Nunhead Ramblings

World Cup 2010

2010-06-13T19:50:00.002+01:00

Well, it's finally here.......the World Cup in South Africa. The tension in the Nunhead Mum household has been, well, tense. Once David and Mac had got "Wembley out of the way" their attention turned from Millwall's Lions to the Three Lions. We've now got a 42" television in the living room which caused a bit of a stir in Cafe Nero when I informed Charlie that Curry's had just delivered. "How big? 42 INCHES?" she yelled which pretty much brought the whole place to an open mouthed standstill.

Finger food abounds in the fridge, freezer and cupboards. It's too much, apparently, to ask my boys to eat proper food with a knife and fork - why eat a roast dinner when they can graze on chicken drumsticks, mini quiches, celery sticks and crisps? Still, it's only for a couple of weeks, I'll ram them full of proper meals over the rest of the summer.

Mac has been learning all about all the countries featuring in the World Cup since he got back to school after half term and we all have lively interesting discussions. Go on, ask me anything about South Korea. Go on, ask me!

David has wangled the afternoon of the 23rd off (along with half of the country I suspect) and is working out the quickest way to get Mac home from school in time for the 3pm England kick off. Not the safest, I might add, just the quickest. Besides, I don't know anyone with a motorbike, let alone anyone who will be happy with a five year old clinging on behind them.

Frank and Marjorie have gone a bit off track.....they've decided not to support England but both picked a team out of a hat to support. Frank is therefore rooting for Australia and Marjorie has got Nigeria and was dressed yesterday in a brightly coloured kaftan.

Janey is "not watching the world cup, bloody stupid, Eastenders has been buggered about with" but is spending every match indulging in some sort of pampering routine. I rang her yesterday during the England game only to be told by Darren that she's "sitting upstairs in the bathroom, waxing her minnie". I didn't need to know that.

And as for me, well, I'm doing what any sane woman would do. Ogling the players. I'm not so much musing their passing abilities or nifty footwork but that's what David and Mac are thinking anyway. Charlie's coming round tomorrow night for the Italy game. Now, they've got a lot of, erm, skill.

Dick Camegg

2010-05-11T21:37:00.002+01:00

The Unholy (?) Alliance. Two smarmy men in matching suits with matching Jags. I'm just miffed that they took Eastenders and Holby off air. I know it's a monumentous day and all that but.....David Cameron and Nick Clegg. Put them together and what have you got?

Dick Camegg.......David (staunch Tory) is unhappy that I am "ridiculing" what is an "important day in British politics, mutter, mutter, mumble chunter". He watched the unfolding drama in an agog fashion and there was even talk of getting Mac out of bed to watch it.

Following a (text) discussion with my family and friends I'm off to copyright Dick Camegg (c) before the papers get hold of it!

A post from Bea

2010-05-02T20:53:00.003+01:00

Hello darlings! Bea here, Joanna's sister. Well, I must say, it's nice to be here. I'd have posted earlier but I've been reading this darling little "blog" and finding out all kinds of things that I'd really, rather not know about my sister and her life. However, this "post" is my favourite.....sigh!

Anyway. I've had a little wander round (permission granted by Joanna of course, I would never stick my nose in where it was not wanted. I've changed the layout, all that lace and frilliness.....eurgh. She doesn't know that yet but she won't mind. It was the balance of her mind you see, disturbed. That's right, disturbed. She hasn't been right, poor lovely girl that she is.

But, she's okay now. She's had counselling, I've taken her to Champneys for a couple of days (the treatments there are to die for!) and she's back at work. David felt it for the best, to get her out of the house and, as he put it, not to "worry about her surfaces". His mother (awful old bat she is, that Amelia, marriage hasn't changed her) thinks otherwise but we've been keeping them apart and I suspect we will for a while longer yet.

They're in East Sussex this weekend, Joanna, David, Mackenzie (sweet, sweet child) and the dogs, staying at Andy's beach house. I don't know about you but, the phrase beach house does not indicate a windswept abode. To me, it's not a beach house unless it's in a country where the heat is hot and the serving staff subservient. Anyway......where was I?

Oh yes, Joanna.....she's fine, happy and will be raring to go after her weekend of wind, rain and Galaxy chocolate bars. She had a whole bag, just for them. I suspect that she will need to join the keep fit classes run at the hospital if she carries on like this.

Well, I'm off to have a more in-depth look round, I hope you're all well and are ready for me to visit your "blogs"!

Mithering Sunday

2010-03-14T17:05:00.000Z

I realised, as I dropped off my Mothers Day present round at Dad's house this morning, that I'd bought my poor mummy what was essentially a large pot of earth with a few bulbs thrown in. Obviously, once the bulbs flower in June/July time she'll be able to pop out onto her cloud, look down (a la Google Earth) and say "Oh look freesias and anemones! I love those!"

Right now, she's probably looking down and saying "Gee thanks, you shouldn't have bothered!"

I'm sincerely hoping that now we've gone past the 12th of March the mood which has enveloped me since the end of December will push off and allow me to be myself again. Friday was the third anniversary of mum's funeral and this is the first year (apart from the actual year it happened) that I have been affected this way. The rest of my family have either talked about it, or pretended it wasn't happening or dealt with it internally. Me, I seem to have had a mini meltdown. Well, you know me, I don't do anything by halves.

My Mothers Day presents included flowers, chocolates, wine gums, a cushion (from Mac who bought it whilst out shopping with his father in post-match euphoria), a one cup/tea pot combo from my grandson (only on special occasions do I remember I'm technically a granny) and a book token from Matthew. Lydia phoned and apologised for the "boring" present but I was out, spending it.

On the way home from Surrey Quays I pulled up at a set of traffic lights, put my handbrake on and found my hand at earlobe level. It was obviously broken. Barely three weeks after my exhaust fell off. I need a new car. And, you see, the thing is my current car knows this and is getting its own back. Little does it realise that all it's doing is speeding up the arrival of the new car.

When we got home, Mac breezed into the house and said "Mummy's brakes have gone!" which propelled David out into the hallway in a panic, vegetable peeler in one hand and a carrot in the other.

My brakes have gone.....that sums up the feeling of the past three months perfectly

The Lock

2010-03-07T21:31:00.005Z

Charlie, who is now ensconced in her new flat, invited me round on Friday night for a "catch up". David, keen for me to "get back on the social merry-go-round" as it will "take me out of myself" (he's been watching too much Rikki Lake methinks) agreed to babysit both Mac and Freddie at Matt and Lydia's whilst the latter pair headed out cinema-wards.

I drove to Charlie's new abode in fashionable SE3 and manouvered my way around the complicated landscaping until I found her "house" - she quite likes the whole institutional feel of the complex as it reminds of her of her boarding school and her "house" there - although she couldn't have liked it that much as she tried to set fire to it twice. But that's another story.

"I'm so looking forward to this evening!" Charlie said as she tossed salad with gay abandon, put some sesame seeds into the oven for toasting and cracked open a bottle of Elderflower wine. It was actually nice to see Charlie without a) weeping on her shoulder or b) being inundated with "helpful" leaflets from the Top London Hospitals Psych Department. "Let me just go and get the cake in from the car" I said, opening the flat door and heading out into the expensively scented communal hallway only to find myself in pitch darkness. "The light switch is helpfully at the door end of the corridor...." said a voice immediately behind me. I paced forward and found the switch and flipped it just in time to hear the door to Charlie's flat go "click". She looked at me, I looked at her. "Oh fuck!" we both said in unison.

A quick summing up concluded that

we were locked out
with no keys
and no mobile phones
with no windows open
and the oven was on, toasting sesame seeds
with candles flickering merrily on the mantlepiece, table centre and window ledge
Charlie had no shoes on and was wearing a fetching apron

Okay, said I, keep calm. Charlie gazed at me in wonderment and said "How can I keep calm? We are LOCKED out, with NO keys, and no MOBILES and my NEW FLAT is about to be burned down by CANDLES and the OVEN!!!!!" "It'll be fine" I said, stroking her arm as if she were a nervy thoroughbred.

"Who's got your spare keys?" I asked, feeling momentarily smug that had she given me her spare set as I think I suggested when she moved in, we would be out of this mess in around half an hour - the time it would take me to drive home and back. There was no point in ringing anyone - especially David who would panic and never let either of us forget it if he had to come and "rescue" us.

"My brother" she said, eyes huge in her face. "Your brother that lives in Esher or your brother that lives in Sittingbourne?" "Matthew!" Bugger, the one that lives in Sittingbourne. Not that either were five minutes away. "Have you left a set with a neighbour?" I demanded. "No, I don't know them." came the small reply as she threw herself at the front door. "What are you doing?" I snapped. "Listening for flames" she whimpered. I suggested, in withering tones, that I go outside and take a look through the window.

"We need an emergency locksmith" I said, pacing the expensively scented corridor and wondering why the hell, if The Management could provide pot pourri for the hallways, they couldn't provide a light switch closer to the flat doors. I banged on the door opposite whilst Charlie hopped from foot to foot. To be fair, her immediate neighbour wasn't remotely fazed to have a snivelling woman beg for access to his Broadband and a phone while some bolshy cow prowled round outside the House in search of open windows to Charlie's flat. When I returned from my prowl (firstly checking on the candle situation) Charlie had a glass of wine in her hand and was sitting on the stairs.

An hour and sixy five quid later, we were back in the flat, on the sofa with Charlie vowing never to leave the flat ever again. She'd had some good advice from her neighbour ("always flick the catch up and/or take your keys with you") and from the locksmith ("always make sure you have a spare set of keys somewhere close") and was frantically stuffing freshly cooked pizza into her face.

"How were you so.....calm?" she demanded of me, as she clutched her aching head.

I'm always calm when other people have a crisis - I'm a complete fruit loop when it comes to my own and would have been climbing the walls had I been Charlie tonight. But I tell you what.....it did take me out of myself and I've been feeling so much better since.

And Charlie dropped her spare set of keys off this afternoon, along with a request that I tell no-one what happened. Now....would I?!

And......breathe

2010-02-28T21:59:00.003Z

It's been a trying time for me. I've not been well. It's been well documented (not on here, obviously, as this is the first day for ages that I've felt able to sit at the computer/laptop without recourse to self diagnosis on the NHS Direct website.....I have all of the illnesses listed under A, D, F, K and S. Or at least I think I do.)

Well documented in that all of my family, friends and neighbours have an opinion on what ails me, what could cure me and what I should steer clear of. My GP, bless him, has diagnosed "stress". Well, give that man a bloody orange. Stress!!!!! Why didn't I think of that?

I laughed when he told me what he'd concluded. I even underlined his diagnosis by having a rant, followed by a little sob, followed by Lovely Loretta (receptionist extraordinaire) having to carry me out to the waiting area and feed me tea and ginger nuts until I was calm enough to walk in a straight line.

Stress. Now I wonder how that came about?

Amelia (chief cause of stress) wanted to come and "look after me" the week before last. I clutched David warmly by the lapels and said "If she comes within fifty foot of me you, matey, will suffer as only I can make you suffer". He went green, phoned his mother back and....guess what? She hasn't darkened my doorstep. Result. Bea's reflexologist went away, almost in tears after I failed to relax under her ministrations. Apparently I'm the first failure she's had since she started officially as a freelancer. The stress counsellor I visited (at Bea's insistence) made me want to hit him which did wonders for my stress levels but, according to my darling sister, he found me "interesting" and "wanted to dig more".

Seriously though. I am better than I was. My blood pressure has returned almost to normal, I can now watch programmes without sobbing into a cushion when Bradley Branning dies/a lion cub loses her mother/Del Boy's granddad dies/Manuel's pet rat has to leave Fawlty Towers/there is a sell out of an item I really want on QVC. And David can now utter the words "oh, we're out of milk" without me beating my chest and wailing "woe is me" - I'm over exaggerating. Slightly.

I was (surprisingly) calm and relaxed on the anniversary of my mum's passing. However, the day after was spent either in tears or ramming Haribo into my mouth. It's been a trying month to say the least. But I'm back. A few pounds lighter, along with my hair which I've had blonded as a "treat" and ready to take on my bit of the world again.

I just need to get my bearings and visit you all for catch ups.....please bear with me!

Who gives a toss?

2010-02-16T18:48:00.004Z

I do apparently. I have to, as David "can't quite get the wrist action right for tossing stuff". There's no real answer to that, is there?

This was the excuse he gave Mac just now when his youngest son asked for "pancakes daddy, with lemon 'n' sugar". I had to retrieve myself from my sick bed (okay, the sofa) where I have been residing since the Wedding That Never Was with mother-in-law induced stress. More to follow on that subject.

So. Although David had been helpful enough to mix up the batter, it was I standing outside getting the pan at the right temperature and pouring in enough batter (but not too much - thick pancakes are "yucky" apparently) and flipping said half cooked batter with gay abandon.

As all the tossing and typing has worn me out enough for me to doze on the sofa until Eastenders starts, I've left David with the washing up. And scraping half cooked pancake off of my cooker hood.

Bea is coming to see me tomorrow with her homeopath and reflexologist - wish me luck!

Wedding Day Blues

2010-02-07T17:33:00.003Z

Disaster has struck the House of Mitchell and the House of Jack Next Door. Well, maybe not disaster. Just a HUGE mistake narrowly averted (according to Amelia), thousands of pounds wasted and jet lag. Shall I go on?

On Thursday, two days before The Wedding of Amelia and Jack Next Door as announced at our Christmas lunch Amelia arrived on my doorstep with collywobbles the size of Australia. "What if Frank doesn't want me to get married again?" she said as she hoisted herself and her bags through my front door. Frank was her (now deceased) first husband and was the sweetest, kindest man in the world. "I'm sure he's okay about it" I pointed out, flinching as the phone rang in case it was the caterers with yet another crisis. Why, when we were paying them to manage this wedding, were they on the phone every half an hour with a query?

After a cup of tea and a dunked digestive she headed off to Jack Next Door's house to help him prepare the house for the arrival of his only daughter from Mexico and to finish his packing for his move to the residential home. I saw him in the garden on Tuesday morning seemingly saying farewell to the stumpy stumps of his rose trees.

Friday morning dawned and the flowers arrived for what had become a discreet family only wedding. After the ceremony at the registry office we were heading to Bea's palatial house for the reception before the happy couple headed off to the Lakes for a freezing week in a lakeside cottage. Amelia disappeared next door again, not looking herself and wearing a "sucking lemons" face.

At half past two, Jack's daughter Fiona knocked on our door to introduce herself and to inform us that the happy couple requested some "time alone". "I dread to think what they're getting up to!" she said as she bounced round the house, proclaimed the dogs "cool" and revealed that she was a geologist. And what that entailed. In mind numbing detail. I almost kissed Amelia when she reappeared. "We have an announcement" she said, glancing at Jack "but we're going to wait until David and Virginia are here".

Three hours later (I picked Mac up from school in a daze and didn't even go near Ayres) and David and Ginny arrived home. For the three hours we waited, the happy couple sat at the kitchen table holding hands and ignoring our pleas to be told what was happening. Fiona asked me how on earth I put up with Amelia. I snorted my response and then had a coughing fit. I was imagining all sorts of things - "at least she's not up the duff!" Fiona boomed - and, from the gaunt look on Jack's face, my money was, morbidly, on a terminal illness.

"We've decided not to get married after all" Amelia said once we were all seated in the living room. "What?" spluttered David at the same time as Ginny let out a bark of laughter "Why?" Fiona said, looking stunned (and jet lagged).

"Because Amelia.....I......we.....felt that at our time of life it was a ridiculous proposition" Jack said, squeezing Amelia's hand. "I flew all this way only for you to cancel the wedding?" Fiona said in a chilling voice "Do you have any idea what I had to do to get out of the field trip I had planned?" she went on. Ginny mouthed "What?" at me. "We felt it was ridiculous and unnecessary" Amelia added, throwing in "But we are going to co-habit" as an after thought. "Will the home allow that?" David asked, shooting me a look. I knew why, I moved into David's house a fortnight before we got married and was labelled a whore, a harlot and a fallen woman for doing so and he feared I was about to exact some revenge.

"Of course darling, we're not in the Dark Ages!" she laughed. Laughed! I was still struggling with the news and waste of money. But, having told us all, the still happy couple had relaxed and looked fifteen years younger and suggested we cracked open one of the many (many) bottles of sparkling wine we had "hanging around".

So. Can you imagine how I spent my Saturday morning? Placating a fuming Fiona (who hogged the computer trying - and failing - to change her flight back to Mexico), cancelling the Registry Office (who told me "no monies would be returned"), giving away buttonholes and table centre pieces, explaining to the caterers that, whilst we would pay them naturally, we no longer had any need for any of the food (apart from a selection of the choicest nibbles) and giving Bea a few suggestions on how to explain to Stephen that the house needed re-decorating anyway.

It was a breeze.

Whaaa'?

2010-01-29T22:37:00.003Z

I was stopped dead, literally in my tracks earlier today. Stunned. Gobsmacked. Shocked even. And I'd like to think I'm fairly unshockable.

David has been at home this week, using up his annual leave before the end of March (his mother wants to know why he didn't take the week off after The Wedding so he could help Jack Next Door move into her residential home - I think you know the reason why) and has spent most of the week at Borough Market which is roughly, ooh, ten minutes walk from his office. Why? I haven't the foggiest.

Anyway, he was out in the kitchen, unloading today's booty (ham, green things with dirt on them) and Mac was watching him, fascinated by seeing things not coming out of plastic bags with Sainsbury's written on them. "Ham!" he bellowed as, presumably, ham entered the fridge. I was in the living room at this point, trying to work out whether or not I could get away with ordering the ridiculously expensive Emu boots from QVC without David noticing but was smiling at my boys enthusiasm for all things edible. "Brockley!" he bellowed as, again broccoli was no doubt released from the confines of David's hessian bag.

"Mummy, daddy said I can't have any ham!" came a voice from the doorway, bottom lip wobbling precariously five minutes later. Note he wasn't bewailing the lack of broccoli coming his way. "Well, you can't, not on it's own. Wait and have some for tea" said I, quickly turning QVC off (am even now hiding my shopping channel addiction from my son). "Oh God!" he sighed.

Now, this is something that's worrying me. He wasn't saying "God" as in how I would say it, like "Oh God, what have I trodden in?" or "Oh My God, look at the price of that!" but "Oh God" as in they've started doing Religion at school and he's merely "expressing his wish to communicate with the Heavenly Father". According to his form teacher, Mrs W.

But it sounds like he's saying "Oh God......" and then revving up for a moan. Which threw Bea on Wednesday and had Amelia clutching her throat yesterday. "You're raising a blasphemer!" she insisted. I must admit I have my doubts and am hoping that he'll get out of the habit of chatting to Him other than in his nightly prayers (which, incidentally start with Dear Lord) which is what I say on a daily basis but for the other reason.

Are you following me?

So, he wasn't moaning because of the lack of ham, he was communicating with Jesus' dad. Right.

So, onto what completely discombobulated me earlier. Not two minutes after the Ham Incident I heard David mumble something and then Mac yell "Jesus!" at the top of this voice.

I shot off the sofa, leapt over Senior Dog who was having a snooze in the middle of the room and skidded into the kitchen. "MACKENZIE!" I bellowed, shaky of knee "Don't you ever, EVER, ever.........."

I trailed off when I focussed on David holding aloft a bag of cheeses and my once again wobbly lipped son happily chomping on an an illicit bit of cheddar.

Cheeses. Indeed.

Snarl

2010-01-19T20:24:00.000Z

Everyone, it seems, is in a bad mood at the moment. Charlie is threatening all kinds of violence towards the outgoing family who are in "her" new flat and who are unable to move because their removals firm had double booked and can't "provide any vans until the "twenty fird love". She's also threatening violence to the incoming couple who are moving into her "old" flat as they're raring to go and she's still got her life in packing cases all over the flat. I questioned this sheer level of aggression as she moved the "essentials" into our spare room on Sunday. Quietly, lest she flare up again. She's okay at the moment though, she's glued to the football with David - if she asks him once more to explain the offside rule I suspect he may get a tidge on edge.

Frank and Marjorie Stewart are in an equally bad mood - they requested (from Lydia, their landlady) that they be able to build a conservatory - "only a small one, we're not ostentatious, just big enough to house the hot tub" - and she's refused. According to Marjorie "my friend" doesn't want what is effectively a greenhouse tacked onto the back of her house. I've pointed out to Lyds that if it shields the poor unsuspecting neighbours from any hot tub shenanigans it's got to be worth it but she is adamant. She's just as adamant that Freddie has his five a day every day - each time I see that child he's got a carrot stick in one hand and grape in the other. Three times on Sunday I extracted the former from his left nostril.

Amelia is also not backwards in coming forwards on the bolshy front (when is she ever?) and is insisting that Mac wear a proper three piece suit to her wedding. He refused to try the waistcoat on on Saturday and received a lecture from his Granny about "children being seen, not heard and doing what they're told to do!" - he rolled his eyes and slouched over to the television, muttering ominously.

Me? I'm all sweetness and light at the moment, the dreaded headaches from caffeine withdrawals are slowly abating and, although I would once kill for a latte, I'm not actually actively missing coffee on a day to day basis. Cut to Bea who, this morning, thoughtfully rang me up and asked me if I wanted to meet her in Sainsbury's Starbucks for a "skinny latte".

"I'm not drinking coffee" I pointed out. Sharp intake of air from my darling sister "Darling. Are you sure? Is that wise? I couldn't get through the day without a latte and an expresso first thing in the morning". I advised her, for the nth time that I am not her and that I was managing just fine without it. I left her puzzling this and she rang off. Two hours later she biked round some alternative "hot beverages darling" in a hamper for me to try. I love my sister.

Anyway, must dash. Our house guest is working up a good old head of steam - an estate agents advert has just flashed up on the round-the-pitch hoardings - and she's bubbling over. She'll be okay if I steer her in the direction of the biscuit tin and Bea's hamper.

Gone a bit......

2010-01-14T16:49:00.002Z

I’m a bit disheartened. Discouraged, even. There’s been no change in my body weight/shape since New Years Eve. I’d decided that, along with my Healthy Eating Malarky, I wouldn’t weigh myself as I’d become obsessed with the dial and its position and use the Jeans Method instead. That is, fitting into a pair of jeans that, as at 31 December 2009, I couldn’t do up without bulging and being unable to breathe.

I’d cosseted the jeans, prepared them lovingly. They’re clean as I washed them before I put them on my Can’t Wear THOSE Any More shelf in my wardrobe a few years ago. But as we all know, washed jeans are tighter than normal and need wearing in a bit before we can define whether or not they actually fit. So, just before Christmas I put them on along with a long line top to hide the bulges and wore them about the house to “stretch” them. After wearing them for two days (and having them leave an imprint around my waist that actually hurt) they had stretched considerably. I’m not kidding myself, I’m never going to wear a pair of skinny jeans but I do at least want to fit into my Pre-Mackenzie pair.

So, having got them ready to accept my current body shape, and having spent the previous two weeks eating healthy foods (with the odd lapse), walking to and from school in the morning, taking the dogs twice round Dulwich Park on Saturdays and Sundays and clenching whilst cooking, I had high hopes of this morning’s little experiment.

I got them on but struggled to pull them up. I could do them up (like before, lying flat and then attempting to stand up straight without bending) but the bulge was worse, they were twisted on my legs and the pockets were sticking out alarmingly. In short they were worse than on New Years Eve.

I walked around a bit to check their flexibility but only succeeded in catching sight of myself in the mirror and emitting a small sob of…..I’m not sure what. Horror? Frustration? Mourning for all of the food I COULD have eaten?

I got out of them as quickly as I could (not easy when they were clinging to my flesh like leeches), threw them on the floor of the wardrobe in a heap and flopped onto my bed. Five minutes – and a good wallow – later I dragged myself downstairs and kicked the exercise bike.

That was at half past eleven. You’ll be pleased to hear that I didn’t delve into the biscuit tin, nor did I hunt out the last of the Quality Street that David has hidden from me. Instead I made myself a Cup A Soup and rang Charlie who is having monstrous problems with her new flat (as in, she’s ready to move into it but the current occupiers aren’t ready to leave it yet) for a good bitching session. We’ve concluded that two weeks isn’t enough time for anything to happen and that I should carry on as I have been and not worry too much about it. She’s going to pop round later with a small bar of Green and Blacks as a treat but I’ve got to promise not to eat it until the weekend as a “test of my willpower”.

Sometimes I wonder if she knows me AT all!

Sweat

2010-01-13T22:19:00.004Z

Well, I have my pengui n Pandora charm but David won't let me have it as I cycled without witnesses (you can't count the dogs, apparently) on Monday. So now I have to "go again" as they say in certain circles while David watches. I fear that as my Pussy Cat Dolls DVD has yet to arrive (damn snow) he is getting his thrills elsewhere. Excuse me, but I'm just about to push some Buttons.

Can you feel it?

2010-01-11T14:29:00.004Z

Apart from arranging wedding flowers, cars, a buffet and trying to convince Mac that he's not losing a granny, he's gaining a grandad, whilst assuring him that, what with his, current grandad he'll have the grand total of two grandads, I'm trying to sort my life out.

You know me, I do love setting myself these impossible challenges.

I've booked a hair cut next week and plan on asking my hairdresser Amanda for a shag. She won't bat an eyelid, that woman has seen it all and come out the other side smiling. At the moment, any style that doesn't mind being washed and conditioned, straightened to within an inch of its life and then scurfed up into a scrunchie gets my vote. But I've decided that this year is going to be my year, the year that I allow the thin, witty, wonderful, gorgeous, classy woman that I know is inside me somewhere come out.

I just have to convince the chubby, sarcastic, alright-in-small-doses, (very) moderately attractive, Sarf London accented woman to let her out.

I'm doing well on my Health Eating Malarky. I'm not calling it a diet as that's a sure fire way to propel me to the biscuit tin via Ayres and the chip shop. It's not that I'm never ever going to set foot in the hallowed establishment but I shall be perusing the granary bread with maybe just a little wander along to the gingerbread men as a treat. I'm not denying myself anything, I'm just being sensible. I'm not sure if it was in fact sensible to open a bag of cola bottles at ten past ten on Saturday night while I watched Most Haunted Live but hey, I didn't deny myself the ten I had. Had I denied myself, David would not have been able to partake of any on Sunday as they'd have all gone. Therefore, if I want an Ayres doughnut, dripping with raspberry jam and covered in sugar, then I'll bloody well have one. I'll just be careful the day after. Y'see? It's a piece of, erm, cake.

My reward for getting on the exercise bike once a week (for now) for twenty minutes is another Pandora charm for my Pandora bracelet that David bought me for Christmas. My aim is to be on the damn thing every other day for half an hour but the dogs seem extremely keen on my legs as they whizz round and its a bit dangerous. David has faith in me, or so he claims, but his smirk when I showed him the (rather long) list of what I'd like to be rewarded with (at his discretion) seemed more than a little smug. I'll show him.

I've ordered the Pussy Cat Dolls exercise DVD and have started eating Oatso Simple for breakfast - no wonder it fills you up, it has the consistency of glue. I'm exfoliating, cleansing and moisturising and drinking 2 litres of water a day and Janey's popping round tonight with a copy of her pre-wedding diet plan "It wasn't a diet as such, just what foods to eat with what foods and what foods not to eat with, erm, some foods" she rabbited on this morning "Terry at my gym did it for me, and he's had more than one minor celeb on his workmat y'know".

I can but try!

Mop and bucket

2010-01-07T22:37:00.002Z

I washed my kitchen floor this morning - you're right to be surprised, it doesn't happen that often. I got that weird feeling that you get when you've done something worthwhile and you can see the benefits. I even stood admiring it for a few minutes, inhaling the lemon zestiness from the Flash I had swabbed all over my laminated area, leaning on the mop in a weary fashion.

Cut to ten minutes later, the smell of lemons still in the air and an off-school Mac charged in from the garden bringing with him excess snow on his feet which instantly turned into water. I sighed and reached for the mop to wipe up the drops. I didn't castigate him (but I did castigate the stupid school that couldn't quite work out that snow + cold weather = turn the heating up a bit).

For lunch I made a quick "soup" of left over vegetables which smelt heavenly even if it looked a bit, erm, odd. Still, Mac was quite happy to eat copious amounts of it and, with about six spoonfuls left, asked for some more. I was so delighted that he was actively requesting vegetables that I hastened to fill his bowl and dribbled the best part of a bowlful onto the table and therefore onto the floor. Cue Senior Dog (he gets first dibs on all leftovers/table to floor mishaps) who gobbled up the hot soup and went off panting. Out came the mop again to get rid of the vegetable smears.

More garden frolics for my son (we have a range of varying snow creatures) and the return of snowy feet, this time accompanied by a little "snow hedgehog mummy" that took great exception to being brought into the warm and promptly melted all over my poor beleagured kitchen floor.

More mopping, but was getting bored of it all by then.

Imagine my horror, nay disgust, when the soup that Senior Dog gobbled made a reappearance on the (yes, you've got it) kitchen floor, right by the fridge. More hot Flash-y water and the fifth appearance of the day from my mop. It's never been so well used in its life.

David arrived home from work just after six, moaning about cancelled trains, slippery platforms and the fact that his shoes are "sodden". He left them to get even more sodden - I don't even have to tell you do I? - on the kitchen floor, ironically right beside the mop and bucket. I swear I heard the cleaning implements groan as I approached.

I was planning on giving the loo and bathroom a good old clean tomorrow (using my steam cleaner that Amelia bought me for Christmas "to help you with the housework dear") but I'm a bit worried what I'll invoke!

New Year Reservations

2010-01-02T20:13:00.003Z

My body is rebelling. I'm not sure if it's rebelling against

a) my family descending and causing havoc over Christmas - highlights included calling Bea's niece Carella (named after her parents Carson and Ella) Cruella because they didn't "get" the meaning of her name, my mother in law Amelia taking in huge intakes of air every time Mac opened a present and Uncle Jim choking on a a mince pie on Boxing Day and going purple.

b) the fact that I've eaten so much rubbish (chocolate, pies, copious amounts of Pringles) to get over point (a) or

c) the fact that my mother in law is getting married to my next door neighbour and expects me to arrange everything.

Is it any wonder I have a cold, a cold sore the size of Australia and permanently cold feet? I am also sluggish, irritable and "don't want to do anything". I've therefore given my self a swift talking to this afternoon while Mac and David were at football and have a plan

a) ignore my family - they will always be there, will always cause me grief and so it's pointless to get stressed about them. Hah!

b) attempt to eat healthily and drink more water. I think, to be honest, that will have to start tomorrow because I've just polished off sweet and sour chicken and rice, six Roses chocolates and a Baileys. I've also promised that I will stick to my Philosophy skin care regime come hell or high water and there will be no more of this "falling into bed at half ten with a cats lick and promise to my mush" lark. I outlined this aspect of my Plan to Bea this morning and she shrieked down the phone "PROMISE me you'll always exfoliate darling, PROMISE me" in a slightly hysterical fashion.

c) try to get out of arranging the wedding of Amelia and Jack Next Door.

This latter bit may prove to be a bit difficult if I'm honest. It's not helped by the fact that everyone around me is so pleased that "they've found love together at their time of life" that I feel a bit mean not wanting to get involved. When they announced their impending nuptials just after the after dinner mints on Christmas Day you could have heard a pin drop. Then the comments/questions started:

Bea: "How, erm, marvellous!"

David: "Erm, right, okay.......right"

Janey: "Oh lovely, when is it?"

Auntie Ivy: "June's nice for a wedding"

Uncle Jim: "Ere, you haven't got her up the duff have you?"

Me: "Where will you live?"

My question/comment was, I felt, the most valid. My mother-in-law is barely tolerable in deepest darkest Kent: to have her next door would be impossible.

She graciously accepted all the congratulations, squeezed Jack's hand on one side and David's hand on the other and fixed me with a piercing look. "Jack will be moving in with me at the residential home, we've managed to get a double flat"

My relief was extremely visible and I shakily put the mince pie down that I was about to stuff into my mouth.

She later revealed to Ivy, whilst poking around my fridge, that they managed to secure the double flat because "Florrie William's husband John died and they've moved her into a single flat. Poor soul. One minute he was scraping the ice off the birdbath, the next he was face down on the privet". Jack, a lovely man, watched her fondly as she pulled out a wizened old lemon from my fridge and asked me "Do you need this for anything?". Ggrrr, ggrrrrr.

"It'll be odd, leaving my garden, but they've agreed to let me look after their gardens now, what with poor old John not being around any more" Jack revealed as we sat down to coffee. "You'll help out with the arrangements won't you Joanna? You did such a good job with Darren and Janey's wedding" he went on, gesturing for Ameila to join him at his side.

What could I say other than yes? Bea has offered to help (although I think her budget wildly exceeds what Jack and Amelia have in mind) and so has Janey. "I can get the limo we had" she promised, entering the reminder into her newly received Blueberry "When were you thinking of? June?"

"Ah" said Amelia. "We've had a cancellation, we were lucky. So, put the 6th in your diaries."

"Of June?" asked Auntie Ivy

"No, February" said Amelia. And then started writing me a list that will take me until February to read, compute and act on.

Update

2009-12-27T17:06:00.003Z

Time woken by husband on Christmas Day: 4am with the words "did I lock the back door?"

Time woken by son on Christmas Day: 5.35am with the words "he's been mummy!"

Number of times Amelia/Bea/Ivy asked me why I cook my turkeys on Christmas Eve: in total, around nine times. That's at least three each.

Presents received: numerous

Useful presents received: a few

Unwanted presents received: one, it's brought me out in a rash, I never learn

Number of times aged family members asked me the name of Bea's niece: seven

Number of times aged family members loudly called her the wrong name: numerous

Number of official glasses of wine imbibed: one

Number of unofficial glasses of wine imbibed: a bottle-ful

Number of times Amelia called Mac spoilt: every time he opened a present, therefore around 30

Number of times my back went up during the day: back was permanently up so exact count neglible

Compliments on food received: many, except from Bea's sister-in-law who found fault with everything including the light switch in the toilet

Family rows: three. One involving me and sprouts with Auntie Ivy, one with Janey and Bea's sister-in-law after Bea's sister-in-law called Scarlett "attention seeking" and one with Bea and Ian when Ian refused to eat his carrots. We got away with it I feel.

Number of times Bea's sister-in-law asked if it were "hygienic having those dogs in the house": countless

Number of times my beloved hounds "purposely" paid attention to Bea's sister-in-law: all day long, it was great

Number of massive shocks: one

Number of weddings I have been asked to arrange: one

I hope your Christmas was as merry as mine!

Checklist

2009-12-22T09:41:00.003Z

Turkeys purchased: two

Collection date of turkeys: tomorrow

Reasons why Bea is no longer hosting Christmas Day: plentiful (and verging on ridiculous)

Guests for Christmas Dinner: 22

Number of guests I do not personally know: 3 (Bea's sister in law, her husband and child)

Number of chairs currently in house: 6

Number of chairs to therefore source: 16

Number of people to offer chairs: 0

Number of times David has said "why are we doing this?": too many to contemplate

Presents wrapped: 4

Presents still to wrap: unsure, David currently locked away in bedroom with sellotape, gift tags, wrapping paper rolls and multiple paper cuts
Cards written: all except David (gold star for achievement)

David's "helpful" suggestions: lots

Number of David's "helpful" suggestions put into place: two (both involve his mother and are in the whole Keeping Her Away From Me area)

Last minute Christmas shopping purchased: sending David out to Sainsbury's in the Bleak Midwinter at 2am tomrrow morning

Festive thoughts from self: minimal

Family row: brewing

Number of times Auntie Ivy has expressed dislike for sprouts: 7 and increasing

Number of sprouts Auntie Ivy will find on her plate if she doesn't stop it: at least 12

Number of bottles of wine in utility room: 8 red, 8 white, 2 rose

Number of bottles of wine hidden for Cook's Treat: 1 red, in cupboard with Comfort and Ariel liquid

Presents still to buy: something for Bea's sister in law, husband and child

Helpful suggestions thereof from Bea: none

Number of suggestions thereof from David: one very good one "just get them a big box of chocolates to share"

Details of defrosting times for pork joint: unknown

Date and time of Amelia's arrival: 24th of December at approximately 9.17am

Date of my certain meltdown: 24th of December at approximately 9.20am

Number of times Mac's face has lit up whenever he hears the words "presents", "Santa", "reindeer" and "Christmas Eve": countless

Thoughts that this is therefore all worth it: growing

Pain versus gain

2009-12-14T16:12:00.003Z

I think it’s pretty safe to say that I’m not a very energetic person. It’s not laziness, honest, it’s just that my mind finds it hard to programme my body, the body that, to all intents and purposes, would much prefer it if “everything” went away and just left me to just “be”.

So imagine the shock that both my mind and body encountered this weekend:

Friday night: work party
Saturday morning: Bluewater shopping centre
Saturday evening: ice skating
Sunday morning: brisk walk around Dulwich Park
Sunday afternoon: balancing on beams

Let me explain further.

On Friday night we congregated in the hospital social club (and adjoining lecture theatre when the junior doctors found it unlocked and set up a mini gambling den in there). I left the house at 7pm, sleek and shiny of hair, svelte of body (Spanxed up to the eyebrows), assured on my heels and radiating coolness.

Cut to three and a half hours later after spending said three and a half hours on the dance floor. My hair looked as if birds had started nesting in it, my Spanx were seriously rucking up under my (mock) wrap round dress, my shoes were abandoned under the table and I radiated enough body heat to warm the Isles of Scilly. I’d also developed a highly attractive wheeze due to the sudden onset of three and a half hours of frenetic dancing. My mind, body and lungs were all waving the white flag. When I arrived home, David took one look at me and made me a strong coffee.

So, on Saturday morning, muttering “whose stupid bloody idea was this?” I joined the queue into Bluewater that began on the A2. Charlie was already there and waiting for me and getting increasingly annoyed that I was still on the road. “I can’t help it, what do you want me to do? Helicopter in?” I screeched. 45 minutes later I joined on her on the roof and parked, amazingly, next to her. “You can imagine the funny looks I’ve been getting” she said as she packed the fold away chair back into her boot – she’d been camping out in the adjacent parking bay and reading Martina Cole.

My legs, already suffering aches and pains brought on my shaking my booty, took one look at the length of shops spread out before them and went into cramp. I spent the first ten minutes standing bare foot on the marble floor, flexing. I managed to get David’s present, one of Mac’s and a little something for Auntie Ivy before we went off to get a coffee. Charlie, who was joining the gang for the ice skating trip, came back with a jaunty little hat, scarf and glove set in blue for her, purple for me. “It’ll match my bruises” I said gloomily as I packed it away in my many bags. “Think positive” she beamed “you can skate, you can skate” she said in what she obviously thought was a soothing voice. “That’s what you think, that’s what you think” I responded.

Naturally, I was right and she was wrong. I can’t skate. I can’t even stand upright without wobbling. She and Bea were naturals, as was Eliza. Janey was an enthusiastic amateur, Lydia could at least manage a few tremulous moves and Jane Opposite preferred to ogle the attractive men on the sidelines. Dawn, Fellow School Mum (who arranged the outing, curse her) had completed failed to mention that she was ice skating champion in her youth and spent the evening getting applauded for her every move.

I tried. I did, really. I put on the skates and clomped over to the ice thinking “ooh, this is a doddle”. Until blade hit frozen water. Have you seen how THIN they are? And they’re supposed to support my body weight AND control it?

I didn’t get a chance to plummet to the floor because I didn’t leave the hoardings for the whole time. I managed to look pretty damn good while I was doing that though and actually said, to a passing whippersnapper who invited me to “have a twirl” with him, that I was “having a breather because I’d been on the ice all afternoon”. “Liar” Janey said as she whizzed past me in a flurry of ice particles.

By the time I was back in my (flat) shoes my legs felt as if they’d been pummelled by a particularly vicious masseuse and then sat on by a large elephant. I have no idea how I got to the bus stop and even less of an idea of how I managed to heave myself onto the bus. Of course, Bea was overly enthusiastic and suggested that we make a regular thing of it. I managed to shut her up by suggesting we find the nearest Pizza Hut and get a stuffed crust each. She was so horrified she spent the rest of the journey in silence.

“I need to get fit” were the first words I said to David on my return. I heaved myself onto the sofa and settled down to watch the Strictly Come Dancing results show. “Really?” said my devoted husband as he offered me the tin of Quality Street. I took five, put three back and stared glumly at the television. A plan was formulating in my head (a classic example of the will being strong but the flesh being weak) and I decided to start my fitness campaign after Christmas. “Why not take the dogs round Dulwich Park tomorrow?” David suggested.

So I did. An hour and a half of brisk walking and I fell into the car. My left leg went into spasm and I couldn’t control the clutch so we kangarooed past Bea’s house just in time to see her dressed in designer leisure wear and supervising the gardener put the fairly lights on the fir tree in her drive.

Which prompted me to go up into my own loft (no mean feat, I hate heights almost as much as David does and so it took ten minutes and a Baileys to get up the courage) and balance on beams whilst stretching across the void to collect the dusty boxes. A full work-out in the loft, not everyone can claim they've done that.

I'll get fit. Definitely. After Christmas. I promise.

Get your skates on.....

2009-12-08T22:26:00.002Z

......because we're going ice skating this weekend. No kidding. Me. On ice skates. Can you imagine? David can. That's him you can hear guffawing with laughter.

I'll report back. If I manage to keep life and limb intact.

Presents!!

2009-12-06T22:19:00.003Z

I asked David yesterday what he'd like for Christmas. He didn't know, shrugged and headed out to the garden. Five minutes later he popped back into the kitchen, a wistful expression on his face. Ahah, I thought, he's going to tell me exactly what he wants for Christmas which will save me wandering around shopping centres with a wild look in my eye, will prevent me getting "mouse clickers finger" while I search online for the perfect gift, will stop me panic buying socks, pants and aftershave that, in the bottle smells just about acceptable, yet on the face smells like paint stripper. And has the same effect on his mush.

"Do you know something?" he mused as he leant on the fridge "No, what?" I said, eagerly anticipating the end of my worrying over his present. "I think that squirrel is gnawing his way through the bird table".

Great. Really useful. I suppose buying him a new bird table is out of the question?

He asked me today what I'd like for Christmas. It was a fairly lengthy list and he had to go and sit down. I had to make him a strong cup of tea in the end and he took it with a trembling hand and just.....gazed into space.

In the meantime, I thought I'd treat you to my most favourite ever Christmas song. The guy might have had dodgy gnashers but he signifies the start of my Christmas.

What have you asked Santa for this year?

Christmas Risk Assessments and Health and Safety concerns

2009-12-04T09:22:00.002Z

I received this email from my boss (who has Health and Safety responsibilities at work yet insists that "an accident or two never hurt anyone") and thought I'd share it with you all!

The Rocking Song
Little Jesus, sweetly sleep, do not stir;
We will lend a coat of fur,We will rock you, rock you, rock you,
We will rock you, rock you, rock you

Fur is no longer appropriate wear for small infants, both due to risk ofallergy to animal fur, and for ethical reasons. Therefore faux fur, a nice cellular blanket or perhaps micro-fleece material should be considered asuitable alternative. Please note, only persons who have been subject to a Criminal Records Bureau check and have enhanced clearance will be permitted to rock baby Jesus. Persons must carry their CRB disclosure with them at all times and beprepared to provide three forms of identification before rocking commences.

Jingle Bells
Dashing through the snow
In a one horse open sleigh
O'er the fields we go
Laughing all the way

A risk assessment must be submitted before an open sleigh is considered safe for members of the public to travel on. The risk assessment must also consider whether it is appropriate to use only one horse for such a venture, particularly if passengers are of larger proportions. Please note, permission must be gained from landowners before entering their fields. To avoid offending those not participating in celebrations, we would requestthat laughter is moderate only and not loud enough to be considered a noise nuisance.

While Shepherds Watched
While shepherds watched
Their flocks by night
All seated on the ground
The angel of the Lord came down
And glory shone around

The union of Shepherd's has complained that it breaches health and safety regulations to insist that shepherds watch their flocks without appropriate seating arrangements being provided, therefore benches, stools and orthopaedic chairs are now available. Shepherds have also requested that due to the inclement weather conditions at this time of year that they should watch their flocks via cctv cameras from centrally heated shepherd observation huts.Please note, the angel of the lord is reminded that before shining his / her glory all around she / he must ascertain that all shepherds have been issued with glasses capable of filtering out the harmful effects of UVA, UVB and Glory.

Rudolph the red nosed reindeer
Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer had a very shiny nose.
And if you ever saw him,
you would even say it glows.

You are advised that under the Equal Opportunities for All policy, it is inappropriate for persons to make comment with regard to the ruddiness of any part of Mr. R. Reindeer. Further to this, exclusion of Mr R Reindeer from the Reindeer Games will be considered discriminatory and disciplinary action will be taken against those found guilty of this offence. A full investigation will be implemented and sanctions - including suspension on full pay - will be considered whilst this investigation takes place.

Little Donkey
Little donkey, little donkey
on the dusty road
Got to keep on plodding onwards with your precious load

The RSPCA have issued strict guidelines with regard to how heavy a load that a donkey of small stature is permitted to carry, also included in the guidelines is guidance regarding how often to feed the donkey and how many rest breaks are required over a four hour plodding period. Please note that due to the increased risk of pollution from the dusty road, Mary and Joseph are required to wear face masks to prevent inhalation of any airborne particles. The donkey has expressed his discomfort at being labelled 'little' and would prefer just to be simply referred to as Mr. Donkey. To comment upon his height or lack thereof may be considered an infringement of his equine rights.

We Three Kings
We three kings of Orient are
Bearing gifts we traverse afar
Field and fountain, moor and mountain
Following yonder star

Whilst the gift of gold is still considered acceptable - as it may be redeemed at a later date through such organisations as 'cash for gold' etc, gifts of frankincense and myrrh are not appropriate due to the potential risk of oils and fragrances causing allergic reactions. A suggested gift alternative would be to make a donation to a worthy cause in the recipients name or perhaps give a gift voucher. We would not advise that the traversing kings rely on navigation by stars in order to reach their destinations and suggest the use of RAC routefinder or satellite navigation, which will provide the quickest route and advice regarding fuel consumption. Please note as per the guidelines from the RSPCA for Mr Donkey, the camels carrying the three kings of Orient will require regular food and rest breaks. Facemasks for the three kings are also advisable due to the likelihood of dust from the camels hooves.

Stocking Fillers

2009-11-25T11:46:00.005Z

I've decided to be fabulously retro this Christmas and give everyone a stocking for Christmas morning - big ones for the children and smaller ones for adults. Genius idea non? I used to love my stocking when I was a kid. It used to nestle alongside my brand spanking new annuals at the end of my bed and always contained a satsuma, some chocolate coins and a Terry's Chocolate Orange. Life was so much simpler then.

Christmas stockings, like party bags, have gone Grown Up regardless of your age. The last birthday party Mac went to was talked about for days purely on the basis of what the partygoers found in their party bags when they got home. Gone are the cheapo bits of plastic, friendship bracelets and mini packet of Haribos. Mac received a bar of Galaxy, a badge making set, an initial key ring (!!!) and a cuddly toy that I know retails at £10.

Anyway, I've returned to my favourite ShinyShack website for fun stuff and will be buying, amongst other things some massage socks for Bea (those killer heels are taking it out of her), one of these for Janey and a little monkey for little monkey Freddie.

For the smaller items I've got my eye on a whole host of these and one of these for David.

I'm also getting this, this and this for my own stocking - well, I can't be the only one left out can I?

Chez moi

2009-11-11T21:59:00.004Z

It's all go at my house, I'm exhausted with the information churning in and out of my brain, the things I have to do, the stories I have to invent just so I don't have to have my mother in law descend upon me this weekend, scraping burnt on crumble off of my ceramic pot AND the decision about what to do with the bathroom.

I'm still waiting for my new debit card to arrive, along with the necessary pin number. Now, I know that the woman on the phone on Saturday said "seven to ten working days" and we're currently only on day three but........even so. Philosophy is on QVC this Sunday and I need to be able to purchase wildly and randomly without David finding out, which he will if I have to use the joint card.

And then there's the bathroom. My bathroom is currently pink. Not quite Barbie pink but candy floss pink which is just as bad really. The minute the first paintbrushful went on the wall I despised it but, to prove a point to David (he said I would despise it) I persevered, pretended I liked it but had to grudgingly admit defeat when Mac's new "girlfriend" came out of it yesterday and said "your bathroom is really pink".

Oh yes, Mac has a girlfriend, an older woman no less. She's six at the beginning of December, they met at the After School Club and she's a feisty young lady, what my mother would have called "difficult". Her name is Keira and she doesn't like fruit or vegetables which made the shepherds pie dinner we had yesterday almost untenable. I spent ages picking the mince out and then the ungrateful little minx asked me for some cheese to go with her potatoes. I pointed out they were in fact vegetables and received a Death Stare. I don't care much for this romance. Besides which, I now know how Amelia felt (and feels) when faced with yours truly.

The lady herself wants to visit this weekend "before the Winter really sets in". Not that that will stop her, she's already sorted out her Christmas visiting days and then the "weekend where I'll come up and we'll do some Christmas shopping". I've told her I'll be decorating this weekend and so wouldn't be able to spend time with her but she seemed quite keen on that idea and said "Oh well, I'll be able to spend time with my son and my grandson instead". I think I might wheeze a bit down the phone and mutter ominously about swine flu hitting Nunhead.

So, back to my bathroom. Any ideas? Bea suggests I go for a nice Laura Ashley print but I don't do prints, they give me the heebie jeebies and propel me back to dad's Great Aunt Bessie's house which we had to visit every Sunday when we were kids. The place was a riot of mismatched furniture, overly "busy" wallpaper which clashed hideously with the carpets. It used to scare me, that house. And I'd always leave with a headache.

I was thinking of a nice duck egg blue with brownish towels.......which will complement the ash flooring. David feels blue will be cold and suggested yellow instead. He even went so far as to bring me some yellow tester pots which, to keep him happy, I've plastered onto the walls. It doesn't look right, it looks like they're suffering with some hideous disease and I told him so. The poor man looked defeated and promised to bring me some duck egg blue testers tomorrow.

I took pity on him and made him a plum crumble. Which I then burnt. Still, it masks the smell of the paint.

Money Money Money

2009-11-08T19:44:00.005Z

I was chased along Bromley High Street on Saturday by a gypsy woman who wanted to tell me my fortune. I didn't want her to tell me my fortune: I was in The Glades shopping centre at half past ten on a Saturday morning and therefore knew that my luck was going to be bad.

Anyway, she caught up with me at TKMaxx and informed me that I'd never be rich but I'd never be poor. Gee thanks, just what I wanted to hear after I'd spent my weekly three pounds on the lottery. She also gazed into the middle distance (I thought she'd caught sight of the marauding teenagers that I'd encountered in Boots who were plastering each other with the makeup samples and giggling like simpletons) before fixing me with heavily kohl-ed eyes. "You'll be sorely tested today" she hissed, furtively glancing up and down the road. "Tell me something I don't know!" I said in an overly jovial voice before catching sight of some stocking fillers and darting into the warmth of the shop.

I reasoned that she hadn't asked me to cross her palm with silver or even demanded that I purchase any lucky heather - perhaps she thought I was past that - and so managed to shrug her words off with a brave "Pah!"

The TKMaxx sales lady didn't seem to mind me talking to myself and rung up my purchases. I couldn't find my debit card in my purse. I shuffled through them all (don't get excited, the cards in my purse include my Matalan membership, my IKEA family card and my Nectar card) but couldn't find it. A small trickle of sweat started prickling my brow. The tutting behind me was reaching a crescendo. I searched through my bag but no joy. By now my prickles had turned into puddles.

Abandoning my stocking fillers I rushed out of the shop, muttering to myself "Ohmigod, omigod, omigod" with a vast range of potential past, present and future scenarios running through my mind. I'll give you an example of just one : the thieves who stole my debit card had bought g large amounts of electrical equipment whilst laughing evilly. Then they handed it over to their accomplice who spent the rest of my money in Marks and Spencers Food Hall. And because I couldn't remember when I last had my card, Alliance and Leicester would tell me to "naff off" and expect me to pay the bills when they came in because I didn't report my card missing (stolen?) in time and I would be destitute, no money. With Christmas coming up. David would be monumentally angry with me (hadn't he always warned me to be careful with my card?) and would call this the final straw and divorce me on the spot for being reckless with money. And even if he didn't then I'd have to use the joint account card to buy things which would make me feel like a kept woman and I'd HATE that but I suppose I could get used to it. And I'd have to re-register my card with everything else and David would know exactly what I spend and where and THEN we'd end up in the divorce courts because he hates QVC even though he really appreciated the nasal hair clippers I'd bought him from there".

This charming little scenario flashed through my mind quicker than you have just read it. It was therefore no surprise that when I finally screeched to a halt in the doorway of TKMaxx that my head was reeling, spinning and generally running amok. My card has been stolen. Or did I lose it? Did I leave it in a random chip and pin machine?

"Think, think!" I muttered, grappling for my mobile, punching in the phone number of my bank and pacing. Once I'd entered my "customer number and pin" and they verified it was me calling, a machine asked me what account I'd like to check on. By now, I was hysterically pacing and attracting quite a crowd.

Now, here is where, in hindsight, I should have listened carefully. It would have saved me clapping my hand over my mouth, stifling a sob and buckling in the knee area.

Always, always, always when I've rung my lovely banking people, the option to check on my current account balance has always been first. My Flexiplan account balance option was second, so number two on my keypad. Always.

A Flexiplan account, for the financially sorted amongst you, is an account where they give you say a £500 overdraw limit. You pay a minimum of £30 into it a month and it adds up to a nice little wedge over time. Unless you're me of course and dip into said Flexiplan until it's £160 overdrawn and the £30 a month goes towards taking you back up to a "nil" balance instead of a "minus" one.

Anyway, back to my drama. I hit "1", thinking that I was being put through to check my current account balance. A few second later a computer told me that "this account is over drawn by one-hundredand-sixty pounds". It was at this point that I did the whole mouth clapping, sob stifling, knee buckling thing. I was turning into a unique piece of street theatre. A scruffy student type looked on the verge of applauding.

I made a funny sort of noise and stifled another sob. The callous bast*rds, stealing my card, SPENDING MY MONEY! and, and, and.......oh God. The computer was still talking in my ear. "If you'd like to enquire about a loan, press 2. If you'd like to order a new cheque book, please press 3. If you'd like to enquire about our savings plan, please press 4.......". On and on until she got to the "if you'd like to speak to a human being, please press 9" option.

"Omigod, omigod, I can't find my debit card and I've just checked on my balance and I'm a 160 quid overdrawn and I know that there was at least £300 in my account and they've stolen it and....and.....I don't know what to do!" I wailed when "Janet from Liverpool" asked if she could help me.

"Right Mrs Mitchell, and when did you last have your card?" she asked calmly. I was beyond calm, I wanted her to agree with me and start a good old bitching session (whilst doing something constructive like promising me that my money was safe and they'd make all thieves pay eventually) but I managed to rally myself. "Tuesday! No, Wednesday, no Friday in Pets at Home and.......and now I'm 160 quid overdrawn and I had 300 quid in there so they've spent nearly five hundred quid of MY MONEY!........" Janet from Liverpool cut me off by clearing her throat and informing me that my current balance on my current account was "three hundred and seven pounds, 59 pence".

"But, but.....what?" I screeched. The pools of sweat under my arms were beginning to affect the rest of my body and my knees were away with the fairies. I was slumped, sweating and bright red in the face on the wall outside TKMaxx. My crowd had attracted the attention of a security guard who was gaping at me warily.

"Your balance is three hundred and seven pounds, 59 pence Mrs Mitchell. The balance you checked was your Flexiplan account which is £160 overdrawn."

"OOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHFFFFFFFFMMMMMMMMPPPPPPPP"

That was the noise I made at this piece of information. I could have kissed Janet from Liverpool who was now calmly telling me that she was going to cancel my card and send me out a new one. No-one had spent any of my money. "Ooooooooohhhhhhfffffmmmmpppppp" I repeated at a lower volume, and started taking off my coat as I was boiling up with a mixture of mortification, relief and embarrassment. "I must have.....I mean, it was always option 1 and......so, it's fine then?" I went on, sliding halfway down the wall. "Yes Mrs Mitchell, there has been no worrying activity on your account" I was half expecting her to say "Unless you count the amounts you pay to QVC each month" but she didn't.

"Is there anything else I can help you with today Mrs Mitchell?" Janet from Liverpool was oblivious to the drama and obviously had to go to and answer a call from another hysterical customer. "No, that's great, thank you, no, look, you've done enough! Thank you, thanks so much......tha......" she'd hung up and I was left with a dead phone, a crowd of mesmerised shoppers and an urge to have a wee.

I think I handled my departure from that doorway with aplomb but I'd lost the inclination to shop, the ability to walk without shaking and had developed a huge thirst. I got back to the car, had to sit in it for five minutes before feeling calm enough to drive and then drove slowly home, feeling relieved but mightily stupid. "That'll teach you not to have been nicer to that gypsy" I said to myself as I pulled into The Avenue.

David greeted me at the door with a winning smile. "You're back early! Forget something did you?" he said, waving my debit card at me. "You can't go shopping without this my darling, remember? You used it last night to verify your account when you rang QVC to check the warranty on my nose hair clippers and left it on the mantlepiece!"

Sorely tested indeed.

Now the party's over

2009-11-01T20:49:00.004Z

"Mummy, can we have fireworks?" This was the question I was greeted with this morning. Clearly Mac was so over the triumphant Halloween party. He had a wonderful time, as did our various guests. Pumpkins were carved, soup attempted (and failed miserably), ghoulies were ghoulish, monsters were monsterish, the dogs were driven to a frenzy by trick-or-treaters and I was extremely disappointed (once the kids were in bed in various beds, sleeping bags and put me ups) in Most Haunted Live's grand finale.

A good night was had by all.....Marjorie dropped by in all manner of leather items as a Wicked Witch, Matthew shared a touching moment with his little brother when they both wore the same costumes and everyone complimented me on my carving. Bea has refused to host the Fireworks Party again this year so Lydia has agreed to combine it with Freddie's first birthday party. "Or we could just go up to Blackheath?" she went on. Bea looked horrified at this. "A public firework display?" she gasped, clutching her chest and agreeing then and there to fund the entire selection of bangers, rockets and catherine wheels. "I'll even throw in a birthday cake" she went on, tapping it all into her Blackberry. "There are right and wrong ways of doing things you know" she said primly, adjusting her devils horns and shrieking as Mac dropped a werewolf head on her lap.

All Hallows Eve

2009-10-31T00:07:00.004Z

I am a fantastic mother, wife, friend, relation and neighbour. An all round general good egg. I must be for the house looks as if the Halloween aisle at Asda has vomited its contents into every room. Vast cobwebs (bigger than usual, according to Bea) adorn walls, plastic spiders and bats are dotted everywhere and Junior Dog has his eye on the huge fluffy spider that is sitting on the kitchen table.

Tomorrow (today!) my house will play host to a random passing group of children, friends and family for an all day Halloween Extravaganza. I have no less than six pumpkins to hollow out and carve. Mac will wake up, get dressed in his outfit (he's not sure if he's going to be a demon this year or a ghoulie) and will breakfast on Devil's Food. He will then welcome everyone into the House of Horror before stepping out, in the evening, with me (David is already rehearsing a bad ankle so that he doesn't have to go) and a selected few to go Trick or Treating.

The one thing I am most happy about (I'm happy now that the work is done) is the fact that Amelia will not be gracing us with her presence. She refuses to "set foot in a house that is encouraging reckless spiritual behaviour". This is a woman who won't even eat a Black Magic chocolate.

Still, it suits me. I've got enough horrors to deal with - as has David who keeps "scaring himself shitless with all the stuff in this house". This evening he asked me where on earth I got the skeleton from......"what skeleton?" said I, all innocence, kicking the receipt for said skeleton under the fridge.

He looked extremely worried and took himself off to bed and "just hopes" that he manages to sleep.

Happy Halloween everyone!

Food for thought

2009-10-26T15:40:00.003Z

Queen Bee Mummy got a shock this morning when Mac and I turned up on her doorstep with Dawn and Jonathan. You see, Dawn, baby Alice and Jonathan had been invited for a play date – we had just been added on at the last minute. Ballast if you will. Dawn rang me at ten past ten, panic in her voice, and instructed me to meet her outside Ayres at half past “We’re going to Queen Bee Mummy’s for coffee” she said.

At half past ten, as instructed Mac and I were outside Ayres, eyeing up the goodies like a couple of waifs when Dawn screeched to a halt, chucked me a £20 note and told me to “buy cake”. This I can do with the best of them and came out, five minutes later with a gleaming, glossy, gorgeous strawberry gateau. “Thank God you were free, I couldn’t face this on my own and, after not letting the boys go to her Halloween party I felt I should turn up for this, you know, just to show willing” Dawn said as we slid towards the leafy park-side properties. Miffed that I was a) a last minute thought and b) available for this lunacy I kept quiet until we were on the doorstep.

For a change, Queen Bee Mummy opened her door herself. The look on her face said it all. I clearly was less than a last minute thought, I wasn’t even being thought about. “Oh, hello. Joanna.” She said, holding out her hand and shaking mine limply. The shame. Shunned by Queen Bee Mummy. Not that I want to be one of her harpies but…..even so. No-one likes being snubbed do they? It got worse.

Apart from Dawn there were five other mummies present: Career Mummy (who can now pick and choose her hours because “such is the success of my company since I floated it”), Actress Mummy (who claims to being on speaking terms with the entire cast of everything from Eastenders to Doc Martin), Vegetarian Mummy (who is constantly haranguing the school to provide a meat free school lunch every day), Nurse Mummy (who is great friends – nudge nudge - with Queen Bee Mummy’s consultant husband – if Gossip Mummy is to be believed anyway) and American Mommy (who arrived from the States in the summer with her banker husband). The Elite Squad. The A Team.

And me.

Dawn, married to a barrister “struggling, but a barrister all the same” was clearly part of the In Crowd. Baby Alice was being handed round the group whilst the older children ran amok in the (landscaped) gardens with Malinka the au pair screeching at them in her mother tongue. I perched uncomfortably on the edge of a WHITE sofa as the interrogation began.

Career Mummy: “What does your husband do?”
Actress Mummy: “Do you work?”
Vegetarian Mummy: “Where do you live?”
Nurse Mummy: “Is it you that has the black Focus?”
American Mommy: “Do you use the entire Philosophy range or just the lipglosses?”
Queen Bee Mummy: “How is Mac getting on with his Maths? Any improvement?”

I answered them all as best as I could and turned to Dawn who had yet to ask a question. She was looking mortified.

Coffee was served by a white aproned staff member which took the heat off me a bit. “Naughty but nice!” Queen Bee Mummy twinkled as Dawn’s gateau, a platter of cheese straws and a huge bowl of fruit was added to the ginormous coffee table. There was then a huge fuss because American Mommy could only drink decaff – “two months to go, Samuel is convinced I’ll have a Christmas birth!” – and there was none in the house. She sat stroking her bump and agreed that a plum and pomegranate herbal tea would be “just peachy”. Queen Bee Mummy looked furious and promised she’d hang “Ocado out to dry for this”.

“Help yourselves ladies” she went on as she did what I assumed were some yoga breathing exercises to calm herself down. The ladies dug in, Career Mummy took two cheese straws and made a huge noise about “not eating anything more until dinner!”. I grabbed a sprig of grapes because they were the closest thing to me and actually looked rather yummy.

“Very healthy Joanna!” Vegetarian Mummy boomed approvingly. Queen Bee Mummy edged the cheese straws closer to me. “Go on, have one of these!” she urged. Actress Mummy looked stressed “There’s no knife to cut the cake, that’s why she’s not having any!”. Queen Bee Mummy shot to her feet and screamed “Angela, the knife! You haven’t given me a knife!”. “Don’t worry honey, we’ll get you a knife” American Mommy said soothingly, stroking my arm and looking a little bit wild about the eyes.

“But….I don’t want any cake” I said, bewildered and catching Dawn’s eye. She now looked more than mortified. Of course. Looking round at the Elite Squad I realised why.

Queen Bee Mummy actually disappeared when she turned sideways, Career Mummy was five foot nothing and just as skinny, Actress Mummy looked as if she’d snap if she moved too quickly, Vegetarian Mummy was being held together by beanshoots, Nurse Mummy looked anorexic and the biggest thing about American Mommy was her bump and even that didn’t look seven months old. Dawn, bless her, can eat like several horses yet still wears size 12 jeans.

Now. I wouldn’t (couldn’t) call myself Kate Moss but (and here I’ve checked with several people before writing this post) I couldn’t be classed as a dead ringer for Dawn French either. Yes, I’m carrying a little, ahem, extra weight and yes, my jeans do tend to restrict my blood supply when I first put them on but and leave their imprint on my body when I take them off but……my practice nurse is happy and, before 11.15am today, so was I.

Angela, in the mean time had bought out the knife, sliced into the gateau and was waving a plateful under my nose as if it were a bottle of smelling salts and I’d fainted. I was still clutching my grapes and feeling a bit hot around the eyes. “Stupid girl!” Queen Bee Mummy hissed at her domestic help and urged me to dig in, grabbing the plate and shoving it at me. Half of me wanted to ram the entire slice of cake into my mush and give them all what they wanted – the other half of me wanted to storm out, vowing never to darken these doors again and hissing “a curse upon ye skinny wenches!” as I went.

I did part of the latter – Dawn, the children and I made a hasty exit, Dawn nearly in tears and apologising over and over again. As we sped away, I caught sight of the Elite Squad gathered on the doorstep, Queen Bee Mummy still holding the plate of gateau.

Shame. I could do with a slice of it right about now!

Horrors

2009-10-25T20:09:00.004Z

He's too clever by half you know. My son, my pride and joy. Cunning, is another word. Manipulative is another one. I'm not complaining. Much. I'm quite proud of his wileyness (another good word there) but I just wish he......wasn't. Quite so much.

It was 3.40pm on Friday, at the school gate. Queen Bee Mummy had issued her Halloween party invitations but Dawn and I had already agreed that our children would not be attending, not after what happened last year. This led both boys to call us "mean" and mutter "s'not fair". Dawn and I stood firm. "Unless....." said Mac looking at Jonathan and then me "Unless Jonathan comes to our house and you make us a Halloween and all scary things" he went on. I said no, Dawn said no ("I'm not schlepping up and down the road wearing a witches hat, even if you are") and I said no again when I caught sight of welling tears in his eyes, even though I felt like the worlds worst mother. "We can go trick or treating on our own" Jonathan said helpfully, as if this was the issue.

What is the issue, David enquired when he got home and was canvassed on the doorstep by his son. "It's two small boys, quite brave now but petrified at the least little noise on the night itself!" I hissed. "They'll be fine!" David boomed and agreed there and then to turn our house into the House of Horrors. I was still hissing on Saturday morning when I piled Halloween rubbish into my trolley and debated over how many pumpkins to get. And did I get them now or risk leaving it to next week and finding them all sold out?

I muttered "hissing hell!" when I got home and found Mac had called and invited, not only Jonathan and Dawn but "Matt and Lydia and Freddie and grandad and Marjorie and Frank and Janey and Scatty and Blue and Granny".

Who needs to turn our house into the House of Horrors?

What's in a name?

2009-10-12T20:39:00.003+01:00

I followed a man round Sainsbury's Dulwich this morning. Quite unashamedly if I'm honest...and not for the reason you're thinking either. He wore the distracted look of a Dulwich Dad - all rumpled hair, quizzical expression and slightly too baggy cords. The reason I followed him at a not-so discreet distance was because of the conversation he held with his child by the courgette section.

"Want that one daddy" said the angelic looking treacle haired child in his trolley "No Quiche darling, not that one, it's very soft" Dulwich Dad responded.

Quiche? I stopped, mid-prod of a marrow and regarded the charming duo as they moved off towards the spinach. I followed them, all thoughts of filling my trolley with green goodness.

I mean, I'm used to Dulwich names. You can't move in Sainsburys or the deli or the Sue Ryder shop without bumping into Jessima, Jacob, Tallulah, Regina, Victoria, Ronald or Archie - all tiny versions of their Dulwich Parents. There was even a Montgomery in Cafe Nero the other day, he was about four and was throwing his toy cars at paying customers. His fathers response? "Don't do that Montgomery, you'll break your cars". But Quiche? Just a plain Quiche or perhaps a Quiche Lorraine?

Had I missed out an entire fashion for naming your child after something you'd find in a chiller cabinet? And if I had, how the hell had my sister? Caitlin has enough names to trip up her future husband at the crucial moment at the altar (two being Alsace and Charlotte) and Ian is going to suffer writers cramp when he starts filling out the many forms that life is going to throw at him. My own precious son is quite poor on the name front but at least he doesn't need to work out if the Simon comes before or after the Edward and three along from the Richard.

So, while I was ruminating on whether I was going to meet twins Sage and Onion at the checkout and bump into Corned Beef in the car park, I skidded round into the Bakery aisle to find Quiche and her father worrying over crusty cobs.

"Shall we get some proper bread for our soup darling or would you prefer croutons?" A dazzling choice for Quiche who was about three. Quiche wasn't going to be fobbed off with bread or croutons - she wanted a raspberry and custard Danish pastry with the tinned Scotch Broth in her trolley. "No darling, not with soup" Dulwich Dad laughed heartily, suddenly catching sigh of his Sainsburys Stalker and raising an eyebrow. I blushed and found myself examining the hotdog rolls.

"Want that" Quiche continued, building up into a mini rage. "Quiche darling no" said Dulwich Dad, preparing to whisk her away from temptation. Quiche was having none of it. "Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo DADDY!" she screamed as they headed into Jams and Spreads. "WANT THAT ONE!" she bellowed as they passed the Nutella. Come on! I was thinking, please do what I do when Mac has a temper tantrum Use the full name!

"Quiche, listen to Daddy. NO!" he said through clenched teeth as he skidded to a halt in front of a Dulwich Elder who clearly believed that children should be seen and not heard. I stopped breathing as I watched him lower his scruffy head into his hands and shakily and slowly exhale while his child started sobbing.

"Keisha May Mary Williams, will you PLEASE stop it. Right. This. Minute!"

Ahah, result!

Carry on Burglar

2009-09-21T10:51:00.002+01:00

What would you think if this flyer popped through your letter box as it did ours on Saturday morning? Would you panic like David and start checking that the house insurance is up to date? Would you hoot hysterically like Jane Opposite at the dramatics of it all? Would you worry, like Ruby Over The Road, that while we’re all at the Stewarts house and our houses are empty, we’ll all be turned over?

Anyway, I’m not going. I’m not missing Strictly Come Dancing for a bunch of hysterics and Marjorie’s macaroons. “I didn’t put my macaroons on there because we’d just get everyone turning up to be fed and not because their attendance is vital” Marjorie informed me yesterday afternoon when she popped round with a beef stew because “well, you can’t cook with that ankle can you? And what with David playing golf and all…..” She should have seen me on Saturday, hopping on one leg, laughing hysterically at Bea who, in apparent sympathy (or trying to steal my thunder) had fallen over in a pile of leaves in Dulwich Park and had hurt her left knee. It’s a vivid purple and puffy.

“Can you really afford not to dear?” she asked in response to the news that I would not be attending on Friday night. “I mean, the way things are today……” she trailed off and looked out of the window along the Avenue as if she expected to see three rapists, two cat burglars and a mugger hovering.

“David will probably go” I said, one eye on Airport 77 – I love a good disaster movie. “Can I go mummy?” Mac piped up. “Oooh no dearie, not to a grown ups meeting” she said, patting him so hard on his head that her bracelets nearly left a dent in his cranium. “Not really for Little Ones” she mouthed to me as she made to leave “Not with the statistics that Frank’s preparing” she added with a grimace.

So. We’re going to be scared to death by our very own Neighbourhood Watch Chairman. Great. Petrified of our own shadows and forced to eat macaroons.

David has agreed to go to the meeting “to escape Strictly” – the man has no taste. So, while he’ll be listening to Frank’s statistics, setting up vigilante groups and being issued with whistles and torches (oh yes, I forgot to tell you that little nugget didn’t I?) I shall be deep in glitter, lycra and glitz.

I think I’ve got the better deal don’t you?

Birthday Planning

2009-09-18T10:29:00.004+01:00

I'm a more mobile today which is fortunate as it's Charlie's birthday bashette tomorrow and, if I'm to be the Hostess With The Mostess, I need to do it without hobbling. She doesn't want a fuss, bless her.

Guest list: her, me, Saskia (if she can finish work in time), Janey, Bea, Lydia. The Boys will be sent to Janey and Darren's house for the duration.

Present wish list: "anything pretty, sweet, girly, practical, functional, smelly, useful, interesting, wacky, random or amazing"

Party menu: "nothing major" then, 24 hours later "can you do your garlic chicken thing? And that nice malteser cake thing! Oh, and I've got a real thing for smoked salmon at the mo, so some of that? With cream cheese and lemon and, oooooh, some of those king prawns and that spicy thousand island dressing?" and then half an hour later "to go with the chicken can you do some proper jackets, like bake in the oven from scratch deal rather than nuke in micro for ten minutes first?"

Drinks: "if I can sleep over on Saturday anything alcoholic" and then ten minutes later "do you still have all those cocktail ingredients? Shall I get some? we can have cocktails and get Bea drunk!"

Specialist decorations: "balloons! Wouldn't be a birthday without balloons!"

I'm so glad she doesn't want a fuss!

Bea-by sitting

2009-09-14T20:26:00.006+01:00

I love my sister. I really do. She's kind, thoughtful, loving and caring. She's also certifiably insane. I'm letting you know now that this post could sound extremely ungrateful. Bea is Alternate New Age - alternate in that at work she can verbally whup someone's arse whilst wearing a power suit, sipping a skinny latte and barking orders at subordinates but at home she's all kaftans, herbal remedies, "love n peace" and soothing words.

Guess which persona turned up on my doorstep this morning to "babysit" me. "Darling, don't get up, I've got the key!" she chirruped as she breezed in and caught sight of me in my jim jams struggling into the kitchen for a wash (I can't make the stairs without tears). Usually Bea would be horrified to find me in flannelette and would immediately order me some silk nighties on the internet. New Age Bea was near to tears as she clutched me to her bosom (brushed cotton covered).

The morning was spent chummily watching Lord Ray of Winston in Henry VIII and coming over all unnecessary. But she refused to let me have access to the custard creams. And made me a Green Tea (she had bought a goodie bag) instead of PG. During my second shuffle to the downstairs loo (really, it'd be funny if I wasn't in such agony) she wouldn't pause the programme for me and said that I could "move quicker if you really wanted to". Having dangled the carrot of Mr Winstone stripping off under my nose she then suggested that I should make her a cup of tea "for a change".

I sent her up to Ayres for lunch. I asked for a chicken tikka doorstep or, failing that, a BLT roll or a sausage roll even. While she was out I hazarded an unguarded trip to the loo, fell over Junior Dog and nearly broke my neck. She returned, pooh-poohed my tale of woe and handed over the box of salad she had bought me. Apparently they were all out of my luncheon choices. If I could have got up there I would have personally questioned Mr Ayre as to the whereabouts of his tikka, bacon and sausage rolls.

During my salad box we finished off Mr Winstone and then she tried to encourage me to wear various different crystals about my person. Now, I'm one of the first to embrace anything like this......to quote ABBA, I believe in angels. What I was not at all happy with was her "opening my chakras" with Mac due through the door at any moment. "Darling, you need to open up your channels to enable yourself to heal" she said in soothing tones whilst whizzing me up a cocktail of "health giving ingredients" in the blender. Middle Dog refused to touch it and he eats snails fresh from plant pots.

Mac was delighted to find Auntie Bea on the premises but was not at all impressed with the oatcakes she tried to give him for tea. "Where are the dammy jodgers?" he asked me in an undertone. "Auntie Bea has hidden them honey, we'll get them out tomorrow when Janey's here". He tried, God love him. Even made yummy noises. But he got an oat stuck and choked so much I had visions of going back to A&E for the second time in four days.

We were allowed to watch QVC though, as apparently "some of the items are incredible bargains". She bought her Pilates machine from there and "can't live without it". Mac fell in love with one of Charlie's Bears and wanted to buy David Bear because "it's like my daddy's name" but wasn't allowed to buy it because "it's mass produced darling boy". Mac, not understanding consumerism and distraught at a) there being no jammy dodgers, b) the lingering threat of oakcakes and c) Auntie Bea in New Age mode saying "no", had a mini paddy and sat down huffily on my bad leg.

Cue much bad language from me just as his father returned from work with a cheery greeting and a boyish smile. New Age Bea packed up her goodie bag and promised to return on Friday with a kiss and a plea to "stop swearing darling, it's bad for your karma."

I keep telling myself off for being such a meanie but when your leg is throbbing like an unexploded bomb, it's very hard. And she rang me half an hour ago to see if I was enjoying the Green Tea. She means well bless her.

Ouch!

2009-09-13T16:44:00.004+01:00

I was rushed to A&E on Friday afternoon. Well. I say "rushed" more hoiked. I was dropping Mac off to tea at his friend Billy's house and, because I've recently been struggling with the old image, was wearing ridiculously high heeled boots with a view to a) bolstering my self-image and b) whipping into the hospital where I work (every now and again) to say hello to the girls and boys and showing them that I have retained some of my old spark and verve whilst giving my child a fulfilling social life.

All was well, we'd taken the train which was a major excitement for my pride and joy and, although I was struggling with the terrain in my four inch heels, we were bounding along quite happily as we turned into Billy's road. I'm not quite sure what happened if I'm honest, all I remember is a sharp agonizing pain in my right ankle, the knowledge that my foot should not be pointing in that direction, the feel of cold hard concrete beneath my palms and cheek, gratitude that I was wearing jeans and the fact that Mac was screaming his head off which meant we were soon joined by half of the street.

Billy's dad Roger was tasked with taking me over to the hospital, which he did by half carrying me as he wasn't "forking out money for the car park" and assuring me that they "were brilliant" and would "get me sorted". He dumped me on a chair in A&E and approached the desk demanding that I "be seen to immediately" as my "distressed son was distressed at his mummy's accident and if a consultant wasn't summoned IMMEDIATELY then by Golly there would be Hell to pay". Kim and Kelly on reception were not remotely fazed by this blatant attempt at queue jumping (there were three gentleman already waiting along with a lolly pop lady and a woman on an electric scooter who was eating wine gums loudly) and gave him short shrift.

"Oh it's JO!" Kelly boomed once she'd caught sight of me and I was whizzed straight through to cubicles. "You have to show these people who is the boss!" Jim informed me as he watched me drape myself elegantly on the bed. I shushed him as politely as I could and told him that I worked here and so was being sort of fast tracked because of that. "NONSENSE!" he bellowed and moved my damaged leg before plonking himself down on the end of my bed. I felt bad enough being given preferential treatment but didn't want him to think that his boorish attitude and somehow helped me along.

By now my whole leg, encased in black leather up to the knee, was throbbing alarmingly and I could feel it swelling. Nurse Jacob arrived and attempted to remove the offending boot. "S'not happening" he said after tugging ineffectually for five minutes. "Am gonna have to cut it" he added.

He cut, my leg all but exploded out and then things went a bit hazy. Jim departed, then a tearstained Mac and pale looking David arrived (he wasn't worried by the way, he'd just taken note of the car parking fee per hour and spent five minutes rummaging in my bag for my staff pass), I was X-rayed, had a cup of tea brought to me by my manager who found the whole thing hilarious until I showed her my damaged boot. She then went off for a quick cry, she's obsessed with shoes and boots and has a collection to rival Paris Hilton's.

"It's not broken just badly sprained and you've buggered the knee ligament" said Dr Fisher as she discharged me "rest it, don't put any weight on it and ditch the bloody stupid boots" she added before striding off in her Dr Scholls.

So. This is me. Blogging whilst resting. Marooned on the sofa. Struggling to get to the loo (not that you need to know that) and in pain. David has been marvellous this weekend - he wasn't, he was moaning and complaining and being completely unreasonable about my injury until I cracked and told him he was unsympathetic and had a few self-pitying tears and then he suggested he ring his mother and "get her down for a few days". I then had a massive change of mind and told him he was doing a fab job and no, it didn't matter that Mac had biscuits for Sunday lunch because he couldn't cope with doing a roast and no darling, I'm fine, I'll just have an apple.

Bea's taking over tomorrow, Janey's nursemaiding on Tuesday and I've arranged for Dawn to do the school run. I've just sent Mac off to the kitchen to ask daddy to make me a cup of tea. Hope he doesn't forget the custard creams.

Chocolate Malteser Cake

2009-09-11T10:21:00.005+01:00

It's Charlie's birthday weekend next week so I'm baking her "the only birthday cake" she "ever wants". I'm doing a test run this weekend because, although this is the only cake I can make without it burning/sinking/looking awful, I'm going to make individual ones rather than a whole big one - Chocolate Malteser Muffins, if you will - and want to see if it actually works. Plus I get to eat a couple without holding back in due deference to the Birthday Girl.

For the cake

150g soft brown sugar (muscavado sugar is best for flavour)

100g caster sugar

3 large eggs

175ml milk

15g unsalted butter

2 tablespoons Horlicks powder

175g plain flour

25g cocoa, sieved

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

For the icing and decoration

250g icing sugar

1 teaspoon cocoa

45g Horlicks

125g soft unsalted butter

2 tablespoons boiling water

2 x 37g packets Maltesers

Take whatever you need out of the fridge so that all the ingredients can come to room temperature (though it’s not so crucial here, since you’re heating the milk and butter and whisking the eggs.

Preheat the oven to Gas Mark 3/170C. Butter and line two 20cm loose-bottomed sandwich cake tins with baking parchment.

Whisk together the sugars and eggs until light and frothy. Heat the milk, butter and Horlicks powder in a small saucepan until the butter has melted and the mixture is hot but not boiling.

Beat the milk mixture into the eggs a little at a time. Fold in the dry ingredients thoroughly. Divide the cake batter evenly between the two tins and bake in the oven for 25 minutes, by which time the cakes should have risen and will spring back when pressed gently. Let them cool on a rack for about 5-10 minutes and then turn them out of their tins.

Once the cakes are cold, you can get on with the icing. I use a processor just because it makes life easier: you don’t need to sieve the icing sugar. So: put the icing sugar, cocoa and Horlicks in the processor and blitz to remove all lumps. Add the butter and process again. Stop, scrape down, and start again, pouring the boiling water down the funnel with the motor running until you have a smooth buttercream.

Sandwich the cold sponges with half of the buttercream, and then ice the top with what is left, creating a swirly pattern rather than a smooth surface. Stud the outside edge, about 1cm in, with a ring of Maltesers or use them to decorate the top in which-ever way pleases you.

Makes 8-10 slices.

Breakdown

2009-09-07T16:49:00.003+01:00

My car wouldn’t start on Saturday morning. It turned over (apparently) but wouldn’t fire (also apparently). David did what all men do in these situations and asked me to “pop the bonnet”. This is I did and waited for the verdict.

“Could be your alternator, seeing as it’s turning over but not kicking in” he pointed out, leaning manfully over the bonnet and fiddling with a red cable like he knew what he was doing. I have to be honest here and point out that I have no real reason to be smug here at all: my knowledge of under t’bonnet is limited to oil, water and power steering fluid and even I know when I’m nearly out of those.

I rang Green Flag muttering “well, I pay ‘em enough each month” and my call was answered almost immediately by a charming young lady called Felicity. I sat back and examined my nails as she ran through the usual security checks. I confirmed my registration number, first line of my address, my post code and my password. I confirmed that yes, my car is a black Ford Focus, petrol driven and no four wheel drive.

“What is the problem with the vehicle?” she enquired in posh tones “It won’t start!” said I and then roared with laughter at the sheer bizarreness of the whole situation. She didn’t join in. “Does the vehicle have petrol?” she went on.

Now. This really annoys me. Assuming that I haven’t put any petrol in it, how basic is that? Not only that but a fellow woman, asking me if I’m that ditsy that I’ve failed to fill my car up. “Yes” I muttered through clenched teeth. Junior Dog, who was lying at my feet, sensed my tone and did a runner. “Thank you madam, I’ll get someone out to you from DooDah Motors within the hour” she retorted before wishing me a good day. Mutter, mutter, chunter, whinge.

“It’s a standard question, they have to ask it” David said when I recounted the treachery to him. “If you had rung they wouldn’t have dared asked you, a MAN!” I boomed. “Yes they would, they have to” he went on but his smug smile said otherwise.

To be fair, after an hour of pacing (I hate waiting. For anything) a bright green DooDah Motors van appeared. All three dogs went into a frenzy of barking which meant that the gentleman who rang my doorbell vaulted over the fence without opening the gate.

After a little bit of probing, asking questions and generally doing what David did but with a little bit more authority, Mechanic Man decided that it was a “fuel pump system problem”. I looked at him blankly (not because I didn’t know what he was talking about but because I was wondering how many zeroes would be attached to the resulting garage bill). “Basically, your fuel isn’t getting through the injectors which indicates a problem with your pump” he translated. I thanked him profusely and headed inside to ring my garage.

I have one, you know. A garage that I trust implicitly…..if Tom says something needs doing, then it needs doing. He’s amazing. He amazed me even more when I rang him to ask when he could fit my ailing Focus in, I was already mentally rearranging my Wednesday or Thursday morning. “If you can get it here before two today I’ll do it first thing Monday morning” he said. David was as amazed as I was at the swiftness but pointed out that I’d be “lucky” to get a towtruck here on a Saturday. It was just gone half past ten when I rang Green Flag and requested an “immediate pick up”.

I sat and smirked when they said they’d have someone from DooDah Motors with me within the hour for the second time that day. David went out to do some weeding (in a sulk) while I made a cup of tea. No sooner had I dunked my bag when there was a dingdong on the door and more canine boisterousness. This time the man from DooDah Motors stayed on the doorstep and wondered why I was staring open mouthed at him. Time between my call and his arrival: seven minutes. This was all going too well for my liking.

David came out and observed the miracle too. Mac returned from his sleepover at Ben’s house and expressed dismay that Minty (don’t ask) wasn’t working. “Is that man taking him to be mended?” he asked David as they sat side by side on the windowsill. “Righto love,” said the DooDah Motors man once he’d got the ramps in place “Drive it up onto the ramps for me”. I exhaled slowly and pointed out that the reason he was about to load my car onto his towtruck was because the bloody thing wouldn’t start. “Oh” said he, reading his notes from Green Flag. “Okay, humour me, give it a go”.

I threw myself into the car thinking “hah, I’ll show HIM!” and the bloody car started. “That’s not your fuel system pump love, that sounds more like your injectors” DooDah Motors man went on as he listened to my poor Focus cough and splutter.

Apparently, this is called “hunting”. Hm.

Anyway the men decided that the best thing all round would be to take it into the garage anyway so it can “be looked at”. Which is where it still is now. It's been looked at by two mechanics and is, even as I type, being run through a diagnostic machine. I dread to think how much all this is costing and Mac is making my car a get well soon card. I've put him on stand by: I may need one when I get the final bill......

Me, myself and I

2009-09-02T16:07:00.005+01:00

I've been......on holiday to Hastings. Pett Level, to be exact, where I was bitten by a crab, soaked by three dogs in the sea, ate my body weight in chips and relaxed so much my blood pressure dropped through the floor and I had to get myself in a right old two and eight over dawdling drivers just to get it pumping correctly through my veins

I've put.....on about half a stone this summer holiday, largely due to the chip-fest but also because Mac and I have taken to baking of an afternoon. Well, that and an indecent amount of trips to Ayres.

I've been....ignoring Amelia's large Santa Claus shaped hints about this Christmas during the annual August Bank Holiday Weekend Conversation About Christmas. She wants to come to us for the duration but we're off to Bea's for Christmas Dinner in Dulwich and Bea, as caring and sharing as she is, "really could not cope with that woman on my home territory darling".

I've lost.......my marbles trying to get everything ready for Mac's return to school tomorrow. Books, pens, pencil cases (all new because "that was last year mummy"), school uniform and shoes. He doesn't want to go back to school and is sulking, endearingly like his father in the bath as I type. David is up there now, cajoling him, having taken the day off to "help" me get the Pride and Joy ready.

I'm going......to the hairdressers to get the gossip. Marjorie has taken to visiting Mandy every week for a shampoo and set and, as Mandy said to me this morning "Oh my God, the woman is sex mad!". I'm heading there tomorrow to get the low down.

I'm waiting.....for my parcels from QVC to arrive. Am becoming a Philosophy junkie and have told David that what I've bought are for Christmas presents.

I'm catching.....up on all the gossip from my week away. Apparently The Avenue has been heaving with gossip, intruige and tales of stroppy recycling men who refused to carry all the bottles from Jane Opposite's Bank Holiday Saturday barbecue. "I mean, do they want me to recycle or not?" she asked as she stacked her empty wine bottles three deep and six along. Ruby Over The Road reckons I missed a blinding party "I still had the hangover on Monday"

I'm dreading.....meeting up with Andy who is planning his civil partnership with his groom-to-be: their suggestions so far have been a bit, erm, random and I'm worried about their next suggestion, after they went off the idea of a sky-diving wedding and reception in an aircraft hangar. They want to be "original".

I'm......tired and planning an early night. David is quite pleased about this. What he doesn't know is he'll be sewing name tapes into school uniforms all night.

Well. He wanted to help me!

Of Vicars and Tarts

2009-08-23T21:39:00.004+01:00

Read this.......and have a box of tissues at the ready. I used to work at that "south London primary care trust" and remember the day that Sonja came into that meeting. I didn't know the full story at the time and it wasn't until much later (much, much later) that I even heard even the smallest snippet of information that was filed in my memory bank under "miscellaneous".

I was read this article over the phone by one of my colleagues this evening and boy, does it put things into perspective.

Five

2009-08-17T17:12:00.004+01:00

I've been trawling through my emails today - to be fair I started yesterday and have finally caught up. I got a good one from work (well, several actually but I couldn't possibly share the contents in cyber space and I'm quite sure you wouldn't find the fact that Melanie from Catering's face lift failed and she "now looks like Jabba the Hut". Anyway. As I'm a sucker for things like this I thought I'd offer this tasty little morsel for you all to enjoy. You can be as selective as you like (Bea listed Harrods food hall for section two) but honesty is always the best policy and it must be about you!

Five things you have on your bathroom shelves

1. A healthy selection of Philosophy shower gels/bath lotions
2. Pantene shampoo

3. Shaving foam

4. Egg timer

5. Glass penguin

Five things you have in your fridge

1. Milk

2. Leftover lamb

3. Half a tub of Boursin

4. Half a bottle of Yop (raspberry)

5. Pitta breads

Five things you have in your handbag

1. Mobile

2. Half a pack of polos

3. Security ID for work

4. Manky old till receipts

5. Philosophy Cherry Cola Lipgloss

Five DVDs you have in your collection

1. Peter Kay Live at the Bolton Albert Halls

2. Dirty Dancing

3. Jaws box set

4. Meet The Parents/Meet the Fockers

5. Open Water

Five CDs you have in your collection

1. Kylie

2. R&B Collection

3. Nelly Furtado

4. The Saturdays

5. Oasis

Five authors/books you have on your shelves

1. Martina Cole

2. Jilly Cooper

3. Haunted London

4. Emma Gold

5. Jane Green

Five things you have eaten today/plan to eat today

1. Toast

2. Jaffa cake

3. BLT sandwich from Ayres

4. Peach

5. Banana

Five things you've done today/plan to do today

1. Did washing

2. Ironed Davids work shirts for rest of the week

3. Daydreamed about our holiday

4. Walked dogs

5. Plan to watch Confessions of a Shopaholic later

Funky Lunch

2009-08-13T13:54:00.004+01:00

We're having great fun today - we've made a cake for afternoon tea with Auntie Bea and now we've got a couple of slices of bread, some ham, cheese, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, celery, mini babybels and some carrots. I want to make an Alekesander the Meerkat but Mac wants to create "a farm mummy". I like that he's ambitious!

Check this out for some fun sarnies!

Oink oink

2009-08-09T22:46:00.002+01:00

Things I have eaten today:

bacon sandwich
half a packet of blackcurrant fruit pastilles
slice of watermelon
punnet of cherries
six murray mints
three custard creams
packet of Cheese and Onion McCoys
sweet and sour chicken and rice
some of David's chicken with mushroom
a nectarine
a slice of toast with honey
two digestives
slice of (cold) cherry pie
a banana
half a Twix
three Rolos

I'm comfort eating. My pride and boy has all but left home. Deserted us. Headed for the hills. Preferring the company of others. All this has conspired me to feel as useful as a knickers on a halibut and a Failure As A Mother. Amelia claims she "saw this coming" and is crowing that she was "right all along". This was all said to David natch and relayed to me with weary resignation but I'm all for ringing her up and demanding to know exactly which bit of witchery she is using to back up her wild claims.

After his long weekend away with Ben and his parents (which was supposed to end on Monday but some how stretched to Wednesday) he returned home to ditch his dirty washing, elaborate on the delights of Camber Sands "we saw a big crab mummy, huge. It was dead though" and sift through the invitations for the remainder of the week. I'm exaggerating slightly on the last claim - I felt honour bound to give him his options for fear that if I didn't those people doing the inviting would either feel miffed about the lack of RSVP or grass me up to my child and he'd hate me forever.

So. Thursday he went to Legoland with Queen Bee Mummy, six other children and three au-pairs. On Friday he had the morning at home before heading to Bea's for an afternoon of puppet making culminating in the Dulwich Puppet Show on Saturday morning. Back home for a quick bit of fatherly bonding whilst watching Millwall play Southampton while I fretted at the kitchen table that I was either a) rearing a child who was so confident and so at ease in all manner of different situations that he was happy to leave me or b) such an awful Shouty Mother that he was desperate to get out and experience Nice Mummies - Queen Bee Mummy is, apparently, "booful and smells nice".

Today he has been resting for tomorrow he's heading to Diggerland with a host of chums (another outing organised by Queen Bee Mummy) and which is somewhere he "alwaaaaaaaaaays" wanted to go yet somewhere I have neglected to take him.

I feel like a spare part and have been repeatedly mentally slapping myself around the mush for feeling this way. "You should be pleased he's not a Mummy's Boy" David pointed out to me earlier. I am. I think. No. I am. And I'm not worried really, just mithering for the sake of mithering. David, however, is panicking somewhat. He was talking to Matthew just before I dived into the fruitbowl this evening and came off the phone looking a tidge green. "Darling, ahahahahaha! Matt's just said something realllllllly funny! He said that I'd better watch you don't start getting broody again now that Mac isn't a baby any more! And that you might want another one to fill the gap!!!! Isn't that funny? Darling? Hahaha? Funny yes?"

For devilment I gave him a coy look and reached for a handy Mothercare catalogue as left by Janey.

It's actually cheered me up a bit I think!

Flying the nest

2009-07-30T19:52:00.004+01:00

What to do, what to do? My friend Rosie (mum of Mac's erstwhile Best Chum Ben when they're not falling out) has offered to take Mac camping this weekend. Just the Friday, Saturday and Sunday and home on Monday. In a tent. On a campsite in Camber Sands. He's keen, David's keen, me - not so keen.

It's the whole cutting-the-apron-strings thing for me. I know in my heart that, whilst my pride and joy is flinging random items of clothing into his rucksack and marvelling at the adventures he and Ben are going to have, he's going to get fifteen miles down the road and demand to return home to "mummy". Of course, I could be totally wrong and this could be just the thing he needs, four days (well three and bit) without me fussing, primping and generally worrying about him. Am I? He probably won't even miss me one little bit will he? Moan, mutter, grumble.....

Not that I've mollycoddled him. Much. He's like me, a homebody, happiest when he's within his own four walls. Janey is bemoaning the age of her children: "wish they could go off with their friends for a long weekend" she said as she dug into a slice of pizza (not before picking off the mushrooms with neon pink talons). Bea is encouraging me to be "brave darling, and cut the ties that bind". This was said as she packed bags for both Caitlin and Ian who are heading off to the Norfolk Broads with Flavia the Au Pair on Saturday for a whole week. "You and David can enjoy a second honeymoon" she went on and then informed me that while her "babies" were away, she and Stephen would be going Tantric. When I told David he asked me where they were flying to. There must be a book I can buy him, you know, a beginners guide or something.

Anyway. A decision has to be made tonight. Rosie will be ringing me shortly and I know that I have to say yes. My tiny boy is upstairs, lying awake with excitement as I type. The contents of his wardrobe are all over the floor and he's already packed some toys that he "might" share with Ben.

David has already offered to pop into Boots at London Bridge tomorrow and bring me back some Kalms.

Malfunction!

2009-07-26T17:19:00.000+01:00

I'm not quite sure why - perhaps its the stormy weather and/or electrical build up in the atmosphere - but things have started to go wrong in this house. I mean, even more than usual. David's Blackberry took on a life of its own on Monday when it started ringing random entries in his address book. I hear Big Boss was rather concerned to get a phone call from David at half past nine at night, especially when all he could hear was "oikish contestants on Big Brother shouting about lentils". David is now mortified that Big Boss fears he is addicted to the reality show and has laid the blame fully at my door. I won't mention that David himself is rather keen on the new arrival Bea but, he assures me, it's only because she "reminds me of you darling". Hm.

Which reminds me....last week I told Janey that there were new housemates and chucked in those names I could remember. "BEA?" Janey boomed from Sydenham. "BEA as in OUR BEA?" she screeched. Once I'd explained the mix-up she foghorned with relief "Bloody HELL, I did wonder what the hell she would make of sleeping in a communal bedroom!". Our Bea was not impressed by even the merest slightest suggestion she would lower herself to appear on reality television as you can imagine. Anyway, I digress. Malfunctioning electrical items. Right.

Apart from David's wayward Blackberry, we've had:

the Sky remote control that keeps informing us that we need to replace its batteries or there will be consequences. So far, since Friday evening, it's had six sets of two batteries. I'm all for leaving it as I'm convinced it's just panicking because it wants attention but David is reluctant to let that happen because he'd struggle to operate the system (and can't go half an hour without swapping channels)

our doorbell (battery operated) that keeps ringing of its own accord. We've taken to ignoring it now even though the dogs go mad barking each time it happens - anyone who desperately wants access to our abode will know to knock on the door. I was told off this morning by a Jehovah's Witness who, when we failed to answer her ding dong, came to our open living room window and instructed me that "when someone rings your bell, you are expected to answer it". I stared at her open mouthed and spluttered an apology before realising that she had her head thrust into my house. My subsequent comment won me no favours and, no doubt, no place in Heaven.
Sky Broadband that only connects when it feels like it. I can almost hear the PC saying "yah boo sucks, I don't want to upload today". This has also affected the laptop - Mac offered to let me use his but, as it's a Fisher Price one, I declined gracefully.

my mobile that only sends texts when I urge it to do so. For example, the text I sent to Charlie only went after I waved the handset in the air and said "send, you git, SEND!"

Still. It's not that bad. At the moment the blackberry is silent, as is the doorbell. David has just selected the Poseiden Adventure on Channel 4+1 on Sky and, as you can see I'm broadbanding.

Although I keep hearing what sounds like an air raid siren. Can anyone in the environs of Nunhead hear it too? Should we be worried?

Fit Flops

2009-07-21T16:38:00.003+01:00

This is fast turning into a once a week blog isn't it.......I must remedy that!

I'm currently aching all over (no, not swine flu - or as Mac calls it "swing flu") but because of a present from my beloved husband. When he presented me with a pair of Fit Flops as a reward for getting - ahem, drum roll please - 97% on my First Aid course I wasn't sure whether to hit him or not. What was he suggesting? I know that I could do with losing a few (!!!) pounds and toning up a tad but, quite frankly, I was a tidge insulted.

Not any longer. They are fabulous. I can't praise them highly enough. They tone you up whilst you are walking, making your leg and bum muscles work harder. They're ergonomic. And that's the extent of my knowledge on the subject. Apart from knowing that, after wearing them last Friday for half an hour whilst I walked Mac to school and back, I came back home, kicked them off and felt the buuuurn. And I mean buuuurn.....my buttocks (excuse my French) ached as if I'd done an extensive work out. And I'd stopped off at Ayres on the way back for a doughnut!

Bea, naturally, is horrified and is beseeching me to "get rid of them darling, its practically porn for your feet, it's ugly, offensive and......eurgh!". She's forbidden me to wear them in Dulwich (and therefore anywhere near her house) and resembled Davina McCall even more than she usually does (in tone and actions) when she came face to face with the offending items this evening. "Aaargh, how COULD you come to the DOOR wearing them? Eeeeeshk!" she squealed before running down the path and leaping into her chauffeur driven Mercedes.

I dread to think what she'd say now: I'm wearing my Fit Flops and my Slanket.

Could do better

2009-07-14T21:41:00.002+01:00

Well. I'm pretty sure that the results of Mac's first parents evening matched mine. His art work was displayed on the wall, examples of his Numbers and Words were blu-tacked to his table and his teacher, by the time we got to him, was suffering from a rictus grin and a bad hair day.

The general gist was "Mackenzie is a likeable, friendly student who gets on well with his classmates" which I naturally took to mean "class clown" - just like me. Also "Mackenzie needs to listen to instructions carefully and sometimes finds his natural exuberance a little difficult to quell" which David took to mean "unable to focus and rowdy". Again, just like me!

However, we were charmed when a number of other parents were dragged over to meet Mac who was suffering from a rare case of shyness surrounded, as he was, by so many adults proclaiming "So, you're Mac!". We headed out of school and onto Pizza Hut as a treat and our pride and joy kept us entertained with tales of school and informed us that "Melissa eats chalk mummy" which is nothing to laugh at but the face he pulled when he informed us of this fact made me choke on my stuffed crust.

My First Aid course is not a barrel of laughs. I'm on day two and it's hard going.....I came over faint at one point when I had to set a "dislocated arm", the dummy was very realistic (and was called Kevin). Day three tomorrow is Burns and Scalds and Dressings in the morning with Resus Annie putting in an appearance in the afternoon......Thursday morning is a quick recap and then a written test in the afternoon. There's six others on the course and the instructor (Malcolm) has an alarming habit of leaping from one subject to another which isn't wildly helpful.

Still, Liz from Physio and I are having a good old giggle, especially when we were given four rolled up bandages each and told to "deal with the angled object" on two of our male colleagues. They blushed, we snorted with laughter and set to our task with gusto. Liz successfully managed to secure the angled object "sticking out" of Bill the Porter's leg whereas Gavin the Security Guard and I got sidetracked as we looked out of the window at a woman attempted to reverse a BMW into a parking space big enough only for a Mini Cooper.

I wouldn't like to see my report, I tell you that much although I suspect Malcolm would like to suspend me with immediate effect.

Five out of ten for effort

2009-07-06T18:56:00.003+01:00

We're going to Mac's first ever "proper" Parents Evening on Friday. I'm dreading it. David is already puffing up with pride. Mac is completely unbothered by the whole thing. When Bea asked him yesterday if he's going to get a good report, he shrugged and pulled his "whatever" face.

"Darling" said Bea as she swilled Pimms around in her glass "When I got Ian's first report I had to be prised off the ceiling with pride. When we got Caitlin's first report I had to be shovelled off the floor with mortification."

This hasn't helped.

Coupled with this is the news from my boss that she's very kindly put me on a First Aid training course because I "filled her quota and ticked all the boxes". There's a test at the end of the course which I'm not looking forward to, especially as David told Mac that if his report is "excellent" he'll buy him a skateboard and that if it's "better than mummy's" then he'll get an extra little present (which I'm hoping is protectice clothing).

He hasn't told me yet what I'll get if my report is excellent but Bea suggests that I point him in the direction of Tiffany's.

A lazy summer day

2009-06-21T16:30:00.002+01:00

What does that mean to you? If somebody said "Hey, have a lazy summers day, just you, all by yourself, go for it!" Would you take off to the nearest beach, lay flat out on the shore and bake? Would you meander through a sunlit meadow sniffing buttercups? Would you take yourself off to the nearest shopping centre and buy buy buy suntan lotion, bikinis and sarongs? I'm not just asking for effect by the way, I'm genuinely interested.

Back in the days when I only had myself and a rather mangy looking goldfish to think about (my parents brought us up to be independent from an early age: I thrown into the deep end of a swimming pool as my first "swimming lesson". I learnt bloody fast I can tell you) a lazy summers day meant a variety of things, depending on my age.

At six it was Screwball ice-creams from the ice cream van and staying out late in the street (Bea never did this and called me an urchin) playing Knock Down Ginger and 40/40. At thirteen it meant trying to wangle an invitation to one of Bea's Super Summer Sizzlers (a gaggle of late teens cavorting around Peckham Rye Park, each with their own Walkman playing their own tunes and trying to be cool with a capital C). At sixteen it was avoiding all contact with stupid boys whilst trying to tan myself to a gorgeous brown armed with a bottle of Ambre Solaire Factor 40 forced upon me by my mother. At twenty five (and with my first serious boyfriend, what can I say, I was a late starter) my ideal lazy summers day was to waft romantically around in all manner of white broderie anglaise eating strawberries whilst watching my Then Beloved play cricket manfully. It never worked. The strawberries attracted the wasps and, as I wasn't exactly waiflike, I looked like an exploded sofa lolling around under an umbrella.

My first summer with David was interesting to say the least. He only has to get an inkling of sunshine and turns a lovely mahogany brown. I go pink, then red, then sort of teak coloured. This was wonderfully demonstrated with our first lazy summers day together: we went sailing. Me, on a boat. My first time no less. I doused myself in Ambre Solaire, pooh-poohed the offer of a life jacket and lay out on the deck in what I thought was an alluring post. I have pictorial evidence to show that I looked like a rapidly pinkening beached whale. After a couple of hours surfing the high seas (okay, the bit off Southampton) we returned to shore.......him gorgeously brown, me pink, shuffling and distinctly overheated and sunstruck.

Summers after that, and before Mac, were spent, I seem to remember either watching cricket with the curtains pulled or me finding wonderfully inventive ways of soothing my sunburn.

Our first summer with Mac was traumatic. He was a very fair baby and, during our first week away with him in August, him aged not even six months, David the well seasoned and well weathered father and me a 32 year still in search of a perfect tan we all aged considerably. Firstly, babies don't understand that the sun is hot. I placed him in a cotton all in one outfit, plonked a hat on his head and perched a parasol over him for our first lazy summer day as a family. Within twenty feet of our walk he had wrenched off his hat, screamed until we removed the parasol and was sick all over his cotton outfit. Newquay residents got used to seeing us only venture out after sundown.

Paddling pools feature heavily in both my childhood and Mac's - David claims he was never allowed one but Matthew suggests that they hadn't been invented then. Matthew is just bitter, David informs me, because he was never allowed another one after he attempted to drown his then best friend in one aged four.

At the moment we've got three on the go. One for Mac - "the poople one is mine" he informs
the dogs who have the other two. Yes. You read right. Mac has the purple one, Senior and Middle Dog share the yellow one (Senior is not really fussed but doesn't like to feel like he's missing out) and Junior Dog has the blue one all to himself. This came about after last year and the Great Paddling Pool Fight when all three dogs tried to squash themselves into one small plastic pool and caused a tidal wave all over the lavender.

Anyway, I digress. Which at this stage in the blog should come as no surprise to any of you.

The reason I'm asking is because I had one of my own yesterday. A lazy summers day sans husband, child and hounds. David had agreed to take everyone to see his friend who has just bought a boat in Rye. After instructing David to....

a) not let Mac out of his sight
b) not let the dogs out of his sight
c) not let Mac on the boat or in the sea
d) not let dogs on the boat or to go too far our in the sea
d) have a relaxing day

.....I was left alone. Just me. The whole day stretching promisingly ahead, just for me, all mine, a lazy summer day.

What did I do?

I put the washing on, put some washing out. Watched Friday night's repeat of Big Brother. Had a Magnum ice lolly while channel hopping. Rang Charlie for a gossip. Ate another Magnum ice lolly. Had some filo prawns for lunch. Watched a film, Shutter. Killed a wasp that had the audacity to fly in. Wondered what all my boys were doing. Ate some peanuts. Received phone call from David and Mac who grassed his father up soooo much "Mummy, I went on the boat and droved it a little way and Senior Dog fell in and Junior Dog wouldn't come back to the shore and Daddy shouted at us all a bit".

Then I had a bath with the door open whilst eating strawberries and drinking Dr Pepper with ice. Ate another Magnum ice lolly (in my defence, they were the mini ones - note past tense). Had a scone with strawberry jam and cream whilst watching Only Fools and Horses. Mused a bit about what delights are awaiting me on the Philosophy hours next weekend on QVC. Received another phone call from David to ask me if seaweed was bad for dogs. Had a chat with Marjorie Stewart as she collected the lottery money "Aw, you all alone today? You could have popped in, we've been watching old holiday home movies!". Pondered for a while if Marjorie was in fact right in suggesting that I'd wasted my Lazy Summer Day. Decided that she wasn't, rootled round in the freezer for the last of the Magnums, cranked up Only Fools and Horses on the G.O.L.D and waited the return of the travellers.

The next Lazy Summers Day I get, I'll do something summery. Apart from eating ice-cream that is.

It's official.....

2009-06-16T13:37:00.005+01:00

.....healthy eating is bad for you. Seriously. The Healthy Mob are dropping like flies all around me - Bea was on the receiving end of a particularly dodgy nettle batch at the weekend and spent Sunday "in agony darling, I think they stung every inch of me as I digested them". Janey broke a tooth on a stick of celery on Wednesday, Scarlett caused a major scare on Friday when she broke out in a rash after eating nearly an entire punnet of strawberries - Janey "thought it was that illness, y'know, menin-wotsit, until I found the missing box of strawbs" and Matthew choked on a radish on Sunday and had to be whacked "really quite hard and over and over again" on the back Lydia reported to me this morning.

David is suffering terribly with wind after our dinner of salad last night - he insisted on having the three bean couscous with it - and my boss rang me this morning to see if I could work this Friday and apologised for lisping - "I had athparaguth latht night and it'th made all my lipth thwell up - I look like Lethlie Ath".

So I don't feel in the thlighetht, sorry, slightest bit guilty as I munch my way through my Ayres Chicken Tikka doorstep. With lettuce. Well, you've got to try haven't you?

This is my life

2009-06-08T16:35:00.005+01:00

Well, it’s been a while. A combination of things have prevented me sitting down at my PC for an uninterrupted length of time and blogging. I haven’t even found any time for any online shopping (pause to steady erratic heartbeat) because, all of a sudden, my life went a bit offline. I was thinking about all this yesterday whilst lying in a bath of Philosophy Green Apple bubbles and, by the time I finished, my bubbles were flat, my toes resembling prunes and my head bonging. And this song was going round and round my brain.

So, to make some sense of it all, I’ve written it all down….read on if you haven’t got a nervous twitch, an aversion to chaos and have half an hour to spare.

My boys
Mac is still progressing with his Terrible Twos three years late. He will no now longer eat anything green as he is convinced they will grow in his “belly and kill me”. I blame his father who has been spinning bedtime stories of aliens and other life forms. He has decided that he’s too old for kisses, cuddles, tummy tickles and being called Chocolate Muffin. He actually muttered the word “Mother” last week which brought me up short. My name is mummy!

David is working hard and surviving (just) the slings and arrows of misfortune. Two account directors have been given “extended gardening leave” which got us all worried until David revealed that they’ve been not only cooking the books but burning them to pieces. He’s continuing to keep his nose clean and has started to embrace homeopathic remedies for his headache, ably assisted by my beloved sister Bea who has shunned “Nurofen for nettles darling”.
My home life
Having successfully diverted a move to Tunbridge Wells things are settled in Nunhead. We’re still looking for a weekend cottage/caravan/shed (listen, I’m not fussy any more) and are also redecorating as we’ve decided, after a year, that we don’t like the hallway wall colour. I was back at work the week before half term for the whole week, 9 to 5 and it nearly killed me. Mac was taken to and from school by Flavia, Bea’s au pair and flourished on proper Italian homemade pasta. He now wants Flavia to move in with us.

Bea and Bea and Family
My sister has become all New Age and is wafting around the house in a caftan and smoking incense most days. Gone is the pill popping sister of old (purely medicinal you understand, she never did rattle when she walked) and, in her place, we have someone who find drinking boiled nettles “wonderfully refreshing”. She’s full of sage advice about stress-busting techniques, has instructed her housekeeper to keep the radio on in the kitchen “24/7 darling to stimulate the chi” and has acquired a small black kitten which she has yet to name as she’s waiting for the pussy cat to “tell her what she wishes to be called”. She’s only like this at home you understand, I rang her at work the other day and overheard her, well, bollocking (the only word that suits the diatribe) a delivery boy who’d messed up her wet decaff and organic biscuit order. She was snarling when she finally got round to me. How she lives a dual life, I’ll never know.

Stephen and the children are getting used to finding mummy draped in diaphanous silk, chanting ominously and distributing bonhomie and good cheer. Stephen is benefiting from all of the massage oil and essential oils and, when they’re not being worn, the children play tents with the caftans.

Lydia, Matthew and Freddie
Lydia is becoming, she says, one of those mothers that she used to despise. She’s struggling to cope with motherhood “at her time of life” and yo-yo’s between pity and admiration for that “old biddy who recently had twins”. She uses the television as a baby sitter, sings the Cbeebies jingles like she used to hum Beyonce and has taken to baby talking Matthew because she can’t quite get out of the habit. When I suggested that she talk to baby Freddie normally you’d have thought I had suggested she boil and eat baby Freddie. “He’s a baby!” she squealed, clutching her pride and joy to her chest and rocking him manically. “Aren’t oo de most booful boysie in da whole wide worldie?”

When I pointed out that baby Freddie is, even at this young age, fixing her with a puzzled look she sulked for a week.

Matthew feels she needs to get out and about a bit more and gets extremely exasperated with she recoils in horror at having to take her baby boy out in the horrible harsh world. “She’s not only wrapping him in cotton wool, she’s adding bubble wrap” he said gloomily on the phone to his father.

Freddie himself is blooming, a proper boy with an alarming habit of trying to fix onto the breasts of every woman who holds him. “Just like his father” Lydia says sourly. I get the impression that all is not well but don’t want to interfere. It’s a fine line, says David, between supporting and smothering. Amelia is beside herself, she does like a good meddle.

Janey, Darren, Scarlett and Blue
The other little family are “coming on a bundle” as Darren’s mum is wont to say. Scarlett is currently being touted round all of the modelling agencies with Blue bringing up the rear and Janey living in a world of child stars and stage school applications. Admittedly, Scarlett is a regular little poser but Auntie Ivy is spouting doom and gloom about the prospect of drug addiction for her favourite granddaughter. Janey is oblivious to her mothers worries and is imagining a double spread in Hello “when Darren signs to a proper club”. Darren’s prospects of signing for a “proper club” took a nose dive on the last game of the season when he scored two own goals and was then sent off for calling the referee “a bleeping, parping moron”. David went to the game and he said it was the funniest thing he’d ever seen.

Dad
My dad has rediscovered his carpentry hobby – you can’t move round his house for bits of wood stuck to other bits of wood that will fit in with that bit he’s just nailed to the other bit. He’s keen to get Mac interested in woodwork and has promised that, if Mac helps him build it, he can have a toy box with his name engraved on it. By the look of the plans we’ll need to move to a bigger house to accommodate it.

The animals
The three dogs are not impressed with this changeable weather. No sooner had all three moulted into their summer coat, the wind and the rain came back. All three insist on checking the weather report before they leave the house now.

Becks the rabbit is alive and well and, thankfully, hasn’t gone the same way as the school hamster. We managed to replace it for an almost identical one and nothing has been said yet. However, as Dawn pointed out, one hamster is pretty much like any other.

Amelia
What can I say about my mother in law. Devastated that we’re not moving five minutes away from her, miffed that we’re not allowing her to meddle in Matthew’s life, annoyed that she’s having to share a room with Jane Mablethorpe when they go off on their annual trip to Eastbourne and highly hacked off that Jack Next Door has refused to go with them. “I can’t understand what’s wrong with the man!” she ranted down to the phone to David the other evening “Any man worth his salt would jump at the chance to go on holiday with ten women!”. David managed not to point out that he’d be mad to go on holiday with ten women all demanding, nagging and moaning. I urged him to ring her back and point that out to her.

Charlie
My best friend has shunned the love merry go round. “I can’t be arsed to get tarted up, dressed up and then have to listen to some ar*ehole of a man pontificate about how frigging wonderful he is” she announced at the my birthday party. “As long as I’ve got my friends, heat magazine, Galaxy chocolate, Ashes to Ashes and erm, a little battery operated item then I’m happy”. The male guests at my intimate little gathering suddenly found something very interesting to do in the garden. David all but vaulted the coffee table.

Saskia
Is in love with a pilot called George. She’s still wearing orange and is loving her daily battle with passengers. “I just wish they’d bring the TV cameras back, I could be the next Jeremy Spake!” she trilled from a Gatwick check in desk. She’s thinking of applying to be a stewardess but, in her own words “doesn’t like heights…..do you think that would be an issue?”

Assorted Friends
Eliza and family have moved to Holborough Lakes in Snodland. Mac finds this word hilarious and also wants to move to Snodland, believing it to be a magical land of make believe. I have challenged David to make up a bedtime story saga involving the Snods of Snodland. I think we may have a best seller on our hands.

Andy and Adam are engaged to be married and are planning their civil ceremony with my help. “I want it to be all romantic and misty and ethereal” Andy breathed as he flicked through Brides magazine “Adam wants it to be manly” he added. “Manly?” Charlie queried as we watched Adam gaze in awe at pictures of the (doomed) wedding of Katie and Peter. We suspect that Adam’s crush on Mr Andre rages on.

Assorted Relatives
Auntie Ivy has decided to give up driving because “every time I go out in the car I get back to a nervous wreck of a husband”. Uncle Jim is quite pleased at this piece of news and now that “she” isn’t going to be driving it “is looking to upgrade to a newer model – of car that is, fnar, fnar!”. Little does he know that, if he does achieve this goal, Ivy will take up driving again.

Aunt Daisy is struggling with the notion of Adam and Andy getting married. “In my day you got married for love, not because one of the people has got a yoghurt maker and the other one hasn’t”. This misunderstanding came about because she overheard me tell Bea at Freddie’s christening that they’re pooling their resources.

The Neighbours
Frank and Marjorie Stewart are still bouncing round their bedroom nearly every night. How do I know? They tell me. It’s like True Confessions over the garden fence most mornings. They’ve still got this mad idea about arranging a beano outing for The Avenue. David fears this is playing fast and loose with the minds of the criminal fraternity (“they’ll see the street empty and have a field day”) so he has instructed me to decline any offers. I felt it necessary to point out that I decline ALL and EVERY offer I get from the Stewarts.

Jane and Bill Opposite are still enjoying their love-hate relationship. Jane went out and blew nearly two thousands pounds on haute couture dresses the other week just because Bill lost almost the exact same amount at a poker game. Bill is remarkably unconcerned about this and his comment of “small tits for tat” has propelled Jane to the plastic surgeons for another boob job.

Ruby Over the Road is moving to Selsey Bill to be closer to her elderly parents. It’ll be a wrench, she revealed, but promises us all that she won’t allow “just anybody” to move into our Avenue. There is talk of Jane Opposite setting up a vetting station.

Jack Next Door, when not dodging offers to join the geriatrics in Eastbourne, has become something of a local celebrity. Neighbours are lining up to ask him for advice on wilting petunias and rotting ivy. He does fact sheets now that I’ve shown him how to use the spell checker on the PC his daughter bought him for his birthday. And when I showed him how to surf the web, well……he said he got RSI in his mouse hand. I dread to think what he was looking at.

And me? Well, I’m keeping my head down, my eyes and ears open and things are (ssssh, fingers crossed) okay. I’m still trying (unsuccessfully) to cut down on my doughnut habit but am drawn, like a moth to a flame, to Ayres. I have started running a bit now, shamed by an incident in the park the other week when I was overtaken by one of those invalid carriages when I thought I was out on a brisk walk.

Although, that’s nothing to do with what happened to me at Pett Level……but that’s a whole other post.

Big Brother 10

2009-06-05T21:12:00.004+01:00

Do I? Or don't I? I watched the launch night show last night in between reading my latest book. Bea has already threatened to disown me if I "so much as push the number four button on your remote control darling girl". But I can't help it. It's easy viewing and, in the current climate, doesn't cost anything to watch (if I don't vote, which I didn't last year) so.......oh, decisions, decisions.

So, I've been away a while.....how's everyone been?

Help!

2009-05-29T15:34:00.003+01:00

Well, I'd just sat down at the computer to update you with what's happening in my life (we're not moving to Tunbridge Wells, more later about my victory) but I've just received a frantic phone call from Fellow Mum Dawn along these lines:

Me: "Hello?"
Dawn : "Hi, it's me, listen I need your help. In fact I don't need your help, I desperately want it"
Me: "Why, what's happened?"
Dawn: "I can't go into it all right now because Jonathan is here (this bit was whispered) but can you meet me at Blackheath Pets at Home at four-ish?"
Me: Erm, right, will have to get Mac ready first so......"
Dawn, interrupting, "Noooooooooooooooo! Don't bring Mac with you! Promise me you won't bring him!"
Me, fearing for her sanity and my son: "Okaaaaaaay, calm down. I'll see if.....someone can take him. Dawn, what's going on?"
Dawn, whispering again: "Woody is dead"

She didn't need to say any more. Woody is the class hamster that Jonathan was looking after over the school holiday. However, his death suggests that he wasn't doing it very well. And I don't think we're going to Pets At Home to buy a hamster coffin. I fear some subterfuge is afoot.

Disturbing times

2009-05-18T16:46:00.004+01:00

David has found a house for us. In Tunbridge Wells. Five minutes (five minutes!) walk away from his mother's residential home It's perfect, apparently. Three bedrooms, two bathrooms, huge garden/paddock, in our price range "but I reckon the guy will be happy to take a cut", needs little or no work doing on it, has room in the driveway for both cars AND the man's wife is called Joanna so it's fate. Apparently. Oh, and David thinks that it would be better to move there permanently rather than just use it as a weekend place.

You can imagine my delight and joy, on returning from queuing for play off tickets for four hours, to be told this - it was ten minutes before I could formulate words other than "what?" and "huh?".

Whilst out buying an entire pig for his mothers freezer (and half a cow for ours) David said he was hit with a blinding thought: why not move out of London? This was half prompted by the glorious fresh air pouring in through the open car window and the fact that Steve At Work has just decamped his entire family to Sedlescombe and "commutes in, takes just twenty minutes more than it would from Swanley" where they used to live.

I could brain Steve At Work.

And of course, once he drove past The New House (he's taken to calling it this already) he saw the man from the estate agents putting up the For Sale sign and demanded a tour there and then. Amelia is delighted, naturally and is already looking for removal firms.

When I regained the use of my mouth and brain function I pointed out to him (everso calmly I thought) that I would rather have my bits Brazilian waxed every day than move to Tunbridge Wells. He asked me why. I snorted in a very unladylike fashion and switched on the kettle before hitting him between the eyes with the following:

- I don't want to live permanently in Tunbridge Wells
- I don't want to move permanently anywhere
- I don't want to move anywhere near his mother
- I don't care if the "new" bathroom is painted sky blue, I'll go to B&Q tomorrow
- I don't understand where the HELL this has come from
- We can't take Mac out of school now he's settled
- The dogs are London dogs
- I'd miss Ayres too much (sad, but true)
- I would have to change the name of my blog and that's just plain wrong

Okay, so I didn't actually voice the last point out loud but I was thinking it very loudly in my head.

He answered with the following:

- Why?
- Why?
- I can see your point
- Okay, also see if they have a tile with a shell motif on it in toning colours
- It's a possibility we can talk about
- Better now he's not even a year in than later on when he's more established
- The dogs love the countryside (then turning to all three hounds and saying "don't oo?!" in a very irritating way)
- Don't be silly, there are bakers in Tunbridge Wells! (Blasphemy!)
- Why are you glaring at me?

We have left it somewhat up in the air. He hasn't actually said any more about it since Saturday evening when I sulked my way through the Eurovision Song Contest (I don't watch it as a rule but I was proving a point) and he pointed out that "that Turkish woman" looked a bit like the current owner of The New House. I glared at him for a full two minutes before he picked up his Dick Francis.

I have, of course, discussed it with my friends and family (all day Sunday spent on the phone and/or MSN Messenger) and their comments/suggestions are listed below:

Bea: "Darling, Tunbridge Wells? Don't do it. It's in Kent."
Saskia: "Convince him it'll be perfect as a weekend place only and that if you move out of London he won't be able to cope without all the pollution and he'll keel over"
Charlie: "You are kidding me? Five minutes from Amelia every day? Does he want to become an orphan?"
Janey: "Hah! Don't tell me mother, she'll be badgering you for your spare room"
Auntie Ivy: "Oooh, can I come and stay? My friend Elsie lives there but I can't stay at hers cos I'm allergic to her Foofy"
Janey, again: "Tell her the house is next to a cattery, she's allergic to cats"
Marjorie Stewart: "You can't move! Frank won't have anyone to flirt with"
Jack Next Door: "Good luck, let me know if you need any help in the garden"
Lydia: "Noooooooooooooooooooo, don't go!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I need you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Jane Opposite: "Tell him to eff off! Tunbridge Wells? Eff me, is he having a laugh?"

You can see my quandry can't you? Whilst I want to support my husband and entertain all of his little ideas blah, blah, blah I don't actually want to do any of that. Selfish? Yes. I admit it. I'm bloody selfish and all I want to do is revert to my five year old self and scream "Don't Want To!" at the top of my voice until he sees reason.

But I know I have to play the long game (use my feminine wiles, as Marjorie put it this morning) and make him think it's a Terrible Idea whilst making him think that he thought it was a Terrible Idea. If you see what I mean. I'm sorry, I'm rambling now.

Tunbridge Wells Ramblings. No, can't see it to be honest.

Tomorrow

2009-05-15T18:50:00.003+01:00

My fate has been sealed. I've drawn the (very) short straw and have been "nominated" by my friends and family to queue for the Millwall Play-Off Final tickets. They'll be joining me though. At some point. At around 9.30am when my position in the queue is secure and they can just stroll up to join me. And to be fair to David, he would have gone himself had he not been conscripted into helping his mother stock up her freezer. It's not that I mind that much but I'm having slight reservations about beginning my mission at around 7.30am. Yes, in the morning. Which means at least a 6am start because the dogs will know it's Saturday and therefore my first task will be to take them to the park. Will Peckham Rye park even be open at that hour of the day?

Still. Charlie is here to babysit for Mac (and may even bring him down to find me and my merry band of fellow nominees if I'm "still there at like, half eleven") and she's lending me her iPod for the lonely hours ahead of me. "If you get on with it" she said as she shuffled it effortlessly "you know what to tell David you want for your birthday!".

Listen, at this moment in time I'd settle for a ticket to watch the Lions at Wembley!

Cold front

2009-05-09T17:19:00.003+01:00

Is it me or is it getting progressively colder again? I mean, considering that this time last week I was dressed only in jeans and a T-shirt wandering around Lewisham trying desperately to find a Christening present that wasn't twee. Even Bank Holiday Monday gave us sunshine.....but since then I've got the chills.

Bea is very concerned and keeps asking me questions straight from the Swine Flu Symptom Book:

"are you shivering?"
"Yes"

"are you spending, erm, longer in the lavatory than usual?"

"No"

"Well, it's not that then"

Thank God for the Royal Mail who yesterday delivered my Slanket. It's heavenly and has barely left my body since it's arrival at quarter past eleven. I've even mastered walking in it, no mean feat as it's huge. David wants to know why I didn't get him one as he watched me snuggle up on the sofa with it last night. This from a man who complains of being hot in the middle of winter and doubles up as my hot water bottle on those cold wintery nights. Mac informs me that it's "got the same skin as Dino", waving his motheaten dinosaur at me. I noted the glint in his eye and lovingly took my Slanket to bed with me last night. It's lovely and warm and cuddly and just so......cosy.

Janey has got Slanket-envy and is thinking of buying one for Uncle Jim's "significant birthday" - she took the order details with her when she left this morning to go to "Bluewater for a dander" - she lives in hope that she'll spot Victoria Beckham/Daniella Westbrooke/Jude Law one day and instantly grab herself a celebrity friend. "Michelle, y'know, the goalkeepers wife, she knows that bloke off Eastenders, you know, the one who went into the jungle and all because she bumped into him outside the lavs". She tried to take it with her when she left "y'know, just to try it". I pointed out that if she ordered it before 3pm today, she could have her own Slanket by Monday. She sensed the reluctance to remove my cosy wrapping but only after a half hearted attempt to mug me for it on my doorstep.

Anyway, must dash because, although I'm wearing my Slanket as I type, I feel the need to snuggle up on the sofa. Combined with a steaming cup of tea and a custard cream, it's the perfect way to spend an evening.

Go on.....get your own Slanket at ShinyShack.com.

Once the party's over

2009-05-06T20:04:00.004+01:00

I'm typing this as I munch my way through my "square" of Christening cake. I don't wish to be unkind but it's taken me ten minutes to get rid of a strip of icing sugar. Lydia actually apologised when she dropped our cake boxes off this morning "Don't eat it if you value your sugar intake or your fillings" she said wearily.

Saint Kate had had the cake made by a "WI friend" - two tiers of rich fruit cake topped by a hideous looking blue iced bonnet. I was quite chuffed when I saw people actively spitting it out.

It actually wasn't that bad. My outfit didn't clash with Saint Kate, Amelia spent the duration of the day sitting so close to Saint Kate that she more or less ignored me, my hair and nails looked fabulous (if I say so myself) and my darling child behaved impeccably. Even when he, Caitlin and Ian decided to hide behind a gravestone to see "who they could scare" they screeched very politely. However, Lydia's Great Aunt Alice had to be taken home early for a "lie down".

David woke up on the Sunday morning pulling worrying at his hair "It's too short" he moaned as he noticed the three inch gap between his hair and his shirt collar. I merely sniffed in a ladylike fashion and raised a newly plucked eyebrow. "If ever I tell you I'm going to the barbers" he whispered to me in the church "remind me not to let him get carried away talking about Arsenal in Europe."

The party went very well, the food was lovely (Bea got very excited when she saw langoustines in garlic and herb butter and sent Stephen up for "a platter") and the DJ played the room like a pro. He even had David up and dancing (see pic above, apologies for this, Mac took it, is very proud of it and "wants to show everybubody mummy") and even Amelia took to the floor for "New York New York".

Baby Freddie behaved extremely well (apart from throwing up in the font but the vicar thinks it was the "shock of the cold water") and a lovely day was had by all.

AND.......Amelia spent Saturday and Sunday night in a hotel paid for by Saint Kate. Hoorah!

In Nunhead, no-one can hear you scream

2009-04-30T21:55:00.003+01:00

I'm not panicking. No way Pedro. I'm cool, calm and collected. Serenity personified I am. So what that I don't have a new outfit with which to face the First Mrs David Mitchell on Sunday at my step-grandson's Christening. So what if the outfit I had planned to wear (after dragging it from the depths of my wardrobe and spritzing it with a bit of Pure Grace) doesn't actually fit me any more. Pah! Worried, moi?

I'm not at all bothered that David arrived home this evening, scalped. He'd been to the barbers for a "quick cut" because "Kate never did like my hair brushing the back of my collar" and now looks like he's had an argument with a combine harvester. I'm not at all worried about the fact that he's done this when he knows that I like his hair slightly longer. I'm certainly not stressing about the fact that he's thinking of his first wife and her penchant for short hair. Chuh!

I am not at all remotely interested in the fact that Amelia is arriving tomorrow evening with her photograph albums to "show round at the party". And I'm certainly not worried that she's "not bringing" mine and David's wedding album to show Kate because "well, she won't be interested, will she?"

I'm not obsessing that, after demanding my help for the last couple of weeks to source balloons, the perfect cake, the snazziest table decorations and the most fantastic DJ ever, Lydia has decided that she can run the show herself from now on. David thinks that this is a good thing as it'll give me the chance to "mingle and not worry about circulating the vol-au-vents".

So, I'm not worried. Completely disinterested in the whole lot of it. You know why? Because I have a cunning plan, drawn up whilst hoovering up Baileys at a vast rate of knots ce soir.

a) go out tomorrow and buy whole new outfit. Including shoes.

b) go to Shear Class for my hair appointment on Saturday and demand to made "fabulous". Also go to nail bar and have classy French manicure stuck on.

c) display my wedding photo proudly at the "do" after the christening (okay, so this bit of the plan may need a bit more work, ie, how to actually work the whole aspect into the day)

d) be gracious when Lydia claims all of the credit for the fantastic food, venue, balloons (again, this may need a bit more work, I don't usually do gracious)

e) stick close to Bea on the day itself in the vain hope that I absorb some of her poise, graciousness, serenity and calm by osmosis.

f) breathe deeply. At all times.

Taglicious!

2009-04-26T20:27:00.003+01:00

Thank you Bush Mummy for tagging me.......like you I'm very excited about doing this sort of thing!

1. What are your current obsessions? Tescos wine gums, finding the perfect outfit for Freddie's Christening, watching my garden burst into colour and trying to work out how best to convince David that buying me that very expensive watch for my birthday is his idea.

2. Which item from your wardrobe do you wear most often? My cosy cardie

3. What's for dinner? We had belly of pork with roast potatoes and broccoli

4. Last thing you bought? The Sunday papers and a Bounty bar but.....had I been writing this post after I'd visited Shiny Shack then it would have been this slanket which I plan to order forthwith to keep me cosy when I'm next in Pett Level!

5. What are you listening to? David reading a story to Mac who can't sleep. Mind you, by the sounds of it he's making Gullivers Travels sound so exciting he'll never sleep again.

6. What five items could you not leave the house with? Keys, mobile, purse, lipgloss, my sanity

7. Favourite holiday spots? Anywhere there's a beach for the dogs to go mad on

8. Reading right now? Wuthering Heights but I'm afraid I can't quite get into it....Bea's thinking of starting a Book Group.

9. 4 words to describe yourself: chatty, amusing, impatient, short-tempered

10. Guilty pleasure? Reading in the bath with the door locked

11. Who or what makes you laugh until you’re weak? My friends and family. Even when they don't mean to.

12. First spring thing? Daffodils where I thought I'd planted freesias

13. Planning to travel to next? Pett Level in May

14. Best thing you ate or drank lately? Sticky Toffee Pudding and a vodka and cranberry

15. When did you last get tipsy? Ages ago

16. Favourite ever film? At the moment, Wild Hogs

17. Care to share some wisdom? It's not how you fall that defines you, but how you get up. Or something like that. It's better than Janey's current favourite of "sh*t happens!"

18. Favourite song? I know him so well, Elaine Paige and Barbara Dickson

19. What did your last text say and who was it from? "That's lovely, am in all evening!" from Charlie

Rules of the meme

Respond and rework

Answer questions on your own blog

Replace one question

Add one question

Tag 8 people

Tune in my head: 2 and 3

2009-04-22T22:20:00.005+01:00

Up by The Saturdays. I'm driving everyone crackers with this, myself too but I just can't help it. Opinion is not at all divided: David has told me that if he hears me singing the "upbeat cheery chorus once more" he'll hunt down and eat my secret Easter egg that I have hidden from everyone, including my beloved.

Mac tells me that "it's silly mummy" when I start bopping round the house singing away to my hearts content. My son, it seems, has bypassed the Terrible Twos At Five Years and Two Months and has now reached Middle Age. Both he and his father sat opposite the kitchen table over dinner tonight tutting and rolling their eyes as I warbled "It's time to step it up a notch, I'm ready to lose touch". Their sighs intimated that I had already had.

Janey is on the cusp of hating it - "It's the only thing that sends Blue to sleep but by Christ it gets bloody annoying after the fiftieth time". Auntie Ivy asked me to "stop humming" yesterday (I'd reached the bit about "The is the crossing at the main intersection" and was beating out an accompanying be-bop beat on her newly laid kitchen lino) because I was "mingling with the dishwasher rinse cycle"

Charlie has mixed feelings towards it: "The students in the house next door have it on full blast every morning, it's an okay tune but not when it blasts you out of bed at 6am every day including Sundays"

And last, but by no means least, Bea has decreed there should be a ban of all "tunes by the colourful minxes" and "threw in" anything by Rihanna, but especially the song "about the umbrella".

Of course, I'm now singing this one too, sometimes cleverly mixed with Up - am I too late to audition for Britain's Got Talent?

Yum!

2009-04-19T22:07:00.001+01:00

Boys will be boys

2009-04-15T14:56:00.001+01:00

Do you often do, as I do, and look to the sky and mutter “Why me?” Do you? Well, I’m glad it’s not just me then. School holidays are fraught enough without an ill child, a child that has fallen out with his best friend and is “distort mummy” and a child who has suddenly decided that he’s going to have his Terrible Two’s at age five and one and a half months.

It’s one and the same child by the way.

I realise that I’ve been blessed up until now with a relatively laid back, chilled, cool little boy that lets nothing (except thunder) worry him. I first knew something was wrong when, of the six Easter eggs Mac received, he only ate one. By 6pm on Easter Saturday he was clutching his head, vomiting with carefree abandon, feverish and whimpering. My initial gut reaction was to storm A&E but David calmly administered the Calpol (see, this is one of the benefits of the Older Man), soothed his son and stayed up all night with him. Me? I was relegated to wringing out the flannels and doing some whimpering of my own on the landing.

He was over the worst by the morning and bravely tackled a boiled egg and three soldiers. He looked everso pale and followed David round like a grateful puppy all day – I’ve never felt so useless. Mummies are meant to be invincible aren’t we? Mummies are meant to be able to do anything in the whole wide world. Mac kept shooting me baleful looks as if it was MY fault that he and Ben had fallen out.

Of course, this falling out preceded the throwing up. On the Thursday before Easter Rosie (my labour ward buddy) rang to suggest an outing for the boys (“Ben is driving me INSANE at the moment and I need to get him out of the house before I break something”) and said I could drop Mac off and she’d take him for the day to give me “a break”. Mac didn’t want to go to Ben’s house he said, he was quite happy at home “doodling”. His vocabulary has come on leaps and bounds just lately and, whilst proud of him, I suggested that “doodling” wasn’t energetic enough and that a run round Horniman’s museum would do him the world of good. He refused point blank to go, right up until the point that I put him in the car. I then spent the journey to Rosie’s assuring him that it would be fine and he’d have a lovely day. I gave Rosie twenty quid (assuaging my guilt) and drove home, trying not to think that I should have listened to my tiny boy.

On the way back I stopped off at Sainsburys in New Cross and, coming along Queens Road on my way home, I was flashed at by a police car. I checked my speed and carried on. More flashing and then the blue lights came on. I pulled over, instantly nervous and no doubt looking as if I had ten tonnes of hard drugs in my boot instead of a French stick and some cheese.

“Is this your car?” enquired the Burly Policeman. “Erm yes” I squeaked and then remembered that it was in fact David’s car “Well no, but it’s my husbands and he doesn’t know that I’m using it but I am insured to drive it and…….” I trailed off and wiped my sweating brow. “You’ve got no brake lights” Burly Policeman continued. “Really?” I simpered “I had them earlier!”. Why? Why did I say that? To assure the comely copper that I WASN’T as dippy as hell? Because it didn’t work. “Whether or not you had them earlier madam, you don’t have them now. Have you got far to go?” I assured him I lived a mere hop skip and a jump away and the distrustful little article FOLLOWED ME HOME! Is there no trust any more? Anyway, why weren’t they out catching burglars or murderers?

I rang David and told him to bring two brake lightbulbs home.

Then Rosie rang to ask me to come and collect Mac. She met me on her doorstep, Mac sitting on the windowsill, sulking. Ben was in his room, sulking. Apparently, both boys refused to set foot outside of the house and so Rosie suggested they go upstairs and play. She said she first noticed something was wrong when flakes of ceiling dropped into her bowl of soup. She raced upstairs to find them wrestling on the floor. “The Queensbury Rules were not being observed” she said wryly. After peeling them apart she threw her son onto his bed and told him to stop bleeding on his duvet and mopped Mac up in the bathroom.

Ben “accidentally” hit Mac round the face “with his nails” when he wasn’t expecting it and, in retaliation, Mac “accidentally” smashed a copy of “My First Encyclopaedia” into Ben’s nose. Mac has four scratches running from eye to chin and Ben has a sore red nose and an aversion to encyclopaedias. “I made them apologise to each other, they pretended that they meant it” Rosie added as I banished my boy to my car. “I’m sorry Rosie” I said, horrified. She was very relaxed about the fact that her son may have an altered appearance and was more concerned that I didn’t let Mac’s scratches go septic.

On the way home, mid-lecture on Nunhead Lane, I was flashed again by a police car, this time with his blue lights flashing merrily away and even a “whoop, whoop” on his siren. Mac, no doubt thinking they were coming for him, started gabbling that he was “sorry mummy and I’m going to go home and clean my room even though I am distort”.

You’ve guessed it, no brake lights on my car either. Same Burly Policeman stuck his head through my window and said. “What is it with you and brake lights madam?”.

To give David credit, he didn’t sound remotely fazed to be asked to pick up four bulbs.

Tune in my Head: 1

2009-04-13T23:39:00.003+01:00

I can't get this song out of my head.....I didn't see the spectacular performance on Britain's Got Talent but I've seen and heard all of the soundbites since. I've seen Les Mis about, ooh eight times, and spend roughly 85% of each performance in tears. This isn't my most favourite tune from the show but Lordy, I've done nothing but sing it!

Normal Service

2009-04-08T19:38:00.004+01:00

I've almost managed to put the horror of Amelia's Stay behind me. I no longer automatically check the calorie content of anything I put in my mouth just so that I can quote it to her when she asks me. I'm even back to slobbing out in T-shirt and trackie bottoms when at home - apparently this was further evidence that I'd "let myself go", as if she needed more proof than my stack of shop bought desserts in the freezer.

David no longer wears a hangdog expression and could be heard to loudly shout "Bollocks!" yesterday evening when a football pundit said something he disagreed with and didn't even say "Whoops, penny in the swearbox!" afterwards. That's one of her favourite sayings is that, although her idea of swearing (crumbs, crikey and fiddlesticks) is so not my idea of swearing. I've always said that, if you're going to have a good swear up, make it worthwhile. I had a very enjoyable afternoon on Monday in the garden effing and blinding like a navvy. Jack Next Door looked up from planting his begonias to ask if Amelia got off okay.

Her relationship with Jack seems to be cooling - they're no longer at the finishing-each-others-sentences stage, in fact they barely spoke during Sunday lunch other than to ask each other for a variety of condiments. I asked him about it on Monday and he gave a little shrug before wiping his brow. "She's a little bit....erm.....difficult. When she wants to be" he admitted quietly. I admired his honesty and ability to understate the bleeding obvious.

Ginny lasted two hours before she scuttled back to Windsor on Wednesday. "I take my hat off to you darling girl" she said as she got back into her ancient Volvo. "How on earth are you managing with the bitter old bird?". She didn't give me a chance to answer as she gunned her way out of the Avenue. I rang David from the kerb who promised to get home as soon as he could. Four hours later he arrived by which time I'd heard all about her disappointment that Ginny "never married and never had children". I received possibly the most backhanded compliment during that conversation: "At least you married David and have had Mackenzie" she said as she dunked her ninth Bourbon cream into her tea. She even managed to make it sound as if she really didn't mind that I'd married her precious son which was a major bonus.

The weekend wasn't too bad, Matt took her off to see The Sainted Kate on Saturday which gave me a nice break. I made endless cups of coffee, watched trash on television, ate the rest of Mac's sweets and spent time with my boys and my hounds. Even when she came home full of the Wonders of David's Ex Wife, I managed to stay calm and saved my mini meltdown for bedtime: I dropped a bottle of my Philosophy Cinnamon Buns shower gel on my foot and sobbed for ten minutes on David's shoulder. It helped.

The Sunday Roast was "too tough" and she only managed to eat the vegetables and was very miffed (but couldn't let it show) when Mac informed her that she couldn't "have any pudding Gran because you haven't eaten your dinner". He meant it as well and, well, it was only fair to agree with him. "After all," I said sweetly as I served David a slice of rhubarb pie with custard "you wouldn't let him have any jelly on Friday when he didn't eat all of his baked beans".

I also made it known to the household that I knew she'd sneaked a slice of pie out of the fridge at some point overnight. Revenge, like leftover rhubarb pie, is best served cold.

As I've already pointed out to David (on numerous occasions), we've done more than our fair share of putting up with her. I've told him that I don't want to see her again until at least after the second May Bank Holiday. This promise was difficult to extract from him because Lydia has arranged Freddie's christening for the Sunday before the first May Bank Holiday. I've let him off with that one on understanding she does not stay at ours. "I don't care if she books into the Ritz at our expense, I'm not having her back here yet" I said. David pleaded with me not to repeat that comment to Amelia. I retorted that I didn't care if she knew what I'd said but he was more worried that she'd take me up on my offer.

So, calm and normality has once again been restored to Nunhead Mum's household. Well. Lydia has been hinting that she wants me to help arrange the christening party, Auntie Ivy feels she should "really do something" for Uncle Jim's 60th and David is looking to find a summer holiday destination that a) isn't "too foreign", b) isn't "too expensive" and c) isn't "too, well, y'know".

I have absolutely no idea what any of them expect me to do about any of it!

SHE'S GONE!!!!

2009-04-07T14:34:00.003+01:00

She actually went yesterday but I've only just gathered up enough strength to celebrate. A proper post will follow but, for now, I'm just mightily relieved that I've got my life back, an Amelia-free house and a Bank Holiday weekend to enjoy!

Oooh........and the CHOCOLATE FOUNTAIN I've expressed an Easter wish for!!!!!! David was last seen looking under "C" in the Yellow Pages. He knows.......

Day Four and catching up

2009-03-30T21:36:00.002+01:00

Mac was taken to school by Granny today. I insisted and all but threw them out of the door. Then I felt terrible and rang Dawn, asking her to text me when they arrived at school. "Take a stroll along Nunhead Lane afterwards Amelia!" I said cheerily as they departed and I slumped onto the sofa. It's no exaggeration to say that it's been hell for the past couple of days. Those without in-laws (or those with nice in-laws) gape at me when I start snarling about Amelia but David left for work early today and was whistling.

Thursday, when she arrived, set the scene for her entire stay so far. David tells me it can only get better but, as he was telling me this from a restaurant at Tower Bridge and I was sitting here with her and a frugal ham sandwich, I'm not convinced. Apparently, he is looking peaky - amazing that she knew seeing as this statement was made three hours before arrived home on Thursday night. David's Ex Wife "knew how to look after him" - this was said as she sifted through the ironing basket after twenty minutes on the premises. I am also "ruining Mackenzie" by letting him have half an hour of television before David comes home. This from a woman who gave him three bags of Haribo sweets when he got home from school and refused to let me put some away for later. "Leave him! Children need to make choices". Mac didn't make any choices between the bears or the strawberries or the sour mix but poured them all in a bowl and got down to munching. Said bowl is now somewhere unaccessible for a five year old. She asked me yesterday what I'd done with them - I professed not to hear and turned the radio up.

On Thursday she asked to see the menu for the week - I gazed at her and mumbled something about "chops for tonight, fish and chips for tomorrow and stew for Saturday" which made her sniff haughtily and question my imagination on the "cooking front". The house wasn't up to her standards either - I could tell this by the way she ran her finger along the window sill and examined it closely. The speck of dust she found was then magnified immensely and she started asking me if I'd seen that "brilliant machine that gets rid of bed lice". I've had nightmares ever since of bed bugs the size of Amelia criticising my bed linen "which wouldn't look out of place in a bordello". The bathroom also came under fire: "do you need all this clutter in here?" she demanded, pointing to my glass sail boat and crystal seahorse who were minding their own business on the towel cabinet. On Saturday she tugged all of our coats off of the coat rack and into a heap and told me to "sort through these, surely you can ditch a couple?" I was so tempted to bin her hideous puffa jacket thing. So, so tempted......

She also seems to have mistaken me for an entertainments agency "I'm bored" being the continuous refrain. Mildly irritating when a five year old who has a whole room full of toys to play with says it, horrifically stressful when it's an elderly woman who once castigated me for "sighing" during a long walk in Hastings. "How can you be bored?" she whirled round and demanded of me. I protested my innocence but she was off and running about the "younger generation not knowing they've been born". I wasn't sighing because I was bored, I was inhaling because we were walking up a hill.

Ginny, her beloved only daughter, rang for a chat yesterday and David, wonderful man that he is, told Ginny to come up for the day on Wednesday to take Amelia out to lunch. Ginny agreed after a bit of hissing from David but Amelia is all for ringing up and cancelling "She doesn't want to do that! I'm okay here! I'll find something to do.". I've taken the battery out of her mobile and have not left her alone with the phone. Oh, and Lydia has refused to visit again until she's gone - Freddie is a bonny child, his health visitor is very pleased with him and he's giggling away like that very last baby on the Cow and Gate advert. Amelia, however, took one look at her great grandson and pronounced him "obese". Even Freddie looked unhappy at this and unleashed a nuclear nappy. Lydia has made an emergency appointment at the baby clinic and keeps sobbing that she's overfeeding her baby and is like one of those trailer park mums. Matthew was despatched this morning to "have words" with his Gran. Instead he spent the entire time with me in the kitchen whilst Amelia "channel surfed" looking for something "educational - doesn't your television show anything other than rubbish and foul mouthed presenters?"

According to Amelia the mothers at the school gates are a degenerative lot. She came back this morning looking horrified. "Piercings, foul language and chewing gum - and they wonder why children are potty mouthed and dress like tarts?" she announced as she got yet another Yorkshire Tea tea bag out of her special caddy. She didn't make me one, nor even offer by the way. We spent today at opposite ends of the house. Or, to be more accurate, she followed me around. My ironing skills were ripped to shreds, the fact that I use Flash Liquid was held up to ridicule, my hoovering arm "isn't flexible enough" and my "lick and a spit" in the utility room is the reason why "it smells like a raddled old tramp out here".

I've got at least four more days of this. At least. I think I'm going to start seriously looking at the suggestions in the comments to the previous post. Although. Between you and me. I did make her a caffeinated coffee instead of a decaff one on Friday night which gave her a teensy headache all day Saturday. It was an accident. Honest!

Day Three

2009-03-28T21:47:00.002Z

Amelia is here until "at least" Friday. Friday. That's a whole week. Or it was yesterday. A whole seven days of hell on earth. I've taken on board all of the suggestions I've received, War Command has been set up on my half of the bedroom. Picture this, if you will:

A notebook is constantly at my elbow, not only to record the cutting comments aimed in my direction but also my thoughts. Token Gay Friend Andy suggested this as did Potty Mummy (apologies, but I've embellished your suggestion PM!). I'm currently sifting through the notebook, composing a post (it helps to share and vent) but all I'm doing is succeeding in getting myself into such a rage that I'm in danger of overdoing the

Alcohol: copious amounts of vodka (which set her off on a rant about my being an alcoholic) cunningly hidden in cranberry juice and coke but she knows it's in there. This was a suggestion from my darling sister and also Married With Four. I needed a double when I heard her say to Mac "I don't know what's wrong with your mother!"

An aura of serenity: sort of suggested by Nappy Valley Girl and Charlie who has herself, today, been on the receiving end of Amelia's cutting wit. "Have you still not got a man?" said my mother in law. Charlie inhaled sharply (her love life is something of a sore point) and rammed an entire Ayres hot cross bun (unbuttered) into her mouth.

Thinking happy thoughts. This from my beloved husband who is wearing a weary expression and keeps apologising for unleashing her on the household. I feel so sorry for him, I really do. I can't quite work out how somebody as lovely, generous and warm came out of that woman.

Eating: I've done nothing but eat Quality Street today. Of course, it's given her more ammunition ("Should you be eating that much chocolate? Those jeans are awfully tight already") but at least this way I get something good out of it. Or, as Janey pointed out, "you may just well put on half a stone and that's a great way to piss her off, turning yourself into a lard bucket". She means well.

Denial. This isn't happening. It's a bad dream, I'll wake up in a minute

Day One

2009-03-26T21:22:00.003Z

Ameila is here and arrived at quarter past eleven with enough luggage to cover at least a week long stay. The clouds of doom are getting thicker and heavier around my head, the dogs are already moping in their baskets, knowing they're in for the duration.

Thus far we have the following:

Criticisms of my wifely skills: five

Criticisms of my motherly skills: eight

Complaints about my cooking/"lack of imagination in the kitchen": three

Comments about the "state of the house": ten (three bathroom related comments)

Suggestions that she is bored already: two

Suggestions for "fun" things for me to do to "entertain her": six

Sarcastic comments directed at friends/family/mums at school gate: numerous

Times I wanted to tell her where to go and what to do when she got there: far too many to even mention

Trying times

2009-03-25T16:18:00.003Z

What is with the weather? After the weekend, in which we went to London Zoo to visit Mac's meerkat (explanatory post to follow), and spent the day in T-shirts and quaffing ice-cream, I've spent today alternately freezing my feet off, getting drenched, jumping at the thunder claps and not going near any windows in case I got hit by lightening.

It's been a bit of a week this week - I've had a headache since Sunday evening - and it's set to get worse. Amelia is arriving tomorrow for a prolonged visit while her flat in the residential home is being redecorated. Everything is currently beige: walls, skirting boards, carpets - I asked her what colours she's chosen this time and she answered "Magnolia". The words "why are they bothering" spring to mind but still, it gives her the opportunity to visit, criticise my cleaning ability, comment on my whites and terrorise me from dawn to dusk.

So she's relatively happy.

Oh my!

2009-03-19T21:51:00.004Z

Forgive me for this slightly self-indulgent post but I just have to tell you that I appear in the list of Top 100 UK Parent Bloggers - now, how did that happen? And at number 38!

Like Married With Four, I'm surprised (but highly pleased natch!) that I'm even on the list. I haven't quite worked out the technicalities - believe me, that will take a little while due to the fact that I'm not technical - but wow! All this plus, MWF is back, back, back and I've found some new blogs to read and follow!

Funny?

2009-03-15T18:55:00.005Z

Mac came home from school on Friday sporting a red nose, clutching a picture and covered in glitter. They'd had Red Nose Day at School which consisted in dressing in their own clothes (I always felt a bit wrong doing that when I was at school, like I was out of place), eating "funny" food (jam sandwiches featured heavily) and telling jokes. So here, at enormous expense is the funny that Mac unleashed on his school mates:

Mac, no doubt shyly: "Knock Knock?"

Classmates in one bellow: "who's there?"

Mac, doubled over with laughter: "Nobody!"

Classmates, surely in confusion: "Nobody who?"

Mac, exiting stage left "told you, haha!"

I must admit I didn't find it funny. And tried to convince him that he somehow had the joke wrong. "But it's not funny" said I in confusion on Thursday afternoon. "Oh it is mummy!" he giggled and then roared with laughter for about five minutes. Later, as I was tucking him in I broached the subject again by asking him to tell me his joke again, whilst I reprised the role of his classmates. More giggling followed the "joke" and I tried to slip in a few of my own funny Knock Knock jokes as a substitute. He wasn't having any of it. "No, my joke is funniest" he said adamantly, setting his chin in a defiant pose, just like his father.

"Did you get Mac's joke?" I demanded of said father when I returned to watch mindless television and drink red wine. "Yes, quite funny!" David said, channel hopping away from Eastenders in the vain hope that I didn't see it. I did. And tried to make the joke funny in my mind. I gave up after a while and concentrated on the unlikely story line in Easties.

"He'll be fine darling!" Bea announced the following morning when she bustled in to say she'd Done Something Funny For Money - she went into Claire's Accessories to buy some red wigs for Caitlin and Ian. "Lovely girl, it was awful. A slip of a girl with multiple piercings in her eyebrow and lip area asked me if I wanted my ears pierced as they were doing a special offer". For Bea, had she accepted this offer, it would have been her equivalent of scaling Mount Kilimanjaro. "They do it in the window of the shop!" she went on, shuddering as she handed over a set of deely boppers for her nephew. "I felt like I was in Amsterdam rather than Lewisham!" she went on, sniffing out the Earl Grey teabags and filling the kettle.

Lewisham? I asked my sister if she were okay, Lewisham not being her usual shopping destination. "I needed a key cutting place, Stephen has locked away my credit cards because of the credit crunch, I had to get a copy of his key cut and thought Lewisham was suitably, shall we say, suitable for such nefarious activities?" Talking of nefarious activities, I asked her if Stephen knew she had his key and had, in fact, copied it. "Don't be silly darling! He doesn't even know that I know he keeps it in his sock drawer! He thinks he has got the better of me, well, let me tell you, nothing separates me from my credit cards, not even my husband." She had taken on a crazed look at this point and started stroking her fringed bag like a Bond villain.

I need not have worried, Mac returned full of his "fun" day at school and revealed that everyone had laughed at his joke and he had won the Best Joke of The Day award. Whilst very proud of my tiny boy, I spent Comic Relief night, glued to the television, the words "now that was funny!" every time a joke was told forming on my lips.

Shopping frenzy

2009-03-12T10:32:00.002Z

I've got so many birthdays coming up the next couple of months that I've decided to be extremely pro-active (unusual for me) and buy now (hoping and praying that I remember what the hell I've bought for who).

Shiny Shack came to my rescue - they do personalised things, jokey things, sweets, cards, charms - in fact anything you could possibly think of. I've bought Bea this, to make up for the lack of bling from the Tower of London.

Go on, visit......I bet you buy something!

An Outing

2009-03-07T14:44:00.006Z

I was accosted at the school gate on Wednesday afternoon by the Over Zealous School Secretary who all but got me in a headlock before you could say "primary school education". The reason for her determination became clear once she'd uttered the words "school outing on Friday" and "a volunteer has pulled out". It seems that someone had nominated me to take their place - Dawn swears blind it wasn't her. "If I can get someone to look in on the dogs" I said, hedging several bets and vowing not to ask anyone to dogsit for the day.

I knew about the day trip to the Tower of London of course, I'd signed the requisite forms, paid over a deposit, then the full amount, gave £10 to the teacher for "spending money", signed another hastily cobbled together form from the coach company (something about if the coach breaks down then we'd be responsible for collecting out children wherever it breaks down) and bought Mac a red cap. Every child has to have a red cap "on arrival at the school gate or they will not be permitted to join the outing". Mac has been conditioned since birth that red means Arsenal, Man United or Liverpool and was in a major sulk about the fact that he couldn't wear a blue one. "Or my Millwall one mummy" he said on Thursday afternoon.

I couldn't get out of it. To be honest, I didn't really want to - I love the Tower of London, the fact that you're walking where Anne Boleyn was before she got her head chopped off and that you can buy jewellery from the Jewel House. But did I really want to do visit with 24 children? Even if one was my own?

It turned out I had no option. David - handily - had the day off which I'd forgotten about so he was able to dogsit. Mac was beside himself with excitement that "mummy" was going with him and "Johnny's mummy isn't". There's a continuing rivalry between Mac and Johnny and I think it's got something to do with Megan. Blonde haired, blue eyed but unfortunately keen on Ramon. Apparently they all "do kiss chase" in the playground. When Mac told me that I had to go and inhale some chocolate.

Anyway. Bright and breezy on Friday morning I was on a coach with five other adults doing a head count. Kids are quick aren't they? I was using Michael (stunning redhead) as a starting point but he kept whizzing from one side of the coach to another. I gave up in the end and relinquished control to Mrs Wilson who terrifies me.

By the time we'd got to the Tower, we'd had stories about Henry VIII and his many wives and I was beginning to get increasingly excited myself. But could I wander round and gaze in awe and shop in peace? Could I meander round with my camera? Could I buggery. 24 children had to be taken to the toilet and I found myself channelling Joyce Grenfell's schoolteacher: "Johnny, don't do that, pull up your trousers" and "Kara, did you wash your hands? No? Why not? Go and wash them please!"

24 children then had to be restrained from galloping off in a million different directions and herded into a tight group. My own little red capped boy was beginning to look like he wished "mummy" hadn't come along. I constantly found myself addressing him even when he was doing what he should be doing. Kara decided she wanted to go and sit on the wall by the raven house yet I told Mac very loudly that he couldn't do that. Mac, who was quite happy standing there gazing open mouthed at a Beefeater, gave me a funny look.

We started off by walking round to the execution site, which is now a lovely monument with the names of those who died on the spot etched into a gorgeous glass table like....erm....thing. The Beefeater who was assigned to us held the kids enthralled with tales of executions and made us all jump when he bellowed "And then her head was chopped off!". Jessima started crying and demanded her mummy.

Mac was keen to go into the shop (he takes after me on that front) but we had to hold off for lunch which we ate sitting outside the White Tower. Three children had not brought a packed lunch and so were not allowed on the trip - oh the tears and recriminations from miffed parents. I was concentrating so hard on remember to make and take Mac's one that I hadn't done anything for myself. Yummy smells were wafting from the New Armouries restaurant but I couldn't leave my post. I consoled myself by eating Mac's crusts.

During the afternoon I spoke to Bea - she also has a great affinity with the Tudors and related buildings (we're convinced she was Anne Boleyn in a previous existence) and I texted her a picture of the execution site along with the words "The spot where you lost your head!". She responded with "OMIGOD" and rang to request some "trinkets". If she was hoping I would whip into the Jewel House and pick her up a bit of bling suitable for a beheaded Queen of England, she was sorely mistaken. As was I. I asked my fellow volunteer, I Used To Be A Career Woman You Know Mummy, if she would mind if I sloped off for ten minutes. She gave me a look, pretty much like she probably gave her minions if they cheeked her, and refused point blank. However, I did notice her in the shop flexing her credit card half an hour later.

Still. The kids enjoyed themselves, ran riot in the one shop were were allowed in (all plastic swords, tatty tiaras and pens) and learnt a fair bit. Mac behaved so well, especially in the shop - he'd spent his £10 on a polyester chain mail tabard, a pencil, eraser and sword and didn't even think of asking me for some more money when he discovered that he hadn't bought any postcards. Unlike I Used To Be A Career Woman You Know Mummy's son Jasper who threw a tantrum of epic proportions because he'd spent his money on crap sweets and pencil sharpeners and then demanded his mother give him more money to buy a crown. Horrified by Jasper's behaviour (and Mrs Wilson's scorn) she started chucking cash around like it was going out of fashion.

"I wouldn't have given into him" Mrs Wilson berated her as we made our way out to meet up with the coach "In doing that you are teaching him that he who shouts loudest, gets what he wants" she added. I Used To Be A Career Woman You Know Mummy looked puzzled at this and was heard to ask Mr Phillips "what does she mean?" Mrs Wilson had had a very trying day, she too had forgotten her lunch and was existing, she advised me, on "a box of raisins that my granddaughter had left in my coat pocket last weekend".

The coach didn't break down but Mrs Wilson was on the verge, she was first off the coach and into the staff room. I noticed that she'd bought some bramble brandy in the shop too.

Oooh, and I wonder who this was? See orb at top left hand side......a different kind of spirit?

Mission Impossible

2009-03-02T21:08:00.003Z

What do you do when your soon-to-be-five-year-old-son announces that he "doesn't want the present I asked for the other day mummy" and insists he's found a fantastically fabulous new present that he absolutely must have, two days before his birthday?

Do you do as David did? Ignore all pleas of this new present being the "bestest ever present ever" and extol the virtues of the present already bought and wrapped and hiding in the Cupboard At The Top of The Stairs?

Do you do as Auntie Ivy did? Bang on and on about "kids today having too much bleeding choice, my God, when I was his age I was bloody grateful if I got a couple of sweets and the unbroken chair to sit on"?

Or do you do as I did? Ring my sister in a state of panic, feeling like the Worst Mother In The World and have to listen to her hoot with laughter at my predicament?

Imagine my shock on Thursday evening when, just before bedtime, Mac chortled with laughter at this advert and declared "That's what I want for my birthday mummy!". He meant, of course, Aleksandr, star of said advert and would not be swayed. "He's not real!" I said heartily as we made our way upstairs. Cue look from Mac who said in a pitying tone of voice "Of course he is mummy, he's on the telly!"

The desire to own a meerkat did not abate on Friday morning and, on the way home from school that afternoon, I was a little concerned at the amount of comments Mac was receiving about his forthcoming birthday present. These included "Oh, you're so lucky! My mum won't even let me have a rabbit!" and "What are you going to call him?" Clearly my child had informed his entire class that I was spending the day mooching for meerkats.

Friday evening saw me ringing round assorted friends and family for help and advice. Four of them were incredibly unhelpful but Charlie played an absolute blinder. "Adopt one" she said. Result! There are many reasons why I love Charlie and this is just one of them, she has turned thinking out of the box into an art form! Bea was equally impressed but not for long as she had to go off and "look for something online darling".

On Saturday morning I told Mac that Auntie Charlie had found him a meerkat ("sourced" as Bea would say). "Wow, thank you!" he beamed and did a little breakdance a la Cruz Beckham. "Can I cuddle it now mummy?" he asked, peering into the garden as if the meerkat was waiting for him by the clump of daffodils just sprouting up by Becks' hutch. "Erm no, he won't be here but we can visit him where he lives!" I said, shoving a bowl of Cheerios under his nose and envisaging spending a fortune in zoo entrance fees.

He didn't take the news very well. "You spoil that child" David said ominously as he went off to explain to Mac that meerkats don't like Nunhead and prefer the rarified air of Regent's Park. After ten minutes, they both returned, one looking slightly mollified, the other looking very worried. "Can I see him soon though please mummy?" asked the nearly-birthday-boy. I assured him he could and breathed a sigh of relief. David took me to one side and whispered "He asked me if meerkats could get on buses, he may well try and liberate one when you take him to the zoo to see it". Note the use of the word "you".

Saturday afternoon is best glossed over. Suffice to say I came out of the cinema with a headache and a desire never to visit ever again. Mac and I were both in bed by half past eight.

Sunday morning and a chorus of Happy Birthday and lots of phone calls for the birthday boy, including one from Charlie who was asked if she could "bring my meerkat" to his party. She fudged it very well and said that the meerkat sent his best but was busy. His other presents went down very well including the present liberated from the Cupboard At The Top of The Stairs that had Janey screaming and reaching for her mirror. "Oh my dear God Mac, I've run out of straightening serum!"

The cake, supplied by Auntie Ivy, was yummy and the birthday boy himself was heard to say it was the bestest one he's ever had in his "whole life". Bestest present ever though was from Bea - it hasn't left his side since Sunday and I had to promise to look after him while he was at school today. I was then cross examined on our way home about "his" day. I've now researched properly the likes and dislikes of meerkats after my "lie" about him having porridge for breakfast was uncovered. "He doesn't eat porridge mummy" Mac said with a snort of derision.

Well, quite.

Flipping hell

2009-02-24T19:30:00.003Z

I generally don't do Pancake Day. David does the whisking and the cooking and flipping but he's out at a cricket club meeting. I perused the shelves of ready made mixes yesterday, even dallied with buying those little Scotch pancake things, you know, the ones with the sultanas. I even Googled for a recipe for pancakes - yes, I am that much of a novice.

I measured, weighed, sploshed and whisked. I heated the pan with oil watched by my devoted son and three drooling hounds. And then came the moment to flip. I wimped out of the first flip and used the spatula to turn it. It resembled an omelette. Still, Mac made yummy noises and squirted maple syrup manically. My second pancake I flipped. No, it didn't hit the ceiling, it didn't even stick to the pan.

Tip: don't flip pancakes in bare feet.

Growing pains

2009-02-22T13:55:00.000Z

A week today, my baby boy will be five. How is this possible? How? I found a pair of his bootees the other day and sobbed for ten minutes because he'll never wear them again. Quite apart from the fact that they're far too small for him now, they're yellow. And he hates "lellow mummy".

Now that my five year old baby is growing up he doesn't need me as much. I felt this oh so keenly last Sunday when he began football training at the park. David and I stood with other parents and grandparents watching as our pride and joys ran round in the mud. After his initial assessment done by a man who looked and sounded like a Sargeant Major ("C'mon boys, keep those knees up!") we received the outcome whilst the child himself stood gasping for air with his hopeful colleagues. It was agreed that, going on the initial assessment, Mac would play in midfield "until his true position has uncovered itself". It turned out that all of the boys were to play in midfield which prompted David to make the remark that "Millwall do that". Sargeant Major did not look impressed.

During one game in which all boys were encouraged to "shoot and defend" Mac fell over quite spectacularly after receiving a well aimed tackle from a child at least a foot taller than him. My heart stopped before leaping into my mouth: David had to physically restrain me from running onto the pitch, picking him up and "kissing it better".

My boy stood up, shook himself and very visibly pulled himself together before carrying on. This was a child that, on the Friday before, walked into a wall (too busy chatting to his friends) and came running to me sobbing. Then he sustained no bruises (other than his pride) but had to have a cuddle and the promise of ice cream for pudding before he stopped wailing. Last Sunday he acquired four bruises, one cut leg and a swelling cheek and wore them all with pride with not even a nod to my maternal instinct to smother, look after and kiss better. Even when I drenched him in TCP he didn't cry.

Needless to say, David took him on his own this morning.

We're taking a handful of his friends to the cinema on Saturday afternoon - the majority of them want to see Hotel for Dogs but some of them are just going for the chance to eat pick 'n' mix all afternoon. I'm more than a little wary of this - Mac attended a birthday party last Wednesday. When I dropped him off he was clean, neat and tidy. When I picked him up he was scruffy, sweaty, tearful and bouncing off the walls. Dawn had similar problems with Jonathan so had called the mother of the birthday boy. "Oh yes!" she had told Dawn "My husband's mother dropped in and she'd bulk bought sweeties as a treat!" The "treat" left my son with a headache and a twitch that didn't go away until Thursday afternoon.

But now it's me with the twitch. QVC have an hour of Philosophy now and so I'm off to stock up on my own treats!

Imelda Staunton....

2009-02-21T22:52:00.002Z

.....as Vera Drake looks everso like my Great Granny Carstairs. Right down to the floral pinny and ever-present cup of tea.

Blue Alexander Henry Roman

2009-02-18T22:19:00.002Z

Scarlett has a brother, Darren has a son and Janey has "piles the size of frigging grapefruits - when he came out, three of the little buggers popped out as well". Still, mother, father, sister, baby - and piles - are all doing just fine after a seventeen hour labour.

Bea has severe doubts about the history of the names for the new arrival - "let's hope that they don't provide another sibling.....whatever next? Yellow? Purple? I shudder to think darling".

Very Valentine

2009-02-14T14:56:00.005Z

I hope you're all enjoying a lovely Valentine's Day? I know that Frank and Marjorie are, all you can hear are Tarzan yells and giggling and their milk is still on the doorstep. Frank informed me yesterday that he'd "bought up" Ann Summers and asked me if I thought Marjorie would prefer "squirty cream or Nutella?"

My lovely sister and her husband are having "his and hers" spa treatments in some remote spot in the country, leaving both of their au pairs to mind the fort. Bea rang on Monday to confess she'd bought some "naughty lingerie" for their night in five star luxury sans children. "It's red and black and there are.....well....frills!" she giggled.

Matt turned up yesterday afternoon, a look of panic on his face, demanding to know what he should get for "a slightly mental woman". I suggested a gigantic bouquet of flowers, a box of expensive chocolates and a nice gooey card - but not too gooey. Lydia is still at that stage where she cries at the drop of a hat. "She's not right you know" he added, tapping the side of his head, as he left the house.

Charlie rang this morning to ask me which of the five cards she received were from me "or any one else who should know better". When I told her that nobody had sent her any cards this year - as a direct result of her stroppiness last year when the padded card she had hoped was from Sexy Surgeon was in fact from Saskia as a joke - she went all girly and said she had to go off and do some handwriting analysis.

Jack Next Door headed off to Sevenoaks and Amelia this morning (with strict instructions from me not to bring her back) with a box of Milk Tray and a bunch of roses. Jane Opposite, now fully recovered from her lipsuction, planned to dazzle "my Bill" when he gets back from Parkhurst. At this, my eyebrows shot up my face and into my hairline "Oh God no, he's only there visiting!" she hooted as we watched Jack's ancient car limp out of The Avenue. "Nah, his old boss is in there, shame really, lovely man. He kept Koi carp."

Janey - due to give birth any day now - received a card from Darren (To My Wife) which he had signed with a big question mark. "Is he trying to be funny?" she demanded not ten minutes ago when she rang to give me her daily update. At least she's not here, as she was before she had Scarlett. She also got the oh-so romantic present of a hot water bottle because the small of her back "gets really cold". I asked what she'd bought Darren and she gave an unladylike snort "I am the size of a f***ing horse and can't even get into my downstairs toilet without a struggle - I'm unlikely to be skipping around Clinton's am I?"

As for me, I've been a lucky girl this year. Breakfast in bed, a lovely card, beautiful flowers and "a little something for later". My present of a lovely warm red jumper looks paltry in comparison but he's wearing it whilst watching the rugby AND he's promised to make some tea in a minute while I just sit down and read my book......bliss!

Bea does IKEA

2009-02-08T14:20:00.004Z

Bea rang me yesterday morning in hysterics "So Thin Now You Can See Bones Au Pair has come back for a week and is livid to find Flavia in the house! She's gone very South American and keeps talking like the Mafia! Darling, you have to rescue me, the children are out at the Natural History Museum and Stephen is determined to watch the rugby at your house and I can't cope with all this on my own!"

Her need to escape the Au Pair Face Off was very intense - she agreed to meet Charlie and I at IKEA in Croydon. "Bea's coming?" said Charlie when I finished BlueToothing. "Yup" I said wearily as I headed past Selhurst Park. "To IKEA? To Croydon?" Charlie went on, flopping back in her seat as if winded. Bea does not do IKEA or Croydon - a school concert at Fairfield Halls was an exception but she needed a lie down in a darkened room afterwards. "Yup" I added grimly. "Bloody hell fire" Charlie breathed.

We aired our plans briefly before we arrived "Keep her away from the fabric section - she won't be able to cope with the colour schemes", "Don't suggest she actually buy anything." and "If she gets too imperious, we can always pretend we don't know her".

We had agreed to meet in the cafe section, Bea promised she'd find a "salesperson" if she got lost. She didn't, she assured me, as she grabbed me into a bear hug when we found her sitting over a black coffee. "Darling, they don't do latte!" she said, eyes wide. "And they serve a full breakfast for just 97 pence! How on earth can they do that? I asked for muesli and got short shrift."

Charlie returned with two hot chocolates and another black coffee and we outlined our plans for the visit. Simple really: a mooch round but Charlie really needs some "pretty vases", a couple of fold away chairs and some "kitchen things". I didn't really want anything in particular but already my eye had been caught by a woman who was stacking some rather gorgeous cushions in her trolley. "Are you buying anything Bea?" Charlie asked, wincing as she broke one of the cardinal rules. "Buying?" Bea's eyes lit up briefly but then her thoughts turned to the massacre at home. "It was awful! She's got a bit heftier than she was but Still Skinny and Everso Tanned - she took one look at Flavia who was making pasta for supper and I thought she was going to eat her. She snarled!" She shook her head as if to get rid of the image in her brain. "All this and a major decision to make!" Charlie looked blank until Bea informed her that her kitchen "is a year old now, so old fashioned so I'm auditioning designers. Stephen's having a fit at the cost but, as I said to him, I can't be doing with an MFI lash-up, not with all the entertaining he expects me to do"

She returned to the original topic of conversation with a sigh. "She's back for a week - to see how the land is lying apparently - before she decides whether or not to return to us. It was then that Flavia appeared covered in flour and asking me if I wanted her to make the ravioli I like so much. Still Skinny and Everso Tanned Au Pair dropped her flight bag and looked at me as if I had suggested she eat the contents." Charlie was clearly itching to get the tale of woe out so we could head off shopping "So, then what?". Bea dabbed her lips with a paper napkin and searched around in her massive Mulberry for her lipgloss. "She said 'Ah, I see you 'ave the imposter' and gave Flavia a filthy look. I said that Flavia has been here since she went to Argentina and has done a fantastic job, at which Still Skinny and Everso Tanned Au Pair started muttering in Spanish and started texting somebody - I dread to think who - and stalking around the house as if she owned it".

"It was then that I rang you darling - I want to keep Flavia but feel a duty to Still Skinny and Everso Tanned Au Pair. I dread to think what they're doing now. Still, if there had been blood shed, Stephen would have called by now". At this she peered at her Blackberry and allowed us to steer her round the store.

She found the furniture "interesting and affordable" but refused to believe that the leather sofa that took up most of a display stage was real leather. "Darling!" she said in knowing tones as she skittered off to look at the sheepskin rugs.

Stephen rang while we were meandering around the Marketplace to inform her that the "girls are getting on like a house on fire!" She rallied after this and seemed almost like her old self. "Lovely girl, please don't buy those cushions, faux suede is soooo Seventies!"

"I refuse to have a dinner service with the words IKEA stamped on the bottom" she said as she whisked us through the kitchen section, alienating a newly married couple from Coulsdon who were deliberating between the white and lime green set.

During our Oasis walkaround (pictures, frames, lovely little things) she got very excited about an Audrey Hepburn canvas and loaded it into our trolley as a "little present for Flavia". For Still Skinny and Everso Tanned Au Pair she bought a smaller canvas of something indistinguishable but "it could be horses.....she loves horses" and marched through to the checkouts, shuddering as we had to negotiate what was "little more than a warehouse darling, full of packing cases, forklift trucks and sweaty men in aprons".

Once we'd paid and loaded everything into the car we broached the subject of lunch. "Oooh, yes, where?" she said, carelessly chucking Audrey into her empty boot. Charlie and I both looked back at IKEA. "Lunch? In there?" she said, looking aghast. She looked even more aghast once we'd steered her into the restaurant, deposited her at a (shared) table and asked her if she wanted meatballs. "Meatballs?" she queried faintly but rallied when she saw that the family sharing our table had a prawn and egg salad. Once she'd had a glass of organic apple juice and had nibbled on a rocket leaf she relaxed enough to comment that she'd had a "lovely day so far" and that IKEA "wasn't as bad" as she'd thought.

"Although darling girls......." she said as we prepared to depart the car park "Please don't tell anyone of note that, well, you know......" We knew what she meant and watched as she shot out of the car park as if distancing herself.

She rang me at nearly 5pm to tell me that "the canvases went down very well", "the prawns are repeating themselves with alarming regularity" and that the Au Pair Stand-Off was more of a damp squib. "They've discovered they have a mutual love of R&B and horror films and have gone out to a club" Bea added that she's still no closer to sorting out which au pair goes and which one stays but at least it looks as if the decision is going to be an amicable one.

"Oh and darling, thank you so much for putting an IKEA blue bag into my boot - Stephen is delighted I've 'discovered' it and wants to go back next weekend to look at kitchens."

Ta-dah!

2009-02-05T21:51:00.006Z

Thank you Potty Mummy for tagging me to do this.......as you've probably guessed by now, I do like this sort of thing!

But it brings up, for me, the same issue that Potty has in that I don't post pics of my family or my dogs or even my friends - unless they are abstract and more than a bit random. Hence the pic of Charlie at her birthday lunch in this post. Now, you wouldn't automatically go up to a random stranger, on the basis of this picture, and say, ooh did you know that Nunhead Mum tells us all your secrets? Which is the beauty of Photo Shop I suppose.

In the same way - not that my family are instantly recognisable and are likely to get paps stalking our every movement - I wouldn't dream of posting a "proper" pic of me or mine on my blog. Quite apart from the fact that they don't know I blog (I know, not even David) it would somehow feel wrong to put a "face to the name" so to speak.

Anyway. Enough of all that.

This is what you need to do

Go to the 4th folder in your computer where you store your pictures
Pick the 4th picture in that folder
Explain the picture
Tag 4 people to do the same.

Quite happily, the fourth picture in the fourth folder on my computer is one of those arty (arsey?) shots that I seem to go in for when my friends and family screech "Oh God, she's got the camera out again!"

The scene: my kitchen. The event: my last but one birthday party. I made (!) my very own birthday cake which is a variation on Nigella's Chocolate Malteser Cake. This is my SMMR cake which sounds very much like a vaccination but is actually chocolate heaven. Its the basic Chocolate Malteser Cake but, as well as Maltesers has Minstrels, Revels and Smarties poured over the top.

David is doing the honours for myself, Charlie, Saskia, Andy, Adam, Bea and Mac. Stephen, Ian and Caitlin were, at that precise moment, winging their way over to our house from an educational trip to the Natural History Museum. I think we managed to save them some but can't be sure. The corkscrew pictured was overworked that day! The highlighter is there because we have a highlighter in every room of the house - it's an accountant thing apparently. Do you like my plates? People cry "Square plates?" at the mere sight of them.

So, my four tag-ees are as follows

Enjoy!

Snow joke

2009-02-02T10:37:00.002Z

Well, this is fun isn't it? The heaviest snowfall in London in....is it one decade or two? David, who loves a good crisis, woke me up at half past six to inform me that there's "no way" he's going into work today. "No trains, no buses!" he announced cheerfully.

I love snow. No, I do, seriously. But only if I don't have to spend that much time in it. I took the dogs out last night and they went mental. Well, Junior Dog did - Middle Dog trudged merrily along as Junior flew round like a thing possessed and Senior Dog gave the impression that he had far better things to do than walk down a snowy road at quarter past ten. The charade was repeated this morning, this time with Mac who is off school as it's shut. Junior Dog ran round and round in circles barking at Middle Dog who was more interested in trying to catch the snowflakes whilst Senior Dog sat down on a warm manhole cover and refused point blank to move.

So, we're in for the duration (even though Junior Dog has just presented me with his lead and collar for the third time since half past seven), I've made leek and potato soup, David has been despatched to Ayres to panic buy doughnuts and returned to inform me that there were "no croissants, no rolls, no french sticks, no sausage rolls......" I interrupted him with "Were there doughnuts?". When he nodded and waved a bag of six of the little devils at me, I felt a wave of calm wash over me.

There is a chance - only a small one mind, that I may be addicted.

Bringing it on

2009-01-28T20:55:00.006Z

I was going to call this post "Things I've Learnt Over the Last Couple of Weeks" but then I had second thoughts. Because I haven't really learned a lot: all the things I've "learnt" I sort of knew anyway.

Like, for instance, when in the grip of a gigantic bout of gastric nastiness and you really, really fancy a Minstrone Cup-A-Soup, don't have one. Reason being, it reproduces itself barely five minutes after you've swallowed the last mouthful and keeps you up all night, not only with increased gastric nastiness but the added bonus of flatulence.

Also, NEVER thank your lucky stars (in your beloved's ear shot) that you're so grateful that "he hasn't had what I've had!" because as sure as Sunday follows Saturday and photographers follow Posh Spice, he will get it, on the very day that you're starting to feel better after ten days. But naturally, "his" bit of it will be nastier, bigger and he'll feel so much worse than you ever did. And he'll be an even bigger drip than you, refusing to - ahem - mop and bleach and generally sanitise everything like what you did. On my first proper day of feeling better (Monday) I spent as much time huddled over the toilet bowl cleaning it as I did when I was in full flow myself.

Plus, NEVER EVER allow your mother-in-law over the threshold when you are feeling less than the full shilling. Added to the fact that my house was not up to standard (cue Amelia standing in the bathroom and bellowing "I thought you said you'd cleaned up here!"), I was "making the house a mess" by my mere presence. My lounging around outfit of tracksuit and T-shirt was deemed inappropriate and I'd feel "so much better" if I put on a nice dress or something. She arrived on Saturday and I spent much of Sunday in tears until she went home.

The first thing I did wrong was "put on a nice dress or something" and headed out to Ruby Blue in Leicester Square for Token Gay Friend Andy's 40th birthday party on Saturday night. David drove Charlie and I over there and warned me against the evils of alcohol on an almost empty stomach - all I'd eaten in the previous four days was toast.

Of course, I was floored by my Woo Woo.

I'll say that again. I was floored by my Woo Woo. Charlie, having drunk a Bramble in three minutes flat, staggered over to the bar to get me "another drink sweets". She returned with a jug of Woo Woo and helped me to demolish it, along with a plate of Cajun Wedges and Stateside Dips. By the time I rang David to come and get me I was beginning to regret everything. Traffic problems meant that he suggested that Charlie and I walk/stagger to Whitehall and he'd pick us up by the Cenotaph. Charlie had got it into her head that he meant Whitechapel and kept talking about Jack the Ripper which set off a gaggle of Japanese tourists who were posing, in the dark, in Trafalgar Square.

I actually think the excessive consumption of alcohol killed off any lingering germs - but don't attempt this yourself.

David did his best to mediate between myself and his mother on Sunday but, when faced with a plateful of greasy pork, overcooked broccoli and rock hard potatoes, I refused point blank to eat it. She then accused me of being a drama queen and insisted I eat "half of it". Now I know how Mac feels when faced with spinach. I said no, she said yes, I suddenly realised I was a 36 year old woman in my own house and in charge of my own destiny so I got up from the table, closely followed by Mac (who came to check I was okay but also to escape his own plate) and then David who spent half an hour stroking my hair as I snuffled into a cushion. She left shortly after that.

But it's not all been bad. I've learnt that, after days of having what my mum would call a "tub down" in front of the bathroom sink because I was completely averse to getting wet because I felt so crap, your first shower is fantastic. I stayed in my first one last Thursday (I know, shocking) for half an hour. Sheer bliss.

And I've also learnt that I have lovely friends - cyber and otherwise - who send me nice emails and bring me lovely books to read and a sister who rings me from the most random of places to ask how I am.

"Darling, I hope you can hear me because I can't hear you but I thought I'd ring whilst waiting for Flavia to finish her flying lesson! I'm at Biggin Hill darling! Kent! Imagine that!"

Relapse

2009-01-22T20:57:00.002Z

I thought I was getting better. As of yesterday, I wasn't. David was so concerned that he took the day off to "look after me". I tried not to go into the kitchen (smell/sight of food) because I didn't want to see the results of his attempt to get a bowl of Ready Brek into his son in my nice clean kitchen. After my second projectile vomit of the morning, he rang for the doctor because "this isn't right". We'd already had the "you're not, you know, you know......" conversation. I answered him whilst reading Armitage Shanks at very close quarters (after doing some in-my-head counting) and assured him he wasn't going to become a father again, weeks after becoming a grandfather.

"She's just not eating or drinking but keeps being sick and you know at the other end and I'm worried." I mentally rolled my eyes (too much energy to actually do it) at my beloved husband's attempt to get our GP out of his warm comfy consulting room. But then I had to throw up. Again. Obviously, Lovely Loretta at the Surgery heard me chundering and promised the doctor would be with us "soon".

He arrived just as David was leaving to collect Mac from school - he asked the same question that David did and received short shrift. I know that pregnancy affects different women in different ways but come on! I had intimate knowledge of every grain of pattern in our laminate flooring and I know the ingredients of Flash Liquid, that's not normal.

Apparently it's "something doing the rounds" and he's given me some nutrition drink that taste likes chocolate flavoured socks and told me to rest. David took today off to "look after me" but I've insisted he goes back to work tomorrow because I can't actually cope with feeling like this and being "looked after".

God love him!

Eurgh!

2009-01-20T22:25:00.003Z

I've been ill. Pause here for sympathetic noises. Not ill as in a little bit dicky or oooh, something I've eaten but ill. I won't go into details as some of you may be eating but, suffice to say, the jeans I purchased in a mad fit of "I'll lose weight at some point that they'll fit" actually fit. Okay, so I can't breathe in them but I can do them up. And walk.

Not that I plan to continue with the rather drastic weight loss plan but my darling sister, who dropped in tonight with glossy magazines, lip gloss and - rather bizzarely - a pineapple, exclaimed "Sweetheart! You have cheek bones! Oh, this is wonderful!"

Lenor, lemons and dust bunnies

2009-01-15T11:39:00.004Z

I think I’m channelling Nigella, Anthea and Kim and Aggie (and quite possibly Kelly). Seriously. I’m not quite sure what is happening but, since we got our heat back on Monday I’ve been in a domestic whirl. Whilst Alf the Plumber was fiddling around in the boiler cupboard I noticed little dust bunnies in said cupboard that wafted out onto the bathroom floor when he shut the door and informed me that “T’was sorted”. The minute Alf left the house I was up in the bathroom hoovering out the boiler cupboard. It’s sparkly clean now and I’ve even put one of those hanging air fresheners in there. I didn’t leave it there, oh no.

I steam cleaned the bathroom tiles with the handy little steam cleaner thing that Amelia bought me for Christmas. My grout is sparkling.

Then I scrubbed every piece of enamel in the bathroom before going into the toilet and repeating the whole thing. It’s now cleaner than a nun’s imagination – it actually hurts your eyes to look at it. Mac is complaining even more about having to get in the bath.

I wasn’t finished there. Safe in the knowledge that my pride and joy was having tea at friend Jack’s house and I had all the time in the world, I polished the bannisters and hoovered the upstairs carpets. Twice. Are you impressed?

I’d like to point out at this stage that I do not live in a hovel – my house is clean and tidy (stray shoes and abandoned socks notwithstanding) but I was on a mission. Something had taken me over, I was a woman possessed.

David had agreed to collect Mac on his way home from work – when they both arrived home at gone six they found me in the kitchen fondling lemons, stirring rice and griddling chicken breasts. Both were open mouthed (David especially, apparently I was fondling the lemons “suggestively”) and even more so when I showed them the already laid table. I even washed up.

After the Tuesday school run I returned home to commune with my kitchen. I made a lamb shank stew and baked a cheesecake. Then I set about cleaning the kitchen, re-organising cupboards and generally whisking about with some bicarb.

Auntie Ivy dropped in with one of her catalogues - “have a look on page 174 and tell me if the woman in the green tracksuit hasn’t got a look of our next door neighbour” – and asked me if I was feeling okay. I assured her that I was and she left with a funny look on her face. When I looked in the mirror I saw why. My hair was sticking out at all angles, half caught in a scrunchie, my face was bright red with the effort of leaning in and out of cupboards and I had bicarb all over my (black) T-shirt.

In the afternoon I rearranged the living room, much to the consternation of the hounds who dislike upheaval. My paintwork is gleaming, my sofas have been Febrezed and I opened every window in the house and huddled in my fleece jacket for two hours telling myself I was “airing” the place.

Yesterday I literally tackled the utility room. It smells heavenly in there but only in certain places…..half Lenor, half musty. I found out why when I manoeuvred the washing machine out of its little niche – the jeans that I thought had blown off the line before Christmas were moulding up nicely in the corner. It now smells as clean as a summer meadow and I think the washing machine benefited from its little shimmy – it’s stopped freaking out every time it does the spin cycle.

Mac and I made biscuits when we got home from school – he’s not quite sure how to cope with this New Domesticated Mummy. I didn’t even whinge when he trod cookie dough into the floor. As a result we had a jolly afternoon and made “not gingerbread men” and decorated them with sultanas. And I agreed to his request of “beans on toast for tea please mummy”.

Today I’ve been wafting around the house in leisure-wear (Bea, if you’re reading this, I’m sorry) inhaling the lemony freshness, marvelling at my gleaming surfaces, casting my gaze over all that I survey and content in the knowledge that, for now anyway, all is right with my world.

The Big Chill

2009-01-11T15:31:00.005Z

Well, Boiler Man (Alf) arrived at 10.35am on Saturday morning. He left at 10.40am with a promise to return "maybe Monday" with the part that our boiler requires. Five minutes to note

a) how cold it was in the house

b) that we've got a "top of the range" boiler

c) that no doubt we're missing hot water "That's what people take for granted you know!"

d) that it'll only be a matter of "unclipping one bit and putting in the new part but it's going to cost a fair bit oh, and here's my call out bill which I'll need to take for now"

I stayed out of the way while David dealt with him (to be honest I was standing in front of the oven warming my bottom half) but I noted that

a) plumbers are good at stating the bloody obvious

b) I know, so why isn't it frigging well working (my language deteriorates when I'm stressed)

c) No shit Sherlock (see "b" brackets)

d) 90 quid? £18 per minute? I'm in the wrong job. That's more than David Beckham gets, surely?

So. Whilst we wait for Alf to return "maybe Monday" we are managing. The kettle has been overworked so much that I now apologise to it every time I click it on. Mac is okay, he's been staying with Bea since Saturday morning and rings me every now and again to say things like "I'm a bit hot mummy, I had to have my window open last night!" and "It's really warm in Auntie Bea's bathroom!" which isn't helping David who would live in the bathroom if he could. He's never happier than when his splashing around in the bath or shower - the enforced abstention is killing him. He's even seriously thinking about taking Marjorie Stewart up on her offer of "taking his ablutions next door"

The dogs have taken to dragging their fleeces around with them - Junior Dog looked like Little Red Riding hood whilst he was waiting for his dinner last night, draped in his red fleece. They're all still sharing the one basket and spent last night fighting with David for bed space. They're not usually allowed on the bed but needs must. I had hounds packed tightly around me which meant that David had about six inches of mattress and no duvet. I woke up this morning to find him wrapped in his dressing gown, perched on the edge of the bed.

I've discovered that fan heaters only heat the air directly in front of them. We have ten (donated by neighbours) dotted all around the house and more cold spots than hot. I think that Gladys is also complaining about the cold because things are being moved around the house again. We lost the TV remote control this morning (come on, the TV is the only thing keeping us going!) and found it after a frantic search (David, not me, I was wrapped in my duvet on the sofa under Senior Dog) in the cutlery drawer.

I'm cooking a curry for tonight, Mac will be taken to school by Flavia in the morning and David is, for the first time in ages, looking forward to going to work. My healthy eating plan has gone out of the window and I'm dreaming about doughnuts and Sara Lee desserts. And hot chocolate. And custard. And fondues. And........

Beyond cold

2009-01-09T22:29:00.003Z

Our boiler expired at ten past eight tonight with a thud, a clunk and a prolonged hiss. David informs me that it's "buggered". We have fan heaters all over the house so it sounds like a jumbo jet is about to land. I am wearing tracksuit over pyjamas and have towelling bath robe on. David is dressed in about sixteen different layers topped off with Amelia's Christmas jumper (it's got gigantic robins in it, it's homemade) so he must be cold. All three dogs are sharing one basket and keep fighting over the fleeces.

Bea has offered us sanctuary but we can't leave the dogs and Bea is "unhappy" about the idea of them wandering in and out on her parquet flooring. Charlie has offered to come and "lift our spirits" by bringing hot water bottles and a few bottles of the alcoholic variety. Frank and Marjorie, on hearing our plight, have offered us a paraffin heater (treacherous with Junior Dog skittering about). I'm chain-drinking Galaxy hot chocolate so the healthy eating plan has gone for a burton and all I can think about his apple pie and custard.

It's cold and its miserable and we're unlikely to get a plumber round until mid afternoon and will then have to pay weekend rates. But then, having watched the Anne Frank Story on BBC1 all week and the the documentary that followed it on BBC4......I think we're all very lucky.

Easy when you know how

2009-01-08T15:14:00.002Z

The school run this morning was easier. On Tuesday we had tears, tantrums, claims of “You don’t love me mummy” (which really did a lot for the guilt levels) and massive sulks (according to Mr S about 90% of his class were in similar moods) all day. But Jessima, the sweet classroom assistant, informed me that he enjoyed his lessons and his shepherds pie for lunch. On Tuesday, Bea’s au pair Flavia picked him up and took him to school. Bea suggested it because “darling, if you’re stressed, then so is he”. The little turncoat skipped out of the door clutching his school bag and chirruping “Byeeee mummy!” as if he were auditioning for a cereal commercial. Flavia looked from him to me and gaped. She had obviously been told she would need to prise/bribe my child out of the door.

Today was calmer. I made no reference to the word “school” or conveyed any urgency whatsoever about getting there. I meandered over my Special K (is it me or is it really horrible?), sipped my tea thoughtfully and generally mooched whilst Mac ran around getting dressed (wrongly, but he tried), brushing both hair and teeth (he got that right) and finding (polished) shoes. “Erm, mummy?” he queried eventually. It was twenty to nine at this point. “Yes?” I replied, reaching casually for heat magazine. “Aren’t we going to school today?”

Hah!

After I dropped him off I came home via Argos. We needed a new laundry basket (the previous one was made of wicker and has been slowly unravelling since October – I threw a T-shirt in there last night and the whole thing collapsed in a heap) and I got some Argos vouchers for Christmas and thought I’d take advantage of the sales.

Big mistake. It seemed that the entire population of Peckham was crammed into Rye Lane Argos. There were three people on the till and, when I joined the queue, there were fifteen people in front of me. I’d used “Ring and Reserve” to pre-order my items: laundry basket, kingsize duvet set and set of tea/coffee/sugar canisters. Don’t tell me I don’t know how to live the high life.

There was a woman in front of me who must have bathed in Obsession perfume. She made my eyes itch and I still have the sore throat. She knew one of the three people on the till and there was lots of eye contact going on between them both which made me feel uneasy for some reason. The lady behind me kept bumping into me as we shuffled along slowly. She looked as if she were in full possession of the basic faculties (sight and hearing) yet kept bumping into me so forcibly that I ended up with a close up view of Obsession Woman’s hair clip each time which, as you can imagine, went down like a cup of cold sick.

After the seventh time I turned round and gave her A Look. After the tenth time, I apologised for being in her way in such a sarcastic tone that the man in front of Obsession Woman got the giggles.

After twenty minutes of queuing I reached till number two and found myself in front of Devon. Devon didn’t speak but held out his hand for my order slip. “They’re all in stock” he informed me, as if I hadn’t “Rung and Reserved”. I did not give him the pithy answer I wanted to as I didn’t have the energy.

Nor did I have the energy to sit on a brightly colour chair (all bolted to the floor) and wait for the remarkably bright computerised voice to inform me that my “item number five-one-five-three is at the collection point”. Woman Behind Me came up and promptly sat next to me, disgorging the contents of her bag all over the floor as she did so. As she bent down to pick up her purse she all but headbutted me in the ribs. She had barely had chance to put everything back in her bag before her item number was called and collected. I gaped. People ahead of me in the queue had their items and were out of the door. People after me, ditto.

I sat and seethed for five minutes whilst the purple jumpered staff behind the collection points went into a flurry of packaging items and stamping receipts. It was then that I saw my three items, clustered together on the top shelf. Hah, any minute now!”

Three minutes later the computerised voice had not announced that I could go to the collection point. Well, I went anyway. “That’s mine, all three of those” I said, quite politely, to a neon pink taloned young lady with a stud through her bottom lip whilst pointing to my easily visible items. She gave me a cursory look and continued her conversation about paper cuts. “They’re mine” I said, leaning towards my items and smiling winningly to a beautifully coiffed young gentleman who was skittering about delivering items to various customers, all of whom were snapping and snarling and not saying thank you.

I took a deep breath. Apologised to my mother for what I was about to do. Winced everso slightly and snarled “Just give me the stuff I’ve paid for and I’ll leave you to it yeah?”.

At which point I had three assistants vying to put my items in bags for me, all of them poised to stamp my receipt. As if by magic my surly tones had summoned assistance – it’s not right though is it? It seems, unfortunately, that if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.

No wonder the chairs are bolted to the floor.

For whom the school bell tolls

2009-01-05T16:27:00.002Z

For someone who has spent almost the entire Christmas break reminiscing about the “fun” that he has at school, Mac is showing a distinct lack of interest about going back to school tomorrow. For the past fortnight, his conversation has been peppered with phrases such as “Oliver makes me laugh mummy” and “I eat my lunch with Jessica sometimes” and “I like Mr S, he is funny”. When we walked past the school the other day (when I encountered Dawn and her Thornton’s toffees – but that’s another paragraph) we had to stand outside so that we could peer through the gates to “see if anyone is there”. A patrol car slowed down and kept a beady eye on us so we moved along pretty sharpish I can tell you.

Yesterday, I asked him to find his school shoes so I could polish them. “Why?” he said, peering over his comic at me and looking just like his father. “So I can clean them for Tuesday” I replied. “Why?” he repeated. “So they’re clean for school” I said. He gave me a look as if to suggest that he didn’t want to go to school on Tuesday, much less in clean shoes.

This morning I woke him up at usual “school” time – half past seven which is half an hour earlier than he has been waking up. He burrowed down deeper into his bed, wailing. I’ve spent today bouncing around the house with faux bounciness exclaiming things like “wow, you’re so lucky to be back at school tomorrow” and “are you looking forward to seeing all of your friends?” in an attempt to buoy him up. It’s not working. He’s currently sitting on the sofa looking like a little old man who has just been told there are no more Werther’s Originals.

And talking of Werthers Originals and Thornton’s toffees foisted upon me outside school gates, I’ve been really good these last couple of days. No, seriously. I mean, obviously I haven’t been sticking rigidly to my low fat, low sugar, low carb, no caffeine, no fun whatsoever diet BUT I’ve stuck to a diet of sorts. Or should I say “eating plan”. Say the word “diet” to me and you can usually find me face down in an Ayres gateau ten minutes later. I’ve decided to eat sensibly and healthily AND on Friday walked round Sainsburys up and down the cake aisle twice and did not buy anything. Nothing in the sweet bakery section found itself in my trolley. I even surprised myself. And I didn’t do my usual trick of sitting in the car on the way home saying “Ooooh, I wish I’d bought that Danish/muffin/cookie/slab cake now”.

So I’ve had the odd packet of Quavers (they’re not crisps so they don’t count) and the occasional snifter of Roses (Marjorie dropped them round as a belated thank you for having them over Christmas) – I haven’t gone mad, that’s the point.

Unlike Jane Opposite who approached me this morning while I was sorting the bins out. She was wearing a full length leopardskin coat, furry hat and dark glasses. She looked like……well, I don’t know what she looked like. “You alright?” I asked her. Bill and Jane Opposite were suspiciously quiet over the festive period – there are normally a couple of rows that spill out into the street. Last Boxing Day Jane could be heard screeching at her girls “Well, I’m fed up with effing turkey an’ all but it’s effing Christmas innit?”. Last New Years Day Bill stormed out of the house at ten past nine in the morning, gunned the Porsche and didn’t return until the fourth of January.

“Depends what you mean by alright” she said. It turns out that Bill and Jane had agreed on a “no present” rule for each other but then, at the last minute, she had cracked and bought him a watch. As a result he sulked throughout Christmas Day. “So, the day after Boxing Day he went online and found one of them clinics, you know, that do…..stuff” she added, shivering as a particularly arctic gust of wind blew up The Avenue. I asked her in for a proper chat which she refused. “I haven’t been able to sit down since Friday night” she explained, leaning on the fence and wincing.

It turns out that Bill bought her liposuction of the thighs, bottom and stomach as a belated Christmas present. Jane lowered her glasses an inch or two and I caught sight of red raw eyes “He thought I’d love it. The surgeon assures me I will. Once I can sit down, breathe and walk properly”

Hibernation

2009-01-01T15:41:00.003Z

The first day of a new year and all I want to do is sit in the warm, swaddled in fleeces and drinking hot beverages. I did, however, venture out this morning at ten to nine with Mac and all three dogs for a run round Peckham Rye park whilst David scrambled eggs and peeled smoked salmon off of the packet. I'm not a great fan of New Years Eve - I think that it's all a bit maudlin, there even (for me, anyway) seems to have a forced jollity about it all. Grinning presenters on BBC1 and all that. Bah Humbug even.

I'm having an odd day. I feel a bit low, but then it's that time of year isn't it? I'm a generally happy, bright person so find it incredibly hard to be melancholy but I know I need to let that emotion out so that I can get back on track again. Wow, this is so unlike me, I feel I need to give myself a good shake!

My mood is gradually improving as the day goes on though. They're showing an Only Fools and Horses marathon on G.O.L.D at the moment which never fails to make me smile, no matter how often I see it. Lots of snuggles and cuddles on the sofa, David is doing me a favour by eating the last of the Quality Street, Senior and Middle Dog are upside down in their beds in the warm and cosy hallway whilst Junior Dog is lying flat out in the middle of the room. Mac is reluctantly letting me share the sofa with him and about sixteen million toys.

This scene is coming up soon so I'm going back to the sofa to enjoy it fully.

Tomorrow is another day, when normal Nunhead Mum service will be resumed!

Happy New Year!

2008-12-31T11:43:00.003Z

I hope that the bongs of Big Ben bring in a happy, healthy and prosperous year for you all!

Things I have put in my mouth so far today

2008-12-29T16:24:00.003Z

two pieces of toast, butter and Bovril spread
one spoonful of Mac's Cheerios
one cup of tea
six Quality Street fondant sweets
one cup of coffee
one apple pie (small)
one ferrero rocher
Soup, Country Vegetable
crusty roll with butter
half a dozen (okay, fifteen) chicken crisps with onion and garlic dip
one glass of Ribena
one murray mint
one sausage roll (not sure why singular sausage roll wrapped in clingfilm but hey)
one rich tea biscuit
one cup of tea
one Thornton's toffee (from Dawn at school gate "You eat them or I will")
one cup of peppermint tea
one custard cream
another custard cream
one murray mint
one cup of coffee
thumbnail (my own)

I'm assuming that the above is not going to win any prizes for the Healthiest Diet award but then, to be honest, I'm merely emptying the fridge (cupboards, hidey holes and sweet tins) in preparation for 1st of January when I shall be eating only healthy, green foodstuffs and drinking only pure water and the occasional peppermint tea.

Well. That's the plan, anyway.

That was the Christmas that was

2008-12-27T19:56:00.005Z

Phew. I can breathe again for another year. I've even been incredibly smug and have bought two presents for next Christmas. And David tells me that watching QVC addles the brain! Hah! My Christmas went as well as it could have done I suppose, given the sheer crowd of people, mixed personalities, assorted foibles, miscellaneous traditions, the occasional cock-up and Amelia.

I cooked the turkeys on Christmas Eve purely because I had half a pig to cook on Christmas Day. When I texted Charlie at ten past eight in the morning to tell her that turkey number one was in the oven she replied with "It's Christmas Eve sweet?". It's her first actual Christmas Chez Moi - I don't think she was properly equipped to join our motley crew. Amelia didn't think so either and kept asking why she wasn't with her family. There was a slight cock-up in that Charlie arrived on Christmas Eve, just after Ginny when I wasn't expecting her until Christmas morning. There was loose talk about her going home again but once she was welded to the sofa with a vat of mulled wine I thought it would be too cruel to evict her. Amelia's stew was an experience and I only got through it because of the lure of the Ayres black forest gateau that Charlie brought with her as part of her contribution (the other part of her contribution was keeping me calm in the Face of Amelia - no mean feat and greatly appreciated).

Mac went up to bed at a reasonable hour for Christmas Eve - Ginny had thoughtfully brought along a set of bells from somewhere and went out into the garden for a "little tinkle". The look of wonderment on his face was magical and he couldn't get up the stairs quick enough - after leaving out the usual contribution by the utility room door of course. Ginny returned telling me that her tinkling had "attracted the attention of a mangy old moggy".

We then watched The Day After Tomorrow - I do love a good disaster movie - plundered the Quality Street tin, downed some more mulled wine and tried to convince Ginny that Charlie really didn't mind sleeping on the sofa and that she didn't have to but it was a nice offer. As Charlie said as we met outside the loo, "I couldn't have let a 60 year old woman sleep on the sofa, even if she does walk four miles a day"

Christmas Day. Ah, the tweets of little robin redbreasts, the excited woofs of the dogs as they rip their presents apart, Mac's yelling as he discovers yet another present that "I put on my list mummy" and Amelia asking me if the pork should have gone in by now. Of course, it's traditional that David should baste the pork but he was more interested in sorting out Mac's new toy. I've given in and he's now got a Wii. God help me, that's all I can say. When I say traditional, I meant of course it's traditional in Amelia's eyes. David doesn't see the point in basting - "It's just pouring the juices that have come out, back on. Isn't it?".

The dinner guests arrived in time, were perfectly complimentary about the food, provided more wine than you can shake a stick at, more laughs than you could cope with with a groaning stomach and all gathered round the television for Wallace and Gromit but pretended it was just "for the kids' sakes". Scarlett was more interested in the antics of Junior Dog, Freddie slept through it and Mac, Ian and Caitlin kept telling us the storyline before it happened. "Look, there's going to be a big bang in a minute!" Caitlin said which sent Bea into fits of giggles. Those that went home left by half eleven while the rest of us stayed up to pick over the bones of the day and the bones of the turkey. David and Jack Next Door were eating turkey sandwiches and pickled onions at gone one in the morning.

Boxing Day and the traditional Sending Amelia Out Of The House. Ginny bit the bullet and accompanied her mother, Mac and David on a "drive" whilst Charlie and I laughed over Amelia's behaviour of the previous day which, on the Day itself, drove me crackers. This included, in no particular order, complaining that the leg meat was too dry, the potatoes not fluffy enough, the sprouts under cooked, Mac was being spoilt, the mulled wine was too "strong and rancid", the dogs were out of control, I didn't have as much style as my sister, I had too many guests, I didn't have enough carrots for the Boxing Day Soup, David is putting on weight and the neighbours (Frank and Marjorie did all of the washing up) should remain "neighbours and not be dragged into this family".

This last complaint was her undoing - I pointed out, quite slickly for me, whilst waving my full glass of wine at her that Jack was a neighbour and, despite the fact that he had spent a vast fortune on her presents, had kept the dogs occupied and did all of the veg preparation, perhaps he should go home in case he's dragged into this family. Sadly, the only witness to this was Bea while we stirred the post-Christmas dinner mulled wine but it brought Amelia up short and she was blissfully silent for, oooh, at least forty minutes.

Talking of Bea, she did wonders at her Boxing Day Bash, despite the fact that the staff had had the previous two days off. "It's very much a buffet, a find us as you find us, type of thing" she cooed as we arrived. Flavia was tipping gherkins into a cut glass bowl of great antiquity but Bea bit her lip and hurried the children into the playroom for some more Wii-ing.

So, that's my festive season in a pretty big nutshell - how was it for you?

Detox, anyone?

2008-12-26T17:51:00.003Z

Here Comes Santa Claus

2008-12-24T19:43:00.002Z

Wishing you all a very merry Christmas.......hope Santa brings you all your little heart desires!

Ding Dong Merrily on High

2008-12-23T12:22:00.003Z

All is calm and peaceful in the Nunhead Mum household. The reason? Jack Next Door has taken Amelia out for "a drive". I feel he sensed my growing tension when he dropped off his contribution to Christmas Day (one table, four chairs, several bottles of wine, a Christmas cake and some peanuts) and suggested a "nice day out on Tuesday". She ummed and aahed for a bit (citing my failure to work out the table placement, sort out the defrosting times etc etc etc as reasons for not going) before agreeing. Especially when I tasked her with picking up the turkeys from the farm in Tunbridge. As I type, the wine is mulling, the tree lights are twinkling, the pork is defrosting and I'm having some "me" time.

David has heroically agreed to go shopping for me to get the last minute bits and pieces (top of my list, Christmas pudding) but won't be doing it until around midnight tonight. I'm not sure why he thinks that the good people of Dulwich and the surrounding area will be tucked up in their beds at that time and not in Sainsburys with him but I'm not going to disillusion him.

Mac has bagged up some toys that he doesn't play with any more so that a) we can take it to the St Christopher's shop after Christmas and b) so he has room for all of his new toys. This he did with little or no argument which brought a tear to my eye and made me a very proud mummy. "There are lots of children who aren't as lucky as you are sweetheart" I said to him as an opening gambit yesterday afternoon. "I'm very lucky mummy" he said, shooting me a winning smile which made me go weak at the knees. When I suggested that he give some of his old toys away, he promised he'd do it tomorrow morning. He spoiled it slightly but saying, as he went upstairs, "especially the broke ones"

Auntie Ivy has bought over enough mince pies to feed the entire Avenue - "I thought I'd bring them today rather than on Thursday" she said, sniffing the air delicately as she unwound her scarf from her neck. That woman can smell mulled wine at fifty paces. Janey, she informed me as she demolished a glass of the steaming brew, is currently in Bluewater panic buying Darren's Christmas present. "I've just given money this year" she added, spotting Amelia's Special Cup and Saucer on the draining board and enquiring where my mother in law was. When I told her she was getting the turkeys from the farm she asked if they would be ready plucked. I told her that I plucking well hoped so.

Now that it's just me and Mac (we've watched Robbie the Reindeer and I've been forced to put the Lion King on the DVD) I'm having a little bit of a panic about the next couple of days.

Tomorrow I've got to do all my last minute bits and pieces include cook two sodding great turkeys. This will mean fending off enquiries from Amelia as to whether or not I'm basting them too much or not enough. Boiling a ham for Boxing Day to take to Bea's (I think she's regretting giving her staff Christmas Day off as she's having to "go places with the hoover that I never knew existed") and sorting out the placement for Christmas dinner. Oh, and allowing Amelia in my kitchen so that she can cook Christmas Eve dinner of.....I'm not sure what yet but she mentioned "stewing" something. David's sister Ginny tried to get out of dinner by arriving first thing Christmas morning but Amelia put a stop to her gallop.

On the Big Day itself I'm most looking forward to the present opening. I'm hoping David will like his Armani Diamonds and his new scarf and that Mac will show more interest in his presents rather than the boxes. Amelia will bill and coo over her presents because I'll drop lots of hints that her precious son chose them all himself (he didn't but if I admitted I'd bought the monstrous crystal thing then she'll hate it). Ginny will be grateful for any gift because, as she says, she so rarely gets them. "The Colonel thinks he can get away with giving me a Terry's Chocolate Orange and a quick fumble".

And then the guests will arrive. Apart from us three, Amelia and Ginny we've got.....(pause here to take huge deep gust of air).....Dad, Bea, Stephen, Ian and Caitlin; Daisy, Ivy, Jim, Janey, Darren and Scarlett; Lydia, Matt and Freddie; Jack Next Door; Charlie and Frank and Marjorie Stewart. I don't think I've missed anyone out (if I have then I shall just smile sweetly and squish them in round the table). Just the 23 for dinner then.

Boxing Day will be spent making Mum's Special Soup, undoing buttons of my jeans and trying to suggest that David takes his mother and Mac out so that the dogs and I can break wind (them) and eat (me) without hearing any Tutting From Amelia.

Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas!!!!!!

Seven again

2008-12-21T22:02:00.004Z

Last Sunday, as part of Bush Mummy's meme, I was asked to complete a list of "Sevens"....the first "seven" being the seven things I must do before my parents arrive. This was billed as the seven things I must do before my mother in law arrives. They were as follows

1) attempt to pass off Sainsbury's Christmas pudding as my own

2) put festive lights up at window

3) bulk buy Kalms and paracetomol

4) get rid of my cold

5) buy Amelia's present

6) clean out fish tank and rabbit hutch

7) clean oven

I can now update my list thus:

1) attempt to pass off Sainsbury's Christmas pudding as my own Not even purchased yet. Have looked at the shelves full of Christmas puddings but am torn between a bog standard one, a luxury one, an alcoholic one, a luxury alcoholic one or a slightly alarming looking toffee chocolatey one. Easier to pass off bog standard one as my own but really like the look of the luxury alcoholic one and have put it on my Tuesday shopping list.

2) put festive lights up at window I did this last Monday evening until I viewed my house lit up from the other side of the road. One side I have the Stewarts and their epic Christmas lights display and the other side I have Jack Next Door and his privet hedge which has "a millyon twinkly stars in it mummy" (a job lot of outdoor lights from B&Q woven into the bush). Feel like the poor relation and haven't switched our shabby effort on since.

3) bulk buy Kalms and paracetomol Paracetomol purchased and lovingly stored in cupboard above cooker. Saskia has poohpoohed Kalms (she has test-driven them whilst dealing with members of the public at Gatwick airport AND whilst wearing an orange shirt and has assured me that they are "old hat now") What I need, apparently, is a good nights sleep every night and so she has recommended Nytol. "A dose of them each night and they'll last you right the way round to teatime the following day".

4) get rid of my cold Don't tell anyone but I seem to have achieved this. Okay, so I sound like I'm on forty a day after any exertion and keep getting that annoying little tickle at the back of my throat but it's nothing that a good old choke and a Quality Street won't solve.

5) buy Amelia's present I cunningly handed this chore (and it is, believe me) over to David. When I asked him yesterday what he'd bought for his mother he looked at me blankly, ummed and aaahed a bit, went red and then went out to check the shed. I spent today at Bluewater, being run over by obsessive women pushing buggies, sworn at by panicking men folk (one of whom kept going up to women in a lingerie department and asking them to hold up bras to their chests to see if he could envisage "his wife wearing it"). I ended up spending an obscene amount of money on labour saving gadgets in Lakeland, a hideous Swav....Swark.....Swazziwotsit crystal cat and a jumper that I just know isn't going to be good enough. David spent the day watching Sky Movies with Mac and had the nerve to tell me at ten to eight that he was "knackered".

6) clean out fish tank and rabbit hutch I've dropped fish tank and rabbit hutch shaped hints to David all week. He'll do it "tomorrow".

7) clean oven Not a hope in hell. I'll just have to keep everyone away from the oven and take the bulb out whilst it's in operation so no-one gets a peek. Failing that, loudly castigate David along the lines of "The one thing, the one thing I asked you to do......" and ignore the confused and bewildered expression on his face.

Amelia arrives on the 4.25pm train tomorrow. Should I panic now, or wait until she gets here?

Bells will be ringing

2008-12-19T19:25:00.003Z

David was never really keen on going to his work Christmas do. I got an inkling of this negativity when I asked him last week what I should wear "Do I go in Old Faithful so they don't think you're flashing the cash and buying me new outfits in these troubled times or do I wear something new just to prove you're not worried about this credit crunch malarky?" He muttered something and retreated to the living room with the paper.

This morning, before he left for work, he announced that he "really didn't fancy" going tonight. "It's bad enough that I have to spend five days a week sharing their breathing space, I really don't want to spend my own time with them as well." I must admit I was quite relieved, I hadn't decided what to wear and memories of last year were still looming large in my mind. If I want to be manhandled inefficiently under the mistletoe by Neanderthals I can pop into the Transport Department at work.

So. We're not going. Or, we haven't gone, it being half past seven and the table was booked for seven. The sense of liberation is massive. David is as giddy as a kipper and, when I asked what takeaway he fancied for dinner, Indian or Chinese he giggled "Both!" and chased me round the kitchen. Charlie - redundant as baby sitter but staying for dinner - rescued the menus from me as I ran round her for the third time and took over the decision for us.

All three of us are getting stuck into the merlot and are planning a night of soaps until nine and then a lovely horror movie. Not necessarily festive but sheer bliss!

When a child is born

2008-12-18T11:06:00.000Z

I’m so caught up in a social whirl that I’m extremely dizzy. Oh, not mine, but Mac’s. He’s taken to asking me, in world weary tones as I pick him up from school, “Mummy, am I in or out tonight?”. He’s had Santa parties, cinema trips (Madagascar 2 is “sooooooo funny mummy”), outings for pizza and Christmas themed play-dates that fair boggle the mind. He has enough plastic crap to fill several bins (including the particularly sharp bits that stab you in the foot during your midnight visit to the littlest room) and his excitement levels are somewhere above roof level.

But most of the excitement is reserved for Sunday and Queen Bee Mummy’s Festive Extravaganza. I’ve heard rumours that she’s employed the best Santa impersonator this side of Lapland, hired several snow machines and has a team of elves and fairies all ready to give a handful of festive fun to hyperactive children. He “can’t wait” and, when my mum’s brother rang last night to say that he’d be popping in on Sunday afternoon, Mac begged to still be allowed to go to Queen Bee Mummy’s house. I felt so sorry for Uncle Harry (he could hear the wailing) that I invited him to Sunday lunch as well.

Lydia did a very brave thing last night. She came to the cinema with me. Without Freddie. She was surgically attached to her mobile phone throughout and, when the nice men asked us to turn off our mobiles during the run up to the film, she said “not bloody likely” and risked the wrath of Sweet Munching Couple who were sitting directly in front of us.

“I’ve not left him. With anyone. Not even Matt” she wailed as I drove her to Surrey Quays in a locked car (for fear she’d bolt). “I mean, will he be alright?” she said as she speed-dialled Matthew for the third time in half an hour. “Is he okay, is he feeding okay? Does he miss me?” Matt’s answers were obviously short and not so sweet as she took on the look of a bulldog sucking a lemon soaked wasp.

I managed to get her through the ticket queue, into the popcorn section (where she hesitated for all of ten seconds before getting the biggest box of the confection that she could carry) and into her chair before she rang Matt again. “He’s not answering. Oh my God, there’s been an accident! He’s ignoring me because Freddie’s not breathing!” Sweet Munching Couple turned round and stared. She stood up, shooting popcorn everywhere and paced. Not easy to do in a cinema seat aisle.

It turned out that Matt was upstairs feeding Freddie when she rang and so missed all nine of her calls. I practically had to sit on her to stop her from leaving. “He’ll be fine, everything is fine, don’t worry, it’s okay, it’s okay, sssh, sssh….” I said, stroking her arm as if she were a racehorse that had been frightened.

Still. The film was good and after about the first half an hour she’d relaxed but kept checking her mobile for missed calls or texts. We exploded out of the cinema at half past seven and she received the news that Freddie was asleep, had been asleep for an hour, was fed, winded, changed and happy. I heard Matt say, witheringly “And I’m okay too” before she rang off. “Food?” she enquired cheerfully and headed off in the direction of Frankie and Benny’s.

As we ate our way through a pile of garlic bread (mobile phone sitting between us on the table) she revealed that she wasn’t quite getting the hang of this motherhood lark. I refrained from commenting. “I get so paranoid and worried and then panic. Even when everything is okay, I feel that I’m not doing it right or I’m not giving him enough attention or he’s not eating enough or he’s eating too much…or he’s not developing properly, he keeps getting hiccups..and…oh, I don’t know..…..” she shoved a slice of bread into her mouth and chewed mournfully. I told her that she’d just summed up Motherhood. “You mean I’ve got this Fear of Getting It Wrong and Associated Paranoia for the rest of his life?” she gaped at me. “Well, until he’s at least sixteen, yes” I said, quite encouragingly I thought. “Everything’s changed since he was born” she revealed as we tucked into Steak with Garlic Prawns. “I mean, poor Matt has taken a back seat and he does so much for both of us. He does all the nights while I try to sleep but I can’t because I worry that he’s doing it wrong and……well, down there is still not right.”

Oh God.

I’ve had discussions like this before. I’ve even shared intimate information with my mummy colleagues (even though I was cringing so much I thought I’d turn myself inside out). My friend Rosie once brought an entire tea party to a standstill by informing us that, after the birth of her pride and joy, her entire lady garden went numb for six and a half months. “I’d never have an epidural again – it froze the wrong bit.” she added, biting into a slice of carrot cake. Janey thinks nothing of telling you that “my minnie has stretched a bit”.

Lydia looked as if she was going to lay bare (as it were) an entire problem page full of issues and concerns and all over dinner. “I mean. After you had Mac did you and David wait…..well, how long did you wait until…..you know?” she whispered, leaning forward and draping her scarf into her coleslaw. I fudged the answer in a completely unsatisfactory manner and pretended I was choking on a prawn to avoid any more questions.

“My mum said that after she had me and my sister she was never right again.” She went on. “Mind you, she was quite pleased to get out of what she calls the whole mucky business so our being born was a boon to her. But it explains why dad went off with that barmaid from the golf club……” We ate the rest of our meal in silence, during which time she’d made a few decisions.

She outlined them in the car on the way home. “Number one, try and relax a bit more – look, I haven’t phoned Matt for half an hour! Number two, try to be less paranoid about his breathing and feeding. Number three, seduce Matthew when he least expects it.”

She seemed quite happy with this and even managed to put her mobile phone away in her bag.