Scattering the Ashes

[Gordon]

Dear Tom,

Further to my previous "Smoking" question, your (very stark) response has jolted me into not buying "ciggies" ever again. Sadly, I have tried to get around this, by announcing that I "only smoke cigars now" - utterly pathetic, I know........but I think I'm getting there. In any event , I did just wonder in the good old days with Bob , (perhaps Douglas Camfield, ) Terrance, Lis. etc, etc - when you all sat around doing the 'read-though' .........was this ever an issue?

With Best Regards,

Gordon

PS I have selected a place for my ashes!

[Tom Baker]

Dear Gordon,

If you don't pull yourself together you could at least arrange to send your ashes to me care of my agent. He's in the book and quite used to receiving ashes of actors as well as taxidermists and cobblers. As a keen under-gardener, I know that ashes make the badgers sneeze and are very good for hard pruned dogwood.

As to the second point, in those long-gone days of read-throughs, everyone smoked. I used to smoke Rothmans King Size, two at a time. Why, I was smoking before I could walk. Then I saw the dark. All around me they dropped down gasping for a gasper. So I jacked it in. And now 25 years later, my lungs have forgiven and forgotten. The doctor told me only the other day that I might pant on till Christmas. Soon, of course smokers will be required to carry a little bell and call out "unclean" and the general public will be encouraged to throw dog turds at them. Is what you really want, Gordy? No, you want to live and laugh and throw away your spittoon.

With warmest wishes from Tom