly in Two Days. Presents Corpse at Celia’s Feet with Solemn Nod. Spends Evening Watching Shadows Move. Attempts to Enter Cupboard Portal but Is Denied Entry.

This Week in Underland:

• Butterflies Die and Tories Multiply
  Poetry misread. Birds scream. A single shoe is packed with quiet rage.
• Reality TV and the Dismantling of Hope
  Bar Rescue worship continues. Visa gods laugh. Trash nowhere, everywhere, always.
• Emotional Support Bureaucracy and Other Myths
  Catnip deployed. Housing unconfirmed. Email refresh count reaches tragic milestone.

It’s Thursday again in Underland, and we are tired. Frustrated. Anxious.

In just two weeks, we leave for Thailand. Right now, we’re deep in the chaos of pulling our lives apart. The house is slowly being dismantled, room by room. But the hardest part? The things we can’t control. And there are a lot of them.

Neither of us are great at leaving our fate in someone else’s hands. We don’t like it. We never have. So this week has been full-on fight-or-flight, every day a new wave of stress. Still waiting on my visa. Still waiting to hear about a home. Still waiting. And trying not to unravel in the meantime.

Waiting on a visa when you’ve already got plane tickets is like speeding down a motorway with no brakes. I check my email a hundred times a day, hoping for something, anything, from the consulate. It’s almost always junk mail. No, I don’t want a discount on patio furniture. Yes, I do want legal permission to leave the country. I’m still within the estimated time period, so all we can really do is wait as patiently as possible. If the good people at the Royal Embassy are reading this, we’re incredibly unassuming and we don’t want any trouble, just to be together in your beautiful country.

We’ve been finding solace in each other. And in Bar Rescue, apparently. Reality TV is about all our brains can handle right now, chaos with no real consequences. Just Jon Taffer screaming about health violations while we scream silently into the void. It helps.

Also: there is nowhere to throw out trash in this country. Say what you will about America, it’s a disaster, sure, but there’s always a dumpster nearby. Here? We’re hoarding bin bags like we’re prepping for the apocalypse.

Really, it’s just…a lot. But we’re still laughing, and honestly, that’s probably what’s keeping us sane.

We know we’ll be okay. We’re ready, more than ready, to build something new. Something that finally looks like the life we’ve been trying to live, instead of this holding pattern we’ve been stuck in for over a year.

So yeah. We’re tired. We’re frustrated. But we didn’t come this far to give up.

R x

Legit. Have no words. Well a few, I guess.

This week has felt like wading through the river Usk at low tide with stilts on with a ticking clock and kermit singing a rendition of, ‘Somebody feed Phil’ incoherently in the background. Still no visa for River. It’s technically still within the expected timeframe, so there’s nothing to panic about on paper. Easier said than done. Sortable if we don’t get it but it adds a whole new layer of tension to everything. 

Estate agents here seem to operate on a timescale known only to sloths and minor gods. We need a house. We need to know where we’re landing. Instead we’re stuck refreshing our inboxes like it’s going to conjure a miracle or our luck this week, a curse.

I’m tired. Properly bone-deep exhausted. My body is wired and my brain is fog. The stress is constant, like a low-level electric hum just beneath the skin.

Also, some random bloke online decided to completely and willfully misread one of my poems and called me a Tory. Genuinely had to laugh. Wasn’t interested in an actual conversation just saracasm, name-calling nastiness and the same old mansplaining that now dominates, ‘The Internet’. Incidentally, I’m so far left I probably qualify as a security risk for frogs and racoons. The idea that I’m out there waving a little blue flag like a fascist smurf made me quite ill – or tickled me purple. I haven’t decided yet. I shall ponder.

Meanwhile, the cats are doing their best to either lighten the mood or finish us off. Mowgli got into catnip for the first time. Five minutes in and he was lying on his back in a blissed-out daze, batting at invisible birds. We now refer to him exclusively as Stoner Boy. Poe has started killing butterflies. I wish that was a metaphor. I think she’s trying to help in the only way she knows how, bringing us sad little offerings like, “Here, maybe this will fix things.” Akela watches us all from the top of the wardrobe like she’s already planning the eulogy. She still believes ear drops are a state-sanctioned attempt on her life.

The cat relocation company we hired, supposedly to make things easier, have been an absolute nightmare. Vague responses. No timeline. No clear answers. Just a mounting sense that we’re going to have to chase every single detail ourselves.

And yes, Trump is still disgusting. In case anyone needed a reminder that the world remains deeply cursed. I live in hope that he mysteriously falls out of a window or some such. Not fussy about the circumstances really TBH. Maybe he could take his other three dictator ‘buddies’ with him.

So yeah. That’s the week. Held together sort of by caffeine, cat fur, sheer bloody-mindedness and a bucket ton of love.

And, that clucking chicken…

— C x

It’s Thursday again in Underland, and we are tired. Frustrated. Anxious.

In just two weeks, we leave for Thailand. Right now, we’re deep in the chaos of pulling our lives apart. The house is slowly being dismantled, room by room. But the hardest part? The things we can’t control. And there are a lot of them.

Neither of us are great at leaving our fate in someone else’s hands. We don’t like it. We never have. So this week has been full-on fight-or-flight, every day a new wave of stress. Still waiting on my visa. Still waiting to hear about a home. Still waiting. And trying not to unravel in the meantime.

Waiting on a visa when you’ve already got plane tickets is like speeding down a motorway with no brakes. I check my email a hundred times a day, hoping for something, anything, from the consulate. It’s almost always junk mail. No, I don’t want a discount on patio furniture. Yes, I do want legal permission to leave the country. I’m still within the estimated time period, so all we can really do is wait as patiently as possible. If the good people at the Royal Embassy are reading this, we’re incredibly unassuming and we don’t want any trouble, just to be together in your beautiful country.

We’ve been finding solace in each other. And in Bar Rescue, apparently. Reality TV is about all our brains can handle right now, chaos with no real consequences. Just Jon Taffer screaming about health violations while we scream silently into the void. It helps.

Also: there is nowhere to throw out trash in this country. Say what you will about America, it’s a disaster, sure, but there’s always a dumpster nearby. Here? We’re hoarding bin bags like we’re prepping for the apocalypse.

Really, it’s just…a lot. But we’re still laughing, and honestly, that’s probably what’s keeping us sane.

We know we’ll be okay. We’re ready, more than ready, to build something new. Something that finally looks like the life we’ve been trying to live, instead of this holding pattern we’ve been stuck in for over a year.

So yeah. We’re tired. We’re frustrated. But we didn’t come this far to give up.

R x

Legit. Have no words.

C x

If this resonated, please give it a share on Bluesky (or anywhere folks still have an attention span longer than a moth after a sleepless night), leave us a comment, or check out our latest anthologies

Poetry Collection, ‘Is this all we get?’

Prose Collection, ‘ Fifth Avenue Pizza’