Timetabling

You spread it all out on the table of days, your buffet of 3600 seconds per hour, 86400 seconds per day.

You type 'GMT', and it tells you that even Greenwich isn't doing GMT till Sunday 26 October 2008 01:00 GMT (02:00 BST). The Wolfberry came by at 4:37:51 local time. Time is a river, an illusion brought into play by existence.

It's as Omar Khayyam said: life's but a checkerboard of nights and days/where Destiny with men for pieces plays.

You shuffle the pieces around. One is you. Anand draws with Kramnik in round 7 of the World Chess Championships. Neither is either. Are you a pawn? You never sought to be a king. You might be a knight. Knights and daze.

Time is perhaps that patient etherised upon a table, vide Prufrock. That poem always insists there will be time. But who is this who comes around to tidy up the table and clear the dishes away?

I sip my coffee. My life is measured out in coffee spoons.