There's a storm comin.
Remarked my old neighbor, The Jim as he leaned on his rake and looked up at the sky.
I looked to the sky too. It looked absolutely normal. In fact it looked quite nice, you could even see some blue which was astonishing for Scotland.
Aye.
I nodded sagely to impress The Jim as if I too had attained the wisdom of the ancients.
Ye can see it.
He said in his old and wise way.
Aye. Aye ye can.
I whistled softly, leaning on my own rake wishing I had a long piece of straw to be chewing. Or gloves. My hands were freezing. Not like The Jim who had hands like those leathery pigs ears that dogs chew.
And if ye cannae see it you can smell it.
He said with a grin finality.
Aye. Smell it.
I echoed, wishing that I could see and smell storms like some kind of storm dog.
One of our other neighbors, The Morven from a few houses down, walked by at that moment.
Ye smell it, Jim?
He barked like a grizzled old Alsatian tugging at someone's bacon underpants.
Aye, storm's comin.
Growled The Jim back.
God, look at these two. Two old storm dogs sniffing around the base of mother nature's tree for some villainous enemy dog piss.
Storm Dogs. The idea sung to me on a primal level. I rolled it around in my head, envisaging myself dressed in black leather with a cape, standing side by side with these two on some rooftop, sniffing for storms and howling at the night.
Woof!
I barked excitedly.
What did you say?
The two old men were looking at me as me as if I had just told them that one of the kids had ripped my knitting.
I cleared my throat and attempted to look old and grave before nodding at the sky.
Storm's comin.