Sep 8 2012

Bring it all back home – Day 3 – Ah go on, go on, go on

Bank Holiday  – not as sunny a day as yesterday but not a problem, for today is a day of being inside – for meeting up with Lovely Hub’s family for lunch and playing it all by ear (or hearing aid in some cases).

Choosing a venue for lunch is no mean feat due to the physical restrictions attached to my in-laws.  Mutti –  she is a survivor of the Berlin blockade, has a wickedly Germanic sense of humour and is much-loved by all – has a  top of the range rollater (wheeled zimmer frame with brakes and a storage seat).  Dad – aka Vati (pronounced Farty because he is one) uses a walking stick which must have magic properties because it rarely touches the ground but hovers tantalisingly about three inches up in the air.  They both have hearing aids – which they often forget to switch on so that they have shouty conversations with each other – and anyone else within earshot.   In addition, their appetites are small and they don’t like huge portions – oh boo!

The last time we lunched together – the day after the big-my-family-wedding  in 2011  – my Dad was with us and what should have been a rather jolly family meal turned into a horrendous wait-fest because the waitress forgot to tell the kitchen about half our meals.  So some of those present had rapidly cooling and uneaten roasts due to good manners whilst the others  looked on in what would have been envy if anyone had started eating.  Eventually everyone had some kind of edible food but the meal that should have taken an hour or so extended to three, and as we were wanting to get back and pack because we were driving home that night – the bonhomie rapidly ran out.

No time restrictions on this occasion as we are staying down here all week and have deliberately avoided making any other plans today.  Conversations with my cousins and Hub’s sister have identified a suitable place for lunch.  For me it is a place of mystery called The Lone Barn.  Throughout the aforementioned misspent youth, I visited this place on many occasions but never in a sober state.  Tucked away near Hungerford Bottom (fnar fnar) I knew when I was there because everything smelled of wood fires, and having been roused from a happily semi-conscious stupor in the back seat of someone’s little red MGB GT (hideously cramped – I found the only way to endure a speedy journey under such conditions was to nod off) I’d join my chums in an evening of drinking that would inevitably lead to my climbing back into the car and taken home in an even jollier state.  Hence, I have no idea where The Lone Barn is and only really recognise  it from the car park and the smell of smoke.  Luckily Lovely Hub knew the way.

The plan was that Hub would take me, Uni Boy and College Boy down there first so that we could get in some drinks and identify any potential hazards.  He would then collect Mutti and Farty, meeting up with his sister, her husband, their son and his girlfriend back at the barn (you lot know who you are and although I could make up silly names for you, I won’t  – except for EEEEE – my bruv-in-law and the only person who can get away with calling me Chell – so I get away with calling him EEEEE.  No names in this blog  in order to protect the innocent/dreadfully guilty).

Seating can be an issue.  Mutti likes to talk German with UB – who likes to talk German back.  We also like to stick UB near Farty because he can usually spout sufficient technical stuff to shut Farty up.  I am happy sitting anywhere so long as I am not near Farty because I never know when he comes to the punch line and spend my time with a fixed grin on my face. I don’t see my sister in law, EEEEE and our nephew often enough, have only met his girlfriend once before but know that we will probably spend the evening with them so there will be time to catch up.   CB doesn’t like sitting with anyone except maybe me and his Dad – although Hub’s sister is an exception because she doesn’t hassle him and he likes her (me too).  Hub has to be within shouting distance of his parents.

UB, CB and I identify our table, get drinks and stake a claim to our seats.  I get a text from Hub to say that the eagles are on their way and text him back to warn him that there are a number of steps to negotiate in order to get down to the room we have been placed in.  Judging from the number of reserved tables and disappointed faces as people walk in , look at the notices and slink out again, we are in a prime spot.  CB – in a suitably Northern paranoid state – has decided that EVERYONE is looking at him because he doesn’t have the same accent as the rest of us – our Southern burrs have returned with a vengeance in the past 24 hours.  I point out that Mutti doesn’t have a local accent either but he is not in a mood to be placated.  He’s been eating far too much protein and it makes him even more grouchy.

The Cavalcade arriveth.  Mutti is supported by her son and daughter – the rollater is lifted down the steps and placed for safekeeping with the children’s high chairs.  EEEEE makes some suitably off-colour paedophile comments about the advisability of putting it there.  Luckily Mutti doesn’t hear him – although she’d probably laugh anyway if she did.  Farty follows – equally supported by his son-in-law, nephew and girlfriend, and the hovering walking stick.

We are seated and I am happy because I have Hub on one side, CB on the other, Hub’s sister and UB opposite.  Farty and Mutti can shout from the top of the table and I am close enough to hear the muttered naughtiness that is EEEEE and exchange grins with my nephew and his girlfriend.  Phew!

UB and I go for starters but we are in a minority.  Mutti takes the opportunity to bombard UB with questions auf deutsch.  Being the polite well-brought up young man that he is, he answers every question – usually as his fork is midway between mouth and plate.  As a consequence it takes him a long time to get through his antipasti, until Lovely Hub and EEEEE take pity and manage distract Mutti  long enough for UB to finish.  Good job it was a cold starter.

The main course provides respite and the chance to munch in peace.  The food was good, as was the service and the hardy trenchermen (and women) amongst us make it through to pudding, coffee and the logistics of where we are going next and how we get there.

After lengthy discussions, all are agreed that it is back to ours – so that Mutti and Farty can have a look at where we’re staying and make complimentary (Mutti) and derogatory (Farty) comments about our choice of accommodation.

The kind manager gives us special dispensation to use the fire door rather than manhandling a slightly heavier pair of oldies up the stairs and down to the car park again.  There are a mere three wide stone steps and a kerb to negotiate.  Piece of cake.

Farty and his levitating walking stick go first; son in front of him,son-in-law and grandson on either side, naughty daughter-in-law hovering in the background wanting to give him a damn good push – but I didn’t Your Honour.

Have you ever watched the scene in ‘Father Ted’ where the lovely Mrs Doyle is standing on a chair washing the windows and undergoes a moment or two of indecision about how to get down.  Her foot hovers, wavers, ‘ah go on, go on, go on’ and then like a dropped stone she falls.  Farty’s feet did this – several times – the growing throng behind him becoming impatient; Mutti has her rollater revved up and ready to go but Farty is blocking the exit with his very impressive frail old duffer act.

Reader – we got him down the steps – I don’t know how but I think the firm hands and limited patience of the man I know and love had quite a lot to do with it.  With Farty down on terra firma the attention is fully focused on Mutti and her wheels of fire.  Farty takes his chance and starts to leg it toward the cars.  I call out a reluctant warning about the steepness of the kerb but stand there with my mouth open as he hops down like a five-year old and walks confidently across the gravel to the passenger side of our car (MY seat).

We stand there in amazement; CB, my nephew, myself and EEEEE, slightly gobsmacked by this apparent miracle until we realise that the three people Farty most wants to convince of his frailty are totally oblivious.  Mutti, her daughter and son are still negotiating the steps and have seen nothing. The myth that is Farty continues.

All back to ours and as predicted, everyone else is complimentary whilst Farty makes comments about the amount of white emulsion used on the walls and how he would have decorated in QUITE a different fashion. Hmmm. And when was the last  time you used a paintbrush then?

Professionally speaking I should be more tolerant of his alleged confusion and dithering but after twenty-five years of snide comments made to me when no one else was in earshot and being groped under the pretence of a kiss good-bye or hello, I’ve had enough.

I lend them my Hub for some urgent DIY jobs that no one else can possibly do (yeah right) and manage (with the protective assistance of UB and CB who fully understand why I don’t like getting to close to Farty) I skillfully avoid the parting embrace yet again.

EEEEE and family leave a bit later and we arrange to meet up at theirs for the evening. A no stress situation.

CB goes for a lie down – the strain of sociability is telling on him.  UB departs to his room for some US political therapy – don’t ask – and I sit down to relax with my Kindle till Hub comes home.

The urgent DIY tasks?  Replacing a raised toilet seat and bath bar; I don’t begrudge their borrowing back their boy and I hope that one day someone will have the same attitude when I need to borrow my boys back.  Hub has also taken the opportunity to talk about the future; harrowing stuff like wills and power of attorney and where all the paperwork is kept. Our recent experiences have forewarned us about the importance of knowing where everything is come the end.

The ending always comes at last; endings always come too fast.

Sep 1 2012

Bring it all back home ….Day 2 ….Running in the family

I am blessed with a large family of aunties, uncles and cousins.  I love them whole-heartedly and unconditionally.  I miss being able to see them when I want to because they are all down South and we are up North. We meet up at weddings, funerals, and back in 2009 when we rented a different house in Hamble, an impromptu open house day where everyone brought food, drink, and especially Pimms.  It was a fine day.

My Mum was one of five; the oldest girl.  When we were growing up we met all our cousins at various functions – my Dad was the youngest of thirteen so I had dozens of cousins that I rarely knew – but we had the most to do with the children of my Mum’s two sisters; Auntie R and Auntie P.  Auntie R had three boys of similar ages to me and my sibs, then ten years later beautiful blonde twin girls.  Auntie P had a boy, then three girls, all young enough for me to able to say – on far too many occasions –  ‘Ha! I used to change your nappies when you were little!’

At various stages of my life I have stayed with them and we have played pivotal parts in each others lives.  We are a family of mild eccentrics and largely, we have acquired partners that complement those peculiar quirks that make us who we are.  Perhaps this is one of the reasons why the celebration of diversity has always meant more to me than the suspicion that you so often encounter with people who can’t cope with change.  I like unusual, original, bizarre – which is just as well really.

Whilst the older generation have whittled down a bit and are no doubt having a celestial garden party at this very moment, my generation has remained blessedly intact.  Things were touch and go when we nearly lost my almost Twin  – my Auntie R’s second oldest .  We were born a month apart and for a long time he found it hard to forgive me for being born first – especially when we were about three or four, bridesmaid and pageboy at Auntie P’s wedding, and I squeezed his hand too tightly as we walked down the aisle.  As an obnoxious almost teenager I used to pull his hair and give him migraines, but always a gentleman he rarely retaliated.  He got swine flu – Christmas 2010 and was very, very ill.  He was in my thoughts daily and the combination of his indomitable strength and the family forcefield pulled him through in the end. A life without him in it would be  unthinkable.

The last time we met en masse was July 2011 for a handfasting and wedding.  It was a beautiful day and my Ronnie loved every minute of it.  There was time to talk and for the next generation to tentatively get to know each other again.  One of the best bits was to see my Twin, high wide and handsome, and almost completely recovered.  The photographer climbed up to a vantage point in the house where the wedding was held,  and managed to take one of those panoramic photos where you can spend hours with a magnifying glass trying to identify everyone and still failing to work out who that was in the fuschia fascinator – assuming that it was a fascinator and not a horrible growth on the side of someone’s face.

In short – my family are brill.

Before leaving home we sent out e-mails, texts and some snail mail to let everyone know that we were visiting down South again and when. Responses trickled in.  Day 2 of our holiday was the designated open house and being a bit better off than three years earlier, we just said bring yourselves and some booze – we’ll feed you.

Bearing in mind that Lovely Hub and I had only seen pictures of the garden here and had arrived in the dark the night before, drawing back the curtains and revealing a sunny conservatory that opened on a not too big but not too small enclosed garden  the next morning – was bliss.  We breakfasted, left the boys in bed and hit Tesco with a vengeance.

By the time we got back the boys were beginning to surface and ablute – much disgust from CB because we only had one bathroom and he had to wait for his older brother to shower first.  Hub and I ignored the whingeing, laid out the food (Hub) and prepared the Pimms (me of course).

There were eighteen of us at one stage; my Twin brought his four boys and there was a commingling of cousins and second cousins that worked harmoniously – apart from me chasing CB round the front garden with a stick – I was smiling therefore it was playfighting.  The sun shone, the drink flowed, the food was consumed.  A semblance of American football was played out in the garden by those with more energy and inclination, CB’s flight simulator kept the small boys (and the big ones) occupied when they weren’t running, eating and drinking. Us olders just ate and drank and talked and laughed; raised a glass to absent friends and in particular to Mum and Ronnie, just as we had three years before about half a mile up the road. My big sis brought back the crate containing Mum’s jewels and bric-a-brac ready for us to tote it around the rest of our relatives to see if anyone else wanted a memento.  It seems a lifetime since I loaded all the little boxes and bubble-wrapped packets into the crate but in reality it was only two months ago.

Our last guest – one of our beautiful twins – left at 2300 hrs – ish.  We put the world to rights and caught up on lost time whilst Hub and the boys tidied up around us  and battened down the hatches for the night – well UB did – CB had retreated to his bedroom with his laptop – the strain of having been sociable all day too much for him.  Hub, UB and I walked our guest  up the rutty unmade road to her car.  A pothole found me and with a definite feeling of deja vu, down I went.  Full force on the knee that had almost recovered from the football boots incident of the week before.

Got up.  Brave face.  Waited till I got back indoors before having a permitted whinge and snivel,  and the application of stinging antiseptic wipes to get rid of the gravel. More than slight feeling of relief that I’d packed some First Aid stuff and that it all seemed to be just surface damage anyway.

From the first guests – including the youngest – our splendid great nephew H at only 9 months – to the last –  it was a great day.  Whatever my sons say the falling over at the end bit was due to pot holes, darkness and my general clumsiness.  Nothing at all to do with the vast quantities of Pimms consumed – Hub was dispatched to the local Co-Op for more supplies during the evening – we didn’t even consider the possibility that the Hamble Co-Op wouldn’t  sell Pimms.

Perish the thought.

 

 

Aug 30 2012

Bring it all back home ….Day 1

We are on our jolly holidays – so this blog may be in bits and not all of them in a logical sequence – but that kind of sums up our families –  so fairly apt  really.

This week we are mostly in Hamble (or Hamble-le-Rice according to the signposts – nothing to do with risotto or pudding with a claggy skin – the rice is olde Englishe for Rise – so Hamble on the Hill really).  This area forms a link for Lovely Hub and I – we both spent (or misspent in my case) some of our formative years stomping around Hamble. Lovely Hub went to senior school here, and I wasted a couple of summers chasing (and sometimes catching) charming , suntanned grotty yachties with tumbled blonde curls and names like Giles, Piers and Jonty – usually coupled with at least two barrels of a surname.  Set on the Solent, for us it is a very special place.

We are just up the road from Hub’s parents and within easy visiting distance of the rest of the family.  Should you be interested, the house we are renting is on the market for £630,000 and is described as a ‘crewhouse’.  Ideal for housing international yachties and powerboat racers when they come here for Cowes week and all the other wet things that go on in this part of the world.  On a small and very select private estate of Art Deco bungalows built in the 1930s  – so posh that Hub and I didn’t even know it existed until we decided to rent it for a week.

As I know from said misspent youth, Hamble is a village designed for the the athletic pub crawler; you start at Ye Olde Whyte Harte, via the King and Queen and fetch up at The Bugle – there are others but this is a logical line for the inebriated sailor.

Before we even got here we had a mission to accomplish however.  A friend from way back moved to a village outside Oxford quite a few years ago and on another trip down South we had popped in to see her and her family – our two boys and her two boys were of a similar age and naturally hostile.  Hub and I had a nice time though.  We keep in touch and send birthday and Christmas cards and as she is one of our favourite people, we decided that the boys had matured sufficiently for another visit en route.

Lovely Hub brought cold meat and stuff to nibble; the boys and I decided to trust our luck to the motorway services.  Fools.  We pulled up at the M6 Toll services and were greeted with a burger place that didn’t bear either of the fast food names we were used to.  College Boy declined – he distrusts the unknown, but Uni Boy and I tested it out.  Overdone burgers, flaccid fries and totally charmless serving staff.  We won’t get fooled again.

The traffic was horrendous and so was the weather; torrential rain and forked lightning – very, very frightening (well, not really as Hub and I both like thunderstorms).  It slowed us down a fair bit though and we were already running rather late.  We were supposed to leave at 0900 hrs when I finished work but it was 1215 before we finally really hit the motorway.

Once we got to our friend’s house it was a great visit.  All four boys were bigger and more sociable.  If you listened to College Boy you would be under the impression that the planned hour-long visit (which stretched to two with no effort at all) was spent picking on him but he took most of it in good part – I thought.  He patted me on the head at one point and I flicked my hand out to brush him away and accidentally (no, honestly) caught his lip – so silly to put his face so close to my hand!  No blood – just a bit of localised swelling and a guilty Mum.

By the time we hit the road again College Boy was beyond reason he was so hungry.  I found him a BK in Newbury and once he had the food in his hands he let us have it – with both barrels – apparently we had conspired to starve and humiliate him and he hated all three of us.  He gets like that when he’s hungry.  We bailed and hit Sainburys, giving us a chance to stock up on some essentials and him the opportunity to demolish his burger (no bun or fries – he’s off carbs this week – another reason for being so grumpy).

The nice lady that owns this house was actually staying in the one-bedroom annexe attached to it; so she didn’t have far to go to let us in – just as well as I had arranged for us to be here late afternoon/early evening and we rattled in around 2030 hrs.  The house was as big, airy and well-equipped as we’d been led to believe from the photographs, and once all the bedrooms were allotted and luggage lugged in, Hub and CB went off to kill some kebabs.

Back twenty-five years when Lovely Hub and I first got together we used to get our kebabs from a shop in town called Zorbas.  It was (and still is) owned by a chap called John who came from Iran and who I knew by sight from my ‘A’ level sojourn at the local Tech.  Whenever we come home we have to make at least one pilgrimage to Zorbas; they have the best chilli sauce and all four of us will very happily bunch through a couple of trays of their  green chillies.  Sometimes John is there and he greets us like long-lost family.  So good to be back home again.

By the time my hunter-gatherers had returned with their kill, Uni Boy and I had unpacked (a little) and set up the laptops (yay for wifi).  After stopping to feed and drink (hard, cloudy cider – we really are home), we finally managed to stow everything away before midnight.  It was dark when we arrived so we didn’t get to see much of the outside of the building but decided to save that as a nice surprise for the next morning.  The TVs worked, the wifi worked (slow but constant at least) and the boys had stopped bickering.  Even the bed wasn’t too squashy.

Aug 17 2012

Falling – definitely without style or grace

The battle with TMA 05 continues but will be completed this weekend.  I have decreed it and in all honesty its only a matter of the introduction, discussion and abstract to do now – piece of cake.  Life has an extraordinary habit of getting in the way and skewing my results however.

Monday brought its small triumphs – the heinous crime me and my musketeers had been accused of committing on Friday morning was blown out of the water by Friday afternoon – due to the fact that my OC-ness makes me file things in a multitude of Outlook folders – and on Friday afternoon I found the piece of evidence that was our vindication.

Unable to crow on Monday however because our accuser was out for the day – a small compensation was that I copied the world and his wife into the email containing our evidence and the big boss at least, knew we were innocent.

So on Tuesday morning I got up, trudged around the kitchen in peaceful solitude whilst the rest of the household slept, then, with my hands full of breakfast and packed lunch-making paraphernalia, tripped over College Boy’s very expensive football boots (electric blue – I almost covet them), did a far from elegant triple salko with twists and ended up in a heap on the floor – wailing.

Lovely Hub was at my side within moments – as was Uni Boy – who had been so absolutely terrified by my animalistic screechings that he actually got out of bed (before three pm) to see what was wrong. In unison they were pleading with me to wiggle my toes and fingers – what?  I’m lying here in a distressed heap, winded, shocked and more than a little embarrassed and you want me to wiggle things!

Of course, as the shock of it all ebbed away I realised why I needed to wiggle my appendages and did so with aplomb – phew – nothing broken.  I managed to get to my feet unaided – in an effort to regain some small shred of dignity – and surveyed the damage.

The container of milk was intact, as were the tomatoes and I didn’t even squash the bread rolls or break the plastic butter carton.  I bore the brunt of the fall; my right knee made contact with the coir doormat ‘Please wipe your paws’ indeed! Spectacular gravel rash  and the promise of mega bruises to come.  My elbow hit the ground second; more gravel rash and the imprint of the skirting board half-way up my arm – mo’ bruising.

My first instinct was to go back to bed and whimper pathetically.  No one likes falling over.  It’s that feeling of being out of control and watching everything dissolve into slow motion before your very eyes.  Uni Boy was very upset by it however and the old maternal instinct kicked in – ‘I’m fine – honestly – no bones broken – just a bit of blood and some bruises – I really am fine’  – she lied.

Lovely Hub – who after twenty-five years knows me best – looked at me with that sideways sceptical look and agreed that I needed to keep moving about – going to bed all day sounded good but I’d feel worse for it and would be even more whingy.

After cleaning my wounds with the antiseptic wipes bought for the  paintball weekend (and never used) – they stung and many rude words were said that shocked the baby Jesus (sorry Auntie P – I lied when I said that I didn’t swear – I did – a lot.),  I put my brave face on and after promising not to walk around the kitchen with both hands full, went back to making my packed lunch and breakfast. All three of us kicked College Boy’s football boots out of the kitchen trade route (please don’t tell him).

After showing my wounds off to my work chums, I was summoned into the office of he-who-thinks-he-should-be-obeyed-but-I-remember-when-he-was-just-one-of-my-support-workers-and-I-had-to-tell-him-everything.  He apologised for the fact that his office smelled of damp (I’d put it down to him and a poorly dried shirt actually).  I flashed my wounds in an effort to engender sympathy and lessen the impact of the inevitable telling-off that was to come.

“You know why you’re here.”

Ha!  You won’t catch me with that one.  I have already mentally run through my past week of sins, lack of respect for senior staff and inappropriate comments, and you will have to use the thumb screws – or even the Iron Maiden – to get me to admit to anything.

“The email you sent out on Friday?” he reminds me after catching sight of my deliberately blank expression.

“Oh. Yes?” I smile sweetly but innocence is not a natural expression for this face.

Turns out  – of course – that he knew all along that we had not transgressed – he was just making sure.  Yeah right.  It really felt like that on Friday morning when we were being threatened with an Ombudsman’s inquiry and made to feel incompetent in front of the rest of the office.

I listened and promised to go back and appease my chums – he promised to send us an apologetic email (oh wow).  I fled to my meeting; the main reason for dragging my pain-wracked body into work.  No, honestly it really did hurt.

Whilst limping down the corridor I almost bumped into one of our occupational therapists.  I didn’t fall this time but after he’d finished sniggering at my gravel rash (are you sure they aren’t carpet burns?) he gave me the obligatory OT falls prevention lecture –  “Always leave one hand free to break your fall’ – in my case I would probably have broken my wrist instead. It’s quite a boon being ambidextrous but I really don’t write as well with my left hand and there are other things which I won’t go into, which might have proved awkward if done with the left hand.

College Boy was up when I got home from work that evening.  He didn’t leave his football boos in the middle of the kitchen floor  of course – someone ELSE must have – and anyway – shouldn’t I have been looking where I was going in the first place? Sigh – I knew this was going to be ALL my fault in the end.

Still – I got takeaway, the night off from studying, a visit from my lovely friend L and a pack of melolin dressings to protect my poor knee and elbow.

The theme of violence has continued on this week.  Hub and I had to call the rozzers on 999 on Wednesday.  Two thugs and a dog were giving it large to another unfortunate youth as we drove home from work – there was blood and the odds didn’t look good.  I did the phoning and Hub did the numerical remembering (car reg of the female who picked up the wounded warrior).

I managed to give a reasonable description of the thugs (aided by the fact that we turned the car round and followed them once we knew the victim had escaped) – all that stuff we’ve done on eye-witness testimony in Cog Psych came in quite handy.  They ‘made’ us though and on the advice of the rozzer on the phone, we did a Gene Hunt-style U-turn and got the flock out of there.

Today has been ‘A’ and ‘AS’ level results day.  College Boy and I managed a full and frank discussion for all of five minutes before it deteriorated into the blame game he had prepared if he didn’t do well:

– the dreaded quinsy – five bouts of tonsilitis in a year – one requiring IV antibiotics and the rest being ‘cured’ by gargling with vodka – don’t ask.

– the hatred of Tweedledumb and Tweedledumber  – his psychology and sociology ‘teachers’

– the hardness of chemistry and physics  – ‘ no one told me it would be this difficult’ – yeah – Uni Boy did but you wouldn’t listen to him

I added a couple of my own:

– arrogance is not a replacement for knowledge – bit of the old ‘overconfidence’ effect creeping in there

– laziness and sitting in front of your computer killing people (virtually) doesn’t help you to revise – no – really – it doesn’t.

– but he has also lost his granddad, and had two parents who have been distracted by their own grief and the  business of  sorting out the estate

We took him to get his results this morning – he was jittery and we weren’t allowed to say anything that might upset him because he was STRESSED!  I got yelled at for the controversial ‘Would you like a lift down to College this morning?”

“Of course I want a lift!  You don’t expect me to WALK there do you?  It’s RESULTS DAY!”

We waited in the car  and my heart went out to the pretty red-headed girl who had her results and wished she hadn’t.  She was sitting on the wall and sobbing and I so wanted to go and give her a Mumhug but Lovely Hub persuaded me not to in case College Boy saw and it made him embarrassed as well as stressed..

College Boy came back – no smiles – and a muttered “Didn’t do too well” as he handed the results slip to his dad through the open car window.

In the words of Maureen Lipman’s Beattie “Well at least you’ve got a ‘ology.” Sociology – taught by Tweedledumber – his most hated teacher.  The other results were U – U for unlovely, unwanted, unwelcome  and ungraded.  Looking more closely at the results, he was close.  If he’d only bothered to revise a little, he would have passed.

If College will have him, he’s decided to repeat the first year but probably drop physics.  He knows we will support him – always – unless he gives up and goes on the dole in which case there may be some metaphorical arse-kicking from Mum and Dad.

He went out on the razz with his college mates this afternoon – told us it was an all-nighter and he’d see us in the morning.  We said okay – he’s not good at hiding disappointment – no point in being confrontational and rubbing salt into his wounds.

Lovely Hub went off to work on a night shift and I stayed home – both of us worried about our roaring boy being out all night.

He texted me at twenty-two thirty ‘home in an hour’.  I texted him back, turned on the outside lights, unlocked the back door and waited.  He was home in an hour; floridly sunburnt, loud from imbibing cider and defiantly waiting for a lecture that I didn’t give.  He tried to get a rise out of Uni Boy – but I’d already primed him about the results and not rubbing it in.

My baby boy is in bed now – all six-foot of him.   I can ease his sunburn and offer him water to rehydrate but I can’t change his exam results.  I wish I could take the pain of disappointment away but I can’t and I shouldn’t.  He will learn – sooner or later, but I love him and his pain  hurts me worse than the gravel rash and bruises could ever do.

Here’s hoping we have better news this time next year.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Aug 10 2012

Wild,Wild Life

Drouth (Anon)

‘Oh Western wind when wilt thou blow, that the small rain down can rain?

Christ, that my love were in my arms, and I in my bed again.’

Lovely Hub brought me a big mug especially for Uni, it says –  ‘I’d rather be in bed’

So I’ve spent nine years studying with the  Open University and always managed to avoid residential courses. I’m glad to have participated in this one but didn’t realise just how much I’d miss Lovely Hub and the boys.  I’ve been at Nottingham Uni since Saturday and it’s now the early hours of Thursday morning.  I have finally extricated myself from the pirate party  – which has had its highs and lows.

It doesn’t help that at this time of night only the hard core are left and they divide up into the young, free and single ones who are angling to get off with each other, the party animals, those seeking to regain their lost youth and those, who like me, have families at home and have no desire to spend the rest of the night groping sweatishly with someone that you won’t be able to look in the eye in the morning.  (My conscience is clear I have only bestowed maternal hugs on my very favourite people).

Hub and I have been texting for the past hour or so – he’s on a night shift and is relieved to find that I am safely back in my room knocking back the San Pellegrino to dilute my alcohol intake  and blogging tearily whilst my lappy sings ‘Building a Bridge to my Heart’.’

Residential school has been good.  I have met some fabulous people;  a couple of the tutors are rather up themselves but the majority are delightfully eccentric – or just delightful. There are definitely some people that I’d like to keep in contact especially my lovely partner L who had to leave today because work called her away.  We had a great time working on the project together and our tutor, although this was only his first residential school (and I’m definitely old enough to be his mother) has been incredibly supportive and has almost awakened a desire in me to do statistics – Argh! Hold that thought.

Time passes …..

I started this blog but I didn’t finish it due to pressure of work  on the project – a hard, hard life as well as a wild, wild one.  It’s over a week later and this is the first chance I’ve had to finish this blog  – I’m blaming lack of blood in the alcohol stream and a carb-heavy diet that has left me sluggish and unresponsive all week.  I still have to write up the project and – for my own warped satisfaction only – run the stats programme all on my own to ensure veracity.  I must be mad.

I was given ‘a village idiot’s guide to doing  2×2 Mixed ANOVA’ by me (residential) tutor – and when I read it last night I actually understood (some of) it. Maybe these old brain cells still have some life left in them.  Mission may not be Impossible after all.

No regrets about doing the residential school now,  just saddened to hear that Lovely Hub felt that life was suspended whilst I was away.  Feel very humbled by this and will do my best not to run off again.  Knowing that he missed me so much is an added incentive to lose weight, get fit and hang around for many years to come.   I missed my men too though, and it was only the fact that I was kept so busy, stopped me drooping into the doldrums, especially late at night when all the fun and alcohol had dried up and every bone in my body was wanting to be home.

Enough of all that; once the food shopping was accomplished and my neglected sons were replete (hands up anyone who thinks they starved whilst I was away – No? – didn’t think so) Lovely Hub and I had time to hit the seaside at Crosby, eat ice creams in the sunshine and drive home through a belter of a thunderstorm.  We also managed to take the boys out to dinner (good old Nandos) and actually get through a meal without major domestic trauma.  The situation deteriorated rapidly when we hit Tesco for a spot of late night shopping – so let’s not go there.

Back to work on Monday and at least a day of trying to remember what the hell I do for a living.  It is gradually trickling back so I guess the cocktails I was drinking last Tuesday night didn’t kill  off that many brain cells.  It’s good to be back with my team – even if we are slightly depleted due to holidays and stuff.  I enjoyed being a student last week but I enjoy being a worker more – except for when my path crosses that of the terminally arrogant and dim who blight our lives by being jobsworths.

Ah, but I’ve only a couple of weeks at work before we take off down South to visit family and friends, especially those who couldn’t make it to the funeral.  It will be good to be back in the bosom of the family and to smell the salt air again.  There was a time when I was at college in landlocked Brum and I used to take jars of seawater back with me for a sneaky sniff whenever I got homesick.  Until the day my Mum phoned me at college in a tizzy because they’d discovered typhoid or something horrible in the water.  After that,  a crowd of us sea-siders had to content ourselves with sitting around Edgbaston reservoir making mournful foghorn noises and wishing we were home.

So, no more prevarication  – me tutor has sent me an email with stat-speak in it and after all his efforts at kick-starting my brain – I will not let him  (or myself ) down.  One more essay and the exam after this and the Psych degree will be mine! (I hope).  A final course starting in October on Crime and Justice and the Criminology degree will be mine next  year.  Toying with the idea of doing an online masters in Forensic Psych with Liverpool Uni – but I promised Lovely Hub that I’d take a break from studying and spend more time running wild with him.  Now there’s a happy thought for the future.

Bring on those stats!

Jul 25 2012

Epic fail in Liverpool – married couple in retail meltdown

Today Lovely Hub and I have failed miserably at retail therapy.

We had to go to Liverpool to swear an oath for probate – which was a different experience to say the least.  We were slightly delayed because I was being Mrs Angry about some goods that I bought online that turned out to be total rubbish when they arrived.  They were mini stress balls that were advertised as being perfect party bag items for children and adults alike.  I only wanted one to use in a photo but you had to buy twenty.  When they arrived they smelled of chemical death and were horribly greasy – not at all like the friendly stress pig that sits on my PC base at work.  Imagine how stressed you would feel if you went to squeeze a stress ball and discovered that you had greasy and chemically polluted hands?

Uni Boy has cast his scientific eye over them and pronounced that they have obviously been exposed to heat and have started to degrade – well that hasn’t happened over the past couple of weeks in England has it?

I contacted the seller of the stress balls and told them I would like my money back  and we arranged for a courier to collect the box when both boys would be home and able to lurch out of bed to answer the door. As usual, the courier played his usual game of knock the door and run – so the parcel wasn’t collected.  The seller claims that it is up to us to take a whole day off and wait patiently by the front door ready to pounce on the courier before he can get back to the van.  I don’t think so.

This made me annoyed.  So I phoned the Trading Standards number and a very nice woman gave me advice about the Sale of Goods Act 1979, goods being of satisfactory quality and the cooling-off period when you buy online.  She also asked me to extract one of the balls and put it to one side so they could check the barcode and possible carry out a chemical analysis (very CSI).

We were running a bit late for going to Liverpool as a consequence.  I thought we had to be there for 1045 hrs and I may have dawdled a tad.  Hub however, knew that we had to be there for 1030 and actually moved up a few gears from his usual laid back loucheness.  We parked in L1, my trusty Sat Nav got us to the Crown Court and we were a bit surprised to see dozens of policemen clustered around Derby Square outside the court.  There were even two mounted policemen but more of them later.

When we got inside the building we had to undergo a security check – no cameras allowed (or Stanley knives).  It had never occurred to me when I grabbed my bulging  bag and shoved the probate documents inside it as we were rushing out of the front door that a strange woman would be rummaging through the contents.  The very nice security woman looked askance into the depths of my capacious bag and the smaller bag that sat inside it.

“What have you got in there?”

“My whole world?”

She performed a cursory exploration, looked me up and down, decided that I didn’t look as if I posed a risk, and ushered us through.  We ran to the lift, squeezed in with some very nice men who were headed for court and had to walk (asthma-inspired wheezing on my part) fast.  We made it with seconds to spare.

The whole probate thing took ten minutes.  We signed things and swore on a copy of the New Testament (possibly because there are things in the Old Testament that might cause offence), it didn’t explode into flames,  and then we were free!

Waved goodbye to the nice security guards who were very pleased that we got to our appointment in time, and went back out to the square which still had a high police presence.  Derby Square is lovely but hazardous.  It seems to be a designated spot for people wanting to spit up greeny-yellow mucous.  So we had to play hopscotch a bit to get back onto the pavement.

I needed a caffeine fix after all the excitement so we went up the road a bit and found a Starbucks, deciding to drink al fresco as it was cloudy but dry.  After all the rushing around it was good to just admire the architecture as we strolled past; some very beautiful buildings in that part of Liverpool, with statues in places that you wouldn’t usually look.

Hub very kindly allowed me to sit and drink my coffee in a spot that was less gob-ridden and had a good vantage point for ogling the extremely tight jodhpurs of the mounted policemen. I was just looking.  Then it started raining.

We had already agreed (Hub with reluctance) that after we’d see the probate people we would buy Hub some new clothes in the bustling mecca that is L1.  He doesn’t like clothes shopping (for himself) and will make his clothes last for years rather than have to buy new ones.  Nothing lasts for ever though and he needed new jeans and replacement polo shirts.

The last time we bought polo shirts (I surprised him and dragged him into a clothes shop when we were out supposedly doing something else) he went in for stripey ones.  He doesn’t like rough pique material but prefers cotton jersey (me too – we have a tendency towards the tactile).  He didn’t want stripey anymore though – so we were looking for medium cotton jersey polo shirts in solid colours (red and yellow are okay, I’ve been weaning him off blue for years and he won’t touch green or anything pastel).

Stripey cotton jersey – yes, solid colour pique – yes.  We very nearly bought two nice dark red polo shirts but then he realised that they were Jasper Conran and Hub doesn’t do designers.  We did Debenhams, Primark, BHS, Burtons, Topman, Next, TK Maxx and had reached the point where we were both whimpering about our sore ankles.

I bought a purse in TK Maxx.  It cost FIFTEEN whole pounds (well fourteen ninety-nine) and I’ve never paid that much for a purse before.  According to the label it should have cost SEVENTY FIVE pounds – yeah right.  Hub told me to get on and buy it  because he was hungry (so hungry that he bought it for me in the end) and we decided to make one last stop in M and S before getting some lunch.

No polo shirts that met specifications but Hub usually buys his jeans from M and S so I was hopeful.  Hopes were dashed.  Hub is a skinny whippet with a 29inch waist and 31inch inside leg – so apparently are most of the people who buy black denim jeans from M and S.    We gave up and went for lunch.

There’s a restaurant on the roof of L1 where you can stuff your face with a fusion of world foods.  Fine dining it ain’t and the people next to us had some very strange food combinations.  I’ve never seen one man eat so many spare ribs and his daughter was hell-bent on following his example.  You can fill up a plate with whatever you like and go back as many times as you want.  Hub and I tried to stay within limits, the only difference being I had a starter plate and he didn’t.  The joy of the place is that when you are shopping-knackered and want food NOW!  you can get it and carrying on munching until you are replete.  They do really cute deserts as well.

After lunch we tried one last assault on John Lewis – which was another epic fail – and then unanimously decided that we wanted to go home.  Big cities are nice for small visits but Hub and I have become far too provincial and like the quiet backwaters now.  No offence meant to my Liverpudlian chums but walking through the perfume section of John Lewis was like being in an episode of Thelma’s Gypsy Girls – pocking Hell!

The fashion plate that is Uni Boy was gravely disappointed in our failure to shop.  We didn’t even go into H and M for heaven’s sake!  College Boy was just hacked off that we went ALL the way to Liverpool and didn’t bring him anything back.

I went online to Cotton Traders and found two polo shirts that met Hub’s exacting standards – then discovered that they have an outlet in the garden centre just down the road from us. Then we both crashed out – getting too old for this malarky.

Back to work tomorrow for me, Uni Boy is off to Spain with his chums and Hub has drawn the short straw again because he has to take Uni Boy to the sports shop to buy an American football.  He might even buy some jeans whilst he’s there. In my dreams.

 

 

Jul 22 2012

Milk and Alcohol – but not this morning

It is Sunday and the sun is actually shining.  Hub and I have most of today off together – he’s on a night shift tonight – and the boys are most definitely out for the count.  Time for the To Do list.

Get up – done that.

Check on Uni Boy  – out on the razz with his mates last night.  His bedroom door is firmly closed this morning and the outside light has been turned off – I assume that he came home in one piece then.

Breakfast – ran out of milk last night so no whiskey porridge this morning then. Fruit juice, toast and Marmite, and a banana.  Ate that.

Wake Lovely Hub  – and examine those bruises.  I had to take photos of them last night to send to his paintball mate – who is responsible for two of the bruises.  I think Hub got his own back though. Had to take another one this morning because it’s developed a wonderful range of colours – and put it on Facebook for him – does this count as a wifely duty?

Put last night’s wet towel in the wash – it was forgotten in all the excitement of taking the photographs.  We’re down to two in the downstairs bathroom having thrown one away last night because it was no longer effective and I remembered exactly how many years ago I bought it.

Tidy up College Boy’s detritus in the kitchen – he was getting up just as we were going to bed last night.  There is evidence that he ate the kebab we bought for him.  He’s not very good at throwing empty things away; I often find empty fruit juice cartons replaced in the fridge or a tub of butter that isn’t any more.  This morning it is just an empty carrier bag, the stiff white paper that wraps up takeaway food and a few stray shreds of lettuce.  Doesn’t go well with toast – in the bin.

Shower – well I will when I’ve finished this – and I’ll remember to do something with the towel when I’m done.  Must remind Hub about hanging up the new blind that we bought over two weeks ago to replace the current one that has two settings – up or down.  Still he put the toilet seat back on its hinges again so it doesn’t fall down unexpectedly.  Not an issue for females but decidedly unsafe for bleary-eyed boys.

Get dressed – by this time Hub will have finished his breakfast and we can escape the house for a while – oh the joys of Sunday morning food shopping!  But we have hungry teenagers with expensive and fluctuating tastes who makes us feel guilty (Uni Boy) or just whinge (College Boy) if the right food isn’t in the house when they want it.  Must buy some new towels while we’re up there.   Don’t need flowers at the moment because Lovely Hub bought up Tesco’s stock of freesias and the house smells gorgeous.  Why is it that Tesco is the only place I can find freesias?

Lunch  – by the time we get back and unpack everything we will both be starving.  Highly unlikely that either son will be awake or offer to help if they are.  College Boy will lurch down in tee-shirt and boxers demanding food.  Uni Boy will emerge at some stage with his dressing grown elegantly draped around him to inform us that he’s having a shower and don’t use the water – please.  Ooh – scrap that.  He has just popped his head round the door to announce that the sun had the temerity to wake him up and he’s starving because he hasn’t had anything to eat since yesterday lunchtime – no wonder he’s so skinny.  Advised that his Dad will be coming down to get breakfast shortly so he only has a short window of opportunity in our tiny and hideously impractical kitchen, he smiles beautifically and says he’ll only be using the oven.  Yeurgh!  Oven-cooked food and it isn’t even ten o’clock yet.  Apparently he and his chums don’t eat whilst out boozing because the food is too expensive, its grim and it ruins the effect of the alcohol.  Should I be worried? Well – he is a scientist after all so he knows all about cause and effect..

Clear out the office – we were supposed to be devoting the whole day to this but due to my talent for procrastination we’ve ended up with an afternoon.  the office is our spare bedroom upstairs.  It houses my PC and the work laptop and it’s usually where I write and do my duty shifts.  I go in there to wake up and check my emails, Twitter and Facebook in the morning, or if I want to escape from noisy boys.  It is my oasis but it is a very cluttered and dusty oasis at the moment.  After our spectacular team work at clearing out my Dad’s bungalow, Hub and I decided that we should work our magic on the office.  The realisation that there are several defunct pieces of computer hardware hanging around in there, a pile of objects and books that were dumped there temporarily over a month ago when College Boy had his party, and – deep shame – files of notes from my first degree – which I took in 1988 – the year we got married.  There really can’t be anything social-work related in those files that is still relevant today can there?  Probably.  Anyway, there are two huge bookcases in the room that are not housing the books that lie around our house in disordered heaps.  I have two Kindles now – one for audio and one for reading but I still can’t resist the smell and feel of a real book.  I know that we will both feel better when we’ve cleared out the office but the prospect is lying over both of us like a big dark cloud.

Take stuff to the tip – provided it’s still open when we finish – otherwise it can go in the garage till tomorrow when Hub wakes up from his night shift.

Dinner – left over takeaway from yesterday – yay!  For Hub and I at least – we have been known to make a takeaway last for three days (I did last weekend) whereas the boys demolish all in front of them leaving only scraps and dribbles behind.

Ironing – this will be accomplished during ‘Wallander’.  I find that the dreary greyness is a suitable backdrop to ironing.  To be fair my ironing pile has diminished considerably since Uni Boy learnt how to iron and decided that my ironing didn’t meet his meticulous standards (Yay!)  College Boy’s clothes spend most of their time in heaps either on or under the bed (we bought him a double when we redid his room a couple of years ago – he has a small area to sleep in now) so there won’t be many of them to iron.  I like Wallander a great deal – although I wish they’d put the lights on occasionally.  I don’t actually mind ironing either provided I have something decent to watch on TV.  I sit on the sofa, ironing board now cleared of OU books and at its lowest setting, unironed clothes in a pile on one side and laundry crates ready to be filled on the other.  The fan is on, both uplighters are on so I can see what I’m doing, I have the remotes, my mobile and the house phone by my side and something to drink – thirsty work this ironing stuff – wonder if Uni Boy would make me a cocktail – or two?)  Once all this is accomplished I am perfectly content.

Hub to work – so I’ll have to remember how Wallander ends so that I can tell him when he calls me at eleven o’clock to say goodnight.

Remember to go to bed – I have a tendency to lose track of time when Hub is on a night shift and this isn’t helped by my nocturnal boys – who having slept on and off all day today will be full of beans when I am flagging.  I have book-related things to do tonight and stuff to get ready for work tomorrow.  We have a new colleague starting and I have to be in early to blow up some balloons – I made a banner before I left on Friday. Life is about beginnings and endings – we have to do them properly.

Tomorrow  – I will be up at six to prepare my whiskey-infused porridge – Hub has just returned form the local shop with the milk.

Jul 21 2012

You can go your own way …

Not the easiest of weeks in all.  Lovely Hub came back from his paintball weekend on Sunday afternoon, extremely knackered and a bit disappointed that he had to spend most of his energy lugging camping equipment from A to B instead of running around splatting people.  It didn’t help that the weather was lousy, that he lost an airbed and had to sleep on the ground, or that bad weather at home meant there wasn’t an opportunity to have a go at pitching the new tent before they went away. I’m told that the draught cider was good though and so was the cocktail bar (? and I thought they were being ruff tuff boys running around with gun-things – sorry – MARKERS –  not sitting there drinking cocktails all weekend).  The zombie game was a bit boring as well, not a lot of variety in being a zombie really.

So after Hub and I falling prey to  two sleepless nights, we were looking forward to a good night’s sleep. Unfortunately both Uni Boy and College Boy are particularly nocturnal at the moment.  Classical music and the boom of Super Mario on an elaborate sound system comes up from Uni Boy’s room and war game playing chortle issues through the curtain from College Boy’s room – he had a door once but it died and we are waiting for some sign of maturity before we replace it.

At half-past three in the morning the air was rent with the sound of the two boys fighting over bandwidth.  I ripped a muscle in my side jumping out of bed to separate them – last time they fought in the middle of the night, blood and bruises were involved (not mine).

At a quarter-past four in the morning an overwhelming smell of cooking permeated the whole house and I cursed College Boy for sneaking downstairs and making bacon super noodles with pepperami and tabasco sauce (a whole bottle) when I had to go to work in the morning.

At half-past five Lovely Hub had to leap out of bed to empty the overflowing water bucket  – for some reason the water from the tank decided to speed up while we were trying to sleep – Sod’s Law

I got up at six o’clock and staggered downstairs in search of painkillers for my achy breaky side.  Uni Boy was awake and it turned out that I had maligned College Boy and his super noodles, it was Uni Boy that had been cooking and despite being a hyper-intelligent megabeing it hadn’t occurred to him that leaving the kitchen door open whilst cooking would mean that the whole house stank of food.

I woke College Boy but he decided that his stomach was upset and he wasn’t going to get up.  Some guys have all the luck.

It was a relief to get out of the house and slouch at my desk – until I realised that torn muscles and slouching don’t mix.  Lovely Hub brought me more painkillers and I spent the rest of the day sitting in accordance with health and safety guidelines.  It’s getting better now – slowly.

Loveliest Friend worked her magic fingers into Hub’s feet and came home happy again and fully reflexologised.  Just as well because he had two day shifts – which he hates but I quite like because I get a lift into work and back.  The boys took turns (what!) to empty the water bucket as they were the only ones in but whatever it was that was causing the problem then decided to make the water flow even faster.

I phoned Uni Boy from work to see if he’d emptied the bucket.  He was a little terse.  Hub texted Uni Boy on Wednesday morning from work to ask him to empty the bucket.  This was Uni Boy’s response:

“Bucket looks fairly empty.  It fills 50ml about every 4 min., and drops 130 times a minute, so flow rate is 750-800ml/hr.  If that flow rate stays the same then the bucket shouldn’t need emptying until the evening at the earliest.”

College Boy would have texted “kk” or not even bothered to reply.

On Thursday night, Hub and I decided to tackle the water tank once and for all.  Well, I lay on the bed and watched Hub tackle the water tank.  He had to take some of the cupboard door frame off and stick his hand in the water tank to fiddle with the ball cock (ooh-er Missus!).  His master stroke however, was climbing out through the bedroom window (who needs Spiderman), scaling the roof and discovering that there was something nasty bunging up the overflow pipe.

All good paintballers have an unbunging stick and Hub is no exception.  Clinging onto the side of the chimney breast he shoved the stick up the overflow pipe and cured all our problems – well for now.  The bucket is still underneath the Heath Robinson pipework but it has remained empty since Thursday night.  Go Hub!  We still need a new boiler but that will have to wait for a bit.

Hub was at work Friday night so  a quiet night in.  Uni Boy and I had another one of our considerably lop-sided  conversations – nearly everything he says goes over my head.  So far this week we have discussed ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ – surreal to be talking about grubby DomSub books with your 19yr old son –  and whether or not the tot of whiskey I put in my morning porridge will still have an alcoholic content after being exposed to the microwave (he did calculations based on alcoholic content, amount of whiskey, temperature and length of time in the microwave – hic!.

When Hub came home we drove College Boy over to his mate’s in preparation for a day of shooting BBs in some disused army camp with a lot of other camouflaged pseudo-soldiers.  It was rather nice driving back at midnight  – just us – especially as College Boy gets particularly frantic when he is trying to get all his gear together.  He doesn’t know that we’ve found his college report (he hid it in a pile of paper on the sofa).  It wasn’t wonderful but then he’s had five bouts of tonsillitis in the past year  – oh – and he’s a lazy git to boot.

Saw Hub off to paintball this morning – it isn’t raining and he’s sent me nice texts so I know he hasn’t been too badly crushed, mashed or covered in yellow paint.  Uni Boy spent some time this afternoon practising his cocktail making skills – oh  dear – do you really need me to test that Cosmopolitan for you?  Oh well – alright then.  The boy makes a fine cocktail.  He went off to a friend’s house and for three hours this afternoon I’ve had the house to myself.

I fell asleep.  Must have been that cocktail.

This time next week Uni Boy will be in Spain and I will be starting my one and only Open University residential unit in Nottingham.  Apparently the booze is cheap (Spain and Nottingham Uni).  I’m going to be a real student for a whole week and I am more than a little bit terrified.

Hey Ho! The Paintballer and the BB Boy have returned.  The latter is totally shattered and can’t even raise the energy to go out for a meal with his best friend. He also has a red mark on his neck from a wayward BB.  He has just staggered past me with a bottle of water, a duvet and heading for bed. Hub has had a lovely day shooting at people as well but also has a couple of war wounds which he’ll show me – laterz.  Uni Boy is off out on the town again tonight with a couple of 500ml bottles filled with his cocktails – he has pre-drinking style that boy.

It hasn’t taken much to persuade Hub that tonight is a good night for a takeaway.

Just seen the war wounds – a bit tame – just on the arms but going to turn into lovely bruises over the next couple of days.  So glad I don’t have dangerous hobbies – unless you count OU terror camp next week.

Now where did we put that takeaway menu?

Jul 21 2012

Dexy – a very fine cat lived here

When I first met lovely hub, I was living in a studio flat with my cat Sam.  Sam was a rescue cat.  A bruiser but very loving, he used to bring his mates in when I was out at work and reward me with a dead rat whenever I made liver and bacon casserole for dinner.  I preferred it when he brought the rat straight to me rather than leaving it under the sofa or in an obscure corner.

Lovely hub moved in and as he’d never been able to have a pet due to allergies in the house, we acquired a rescue kitten called Elmer Fud.  Sam and Elmer eventually got on – although Sam wasn’t averse to giving this tiny black upstart a warning swat when he got too uppity.  We moved into a little terrace house and the cats settled in.  Three months later Sam became ill and had to be put to sleep when they found a tumour in his throat.  Through various means when we moved Up North six years later, Elmer Fud had been joined by four more rescue cats and Uni Boy.

Muffet died first; she and her sister Callie were rescued from a drunken pub singer called Imelda.  With her wild curly black  hair and an aura of booze, she blessed us for taking the last kittens from a litter of six born to an elderly  mother cat with cat ‘flu.  The vet told us they’d lost several of their seven lives already and that they probably wouldn’t live more than a couple of years.  Muffet achieved seven years and managed to make acquaintance with College Boy the year before she died – neither of them were particularly impressed. We buried her under the lilac tree in the front garden.

Tigger – as ginger, mad and bouncing as his namesake  – was run over the day before we moved to a bigger house on a quieter road.  He would have loved the new house and garden, so we took him with us and buried him under an impressive magnolia tree.

Then there were three; thin rangy black Elmer, tiny calico tortoise-shell Callie and Sylvester – a human in feline form.  Sylvester attached himself to us before Uni Boy was born.  A stray with a dirty matted coat, who smelled to high heaven but decided that he fancied living with us.  After he’d been washed, had his doormat of a coat clipped off and been taken to the vets to have the op and stop him spraying everything in sight, we discovered that he was a pedigree Maine Coon cat; big, fluffy and incredibly lovable.  He single-handedly saw off any dog that dared to wander into our garden but would just as happily sit on your lap, a huge black and white purring chunky lump.

Sylvester was the next to go; falling victim to FIV and fading very fast.  He’s under the pine tree that Father Christmas in the Delamere Forest gave us.  It was once a five-inch sapling and now it towers over the house.  I miss all our cats but Sylvester will always hold a special place in my heart.  Not long after he died we were asked to take in a pedigree Persian Blue called Sean.  He looked beautiful – if you liked squashed faces – but had the most unsociable personality.  He also came to us already under a death sentence of kidney problems.  We had a year of his scornful company before his kidneys failed and left us with another dead cat and hefty vets bill.

Elmer disappeared one day.  Always prone to wandering far afield and not being seen for a while we had grown used to this but when he failed to return after a few days we started to worry.  His black fur had turned a rusty-brown and with a digestive system that was never brilliant from the start, we eventually found out that he had crawled into a garden, died and been collected by the RSPCA.

Callie soldiered on until 2000 and we found her curled up and as peaceful in death as she had been in life.  We have a birdbath now in the middle of the lawn where she liked to sleep, and she lies underneath it.

‘No more cats!’ we both said.  Uni Boy and College Boy gave us looks.  A week later, on Father’s Day whilst lovely hub was working, my parents took me and the boys to the Cats Protection League.  Just to make life more exciting, the fire alarm went off and a fire engine turned up.  Much joy for two small boys: loads of cats AND firemen.  We found Abba and Dexy on death row.  A not particularly cute looking tabby brother and sister who were weeks away from being put down because they were six years old and no one wanted them.

A week later they were ours.  Abba was obviously the bossy big sister, she had an umbilical hernia which made her white fluffy stomach hang down and swing from side to side if she broke into a trot – which was rare.  She was my female ally in houseful of men and she was a feisty female who would lash out at anyone or anything that annoyed her – usually little brother Dexy or College Boy but she caught both me and lovely hub occasionally too.  She was with us for eleven years, ruling the roost but always purring, and she became deeply attached to my Dad when he and Mum moved Up North to join us.

Abba was a judge of good character and was very useful in helping us choose a double glazing company. She sniffed at the first two reps and walked away in disgust, but when the third arrived, she sat on his feet purring and dribbling so he got the business.  She was right; his company did a good job and within a couple of years the other two companies had gone bust leaving disappointed customers.

Abba started going downhill last summer; she lost a lot of weight but seemed happy and  still had a good appetite.  She chose to die on September 11th – 9/11, on the day that lovely hub, my Dad and I were seeing Uni Boy off on a trip to Berlin.  Having waved him goodbye, we went on to a food festival but curtailed out visit because College Boy felt worried about Abba.  He was very good with her, sitting next to her on the sofa as her breathing became more laboured.  he told us to take Dad home first so that he wouldn’t be upset by Abba’s deterioration.

She died that night and I bought a lavender bush to plant on top of her grave.  After she died Dex became very vocal and very deaf.  Always the skinny cat, he never stopped eating and yelling – unless he was purring.  He and College Boy forged a bond so that hub and I became mere food providers and second best if College Boy wasn’t around. He committed GBH on me when I tried to remove a vole from his mouth.  His incisor went through my finger, right to the bone and necessitated a trip to A and E.  The tingling in the finger remains, nerve damage from his very effective gnashers.

We’ve known he was living on borrowed time; he got thinner and more whiny, scavenging anything and everything that we left in his reach.  He survived College Boy’s party, and nine months to the day his sister left us, hub and I found him, stretched out on the path by the front door in the late afternoon sunshine.  He just looked as if he had fallen asleep.

I howled and was hugged by lovely hub and College Boy.  We wrapped Dexy up and put in the garage for now.  My Dad is dying in hospital, hub has Norovirus  that he caught on the ward, and College Boy has tonsillitis and drugs, We’ll dig a grave by the buddleia and plant some more lavender bushes.

Dexy was a very fine cat.

Jul 15 2012

Paintball Wizard – got such a supple wrist

I am a deserted wife.  My Lovely Hub is somewhere in the Brecon Beacons firing small balls of paint at about 800 similar-minded individuals.  He will come home tonight, muddy, smelly and covered with a multitude of small but perfectly formed raised welts which will morph into bruises over the next couple of days.  He usually picks up three or four of said welts on a day’s paintballing but he’s been gone since Friday so I may have to use a red marker and join up all the dots when he returns.

We have coped with being so cruelly abandoned thus far; me and the squabbling teens, and that is despite the many issues that threaten to disturb our domestic bliss (!)  One of the main issues over the past couple of days has been an overflow water tank that doesn’t – or rather it does but in the wrong places.  The morning after the Fruit and Nut party, Hub woke to the sound of dripping and discovered that the valve that should open and let water out of the tank had stopped working.  Whether or not this has anything to do with College Boy’s filling our house with drunken teenagers, or whether it was just an awful coincidence, we may never know.  For the past month though, Lovely Hub has been utilising a length of plastic tubing and several jugs to empty the excess water out of the bedroom window and onto the roof below – where the moss has become lush and verdant. He usually has to do this in the early hours of the morning when the dripping wakes him up (it wakes me up too).

Being tallish and thin, Hub has no problem getting his hand into the tank and extracting the water via the tube.  Being neither tallish or thinnish, I have a very large problem – which is why I stay in bed and pretend to be asleep whilst he is stumbling about in the dark with jugs and a plastic tube, trying not to wake me.  College Boy had a go but he has inherited his mother’s chunky wrists and whimpered when the nasty tank bit him.

The mad scrap metal merchant who used to own our house put the door frame on the airing cupboard after installing the water tanks and as a consequence there is very little room for manoeuvre.  We know that we have to sort our heating system out but in our usual haphazard fashion we have put it off.  We all know that the timer for the boiler died a couple of years ago – which is why I get up earlier than everyone else in order to switch it on manually.  We all know that the radiator in the upstairs bathroom never goes off; it is a small sleepy satellite that has cut itself loose from the mothership.  We all know that putting the boiler to hot water only will turn the heating on – sometimes – it likes to keep us guessing.

There are many other anomalies in our house; three extensions and four flat roofs, wiring that sits on top of the wall instead of inside it, walls and ceilings that are covered in every pattern of Artex imaginable (we think that they used the downstairs hallway to practice on because it has at least five different patterns).  This smaller version of the Money Pit  (Home Crap Home) always has something that needs doing but there is always something else that is more important to spend the pennies on.

As the realisation that Lovely Hub was going away for three days dawned, so did the thorny issue of how I was going to empty the water tank whilst he was away.  College Boy and I had a dummy run but it consisted of him standing on a stool moaning about how much his hand hurt whilst I stood halfway across the bedroom holding a length of guttering that he found in the garage and which is now lying on the (broken – cheers Gibbo) patio table outside.  The guttering worked quite well once CB had got the water flowing but as the tank tends to fill up in the early hours of the morning, the idea of standing there holding a six-foot length of guttering out the window whilst CB swore at the water tank did not appeal.

At last, Lovely Hub conceded and called up a friend who has a plumbing business.  He was due to visit on Friday lunchtime, several hours after Hub and his friend had departed for jolly paintball japes, so I made sure that Hub wrote it all down for me.

Hub’s friend stayed in the front room the night before they departed.  We were not good hosts; Uni Boy spent much of the night watching American talk shows and chortling in his bedroom – next door to the front room, College Boy spent much of the night upstairs shouting at his game buddies and chortling, Hub emptied the tank before and after we got some sleep and the garage alarm went off at half-past three in the morning waking up everyone but Uni Boy – who had’t gone to bed yet.  We weren’t chortling.

After the paintballers had gone (only one false start – Hub had to come back for fruit juice and his paintball markers (gun things) without which ….. ) I was very proud of the fact that I got the grey and blue bins out on the road to be emptied (even though they were very,very heavy for poor little me) and glad that I did it at half past seven in the morning because the heavens opened shortly after that and continued to chuck it down all day.  My wonderful neighbour put them back for me. Mwah.xx

I made my ‘to-do’ list once they’d gone; ensuring that I’d already done at least three things on it so that I could cross them off straight away and give myself a sense of achievement.  TMA05 featured heavily on the list – it is the title of the next piece of Open University work I have to do and I need to get going on it because in less than two weeks I shall be leaving for a residential block at Nottingham Uni – ooh squee! The chance to be a real Uni Woman at last!

My new tutor – the one that I thought was so nice and sympathetic compared to his bile-filled predecessor – is just as fluent in sarcasm.  My sad attempts at hypothesising and working out whether I need an ANOVA, MANOVA or a MANCOVA to analyse my as yet uncollected data (we do the experimental research whilst at Nottingham) and how many tails it has (don’t ask) do not meet with his approval.  As a consequence I keep moving the books around on the ironing board that I use as a table and finding multiple distractions to avoid depressing myself further. Uni Boy irons far more than I do so I have to move my piles of books so that he can borrow the board.  Fortunately, he irons nocturnally so I find my board back in the front room when I get up in the morning.

The plumber and his mate visited at lunchtime as arranged, looked askance at the water tank and chortled at our solutions.  Within half an hour they had rigged up a curious Heath Robinson-type construction of pipes and joints that enables me to drain the water into the mop bucket.  I still have to empty it using the measuring jugs – so the moss remains healthy  – but I don’t have to try to get my hand inside the tank anymore.  Unfortunately, on the first night the pipe was a couple of inches short of the water in the bucket so all I got was drip, drip,drip all night long.  One night of the Chinese water torture was enough.  I have now raised the bucket up so the end of the pipe is in the water and silent.  Uni Boy emptied it for me yesterday tea time (when he woke up) and College Boy had another go at bedtime (mine not his).  The bucket was nearly full when I got up this morning – I had a lie-in and woke up at twenty-past seven – whoo!  Chucking water out of the window has a curiously medieval feel to it.

We ARE getting a new heating system.

This morning I have Tai Chi-ed, and will be eating breakfast shortly, after which I shall make another ‘to-do’ list that will feature TMA05 prominently but will also have things on it that I actually want to do – and some that I don’t but hey – that kitchen bin won’t empty itself now!

There are so many ways in which Lovely Hub makes my life easier (and happier and funnier and totally bearable) and it isn’t till he’s not here that I stop and appreciate that.  He’s got to cope without me for a whole week soon but I think he’ll manage a bit better than I do – which offends my ego somewhat – no one likes to think they are easily replaceable.  I’m still reaching for the phone to call my Dad and tell him things.  That may never stop.

Ho hum.  Time for breakfast before I get totally maudlin and have to put whiskey in the porridge to cheer myself up again.  Uni Boy has just gone to bed.  College Boy has chortled himself to sleep and this is a time when the Whinging Cat and I would have cuddled each other back into a good mood.  Except that the  Whinging Cat is now buried under a lavender bush in the garden.  Where’s that whiskey?