toxicsoup

closed

2007-10-08T17:36:00.001+01:00

Imp doesn't love me anymore.

I can't write this any longer.
Thanks for reading.

FT

surf dude

2007-09-09T10:45:00.000+01:00

I sprint to the water's edge, hiding my beer belly behind my Mermaid Body Board.

Actually, it is important to note that this is not, in fact, my Mermaid Body Board. It is LittleImpA's Body Board. My choice consisted of either that, or LittleImpB's Bambi Body Board.
I think this kind of decision is called being 'between a Disney Body Board and the deep blue sea'.

We both (Mermaid Body Board and I) crash into the sea.

It is freezing!

We both crash back again, whimpering, before realising complete immersion to the neck is necessary in order for me to conceal my portliness and thus pose as a Beach Babe.

Gasping, I wade deeper, Mermaid Body Board in tow.

"Bloody'ell,bloody'ell,bloody'ell", I wheeze, wetly. The goosebumps I am sporting are creating increased drag and therefore cause me to burn off an extra 5 or 6 calories. Silver lining duly noted.

I can see Imp a long way off, relaxing in a beach chair, reading a novel and not looking at all impressed by my Beach Babeness. That was not part of the deal! She is supposed to stand on the beach and watch me at all times, waving enthusiastically at me whenever I look in her direction and shouting encouragement. How selfish of her to think only of herself while guarding my clothes and belongings.

Speaking of waves, I turn around and look for one, ready to begin my Body Boarding Experience.

There aren't any waves!

The sea is almost completely still. How curious! I am surrounded by loads and loads of no waves. Bloody-mindedly, the sea (powerful, terrifying, untamed by Man or Canute alike) continues to lap gently upon the shoreline.

Bollox.

Every face on the beach seems to be turned my way, scrutinising me in fascination, wondering what I am planning to do with my Mermaid Body Board. I notice that not a single other person in the sea has a board. They are all watching me too. The entire half-mile of beach falls strangely silent.

Imp turns a page, noisily.

I clutch my Mermaid Body Board and try to look cool.

beer belly

2007-08-30T09:30:00.000+01:00

It is getting on for 15 years since I last swam.

This is for several very good reasons:

1. I am developing a somewhat ‘portly’ appearance.. otherwise known as a beer belly.
2. I am developing a complex about my beer belly.
3. I am not very good at swimming.
4. I might drown and, the pathologist (who would probably be Amanda Burton) would say something along the lines of:

AB: “Yes, it’s clear that she had consumed a pint of beer and a bag of Frazzles approximately 58 minutes before swimming, whereas Everybody Knows you should wait a full hour after food before getting into the water. Therefore I deduce that this (unidentified) person died from food-before-swimming-syndrome, has the beginnings of a beer belly and, given the evidence, in my opinion Deserved.To.Die”.

The detective on duty (probably Bergerac) would, horrified, scribble notes frantically and plan his next talk to Primary School kids.
(Don’t play on railway lines, don’t stick your fingers into toasters, don’t swim for an hour after eating).

AB: “Oh, and by the curious markings on the backs of her knees, I conclude that this (unidentified) lived in Wales, once ate 12 doughnuts in one day and, hated spaghetti hoops”

These reasons are enough to keep me strictly clear of water of any depth greater than would necessitate me to reveal more than my ankles, but, I accidentally bought a wetsuit, thinking it would make me thin and now I am on a beach…

cheese and tomato sandwich

2007-08-02T12:17:00.000+01:00

I am on an interview panel!

This is because I am so grown up and people obviously recognise my talents as a discerning, mature person to have around.
Also I’ve been practising my Wise Look in the mirror and I am wearing my best shirt.

It is going well. I am making notes and nodding with a kind of thoughtful erm.. thoughfulness.

I’m sure that the candidates are greatly relaxed by having me on the panel.

We break for lunch. This is always a highlight as food is provided, thus disproving the saying about there being no such thing as a free lunch.

I scan the sandwiches. Ham, Tuna, Beef, Chicken.
I am a vegetarian.

I buy myself a cheese and tomato sandwich and sit down, chatting to the candidates and being friendly.
I am not naturally a chatty person; in fact, I have been known sometimes to be a bit grumpy (although not in living memory, as I’m sure Imp will agree). However, today I am doing really well.
I switch my brain into SmallTalk mode.

“So, did you enjoy looking around?” I ask one of the blokes, who looks like a very worried rabbit (this is a metaphor, as he doesn’t have fur or long ears and he is taller than me (although I am actually very tall)) in headlights.

I bite into my sandwich while he formulates his answer and, spectacularly, a load of tomato spurts out and lands on my (posh) shirt.

This is a disaster! I have heard about the properties of tomato. It is capable of staining for life (and then on into infinity). It is a scientific fact that there are tomato stains on many fossils that have been found. This is because it is essential to soak the stain immediately in cold water, but Woolly Mammoths do not like cold water.

I rush to the toilets immediately (after finishing my sandwich) and douse my shirt with cold water.

The stain takes no notice!
I re-douse.

There is no apparent effect. I am defeated.

I have a Wet Breast. It is dark blue against the rest of my posh shirt, which is light blue. As if that were not bad enough, it highlights the tomato stain beautifully.

I take my place back on the interview panel, Wet Breast glorious.

bargain

2007-07-09T20:38:00.000+01:00

I have run out of unread books!

It is time for me to do the charity shop circuit. Charity shops are the best thing since sliced bread (and fitted sheets) (although to be honest, I am happy to slice my own bread) because it means that I can feed my habit for an average of about 75p, plus, I get to have a bet with myself about how many 'Peter Benchley - Jaws' versus 'Virginia Andrews - Flowers in the Attic' I will see.*

I am very lucky, because, within about 100 metres from my front door is the beginning of The Circuit. Imp and I do it when we are too fat/thin for our clothes, depending on how many pizzas we eat.**
At the moment I am wearing MediumPieMuncher clothes, which means that I can spend all my money on books.

I head on down to the PDSA, full of hope.
Not a sausage.

Next, Tenovus. No good books, but I am tempted by a boomerang. However, the last time I almost bought a boomerang, Imp gave me a Scowl. With a Capital S.
Checked by that particular chilling thought I hurry out the door.

British Heart Foundation. Chick lit. And not a single book under £2. Outrageous! I leave.

My feet are getting tired now. For some reason, Charity Shop Shopping is more tiring than mountain walking. I think it is the air, which I suspect that it is laced with some form of airborne-tranquiliser that is designed to hit you as you enter and, dull your senses to the extent that you are prepared to start buying brass dogs, old ashtrays and a dead old lady's dribble-stained thermal vest.

This is not a problem to me as I am a professional. I am like a highly trained killer - I dart in, head straight for the books, scan, and leave without inhaling more than twice.
I expect I could give Andy McNabb a run for his money, if ever we should meet in a Charity Shop Shopping Contest.

I make a mental note to write to him. He probably won't open the letter, though, unless I draw bullets on the envelope.

I make a mental note to draw bullets on the envelope. And a tank.

I trudge into Barnados. If I don't find a good book now, I will have to cross the road and the shops Across The Road take a higher level of shopping skill as, they have people who are too tall/thin/small (or have a milky eye) and who pounce and shake collecting tins at you.

Bingo! A book I have never read!
Just as I am about to pay, I spot (with my highly trained Charity Shop Shopper's eyes (read this and weep, Andy)) a Mr.Man mug and it is only 50p!

I pay, trying not to get grumpy at the old lady who wants me to wrap the mug in two carrier bags and who can't see the buttons on the cash till but, no problem. I am untouchable because, today I am the proud owner of a Mr.Lazy mug.

Imp will be so impressed.

*Jaws - 8; Flowers in the Attic - 13

**Me - 2; Imp - 2 slices

Queen Street

2007-06-30T23:00:00.000+01:00

I am going to the cinema with Ickle Bro!

We walk through town.

This is not as simple as it sounds.

Ickle bro, who is younger than me, should Rightfully-As-A-Result-Of-Logic-And-The-Laws-Of-Science, be shorter than me. I'm sure it says somewhere in the Bible that I should be the tallest.
Unfortunately something went horribly wrong and I was robbed! I think this might have been a result of the council building a road past our village when I was 10. I expect I inhaled some dangerous pollutants and stopped growing.

Thinking about it, Ickle Bro should really be called Freakily Tall Bro and, I should be called Half An Inch Below Average FT. But that would be a stupid name. And anyway, I don't like to dwell on it.

I make a mental note to write a letter of complaint to the council

So we walk through town.

I walk Very VERY quickly and my legs move quicker than the speed of light. In fact, my legs move so quickly that to other people it might look as if they are moving backwards, like that weirdy optical illusion that happens to car wheels when you watch a Ferrari bombing around Brands Hatch.

Even so, every fifth pace, I have to do a little skip.
This is not becoming for a woman of 34.

“OY! Slow down!” I gasp. My legs are now making that really-quick humming noise that bicycle tyres make when you are cycling downhill at more than 40 miles per hour.

“Sorry!” says Ickle Bro, glancing down from somewhere up in the sky, looking surprised. He moves into Matrix-style slow motion, loping along as if in zero gravity. But still quicker than me. Bastard.

I wipe away the sweat from my chin and skip along behind him, in a way that I hope emphasises the fact that I am older and, therefore, still The Boss.

day trip

2007-06-18T16:37:00.000+01:00

We have decided to go to the National Botanic Gardens of Wales, to cheer ourselves up. It is a scorcher of a day and it would be criminal to stay indoors.

I spend a while choosing which hoodie I should wear, as the gardens will be full of old people and I wouldn't want to scare them. I wear hoodies all the time and must surely have a Day-Out-to-the-Country Hoodie. We are young, and vibrant, and full of life and I want my hoodie to reflect that, without looking like a drug-dealer.
I expect we will be the only young people there.

We boil a kettle so that we can make a flask of coffee. This is NOT a Granny thing to do, it is just that I need caffeine in order to stay awake for such a long journey, as it might take more than an hour. I take a moment to spike my hair, as I am Young and Funky.

“Aaaargh!” Imp yells from the kitchen.

I run.
She has burned her hand with boiling water! She is not having much luck at the moment.

***

We climb into the car. Imp has to be careful because of her whiplash injuries and, because she has been holding her hand under cold running water for the last 15 minutes.

“Oooowwwww!” she yelps. “The sun's burning my hand!”. The temperature inside the car is about 3,482,800,0000000000 million degrees. This is what it must be like to live in Torquay.

I run back into the house and soak a bundle of kitchen towel in cold water, so that she can wrap her hand in it. We strap her special neck-collar into place. She is very fragile at the moment.
We pull away.

“How's your hand?” I ask, anxious. I indicate, to drive around a leaf.

“Still burning”. She looks really depressed.

I open the sunroof. “Stick your hand out the sunroof, the wind will keep your hand cold!”
I am a genius. I am surprised that Alan Sugar hasn't rung me yet. I expect he is waiting for his current assistant to fail miserably so that he won't get sued for violating Equal Ops, or something.

“I can't!” Imp looks apologetic. “I can't lift my arms above my head because of my neck”.

I press the opening-window button. That idea doesn't work either, because Imp burned the wrong hand.
I close all the windows and the sunroof and put the air conditioning on.

Imp's phone bleeps. It's a text! I hope that it is her ex-husband so that we can complain about him a bit.

Imp is having trouble pressing the buttons on her phone, because her hand is swathed in soggy kitchen towel. I am getting impatient.

“Who is it?” I ask, casually-yet-nosily.

“Dunno”. She rummages around in her bag. “I can't see it, without my reading glasses”.

We continue, in this manner. Young, vibrant.

beaten

2007-06-14T11:26:00.000+01:00

Imp has been assaulted!

There is Good News and Bad News.

The Good News is that there were about 50 witnesses.

The Bad News is that she has got whiplash injuries, which means that we can no longer play squash, which means that I will get fat and become so big that I will have to be hoisted by crane from my first-floor window into a truck in order to be transported to hospital, where they will all mutter and stroke their chins while scraping the dying flesh from the folds in my ankles. Then I will die from obesity and will have to be buried in a specially-constructed coffin with cantilever supports.

But anyway, it's not about me.

Imp has got to wear a special collar! It is to hold her head up so that she can carry on working.

“I look like a nob”, she says, sadly.

“You look gorgeous!” I lie, hastily. If she had bigger teeth she would look like Smashie, of Smashie and Nicey fame. With purple hair.
I decide not to tell her this.

She stares gloomily out the window.

I think she can read my mind.

going to work

2007-06-04T17:05:00.000+01:00

I have designed a fool-proof system for holding the door open!

My flat has got a very determined fire-hingey-thing to ensure that the door stays closed in case of fire, effectively making it harder for me to get out and therefore making it necessary for me to leap from the bedroom window, thus breaking both my ankles.

All fire doors are installed with this in mind, which is why firemen get to climb up ladders and carry people and look heroic.

Normally I can get out of the door okay (when there isn't a fire) and as along as I remember to hurl myself through, it doesn't get me. I would estimate my Getting-Through-The-Door-Without-Personal-Injury (henceforth referred to as GTTDWPI) rate to be about 85%.

However when I am wheeling my push-bike, the GTTDWPI odds drop to approximately 40% for me and, 0%x3 for my bike.

Now I have a weapon. A bungee cord... which stretches from the back of the door, to the bathroom door handle. I simply stretch the cord, hook it over the door handle... and the fire-hingey-thing is foiled (Aha!), allowing me to wheel my bike out without even moderate-to-severe bruising/denting to the shins/forks.

***

I am in a rush!

I put my rucksack and helmet on (I do not look at all like an Anorak) and prepare my GTTDWPI device. Checking that the bungee cord is hooked safely over Doorhandle1, I stretch it, straining, towards Doorhandle2.

Now. The obvious danger here is that the bungee cord will slip from Doorhandle1 while I am stretching it towards Doorhandle2, twanging back at great speed and hitting me full force in the arm, bringing tears to my eyes and unsavoury words to my lips.
But it won't, because I have performed this many times before with crowd-cheering success.

I carry on straining, confidently.

It.Twangs.

Hard.

Owwwwwwww!

My eyes water and I swear. Expertly.
My GTTDWPI device has failed!

Bastard! I can feel my arm bruising and the blood pooling, as I yelp.

I am a Failure. Even more so than Clive Sinclair! At least his crap inventions don't hurt him.

I struggle through the door, repeatedly being bashed in the shins/shoulder/arm/forks/back wheel and limp down the stairs - bashing my shins on the pedals for good measure - with my best Bad Mood face on.

under the duvet

2007-05-23T19:15:00.000+01:00

TinyDog® has got a huge mass of poo on her bum!

This is as a result of having a hairy bottom. The dog, not me.

Normally when this happens we bung her in the bath and Imp deals with the pooey end while I wrap a tea-towel around my head and hang on to her collar while retching quietly to myself.

Over time we have discovered that Imp is much better at dealing with the realities of poo, while I am much better at talking about it.
This is because she is a mother. It is a scientific fact that all mothers actually enjoy wiping up poo, sick and bodily excretions.

We decide to ignore the poo - we are in bed and it is the middle of the night.

Unfortunately, TinyDog® has followed us to the bedroom and she has brought the poo with her. It’s dangling off her doggy-arse…. and she is sitting pongily at the bottom of the bed.

I give her a dirty look. I have spent years perfecting this look. It is even more terrifying than being lost in Ikea without a handheld Sat Nav.

She ignores me.

Imp and I wrinkle our noses and stick our heads under the duvet.

“Kick her off the bed” gasps Imp, peering at me under the duvet.

I flail my legs wildly and TinyDog® is catapulted from the bed. I hope the poo hasn’t dislodged and gone flying across the bedroom.

I risk a peep. No sign of the dog.

I join Imp back under the duvet and we lie, breathing through our mouths, waiting for the stench to go away.

It doesn’t.

I could swear it’s getting worse! Lying in bed accompanied by the gentle aroma of dog shit is not my idea of fun. I poke my head out.

“Noooooooooooooo!” I wail.

TinyDog® is perched, innocent look pasted over her hairy face, on top of my clothes. Somewhere under all that fur, on top of my favourite t-shirt, is a massive turd.

The smell is overpowering.

I dive back under the duvet and sniff my armpits for relief.

not properly gay

2007-05-13T22:50:00.001+01:00

I am accosted by a woman who wants me to play Lesbian Badminton!

I back off, hurriedly.

We are attending a meeting, Imp and I, to plan things for the Cardiff Mardi Gras. I have never been to a Mardi Gras meeting before and have no idea what to expect but, I am feeling Very Important.

I expect I have been asked to go because I am not only (i) gay and, (ii) have extraordinary administration abilities, but I also am (iii) very good at nodding in an agreeable way.

Imp worries aloud if she will be the only Lipstick Lesbian there.

“Ha!” (I say, with my plethora of no past Mardi Gras meetings to fall back on).

“Or course you won't, Imp”, I add, knowledgeably. “I'm sure there'll be loads of 'em”.

She looks relieved and slaps a bit more lippy on.

***

Things are looking interesting.

We have arrived but there are no Lipstick Lesbians to be seen! This is very worrying as they are very nice to look at, even if they are not as intelligent as normal dykes*.

I edge through the door and stare, worried, through the people milling around drinking coffee and chatting. They all look like they have turned up for a recording of Gardeners' Question Time.

The women nearest me have beards and, groundwards, stripy socks peeping out from under their half-mast burgundy cords. Even the blokes have less body hair than the women! I gulp.

Now, I would never abandon Imp as she is The Boss and I might get told off later but, I seriously consider leaving her momentarily to face them alone, while I sprint across the road for a quicker-than-the-blink-of-an-eye pint. I turn around.

Too late! I am whisked up by a woman who must surely have cats and definitely has verbal diarrhoea and, I'm deposited in front of two more must-have-cats women. I whimper. Imp, somehow has escaped and is near the refreshments table**. Damn her.

“Have you been here before?” Cat-Lady asks.

“N...”

“Do you go to the group at all, the one upstairs?” she bulldozes merrily along.

“Wh...?” The other women join in, nodding enquiringly.

“Above Ikon, the meeting upstairs, for Lesbians”. Unaware, she nails the coffin lid on that one.

“N..” I protest.

“Would you like to play Lesbian Badminton?” She continues. The nodding women again resume their nodding.

“No!” I manage a whole word!

“Or Lesbian Cycling?”

“No!”

“We do walking, as well”, Cat-Lady informs me. There is more agreement in the form of nods.

“I don't want to join a Lesbian Group” I manage to say. "Or play Lesbian Sports".

The three women step back in unison, puzzled and astonished.

“Do you belong to any other Lesbian Groups?” one of the nodding women asks.

“No, I don't know any groups”.

They are stunned.

“I play Normal Badminton and anyway, I don't like the word Lesbian” I say quickly, desperately trying to catch Imp's eye so that she will come and rescue me.

We all stand in silence, nothing whatsoever in common at all.

I study my Gay Trainers and scratch my beard.

*Imp, of course, is much more intelligent than me. She is the exception to the rule.
**See? Superior in every way.

smelly

2007-05-04T17:20:00.000+01:00

I am shovelling shit!

It is pig shit, which is a particularly pungent variety of shit, but not as bad a dog poo. Anyway, I secretly like anything to do with poo, as long as it doesn't involve my face.

It is a stunning day for doing a bit of farm work and I hop over the fence and battle my way through the pigs. They are not being very helpful with the shovelling and, seem to be more interested in eating the shovel handle than standing politely aside while I bustle. (They are boy-pigs, which I think you will agree, makes all the difference).

The young people I am working with stay firmly on the pig-free side of the fence. I am surprised that they don't want to join in! I always jump at any excuse to get muddy – it is a scientific fact that muddy people are healthy people (or something).

This is what is wrong with society today, I think. People don't want to get covered in pig shit. Crazy! I must remember to pass on my thoughts to the Welsh Assembly.

I wrestle what's left of the broom from a hungry pig and sweep frantically, avoiding snouts and teeth. It is a bit like playing Pac Man, but smellier and with straw.

I am good at Bustling. It can be achieved much better with a broom or spade in your hand but, all the same, it takes a special kind of person to Bustle successfully. I am now at an advanced level as, I can Bustle in a pig pen.

I stop for a moment to consider this. (The pigs take this as an invitation to begin chomping on the fronts of my trainers.)

The pigs move on to the bottoms of my jeans. This is not in my contract.

***

“It bloody stinks in here!”

A scary-looking five-year-old wrinkles up his nose and glares at me. I ignore him.

“So what toxic substances can you see in the picture?” I ask. Two rows of tiny faces look up at me. They have climbed into the back of the Drugs Bus and want to be Entertained, with a capital 'E'.

“Heck, it's minging!”

I avoid eye contact and continue to instruct. “You can all have a special free pen and I want you to find six dangerous things”. I pass out activity sheets and pens.

The five-year-old is looking daggers at me, furiously. “You smell of SHIT!”

“Oooooh, Pooey-pong!” another tiny kid joins in, pinching his nostrils.

It is impossible to ignore the accusations any more.

“I know, I know! I smell of pig poo, BIG DEAL!” I counter, cleverly. I have been fully trained in Motivational Interviewing and my communication skills are the envy of many.

“Eeeeeeeeeeeewww!” erupts a wall of squeaky voices. “Get out! You SMELL!”

“It's not that bad”, I point out.

“Oh.My.God. It's SOOOOOOO stinky in here!”. A very cross-looking girl is giving me Evils. She is scarier than my Mum.

I have been evicted! From my own van! By a load of five-year-olds!

Defeated, I exit to exaggerated gasps and mimes of excruciating suffocation and stand, pongy, on my own out the back.

rash

2007-04-24T09:00:00.000+01:00

Owwwwwwwwwwwwww!

“If you give me your details, I'll pass them on to him when he gets back”, I say in a fake-jaunty phone-voice.

I was unlucky enough to be closest to the phone when it rang. My colleagues, I notice, all seemed to be very VERY Busy, suddenly.

I write the message into the Message Book, eyes watering somewhat.

“AAAAaaaaaaaaaaaarrrgh!”, I think to myself, sneaking a quick scratch with the clicky-end of my pen.

“No problem. Is there anything else I can do to help?”, I chirp, threateningly.

I learned this particular Telephone-Voice from the Customer Services Desk at Asda, where they manage to say all the right things but, with a professionally-developed scornful top lip glaring challengingly at you. I think it is the law that you have to be able do this lip-thing before you can be placed in any position of responsibility. They do it at hotel receptions, too.

“Bugger off!”, I think, frantically. “Go.Away.Go.Away.Go.Away.Bugger.Off”

Not that I'm accepting any responsibility, but I was involved in a terrible hair-removal accident a couple of days ago, in a sensitive area*.

*Note. The hair-removal was in a sensitive area on my body, not in a sensitive area like in the Central Command Post of MI5 or in say, a WI meeting in Afghanistan.

“Bye then”.

I slam the phone down and sprint quicker than the eye can see, to the kitchen where I pretend to wipe surfaces, scratching furiously as I go.

patchy

2007-04-22T23:50:00.000+01:00

Important notice: It is imperative when using hair removal cream that one covers up the areas from which one does not want hair removed.
This is especially important when using hair removal cream on or around one’s pubes... if you don’t want to look like a complete ning-nong.

No reason.

chippy

2007-04-07T22:49:00.000+01:00

I have finished the wardrobe! It has only taken me four days, which is quite good when you consider that I have been making the design up, as I go along.

I step back and admire. There are a couple of bits of wood at the front that should join but don't and, this means that I have had to suspend the vertical divide by a clever system of screws. This, however, does not count as 'bodging' but rather, 'improvisation'.
I have given strict instructions to anyone who might place anything in the wardrobe, to make sure that the items in question are not heavy.

I think about this very hard.
I shall carry out surprise inspections at roughly four-weekly intervals to make sure that no one has left (for example) a packet of chewing gum or a twenty-pence piece in a pocket.

It's a good job that I am so good at DIY. I think Imp is impressed.
My next job is to dig up the hall floor as it is slowly slipping into the basement.

progress

2007-03-29T22:03:00.000+01:00

It is not quite going to plan.

I have been building this wardrobe for 1 whole day and two whole evenings and unbelieveably, it is not yet a wardrobe.
Imp smiles, knowingly.

I just can't understand it.

carpentry

2007-03-28T15:05:00.000+01:00

I am going to build a wardrobe!

It will be very easy because I have an alcove, a basement full of salvaged wood and two rescued drawers. Also, I am also a trained expert in Space Lego and I never, ever bodge.

I expect I can get it done in less than a day...

30 bikes

2007-03-14T11:30:00.000Z

“And anyway, I drove up to Ludlow to buy a aluminium 5-bear split-shift fork”.

We are trapped in a pub with an Anorak!

“You can't get them anymore because they stopped making them in 1946, but I know a bloke, you see”, the Anorak confides.

Hamish, Sioned and I have just climbed the Sugarloaf mountain and are in desperate need of refreshment.

We settle in a convenient pub and sigh lovingly at our pints. The Wales-Ireland match is playing in the background and this is indeed, heaven. Pub. Pint. Rugby.

We have stomped our way uphill through snow and this was the carrot. I smile inside and reach for my pint.

At that moment, I notice the bloke at the next table is watching us. He is listening to our conversation.
I quickly look away. Sioned keeps talking. She mentions her mountain bike.

Too late! He moves in for the kill.

“Are you cyclists?” He asks.

Hamish makes polite noises of agreement. I nod.

"I'm a professional cyclist", he tells us. He is fat and pushing 70.

Sioned blinks at this. She quickly points out that although we all own push-bikes, none of us are professionals. I detect a hint of sarcasm.

This, however, is of no consequence to the Anorak. He has performed the classic textbook Anorak's Entrapment Technique, as set out in chapter 4 of 'The Official Guide to being a Boring Bastard (edition 2), 1939'......... and we have fallen for it!

We glance at each other, nervously.

First rule of avoiding anoraks: Never EVER, under any circumstance, make eye-contact.
Second rule of avoiding anoraks: Never EVER, respond to anything an anorak says.
Third rule of avoiding anoraks: Move house if possible, or if trapped behind a pub table, hack off any limbs that are preventing you from getting out and crawl, bleeding and twitching towards the door.

“Yes, I own 30 bikes”, he says, not listening to anything we say.

Sioned stares into her pint. “That's nice”.

“I've probably spent £50,000 on them, over the years”, he adds, warming up. “I keep them all in my loft”.

“Aye, that's great”, observes Hamish, with spectacular fake enthusiasm.

"I don't believe in carbon-fibre, that's for nancies", he says. "I bought a frame last week that is weighed down with 12 tons of lead and a sherman tank, for stability. Bargain, only two grand. I'll add a four-berth 8-jointed bungalow with a 6-iron and I'll probably use it to go to the supermarket a couple of times, before I stick it in the loft with all the others", he informs us.

I try using emergency telepathy but both Sioned and Hamish have lost the will to live. They are clearly contemplating Rule 3.

“I cycled from Galway to Dublin, a couple of years back”, I offer.

The Anorak isn't interested.

“I used to cycle 12 times around the Isle of Man, and then cycle across the sea and cycle up every mountain IN THE WORLD, before breakfast”, he informs us.

“That's nice”, says Sioned.

“And I once cycled to the MOON, without an oxygen tank, on a bike without any gears”.

We are defeated. Life is no longer worth living.

“And that's when I had to buy a hand-made load-bearing 3lb cotter pin from ebay, and I had to cycle to Saudi Arabia to get it because I didn't want to pay the postage”. The Anorak is in full flow.

"Back then, I only had one leg, but I sprayed the stump with WD40 and it grew back within a week".

Agreeing heartily, we down our beers and, tall stories flying dangerously past our heads, we make a break for the door.

hotel

2007-03-02T20:25:00.000Z

It is our last night in Dublin and, have moved to a hotel near to the airport.

Luckily, it is the swankiest hotel in the world and we only paid a couple of monopoly notes for it because we cleverly booked it on the internet. (This is because only about a hundred people in the aforementioned world know about the internet, so we got a bargain)

Weirdly, there is a door through to the adjoining hotel room, but, I'm sure it must be thoroughly locked and bolted.

I play with the telly and inspect the broadband facility while Imp wraps herself in a giant fluffy hotel robe, rifles through the complimentary smellies and shoves them into her washbag.

This must be what it would be like to be a footballers wife!

***

We climb into the biggest bed in the world, switch the light off and snuggle up.

***

It is only two minutes since I switched the light off. There is some talking.

“Is that next door?” I whisper.

“No, it must be the corridor”. Imp murmurs.

***

It is two minutes and 30 seconds since the light went out.

“No, you're right, it is next door!” Imp is horrified.

We hold our breath and listen.

***

Through the joining door we can hear Mr and Mrs Irish and Baby Irish! But the thing is, we can hear everything!

There may as well be no door!

“Will I go and wash my hands?” says Mrs Irish*.

“Aye, and be sure to splash around while you're there, to be sure”, says Mr Irish, irishly**.

“Aaaaaaaaaah iggg ig aaah”, gurgles the baby*.

“Shit!” gasps Imp.

We lie still, too terrified to move, in case Mr and Mrs Irish and Baby Irish hear us and realise that we are here.

Mrs Irish splashes, during which time I remember, appalled, all the things I have said to Imp in the last half an hour. Some of them were referring to her bottom! I gulp. (quietly)

A mobile rings.

“Will that be the phone?” says Mrs Irish*.

“Aye, so it is, to be sure”, says Mr Irish**.

“Ahh ahh ahh!” says Baby Irish*.

“Will I answer it?”*

“Aye, to be sure, so it is”**

We listen, fascinated.

They have got it on speaker phone! It is Mrs Irish's mother!

“Did you have a good journey, to be sure?” enquires Mrs Irish's Mum. “Is the baby well, to be sure?”*

I turn to Imp, quietly, careful not to rustle the duvet. “We'll have to move rooms!”

She looks at me, solemnly. “Ring the desk and ask them”.

I stare at the phone.

“I can't! They'll hear me!”

I climb out of bed and silently (so as not to disturb the neighbours) get dressed.
Hair awry and a pillow mark on my face, I creep out the room, down the corridor and into the lift, while Mr Irish tells his mother-in-law about the traffic.

* Insert Irish accent liberally

** Insert Irish accent, plus random 'fecks'

holding it in

2007-02-27T11:30:00.000Z

We are in a twee café in Dublin!

We have been up since 4 o'clock and so it is roughly tea-time to my body, although it says it is only 10am on the clock on the wall. This is what happens when you fly budget airlines; the flight only takes 40 minutes but you have jet-lag for a fortnight.

We both wearily squint at the menus and then thrust monopoly-money at the woman on the till, hoping that she has been especially trained to deal with Non-Sterling.

Dublin is a strange place. I saw some respectable-looking women walking from the toilets with black cross-shaped marks on their foreheads! You would think they would have checked for dirty marks in the mirrors while topping up their pink lippy and straightening their American Tans.

Maybe it is some kind of Irish ritual, a bit like tattooing a tear on your face in prison, if you have murdered someone. But for ladies. To say that you've been to the toilet.

I hope that they don't force me to have a black cross on my forehead when I need to go.

I tuck in to my Irish breakfast / tea.

Imp points out some more black crosses. It's strange that everyone doesn't have one, as you would imagine that at some point in the day everyone would need to empty their bladder - even the men.

I think about this for a long time. There are a lot of respectable-looking women without crosses.

Perhaps not having a cross is a sign of being a scary hard-knock in Ireland. Like being a skin-head, but in a pleated skirt.

***

We are on a bus tour!

Imp is brilliant at spotting Black-Cross People!
I am rubbish at it because my short-term memory is not even long enough for any imagery to fully travel along my optical nerves, due to the jet-lag.

I whisper to Imp that I am relieved that I wasn't accosted by a large lady in a twin-set with a black marker pen, when I went for a wee.

“Actually, I think it's because it's Ash Wednesday”, she points out, graciously.

“Oh!” I remark.

“And there's quite a lot of Catholics in Ireland”, she adds, mildly.

“Oh!” I repeat.

(I hope I said "Oh!" in a way that suggests that I was only joking about the paramilitary wing of the Black-Cross WI lurking in the ladies toilet, downstairs in the twee café)

The bus lurches on.

world record

2007-02-24T11:45:00.000Z

I have a degree, several A levels and more GCSEs than you can shake a stick at.

(Admittedly, I have never seen a GCSE and, if I did, I would be sure to sternly shake a stick at it simply to disprove my own statement. However, until then, my stick remains unshaken)

Oh, I've also got a fork lift truck licence, if anyone needs any fork lift trucks driving.
Clearly this marks me out as a (scientifically-proven) very talented and able individual.

I digress.

This morning I achieved a new, world record! Without the help of my incredible intellect or even my stick-shaking abilities!
I must remember to ring the Guinness Book of Records to let them know. I'm sure they will be most excited.

Between the hours of 6:00am and 10:00am, I did a poo in Ireland, England and Wales. Therefore I pood successfully in 3 different countries in the space of 4 hours, averaging at 2 hours between each poo.
Genius.

I thank you.

bandage

2007-02-09T21:30:00.000Z

Imp has hurt her wrist!

She did it last Wednesday while playing squash.
One minute she was doing athletic Lara Croft-dives and the next, she was making pathetic two-handed shots that barely made it to the back wall.
This is where her similarity to Lara Croft ends, as Lara would never become injured, or at least, nothing that involved a lack of performance.

I refrain from mentioning my thoughts on Lara, in case I get a telling off.

Luckily I am a qualified First-Aider and even have an out-of-date defibrillator certificate. I always knew it would come in handy some day.

Doing my best Mark-Green-From-ER impression, I noisily wriggle her wrist around a bit for her and, having successfully brought about a few creaks and responding yelps, diagnose a sprain.
I then instruct her to ignore the pain, before beating her hands-down at the next game.

***

We are back on court.

Imp has had a week to recover and now she has masses of white strapping, grandly binding every moving part of her arm, from her elbow down! I marvel that she is even able to hold the racket and generously carry her water bottle to the court for her.
After all, I love her very much.

However, I am not one to allow someone to win, simply because they are injured. This would be a waste of my £5.20.
(I will, on the other hand, allow her to win a couple of points in each game, to save face.)

The ball is warm and we are ready to go.
I crouch down, keeping Imp in my peripheral vision and waiting for her serve with her ridiculous, huge duveted limb.

She serves, her arm poking out awkwardly like a big bandaged monstrosity and, grinning, I send the ball whizzing back past her head. Winner! Judging by the way she is moving, I think her strapping must be causing a certain amount of extra drag.
Now I'm no scientist, but I know that keeping a roof-rack on your car produces extra aerodynamic resistance and as a result, uses up approximately 5% more petrol. I would imagine that Imp's arm must be having the same effect - slowing her down by about the same amount, to say nothing of the extra weight.

Fantastic! It's a dead cert, I think to myself and, return to the small matter of being a complete bastard.

***

Imp wins. 2-0.

I do my best false smile and on the way back to the changing room I tell her that I wasn't really trying.

bedtime

2007-02-06T23:11:00.000Z

The walls of my flat have become thinner!

I lie in bed, trying to ignore the conversation next door. It's like Chinese Water Torture, but much later.
I can't hear every detail but I know that The Girl is going to the kitchen to get everyone another drink and Bloke 1 keeps laughing at whatever witty thing Bloke 2 is mumbling about.

This is a puzzle to me. I've been here for more than 2 years* and I've never heard anything through the walls before. How can this be? I muse over this for a while, hoping that it will make me so tired that I will become unconscious through the effort of thinking.
This happens to me quite a lot in places, like at traffic lights, or while watching Casualty at Imp's house, but it never seems to work in bed.

*In this flat, not in bed trying to get to sleep.

There was a time that I would have considered this a reasonable time to be up talking. And that was even before they invented Red Bull. But now I am a person of stature in society (ie, I have a red triangle in the boot of my car for emergencies and a Mini ISA**) and need my sleep. I harumph indignantly and carry on Not Listening To Next Door.

**In the Building Society, not the boot of my car.

The Girl's back from the kitchen. I know this because she's just sneezed.

I hate her.
How dare she sneeze! And the blokes, how dare they talk, in their own home. Bastards.

I bury my head under my duvet but, for some reason the laws of science gang up on me and it seems to amplify everything even more. I must be the unluckiest person in the world! I groan as Bloke 2 slurps his can and The Girl sips her Lambrini. I can practically hear the bubbles pinging on the glass.

I check my clock. Squintily. 2:00am.

I've decided. The only possible course of action is to drink whiskey. This is scientifically proven to deaden your hearing and aid sleep.

I drink whiskey. Medicinally.

It doesn't work.

I drink more whiskey. Not-so-medicinally.

I check my clock. 2:45am.
I've got to be up for work in 4 1/4 hours time! Aaaarrrgh! Bastard bloody students, talking and having a nice time and being next door to me and my inexplicably thin walls.

I'm not a grumpy person as a matter of course, or at least, I'm not grumpy when I'm in a good mood. But now I'm in a bad mood. Because it's the middle of the night and I'm not even tired anymore and Bloke 1 is still chuckling, which is beginning to get right on my ***s.

Moodily I shuffle with my duvet and a pillow and make myself as comfortable as possible on the living room floor and, miserably I lie in the dark and devise ways to murder the next-door neighbours...

windy

2007-01-19T17:13:00.000Z

Apparently people have been very badly affected by extremely strong winds all over the country, in the last few days.

I know how they feel.

fuff

2007-01-16T17:58:00.001Z

Imp farts on my leg.

I am appalled.

"Did you just fart on my leg?" I interrogate, skillfully.

She buries her head under the duvet and sniggers.

She farts again, this time with added gusto

Now I am very worried as she is a headteacher and has no business behaving this way. I think I should write to someone important, to complain.

dental trauma

2007-01-04T22:24:00.000Z

I am at the dentist!

He seems to be a really nice bloke, but dentists will always be a breed apart. They are people who get paid to inflict pain, like career-murderers or dominatrix. It is a proven scientific fact that all dentists have the hard-back version of the Myra Hindley Biography next to their History of Screams Compendium (Lulu, her Life and Loves), in the Easy-Reading section of their book collections. Also they are all failed lobster-chefs. Fact.

I glance at him suspiciously as he prepares his instruments of torture.

Time shakes a bit and the temperature drops a few degrees.

Extractions. Not something you would choose to have done for fun, in the New Year.

I seem to remember reading a while back that a hundred years ago (or so), men used to force their new brides to have all their teeth removed once they got married, to prevent expense in later life. I consider this and, conclude that all men are bastards.

This particular bloke leans forward and injects the gum.

Silence.

The dental assistant hovers, in a hoverey dental assistant kind of way.

I wonder how much you get paid for handling cotton wool all day?

With the swift determination of a pouncing lion, the dentist swoops in for the kill.

***

“AAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrghhhhhh!” I scream in my head.

The pain is excruciating! I can feel my bones crunching.

I weep silently and bravely say nothing.

Sweat spangles on my forehead.

Blimey, it’s painful.

The dentist flips the wisdom tooth out of Imp’s mouth and I watch in relieved agony, fascinated, knowing that she doesn’t even realise that it’s all done, yet.

“Bite on this, please”, he murmurs, shoving some gauze into her mouth, and she squeezes my hand again, expecting some more pain.

Bloody hell, she’s got a powerful grip.

I must make sure that next time I encase my hand in Plaster of Paris, before I recklessly promise to hold her hand during some medical procedure.

Clasping my poor, crushed hand, I whimper pathetically as we leave the dental surgery.

toppling

2006-12-13T23:50:00.000Z

I have woken up ill!

I am confined to my bed, with a neat stack of paracetamol and ibuprofen near to hand.

As a professional beer drinker, I do not suffer hangovers and must therefore have caught a terrible life-threatening illness or, even worse, Man-Flu.

It’s strange that I should get this the morning after drinking industrial amounts of beer at the Beer and Cider Festival, but it’s a funny old world and one should never discount ironic coincidence.

My alarm clock bleeps. Bastard.

I consider food.

I reject that thought.

I have heard that these aforementioned illnesses can leave you confined to bed for weeks and I wonder if I should ring Imp and get her to come over and nurse me back to health?
I would ring NHS Direct but I can’t remember the number and besides, they always tell you to ‘get thee from thy bed and walk’ in the direction of the closest surgery; whereas Imp is much better at being concerned and does things like gets me cold drinks and, she whispers and kisses my forehead and stuff.
My doctor is crap and I think I can honestly say, he has never done that.

I make a mental note to complain about the state of the National Health Service.

I have to get up for work in a minute! I moan, quietly, so as not to disturb my head.

I have contracted a fever!
In fact, I remember seeing a mosquito in my flat a few days ago. I could be stricken with malaria. I try rolling my eyes in a feverish malaria-infected way.
It doesn't seem to help.

I consider stuff. Again.

This could be serious. I’ve only got enough body fat to nourish my body for about 437-439 days (give or take a month or so) and it is about 9 hours since I last ate (apart from the midnight chips, but they don’t count) and so I am in serious danger of missing breakfast...

I sip some water and wait, to see if anything bad is going to happen.

Nothing bad happens.

Encouraged by the Nothing that happens, I feebly text Imp. “Hiya my lov. Hope u ok. I bt wors 4 wear. X”
I think she will spot the hint and drop everything, in order to be by my bedside.

In the meantime I clasp my head and try groaning.

Groaning helps a lot. I don’t know why.

I wait about another 30 minutes while my body wastes away (quite) slowly.

Imp texts. She is very busy doing impossibly important things like being a parent and a headteacher and turning up for work on time and, sends her love.
I think I detect smugness.
Tssk.

Defeated, I stagger from sickbed and make myself a (veggie) sausage sandwich.

tippling

2006-12-11T18:18:00.000Z

I scan my beer-booklet.

There are about 40 breweries here and this is going to take a scientific decision.
I am not at all scientific, but luckily, when it comes to matters of beer, I can extend my skills quite satisfactorily.

I scan again, in a manner of great scientificness.
It is a fine balance. Obviously the name of the brewery is crucial, as is also the name of the beer, type of beer, its ingredients and lastly (but not leastly), the alcohol percentage.

Beaver Beer? (of course), Dorothy Goodbody’s Wholesome Stout? (nope), Clouded Yellow? (definitely not), Dark side of the Moose? (absolutely!), Windy Miller?
What a wonderful dilemma.

The bar stretches into the distance, hazy with beery loveliness and crowded with big, bearded, beer-bellied CAMRA paramilitaries.
We blend right in; me with my beard and my brother with his er.. no beard.

I grin boozily at Ickle Bro who boozily grins back and, devoted, we head for the far end of the bar, grasping our special-issue pint glasses and our dog-eared beer-booklets.

outside wrexham

2006-11-15T18:30:00.000Z

I queue for a very long time.

Fortunately I am very familiar with the British road systems and their peculiarities and have come prepared with some sandwiches and a can of pretend Red Bull.

I have been queuing now for three quarters of an hour and, I have driven the total distance of up to Where That Lorry Was When I Started and I am beginning to wander whether I should switch the engine off and go for a walk.

This might be a stroke of genius!
I will soon run out of sandwiches and, the pretend Red Bull will almost definitely give me wings. I look out of the window and study my immediate surroundings.

If you ignore the car next to me and the other car next to me and the other 45,372,849320000 cars and a scattering of lorries, the scenery still isn’t that good - although I suppose you might think it was luxury if you from somewhere deprived, like Birmingham, but I am from Wales so I have high expectations.

On the other hand, there is an embankment and some trees and the trees are almost green (through the layer of exhaust fumes) so that’s encouraging.

I switch off the engine.

Casually I open the door, brush off the crumbs, stretch, and look around.
My legs have got very sweaty and my trousers are jammed up my arse-crack. I hope no-one notices.

45,372,849320000 sets of eyes watch me (apart from people who might only have one eye) and my resolve wavers.

The car in front creeps forward almost two feet.

Relieved, I leap back in, start up the engine and rush forwards to fill the gap.

for your delectation

2006-10-25T13:07:00.000+01:00

Rex the Runt - Under the Duvet (listen out for Auntie Brenda!) 9mins34secs

Jesus sings Gloria 42secs

anti-natal

2006-10-22T22:05:00.000+01:00

My sister has asked me to be her birthing partner!

I think about it for about 1.27000004658 of a second and picture things too horrific to be repeated (but that look a bit like a melon in a doner kebab). There is no mirror available but I think I may have paled slightly, due to the fact that I have to sit down hurriedly before I lose consciousness.

It constantly amazes me that childbirth is still legal in this day and age. After all, it is the Twenty-First century and I’m sure Tomorrow’s World said something a while back about mail order and Jiffy Bags.

Next time I see Maggie Philbin I must remember to quiz her about how one may go about this.

Graciously I stand down from my position of Potential Birthing Partner and magnanimously and selflessly offer this midwifery-gift to Imp, pointing out that although I would love to become acquainted with my new niece/nephew as early as possible, I would be quite happy to wait until it has left the birth canal.

This is a stroke of genius! My sister thinks it is a great idea; Imp weeps tears of joy and I am off the hook.

I quickly hand the phone to Imp so that they both can continue sobbing about babies without involving me and, turn back to the important task of putting my DVD collection in alphabetical order……..

ouch, my baby bits...

2006-10-17T16:05:00.000+01:00

I learn to ride off (small) kerbs!

It is true, this is not a particularly elegant spectacle, but a necessary one if ever I should be involved in a life or death unicycle chase and came upon a 2 1/2 inch drop.
Ickle Bro watches in envy......... he knows he would die if he were in the same situation (unless the chase was abandoned after 24.6 inches).

dangerous drugs

2006-10-16T22:45:00.000+01:00

I am in a pub with a load of ten-year olds!

Actually it is a pretend pub but it has original fittings - a bar, optics, pumps, tables, beer mats, a slot machine, pictures of miners up on the wall.

The kids, however, are totally convinced and their eyes are popping out their heads, planning what they’re going to tell Mummy and Daddy, later.

The teacher settles onto a stool at the back and looks suspiciously at home. I thought it was illegal for teachers to have private lives, let alone one that involves socialising. I determine to report her without any delay to the Local Education Authority.

Meanwhile the children find themselves a stool each and gaze up at the beer pumps, clearly wondering if they are going to be given a half-pint and a straw.
I prop myself up on the bar and grin at them.

“What sort of things do people buy in pubs?” I ask.

Ten right arms shoot up into the air and wave frantically at me.

“Champagne!” yells a posh looking girl, all teeth and expensive hairdo.

Blimey.

“Mineral water!”, calls out another posh kid, in a posh voice.

“Cocktails!” This is from a plummy kid perched to my right.

Clearly this isn’t a school from the inner-city.
Normally we go through every brand of lager ever to have graced the hostelries of Britain, along with a few black-market spirits from the illigeal distillery in the cupboard under Uncle Phil's stairs.

“Sherry!”

“Chardonnay!”

“Pimms!”

I don’t even know what Pimms is, so I quickly change the subject before they discover my working classness and demand that I scrub the floor in a jaunty cockney accent.

“So! Alcohol is a drug. That is why you can get addicted to it and, that’s the reason it can cause so much damage to your body if you drink too much”, I chant, in my Blue Peter voice.
Valerie Singleton would be proud of me.

“Who knows the names of any other drugs?”

The hands are slower this time.

A girl with an equine plait limply waves her wrist at me.

“Um… I’ve heard of one, I Think, called something like…. ‘Can’..” she trails off.

“Yes?” I nod, encouragingly.

“Can…something…..”

She’s posh and she’s heard of cannabis! I rejoice to myself and wait for her to (delicately) spit it out.

“Can…..a….”

We’re all leaning forward now, willing her on. The teacher is looking vaguely surprised.

“Cann-A…….Oh! I do know it!”

I’m holding my breath now.

“Canapés!” she announces, triumphant.

I blink.

creep

2006-10-10T17:34:00.000+01:00

I am at Imp's house!

This means I can watch TV.

The benefit of not having a telly of my own is that I am excited about watching old episodes of The Dukes of Hazard.
I bound into the front room (after asking if I can put the telly on) while Imp does grown-up things like putting the kettle on and clanking things.

I am half way across the room, finger poised, before I notice. I freeze in mid-stride, like they do in Scooby Doo.
TinyDog® is asleep on the sofa!

I tiptoe out again, so as not to wake her...

sitting comfortably

2006-10-05T20:58:00.000+01:00

We are snuggling on the settee!

Imp’s house is great because it has a settee that doesn’t have hard bits and it is long enough for me to stretch my legs out, even though I am extraordinarily tall.

TinyDog® is curled up on the other chair, because we are the bosses and she is bottom of the pack. I am an expert on animal psychology, ever since I read a book about dog-training*.

*I don’t think the fact that she keeps trying to shag my leg is a cause for concern, it’s just that even to TinyDog®, I am amazingly attractive.

We snuggle a bit more.

Inexplicably, and before I am able to stop it getting out of control, I am engulfed with a wave of affection for Imp (because she has a comfy sofa) and I offer to get up and make coffee.

Damn!

“That would be lovely”, Imp murmurs, in a not-having-to-get-up tone of voice and, cursing my incredibly generous and unselfish (although sometimes a tiny bit grumpy) nature, I do a stunt-roll off the settee and stomp to the kitchen.

***

“Decaf in the white mug, leaded in the brown”, I chant, as I get back to the front room.

I place the mugs carefully on the little table and wipe up a few drips that somehow ended up on the floor (I suspect gravity) with my sock, hoping that Imp hasn’t noticed my lack of waitress-abilityness. It’s 18 years since I was sacked from my waitressing job.

I stop.

TinyDog® has nicked my place on the settee!

“TinyDog® has nicked my place on the settee!” I report in my squeaky indignant voice.

Imp agrees.

I think she is asleep.

I stand in the middle of the room, bereft and cheated of my rightful position. Now is my chance to demonstrate that I am Alpha Female and TinyDog® is Nothing with a Capital N.

“TinyDog®! OFF!” I command, waving my arms in a way that would have Barbara Woodhouse weeping with tears of joy.

TinyDog® glances at me scornfully and cuddles up a bit closer to Imp.

I sit on the other chair.

humbug

2006-10-02T16:20:00.000+01:00

I pretend to think about it very hard.

“So will you come?” Imp asks. “It’s fancy dress, you like fancy dress…”

She is flailing around now for reasons, but we both know it's a weak argument.

“There’ll be beer!”

It’s true, I like fancy dress and I like beer, but I only like certain types of each. For example, I DON’T like Extra Fizzy Cheapo Supermarket Lager at 15p a can…. and I DON’T like fancy dress if it’s a ‘Fifties’ theme at a 50th birthday party and there is a danger that I might be forced to wear a lemon yellow A-line skirt and dance like a girl.

I remain unconvinced.

I think about it again and wonder if I can get away with being a Fifties Root Vegetable or a Fifties Pimp with Sex Slave?

“…and there’ll be Fifties music and everything”, she adds, terminally.

I scowl at the phone and do my best Grumpy Face.

Inexplicably, she can hear my Grumpy Face and does Stern Face.
Imp never ceases to amaze me with her Super Powers. I think it is something to do with Female Intuition and, that I was probably picking my nose and arranging my toy cars in order of how-many-doors-open, near the back of the queue when it was handed out.

I present my best counter-attack, fully thought out and articulate in its every nuance.

“But..but…but……………………….. ”

“..............(but)”, I emphasise, hopefully.

Imp doesn’t agree.

“You’re my partner and that sometimes means coming along to things just to support me”, she says reasonably.

Damnit. She's right.

I agree and scowl a bit more when she isn’t listening.

dance yer tits off

2006-09-30T12:38:00.000+01:00

I've decided to join the 21st century and stick some downloadable mp3s on my site (see right-hand bar).

The bands featured at the moment are punky/electronica/weirdy-dancy Cardiff bands;

Sicknote
Bomb Culture
Staedler&Waldorf

Enjoy :)

impressions

2006-09-28T23:36:00.000+01:00

I am at the recycling place!

I back my van up to the giant skip, park alongside two other cars and jump out.

I am bringing a vast pile of collapsed cardboard boxes from work to be recycled. I am aware that most of the boxes bear the legend ‘1mm Monosyringe’ or ‘Durex Extra’, but this is no cause for alarm as they are all stacked neatly and flatly and unreadably. Confidently I begin to unload.

A woman clad almost entirely in wool smiles woolily at me and I give her my best wholesome beam back.
Luckily, although I am the world’s most grumpy person, the sun is shining and this makes it somehow easier to do pretend smiles.
Her husband (or man posing as her husband) nods through his beard and I conclude that they must be Christians. I check for sandals and hairy toes, but their feet are hidden behind their Volvo Estate.

Now I begin the hurling of cardboard.

I particularly like hurling cardboard as it gives me an opportunity to use my Gardening Growl.
Obviously, if it was a tiny skip then I would look silly and wouldn’t dream of grunting and growling while throwing cardboard boxes, but this skip is about 3 feet taller than me (it is enormously tall) so I get to do a kind of jump and a growl, like a Neanderthal doing ballet.

I can see the Christians are very impressed at how hard I am working, so I wipe my brow theatrically and climb into the back of the van for some more cardboard.

A bloke in a Hi Vis jacket who has to guard the Scrap Metal skip yells something across at me. I can't hear what he is saying but I can tell that he too is in awe at my hard-workingness.

This is fun! I get to jump and grunt and chuck stuff and get paid for it!

I get to my last box all too quickly. That’s a shame.

Checking for my audience, I do an extra-energetic leap and, elegantly, in mid-air, the box flips and empties its contents of How-To-Put-A-Condom-On leaflets all over me.

The unwanted leaflets that no one bothered to tell me were in the box.

All.Four.Hundred.Of.Them.

Like confetti.

With pictures of erect penises on the front.

Face hot enough to heat a small town, I hurriedly gather them all up. I can feel a shocked crowd of stares boring their way into the back of my bowed head.

Leaping into the van, I screech off, hurtling on two wheels around the bloke in Hi-Vis at the gate and disappearing at top speed to find a lay-by to sob in.

beating about the bush

2006-09-25T08:30:00.000+01:00

I firmly hold the willy.

This is something I generally try to avoid, let me make this clear.

"Now! After checking it is the right way up, squeeze the air from the top of the condom and, in one movement, slide the condom to the base of the penis", the trainer explains.

I struggle gruntingly with my plastic willy. The condom is slimey and it keeps rolling back up! It's a good job I don't have to do this in the dark.

Paul, my partner in this exercise, squints a bit and I could swear I see his eyes water.

"Any good?", I enquire (accusingly).

"Yes!" he shrills, from the safe distance of behind-a-chair away.

I am now an expert on condoms and if ever I should be called upon in a sheath application emergency, I can refuse to do it from a position of smugness.

By 4:30 I will be a fully qualified Assessor in condom application. My CV is getting very surreal.

We check to see how the other groups are doing.

A femidom catapults past.

Maybe I should join the Dental Dam group? I quibble. This is not a choice I have to make very often. I quibble again.

We embark finally, on the more interesting task of licking each of the flavoured condoms* as a quality control measure.

I hope the buffet arrives soon, I'm starving.

*Vanilla is best

0.7 miles

2006-09-20T10:45:00.000+01:00

I am going to the bike shop with one and a half bikes!

I have never been to this bike shop before but it is called Cyclopaedia and the geniusness of the name makes me want to visit it. Just thinking about it makes me happy.
In fact, I might give them the keys to my house and offer to have their children, if they are nice to me, although I would have to clear that with Imp, first.

My normal bike needs a grip shift and my unicycle needs a doojit-thingy and, Google Maps informs me that the hilariously-named-bike-shop is 0.7 miles away.

I consider my options. It could take a while to get there, pushing one and a half bikes.

While Imp and I were in Amsterdam we saw people carrying all manner of things on their bikes… my favourite being the bloke with a 2-seater settee.
Not to be outdone, I climb aboard my bike and, hanging onto the unicycle, I launch merrily off.

This is not as easy at is sounds. Especially the ‘merry’ bit, which wears off remarkably fast.

There are pedals protruding everywhere.
I wobble precariously, steering with my left hand and hanging on to the very pedally unicycle with my right.
It pokes me in my shin and I swerve a bit, leaning to the left to avoid it.

Now the unicycle wheel decides to start turning. Bastard!
This is a bit like carrying a strange torture device that takes random jabs at my side. Maybe the Romans should have done this to Jesus instead of crucifixion. There’s no way he would have forgiven them for that.

I swear in a ladylike way and it stabs at me again, just to prove it can.

A bus farts its way past me, leaving me gasping in a cloud of hot exhaust fumes. This is a popular move with the passengers who stare at me, wide-eyed, through the murky windows in a line of face-pressing delight.

Naturally I am a talented cyclist and were it not for the hill, and the pedals that keep taking swipes at my kidneys, and the buses…. oh! and the broken grip shift, I would be fine! I struggle hillwards, swearing eloquently.

My gears move.
This is what happens when you have a broken grip shift and no sense of humour left.

I can’t do a thing about it, what with hanging on to the unicycle for dear life and everything.

The Laws of Sod dictate that the gears should move upwards, thus making it more difficult to cycle. They adhere strictly to the rule and my eyes begin to bulge.

I invent some more swear words and battle miserably on, my cheerful mood a thing of the distant past.

hob-nobbing

2006-09-15T23:40:00.000+01:00

I am standing next to a politician!

I have no idea who she is, but I still turn into a mute, with wild, staring eyes, as is required of all mortals meeting someone famous.

“So you designed these leaflets?” she asks, in a politician-like way.

“Yes,” I say.

There is a silence. Mostly it’s in my head, but I rush to fill it, before she notices.

“On the computer,” I expand, helpfully.

She nods and I can tell that she is bowled over by my wit and repartee. (Actually I have no idea what a ‘repartee’ is, but I think it’s clever and funny, a bit like an Oxford Graduate dressed in a giant tampon costume.)

We both stare at the display board and I hope that someone will rescue me or choke on a butterfly cake, soon.

“So what inspired you to design them in this way?”

A journalist is scribbling in Arabic into a notebook, which is very rude, given that he is supposed to be writing about the leaflet-launch. I suppose he is doing a night class and needs to practice but, honestly, there’s a time and a place.

I think about her question. I could get a pay-rise out of this! This is my opportunity to get in with the Big Boys… Tony might hear about me and nip by and buy me a company car!!

I frantically try to remember why I designed the leaflet.

“Erm, well I did it like this because my boss liked it,” I explain.

Bugger.

Sunday Game

2006-09-10T19:55:00.000+01:00

A couple of years ago I bought the Polyphonic Spree album "The Beginning Stages of...." for my friend, Witty, because she likes the French Horn.... and because I thought they looked funny.

She ripped the paper off, looked at the album cover (trying to disguise her horror) and clearly thought I'd bought her a Christian Cult Album of Cringeworthy Choruses. Which of course, is the real reason I bought it. I'm a git at heart.
How we laughed....

Two albums later they're still as weird as ever but I'm not complaining, especially since I found this equally weird game.

The artwork is spectacular and if you crank the sound up you'll be accompanied / plagued by something that sounds like a cross between Flaming Lips and Mercury Rev.

The game is a Click-And-Wait-To-See-What-Happens type puzzle. Sounds a bit like sex, come to think of it.

The mission; to get three lost, robed, band members back to the main group who have somehow got separated, possibly on the way back from the bathroom.
It does say.. but I couldn't be bothered to read it.

Anyhow, it's worth it, just for the animation.

Click

quiet evening

2006-09-09T18:20:00.000+01:00

We are watching the telly!

This isn’t something that happens very much to me, as I don’t have a TV. I wouldn’t go as far as to say that it is a highlight, but it is certainly an event.

We have scanned through all 900 channels available and there is nothing on.
This is incredible! You would imagine that there would at least be an old episode of The Equaliser, so that I could stand in front of the mirror and practice looking menacing.

I scan again.

We lie on the sofa, snuggling down and watch a programme about weaving.

There is an unwritten law that if you have a TV with hundreds of channels, you must watch one of them, even if it is crap. I think you could be hunted down and forced to go to local prayer meetings, or sentenced to death or something, if you do not comply.

Luckily when you are snuggling, weaving can be very interesting. Soon I shall be a Loom expert and people from far and wide will come to me for Loom Facts.

Imp is clearly feeling romantic because she is burying her face into my hoodie.

“Hey!” she whispers.

I shift my attention from a particularly intricate fly-shuttle. “Yes?”

I expect she will snog me now and we may have to close the curtains.

“You smell like a charity shop”.

“…What? No I don’t!” I protest.

My counter-argument delivered skilfully, we continue watching the TV while I worry about my clothes.

lift-off

2006-09-06T17:20:00.000+01:00

We are in a plane!

This always excites me because it’s a bit like being in space, but lower and you can breathe.

We take off and I lean over Imp, staring at the landscape and looking for our hotel. I have been lead to believe (by Google maps) that there will be a little red arrow over it, emblazoned with the letter ‘A’, but I can’t see it. That’s very disappointing.

I look over at the other passengers. They are being very grown up and reading. I am still very excited about the fact that we are still leaning back, climbing upwards (like a spaceship) and that I can see almost the whole of the world (apart from Australia) laid out below us, through the tiny window next to Imp.

I pretend not to be excited and get my book out.

I pretend to read for nearly ten seconds.

“Look!” I say to Imp, in my pretending-not-to-be-excited voice.

“Look, there’s a road!”

She looks up from her book and agrees.

We both get back to reading/pretending to read.

“Look! That must be Breugerbreuger-Van-thingy!” I point at a town.
This is what it must be like to be Digby, The World’s Biggest Dog. I manage not to say that out loud.

Imp agrees, this time without looking up.

“Look! There’s a boat!”

She grunts.

“Look! We can’t see anything now apart from the top of the clouds!”

She grunts.

I get my book out again and resume pretending to read.

sights to see

2006-09-04T07:15:00.000+01:00

Celia-The-Guide powers on ahead, waving her black-and-white brolly around manically.

All 85 of us stumble along behind her, occasionally catching our breath for long enough to comment on the quaintness of the back yard we are walking through, if we get the time to look sideways without crashing into the person in front.

“This is someone’s back garden!” Imp wheezes, as we all power-walk like a giant, blurry, overgrown pre-school crocodile. It's a shame we're not all wearing lycra because that would look (even more) hilarious, although judging by the size of some of the thighs in front of me, might be a fire-hazard.
I decide not to suggest this when we get back.

It’s unbelievable!

Our ‘gentle stroll’ through the traditional Dutch village of Volendam is actually a brisk tour through the back alleys and gardens of the villages poor residents who, doubtless, close their curtains and hide, quivering in the kitchen, every day at 1:30 sharp. We see no one. Not a soul.

The Italians look as baffled as we feel. Maybe this is for the benefit of the Americans, who might not have seen houses smaller than Southfork before. They make excited american noises whenever we pass something smaller or quainter than the Albert Hall.

Nobody dares tell Celia-The-Guide that the rest of us would rather walk around the front, in case she shouts at us. We all remain silent. She barks orders in English, Spanish and Italian and we obey, unquestioningly.

“You must buy your food at the café where I tell you to buy”, she commands.

85 grown adults nod.

The Boring Ancient American Bloke peers into someone’s living room and Imp and I speed up, embarrassed beyond our wildest Saga nightmares.

The black-and-white brolly disappears around a corner and we power on, terrified of making her wait and, tragically missing the finer details of some ornaments on a back window sill.

By now we are giggling and snorting like naughty school children.

The Boring Ancient American Bloke starts chatting up Celia-The-Guide and we listen, fascinated and appalled at the same time. This is arse-licking at its most blatant. This is what it must be like to be old and American! I must remind myself to remain at all times on this side of the Atlantic.

“…..and then we’ll be visiting Norway,” he drawls tediously, his knee-length socks succumbing to the coma-inducing boringness of it all and slowly sliding down towards his ankles.

Celia-the-guide nods, eyes glazed. She walks faster.

“Do you have any children?” he pipes up and we snort again in stereo. Some snot lands on my chin.

We are passing some underpants hanging to dry on a washing-line and I wonder whether Celia-The-Guide will slow down enough for me to take a photograph of them.

Imp laughs harder and we both walk in a sideways crab-skip so as not to wet ourselves.

I clutch my dinner money, waiting to be ordered to spend it.

Sunday Game

2006-09-03T22:27:00.000+01:00

Back in the long and distant past, long before television had been invented and we had to make our own entertainment, I used to spend hours standing in Woolworths playing Tetris on the Gameboy stand.

Hours and hours and hours and hours.

Somehow that open-mouthed fascination still hasn't gone away (even though I am now officially 'Grown Up').

Luckily There is this:

Even more fortunately, it isn't on a stand in Woolworths... which means I can drink coffee and talk to myself and sometimes even fart* without worrying about disgracing myself.

My highest score is 30, 985 and IT'S NOT GOOD ENOUGH TO GET ON THE LEADERBOARD. Oh, the shame.

If you know how to score high, let me know pleeeeasee.

Click

*In a ladylike way, of course

cheese safari

2006-09-01T20:33:00.000+01:00

I can’t believe it has come to this!

Not only have I reached the grand old age of thirty-four but now I have also turned into one of those people who goes on coach tours.

I have always sniggered at people who go on coach trips. Clearly they are either too old to read a map, or they are too scared to drive faster than 30mph.
I have also observed that usually they have a gammy leg or a blue rinse.

Imp and I climb onto the coach.
I notice that Imp’s purple hair glints regally in the bright morning sunlight as I limp up the stairs. We grab our seats and whisper about the other people on the coach.

We are going to be dispatched at a specially constructed clog factory in the middle of a giant coach car park, in the middle of nowhere, where we will be unleashed to take furious photos of anything that moves and spend lots of money.
We will then be herded back onto the coach and onward, to a cheese farm, before there is even the slimmest chance that we see any real Dutch people. This is what the brochure says.

I am a bit worried that the cheese might be unlike British cheese.

As far as I know, cheese in Britland would be made in a cheese factory, whereas here it seems it procreates. In a farm. This is quite alarming.

I hope that we can watch the cheeses gambolling from behind the safety of the reinforced glass of our coach windows.

We arrange our travel blanket over our knees and patiently wait for the coach to move off..

heavens above!

2006-08-29T23:08:00.000+01:00

It is my birthday!

Imp and I go for a walk in the park.

We have been having a bit of trouble working out basic things like how to get on a tram or how to pay Van Scrabble due to our not being Dutch, so a walk in the park should be erm… well, a walk in the park.

It is a foreign park that has a very long name, but luckily (due to my superior navigation skills) we manage to find our way around without having to buy a loaf of bread or asking to book a non-smoking table for a family of four.

We have been here for about 4 days now so naturally we are now both practically fluent in Dutch but speaking it would be a whole different matter.
If, for example, we were attacked by a rabid dog then we would have to rely on Mel Gibson-type doggy-growly-communication rather than commanding it in a stern voice to Sit! and then go immediately to see a vet.

I check for rabid dogs.

There are none that I can see.

I realise that I don’t really know what a rabid dog looks like so I carry on being on my guard.
It would be just my luck if I make it to my 34th birthday only to be nibbled on as an aperitif for a disease-ridden Dutch dog. Although I think it sounds like the kind of thing Tom Waits might have sung about so maybe in a weird kind of way it would be an honour.

***

The best thing about having a birthday at the end of August is that it usually falls somewhere near the bank holiday (which means I don’t have to go to work) and that it’s guaranteed to be sunny.

It begins to rain. A lot.

In fact, it is the kind of rain known as Comedy Rain.

Comedy Rain is the wettest rain known to man. It is the kind of rain that soaks you right through to your internal organs in less time than it takes to wish you had a coat on.
In fact, Comedy Rain is the kind of rain that is used in biblical floods or more recent natural disasters, although then the word ‘Comedy’ has to be removed.

We don’t care about getting wet in one squillionth of a second..

Well, Imp minds a bit because she now has to walk like a bandy-legged robot in the way that people who are fully clothed and very wet, do.

But anyway. The rabid dogs will have imploded.

We walk like bandy-legged robots to find some beer (via a museum because we are tourists).

say again?

2006-08-27T23:58:00.000+01:00

We are in Amsterdam!

Imp and I have bundled the kids into a children’s home and legged it across the channel and now we are abroad, where nobody knows us and we can hold hands.

In Wales, you have to worry about being shouted at by a fat, ugly, drunk bloke in a string vest with a spider tattoo on his neck and beer stains down his chin, being egged on by his fat, drunk mates. (It is not always the same bloke, but it is always a bloke).
That is the price we pay for being in a same-sex relationship.

Here, we are not the weirdest people and that is saying something.

We stand by the Central Station and squint at the map that we have acquired from the hotel lobby.

All the streets are called things like ‘Eerstehelmerstraat’ and ‘Gillis Van Lendenberghstraat’ and ‘Floogn-Loogn Schnitzel Danduff Van Earwaxn Straat’.

It is a scientifically proven fact that places are much harder to navigate when place names are a random jumble of consonants with an even randomer jumble of vowels thrown in. Carol Vorderman would be appalled.

I make a mental note to report the Dutch to the authorities.

walk

2006-08-19T18:32:00.000+01:00

We have walked for 5 minutes and TinyDog® is in a mood with me.

I am armed with my OS map, rucksack and dog-on-lead and I am walking a 13-mile section of the Pembrokeshire coastal path.
Imp has had a better idea and is sitting on a beach (wrapped up warm in a jumper and coat) with LittleImpA and LittleImpB. We remain in contact by text.
I am puzzled by her apparent disinterest in joining me in this jaunt along the cliffs.

My enthusiasm however, is catchy. I’m sure that the dog will really enjoy this opportunity to see some of the most beautiful landscape (and seascapes) in the country.
Strangely, the dog has her eyes screwed up in the wind and her tail is resolutely down. I could swear she is sneering. I think she has just realised that there are another 12 ½ miles to go.

I drag her along and announce what a beautiful day (apart from the wind) it is. TinyDog® remains unimpressed.

We clamber down a small section of cliff and I glance sideways at the dog (who is trying to go back the way we came). I think she is muttering under her breath.

Consulting my map I confirm loudly that there is, indeed, another 12 ½ miles of magnificent countryside to go. We are so lucky.

TinyDog® continues shuffling stroppily along behind me and we carry on in this manner, woman towing dog.

the law

2006-08-16T21:10:00.000+01:00

We are staying in a caravan!

In my younger days I would have roughed it in a tent, up a mountain, beside a swamp, swarming with Horse Flies, backing onto a moor with escaped criminals and murderers hiding in it.

But now that I am in my thirties and Imp has children to look after, we are striking a compromise and have doors that lock but we are not using the heating, even though it seems to have forgotten to be August and it’s pretending to be February.

I squint out at the pouring rain and crack open a beer. Imp flicks through some leaflets looking for a good wet-weather activity.
We could go to a knitting museum but, after a lot of thought and a certain amount of agonising we decide to go to a beach, because it is compulsory to eat ice cream while you are on holiday even if it is raining and, for some reason ice cream vans can only be found next to beaches or in run-down housing estates.

When I become Prime Minister I will make it the law that ice cream vans have to spend at least one day a week in pub car parks and I will also make it the law that pub car parks will have to have lids.

device

2006-08-16T18:28:00.000+01:00

Speeding is part of the joy of being on the road, somehow with my licence still intact.

Obviously I only ever go above the speed limit in extreme emergencies like if I'm being chased by a crazed lunatic or if I have a souffle in the oven that needs flipping or whatever it is you do to souffles.

Anyhow, the government came up trumps 6 years ago with this little beauty. I can't for the life of me understand why it didn't make it. Cutting the fuel supply to your car while you are driving sounds like a really safe and useful idea. Bless them.

In order to top their totally fruitcake crazy-loony-bonkers brainwave that in true Tomorrow's World style, didn't quite make the grade, they've come up with this thing now.
I expect we will all be made to wear this black box thing on our heads and may suffer electric shocks evertime we go over 20mph. Or something. Nothing will surprise me.

Related articles:
Anti-speeding car - girls approve (apparently)
Bloody hell, it's everywhere...

sign the petition

drugs are dangerous..

2006-08-09T20:06:00.000+01:00


watch and grin :)

sod's law

2006-08-08T22:47:00.000+01:00

I am in Lidl when I feel the urge.

Lidl is a great shop because it sells cheese pasties and Pretend-Baileys and horse blankets (not that I know anyone in the middle of the city who has a horse to put a blanket on, but you never know when you might need one*).

I buy a guide to Amsterdam and some aubergines and clench my buttocks and rush out.

As far as I know, there aren’t public toilets in Lidl, unless you are supposed to ask a member of staff, but I don’t want to because they might announce it over the tannoy and then everyone will know that I need a poo.
I quite like talking about poo, but I don’t want a shop full of strangers to know when I am about to go.

Tesco has customer toilets and so does Asda (although in Asda they are always miles away from the doors) and it seems that Lidl doesn't, but then again, you can't buy horse blankets from Tesco so I suppose you can't have everything.

My face reddens with the strain and I waddle to my car.

I speed off like the stunt driver in Cagney and Lacey, leaping over speed humps and screeching around a roundabout hoping the traffic lights will be green. Obviously they are not.
Hunching over the steering wheel, I wait anxiously. They seem to take a very, very long time.

Murphy’s Law states that if something can go wrong, it will (or something like that).
The myth is that he dropped a whole load of cats with buttered toast strapped to their backs from a great height to see which would come out worst, the cat or the toast.

Clearly that is a load of bollocks, because the RSPCA would have got wind of it and sentenced him to a 2 month suspended sentence or community service.
I suspect he might actually have been stuck on the motorway about ½ mile back from an accident, bowels in spasm and his mother-in-law sat next to him when he became enlightened.

Anyway, the lights change and I get through them without soiling myself.
Murphy was wrong this time; nothing has gone wrong and my house is just ahead AND there is a parking space right outside.
I giggle hysterically and sprint up the stairs to the door to my flat, getting my key ready as I run.

The key goes half way in and gets stuck.

I freeze.
....
....

"...#*@??", I say, not very calmly.

My bowels go into labour.

Powered by fear I jiggle the key as hard as I can. I operate my life on the somewhat lazy theory that most things can be fixed with a hammer or by begging. Hammerless, I beg.

It won’t come out.

It won’t come out and it won’t go in.

It won't come out and it won't go in and more importantly, it won't turn.

I check my keys in case I’ve used the wrong one.

I haven’t. It’s the right key but IT DOESN’T BLOODY WORK AND I NEED A POO.

Sweat running down my face, hallucinating slightly, voice and hands shaking, I ring my landlord…

*If I ever need a horse blanket I will report back.

Sunday Game

2006-08-06T23:43:00.000+01:00

Time to kill?
Do as I do. Throw pickaxes. Grow a beard.

Click

coming of age

2006-08-03T10:51:00.000+01:00

Imp said in her comment on my post 'finger';

As the unicycle was a present from me for fts last birthday, and another is looming, anyone got any good suggestions for this year? All suggestions considered!

This year my birthday will be an important one. It will be the birthday after the birthday after the birthday after the birthday after my 30th.
Clearly some planning is needed. This is your chance to be involved at minimum expense to yourselves.
Perfect.

strapping

2006-08-02T23:42:00.000+01:00

This man is called Jock Stirrup.

Yup.

potty

2006-07-31T16:35:00.000+01:00

We are on a beach!

It is very hot and we are all smothered in Factor 35,000,065789437 sun cream. To the casual observer it appears as if we have all been in a gruesome Ice Cream Factory incident.

To most people, being on a sandy beach, lying back, skin sizzling, sand up nostrils, listening to the sound of people laughing and gulls shrieking might be a real treat but, to Imp and I, it is the latest in our What Can We Do To Entertain The Children effort.

We are surrounded by a beachful of relaxed people. Meanwhile both of us have matching Hers’n’Hers wild staring eyes. If we had taken a few grams of speed each, we might be looking more relaxed.

Wired, I count the children again (seven) and scan the immediate area for dangerous strangers / giant sand-roaming skin-leeching jellyfish / huge mutant child-eating sea monsters.
Sweat pours down my back and I develop a nervous tic.

Not that I need contraception, but this parenting lark is something I will be at pains to avoid for the foreseeable 12,000 years.

We have a 1 yr-old, a 2½ yr-old, a 4 yr-old, 7 yr-old, 9 yr-old, 10 yr-old and a 14 yr-old. I am a 33 yr-old.
Imp has to look after all of us.
I sneak a glance at her. She is dribbling and mumbling to herself.

For about the third time, 2½ yr-old wees in the potty and, with the eyes of every sunbather on the beach boring into the back of my neck waiting for me to do something wrong (so that they can write an outraged letter to the council) I stumble up into the sand dunes and deposit it on a thistle that I am fairly sure no one will want to sit on.

I haven’t managed to build a single sandcastle yet because I have had to think of all the things that could go wrong to the seven kids and then develop systems to deal with these potential incidents. I feel like the UN and it's not much fun.

All this said, it seems to be going remarkably well so far as no one has drowned or been sucked into sinking-sand like they do on the telly. Also Lassie is nowhere near, as far as I know, but we're managing.

I begin to relax.

***

4 yr-old does a poo in the potty. Bugger.

I hadn’t allowed for management of stray poos and I scratch my head.

The sunbathers glare at me and wait for the verdict, appalled letters being mentally composed as they squint toward me. The poo stares at me too, lurking in a dressing of wee.
A distinctive poo-smell cooks up in the heat for good measure and, I breathe through my mouth instead.

Then I have a genius idea!!

I pour sand into the potty.
I am undoubtedly an amazing problem-solver of James Dyson-like calibre. I make a mental note to get in touch with Mensa in case they need a figurehead.

Now there is no smell and I don’t have a poo learing back at me.

***

2½ yr-old sees the potty.
It is full of sand and is therefore now an exciting plaything. I see her looking and gasp in horror...

Before I can hurl my body in a Matrix-like dive to stop her, she buries her arms, elbow-deep in poo. All. The. Way. There is poo everywhere.

Confused, she wipes it over the front of her dress and I weep and gnash my teeth.

The sunbathers sit up, interested, waiting.

finger

2006-07-26T17:28:00.000+01:00

My finger is swelling up like the proverbial balloon.

I have been demonstrating my unicycling prowess to my family and it has been a great success. I pedal frantically past the row of terraced houses where Ickle Bro and my Dad stand marvelling at my skill.
I am a natural and only fall off a few times.

Unfortunately I haven’t yet mastered corners or bumps or little stones in the road so I have to jump off when I reach a bumpy-bendy stone in the road.
No matter.
This blue-rinse inhabited sleepy corner of North Wales hasn’t seen such excitement since the tractor came to do its annual grass-cut in the playground and I have to be careful not to allow the gale-force gusts from the flapping net curtains, to blow me off-course.

I am a unicycling celebrity.

(I should remember to quit while I am ahead but I am not blessed with a great deal of common sense and I used up my day’s quota by around 4pm. If Imp was with me she would tell me to be sensible but she is somewhere else, not riding a unicycle.)

I drive to my sister’s house and again wobble my way to stardom in front of my three nephews and around 5628,006,000000 of their friends. It is a bit more tricky this time as I have to hang on to a lamppost in order to mount my unicycle and then hurl myself down a lane at a gradient of around 1:2 that is almost a cliff-face.
Evil Knievel would be wetting his pants at this stage but I am now invincible and much braver than him.

Luckily it seems I am also very talented and this slope-business (I have never unicycled on a slope before) is easy-peasy.

Convinced in my own talent I gather up my bike and my 5628,006,000003 spectators and we graduate around to the rough ground behind the house. It resembles a bomb-crater but I am not fazed or worried at all.
Only a big girl in a Big Girl’s Blouse would be worried about unicycling in and around the boulder-field that passes as the car-parking area for this row of houses. I mount and don’t have second thoughts although there is one that might pass as 1¼.

Anyway, all it takes is some confidence and a bit of belief. What could go wrong?

I hang onto the horse box that rocks gently on the uneven camber.
Heroically I launch and the crowd of 5628,006,000003 little boys gasp in excitement.

At this point my confidence hurls itself into the north face of a car-park rock, just as my wheel plunges into a crevasse.

I hit the ground, bouncing on my knees, palms and middle finger on my right hand.
It hurts enough for me to imagine some very entertaining four-letter words that I can’t allow to escape my lips, given my audience. I howl a bit and try to look brave.

I hope it’s not broken.
It’s my favourite finger.

bfn...

2006-07-20T11:49:00.000+01:00

I'm being really shite, it has to be said, at getting those posts up (the bleeders).
Real life gets in the way sometimes. Sorry.

Anyhow.

Imp and I plus the two LittleImps are heading northbound to babysit 5 children.

No, really, we are.

It's true that I'm not really a child-friendly person and much prefer adult company. This is why I became a Young Person's worker. This also is why I am off to babysit 5 kids.
It gives me something to moan about at parties. Not that you can go to parties when you've got 5 kids. Which I haven't. I'm just borrowing them. But I still want sympathy.*

So the moral there is, don't go to any parties that I'm going to be at in the near future unless you would like to have your hair restyled with an extra parting due to the velocity and force of my whinging.**

As if it was bad enough.......

Not only am I going to be babysitting 5 kids... but we're gonna be there till next Wednesday.... and I think the internet is down at the 5-kid-residence. Argh.
I expect we'll be washing our clothes by tramping down to the closest river and beating them on rocks, too.

Think of us.

*Look! I can short sentences!

**Look! I can do long sentences!

Sunday Game

2006-07-16T22:35:00.000+01:00

This is the kind of thing that makes my brain hurt..... but I still keep going back for more.

Its redeeming feature is that you can note down the passwords for each level so that you will only gradually lose your marbles over 1 level.

Click

red face

2006-07-15T23:30:00.000+01:00

Projectile vomit isn't a myth!

It is 4 o'clock in the morning and I scramble frantically over Imp. She sits up.

"What's wrong, darling?" she says.

I am unable to answer due to my stomach muscles doing the Mexican Wave. I continue hurdling her by now, anxious form, and mumble something about not being well.
I sprint to the bathroom and make it as far as the sink.

This must be what they call Perestalsis. I remember doing it in GCSE Biology and now I am experiencing it in the form of Super-Perestalsis! I don't remember exercising these particular muscles so I am a bit surprised, but they are working very well. Inside I must be like an athlete. Colin Jackson in the form of an Alimentary Canal.
I'm so proud.

My Vegetable Masala makes a reappearance, some of it and, I manage to hurl myself toward the toilet before the rest pops up.

I have never had the experience of projectile vomit before but I have laughed at videos of babies spewing all over their parents. It is possible that I am being paid back for all those times.
Jeremy Beadle would love this moment.

My dinner exits my sweating suffering form at the speed of light, hits the water and bounces back up into my face.

This is not helping my general demeanor right now as I was feeling pretty ill before this happened. If it is at all possible this actually makes me worse.

the only comfort is that it is red sick, so I am easily able to identify which bits of me need cleaning up.

I finally shiver my way back to the sink, clean it out and then clean my face. I look like a Red Light District version of The Exorcist. I think about showing Imp, but I don't think she will be impressed in the same way.

Face scrubbed, teeth cleaned, stomach empty, I go back to bed and she looks after me.

how do you say...

2006-07-14T23:38:00.000+01:00

It is while repeating the phrase for the twelfth time that I realise.

"How old d'ya have to be to buy tobacco?", is in fact a very cruel tongue-twister, not a sentence.

I should ask for Danger Money.

Fun Day

2006-07-12T15:58:00.000+01:00

I am at a Police Fun Day!

I think it is an oxymoron, but this is my own private opinion and I am not prepared to announce it out loud.

There are a lot of people in this part of Cardiff but for some reason I don’t think they want to be at the Police Fun Day, judging by the fact that they all aren’t here. It might have something to do with all the police, in their high-vis trendy police polo shirts, being jolly and having Fun.

Someone should tell the police that a No-Police Fun Day would be much better attended.

I sigh and tell a 5-year old for the fifteenth time that I am a drugs worker and “No,” I won’t hold his ice cream for him while he goes to play football and “No,” I don’t sell crack.

youth worker

2006-07-07T18:43:00.000+01:00

“So how many paracetamol does it take to kill yourself?”

I blink.

He is about 11 years old; fresh-faced, hair spiked up at the front and clutching a skateboard. He doesn’t look suicidal.

I am at the Ely festival and there are enough shell suits in the park to start a European shell-suit mountain. That is, if everyone took them off and piled them into a huge, static heap, which isn’t that likely thinking about it, as they might get chilly and no one could smoke for fear of infernos.

The combined noise of all the shell-suited bodies as they rustle their way around the stalls sounds like the tide during a force 8 gale.

Maybe I didn’t hear him right, due to not having super-human hearing.

“Did you just ask how many paracetamol it takes to kill yourself?” I yell.

He nods vigorously. “Or heroin,” he adds loudly.

I have a quick think but nothing turns up in the way of get-out clauses.

“Anything from about 7 pills upwards is extremely dangerous,” I say, “and any amount of heroin could kill you if you get a bad batch or you don’t have any tolerance built up”.

The little boy looks very, very, very interested.

“Is it painful?” he says, with a look on his face that I imagine his maths teacher can only dream of.

“Yes. It can be incredibly painful and very long and drawn out… I wouldn’t recommend it."

He looks disappointed.
I wonder if finding out the most efficient way of suicide is normal for an 11-yr old? Maybe I should call Social Services.
I have another think for about a quarter of a second.

I decide against it (after agonising), as I am allergic to paperwork.

“I would say the best way to kill yourself would be to drink a load of petrol and set fire to yourself,” I say, helpfully.

Appalled, he flees and I check to see his mum didn’t overhear.

Wednesday Game

2006-07-05T22:50:00.000+01:00

In view of the fact that I didn't post a game on Sunday, here's a little something to keep you going 'til the weekend.
If you're not playing this, you should be!!!

Zwok is a cross between Worms and any other tank/crossbow shooting game you've ever played... but better by far.
Created by Playstation, it's a nice little multiplayer. Normally I don't play multiplayers as you end up having to learn an A level's-worth of instructions and controls and I just can't be bothered. However, this little beauty takes about 30 seconds to learn and each game only takes a couple of minutes.
Perfect teabreak material :) The sound is switch on and offable too.

Create a character, pick your weapon (which you earn as you play), point and wait for the fallout. It's great!

Click

training course

2006-07-03T21:57:00.000+01:00

I haven't learned any new tips; Imp will be very disappointed.

Not that I need to learn any new tips - my technique is fine, thanks. In fact, it's more than fine. Most people would be grateful to know what I know.

But anyway.
I am at the All Wales Network for Sexual Health and the programme sounded most promising, especially the LGB bit. I wait expectantly, notebook to hand, intelligent face not far behind.

The bloke waffles a little bit about a project that is happening everywhere apart from in Cardiff and I quickly check to see if the person next to me is looking as disappointed as I feel.
She looks like a very experienced meeting-person, so I sit up even straighter and make more effort to give a pinstripe effect, in my jeans and t-shirt.

I look down and notice that I have put my name tag on upside down. I decide not to fiddle with it as that would be distracting for other people.

I pick at the scab on my elbow and pull out a few eyebrows for entertainment.

I turn my badge the right way around.

It has to be said... the workshop is actually quite disappointing. I thought that I might learn lots that I didn't already know..... for my job, of course.
But the bloke is a bit boring and what he has to say is a tiny bit irrelevant.

I put my badge back on upside down again, just to be awkward. That'll show 'em.

I think very hard.
To be fair (as I am a very fair person and not at all grumpy, ever) mind you, I don't expect there's a lot left that he could have taught me.
But it's a pity, all the same.

lovey-darling

2006-06-28T22:30:00.000+01:00

I cycle home.

It has been a very long day and Toby, my car, is in the garage so that the Nice Garage Man can find, and remove, a squeak.

I like cycling, but not through Cardiff city centre.
For some reason the motorists of Cardiff seem to regard it as a blood sport, seeing who can drive closest to the cyclist. I notice the other cyclists on the road have a hunted look in their eyes and dodgy stains around their arse-regions.
I strap my helmet on and check that I have my Determined Expression, before I push myself out into the steady stream of traffic….

It is a minefield.
Drivers who drive too close.
Drivers who won’t let you change lane.
Drivers who don’t even notice you.
Drivers who overtake and then slam their brakes on right in front of you.
Drivers who rabbit away on their mobile phones while obliviously ramming you into the gutter.

Bastards.

I flinch as a bus blasts past me and pulls in too early, cutting me up and narrowly missing my front tyre. It farts hot exhaust fumes in my face and I swear ferociously.
That’ll teach him.

I clunk onwards, muttering away to myself and scowling at anyone who isn't on a pushbike.

My phone rings.

Wobbling past the City Hall, I half stand in my saddle and ease my phone out of my jeans pocket, negotiating a startled pedestrian and not mowing her down at all.
It is fortunate for everyone around me that (i) I am riding a bike that has two wheels and, (ii) that I am such a skilled cyclist with an in-built sense of balance.

It is the Nice Garage Man, who wants to know if I am on my way.

“I am!” I say, doing my best smiley-voice.

He is very chatty and we have a friendly little natter, while I peddle along leisurely around all the hundreds of people that seem to be standing around in front of the museum.
It’s a lovely day; they must all have decided to come to come and stand on the pavement by the museum at the same time. What a coincidence!

I cycle even more slowly. Cycling and talking on the phone is something that should only be reserved for the very talented, like me, but even I have to reduce the pace.

There really are a LOT of people around today. Quite a few of them have massive cameras and they are not even Japanese! How strange.
I notice that the road is cordoned off and there are some police officers standing around.

It is illegal to phone and drive and, I assume that extends to cycling. Oops! I pull to the side of the road and hide my phone quickly in my hoodie, trying to look as innocent as possible and like I haven’t got an ASBO.

A person who looks how you would imagine an agitated film director to look, waves his arms at me in an agitated film-director kind of way and I look at him blankly.

Just behind him is a camera crew…

…and a bloke with a big fluffy microphone on a stick… and a gaggle of actors, being all Lovey-Darling.

I have cycled right into the middle of a film shoot.

I hurry away..

Doo-Wop Horses

2006-06-28T21:32:00.000+01:00

Crank your sound up and click on and off these horses to make them sing.

What else?

sidelines

2006-06-27T22:01:00.000+01:00

The ball zooms past me and I launch myself at it!

I have very good hand-eye coordination and have played for several Quite Important teams in the past. Of course, back in those days I was thin and lithe and didn’t need to tuck my stomach in my socks, but even so – hand-eye coordination is a skill that never goes away, that’s a scientifically proven fact. Much like riding a bike.

However, today I am riding a bike and it's not at all like riding a bike.
It has to be said in my defence, this bike only has one wheel… but I am disappointed in my lack of innate Unicycle Hockey skill.

I have been imagining this moment (my first ever Unicycle Hockey match) for weeks now and, I am always really good. The David Beckham of circus skills.
I dodge down the wing, do a cunning hop to the side while flicking the ball across the pitch. The winger flicks it back and I catch it skilfully, spinning on the spot, quickly glance up and deftly slam it diagonally through the defenders… into the back of the net.

The crowd goes wild.

I do a Forward Unicycle-Somersault and lap up the praise, screams of joy from the spectators, a unicycle talent scout madly scribbling in his notebook…..

***

I wobble a few feet, get the hockey stick inexplicably caught somehow under my armpit and fall off in a tangle of feet, peddles and hockey stick.
Bugger.

I crawl back to my feet and drag my unicycle back to the wall. Hanging on for dear life, I haul myself back to my teetering, sweaty position at the side of the pitch, diligently guarding the radiator….

Sunday Game

2006-06-25T22:55:00.000+01:00

Imp and I have been gardening today and I managed not to get eaten alive by ants or to get munched to nothingness by other creepy-crawlies.
Can't say the same for the plants we were supposed to be guarding. I shall be rushing out first thing tomorrow morning to buy a massive industrial-size cannister of slug pellets and a .22 rifle to 'persuade' next doors cats to stay away.
If the rifle doesn't work I will be resorting to land mines.

On a lighter note, I have been spending the past hour guiding Orangutwang through a maze of spiders and wasps in an effort to collect all the bananas.

Er.. yep.

Imp is in the front room typing up important reports and being Grown Up. I am in the dining room playing Orangutwang.
Says it all, really.

For those of you who have no dignity (or work ethic), check it out.
This is a brilliant *teabreak game* (ahem) as it is mouse controlled, therefore leaving the other hand free for ringing through to the person opposite you to ask them to fetch you a cuppa. Honestly, you'll be dead popular.

Click

depilation

2006-06-22T23:59:00.000+01:00

Imp waxes my legs!

It is for a special birthday treat. (For her, not me).
We will have to engage in serious discussions as to whether this will ever be repeated again. Maybe next year, when the swelling has gone down.

When I say ‘Imp waxes my legs’, what I really mean is ‘Imp waxes a line on one of my legs’.

It all seems to go far too fast for me. What I would like is for the wax to be applied and then for us to maybe go for an extended weekend break somewhere quiet and secluded, while I gather myself together and have a think about it. Like in films, where the hero (who is about to die from something terrible like a rare blood disease or being beheaded) will stand at the top of a cliff, hair being whipped around his face by a gusty storm (or should that be ‘stormy gusts’?) and gaze moodily out to sea, thinking and being brave.
I need time, before the deed is done.

The wax is applied, a strip of cloth placed onto the still-hot wax and then (accompanied by a vicious grin) Imp rips the strip, my leg hairs and the top layer of skin from my leg. No gentle discussions like ‘Are you ready, Darling?’… Nope. Just that sound you hear when you pull apart two pieces of Velcro, drowning out my cries of agony.

I inspect what is left of my leg.

It is red and blotchy and, just down there, above my ankle, there is a dot of blood. IMP HAS MADE ME BLEED!

Quicker than the speed of light, she dives for my leg and does it again, (wax, rip, PAIN!) before I can hurl myself at the carpet, weeping, and crawl away to the bathroom to mop up my wounds and hide until the coast is clear…

24 hours

2006-06-20T10:47:00.000+01:00

I have juggled all my appointments around so that I can work all night on Wednesday.

Now that I am a Very Important Drugs Worker, my diary is a thing of great beauty and busy-ness. Did I mention that it is because I am Very Important?

It is the summer solstice and I will be working at Stonehenge.
I'm not a hippy or a druid or au fait with ley-lines at all, but I am still looking forward to being there at that magical moment when the sun moves above the horizon, blazing magestically through the ancient stones...............

er.......................

........... on Thursday morning???

Thursday the 22nd of June????

"_?"

I wrinkle my forehead and squint again at my diary.

I have a very bad feeling about this.

***

I rush to the office to find my boss.

"Solstice-Sunrise-TuesdayNight-BigStones-TooLate-Help!-TerribleMistake!", I pant, sweat cascading from my brow, somewhat in a panic.

She stares at me.

I translate, explaining that I think we are about to turn up for the summer solstice a day late and we haven't even got the services of Cher, who might by now be able to turn back time. This could be a disaster!!

Even though I can do very good Bambi Eyes, I don't think the druid population of Britain will be prepared to hang on until Thursday morning to perform their prancy bits, just because we aren't very good at things like The Days of the Week.

The office goes quiet, save for my arthritic, rasping heart as it noisily attempts to avoid total shutdown.

My boss is pale, as she lunges for the phone...

Sunday Game

2006-06-18T21:32:00.000+01:00

This is a game that I got addicted to about 5 years ago and still revisit occasionally.

You are a UFO and your mission is to collect the things on your shopping list and return them to the Mother Ship.

See? Something for everyone... shopping for the girlies and gay boys and, aliens for the boys and gay girls!

Using the arrow keys, have a scout around looking for people to abduct and cars to beam up.
Use the space bar to zap them up and keep an eye on the energy bar (indicator of energy, not Kelloggs Nutrigrain...) which goes down as you use up the power it takes to beam. Recharge by having a rest or hovering over the Mother Ship.

Along the way you'll get shot at by rival aliens, which keeps things interesting... and remember, you move slower the more cargo you have on board. Unload every now and again.

There are 10 levels, which get progressively harder as you go along.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to beat my 200730 top score.

Click

no fit state

2006-06-17T14:53:00.000+01:00

I join the circus!!

It is a scientific fact that only those at their peak of physical fitness; gods and godesses of movement and balance, can join the circus.

I clamber onto my pushbike, tuck my stomach over the handlebars and wobble the half mile to the circus training school where I will be welcomed with open arms as the new hockey-playing, unicycling prodigy.

Unicycle hockey is the obvious activity to hone my skills in my quest to become a world-famous mountain unicycle instructor and, to help me stay on for a greater distance than the length of floor that my prone body takes up while unconscious..

And to be quite honest, I'm surprised that there aren't more people there. I mean, what do other people do on a Thursday night???

fightin'

2006-06-17T14:52:00.000+01:00

It's Saturday and it's too hot to go out.

Better waste time then, watching ingenius little films on the internet and generally not doing housework. (don't tell Imp)

Click

streamline

2006-06-15T19:05:00.000+01:00

I can’t stand it for one moment more, all that leg hair gently swirling around in the bath like seaweed, weighing me down.

I have promised Imp that I will grow my leg hairs so that she can have a go at waxing them.
I am secretly terrified. (don’t tell anyone)

We bought a pack of leg wax from a cheapo shop and it is now hanging over me like the Sword of Damocles. But much more scary.
One day soon, Imp is going to heartlessly rip the hair from my body. I notice she is looking quite excited about this and far too happy for my liking.
I am beginning to jump whenever she appears behind me.

Apparently the hair has to be about 1cm long.
Luckily I am blessed with hair that crawls from my follicles at roughly the speed of a Citroen 2CV trundling down a very steep hill.

However, it has still taken more than a week and I am becoming more and more aware of my leg hair.
Who would have thought that leg hair could be so obtrusive?
I can feel it snagging on the inside of my jeans and building up static, waiting to thump massive amounts of electrical charge through me every time I attempt to drop my pants while hovering over the toilet seat.
This is not acceptable, as I beginning to dread going to the toilet, which is normally one of my greatest pleasures. I will have to research the benefits of wearing wellies. (as an earth, not to wee into)

I wonder if the Electricity Board would be interested in wiring me up and buying the excess energy? This is an environmentally friendly idea and I might approach them about it. Contemporary, cutting edge, resourceful, that's me. I could be rich beyond my wildest dreams.

If I find that anyone reads this and steals the idea from me I will sulk.

I look down at my hairy, static, hairy, hairyhairyHAIRY legs and fight the urge to remove every last one. My hand shakes and the razor beckons.

No, I can't. I promised Imp.

I stare at the razor.

It stares back.

Glancing around quickly for intruders in my bathroom who might snitch on me, I grab it and, guiltily allow myself just one stripe from each leg…

shower cubicle

2006-06-12T17:10:00.000+01:00

I can’t put it off any longer.

The shower needs re-grouting and that means that someone will have to get in there and get the old grout out.

It’s not funny, either.
Ever since Victoria Wood met Julie Walters, grouting has become funny. It’s apparently a funny working class way of avoiding sex.

“Wanna make lurrrrve?”

“Can’t, I’ve got to do the grouting”*.

*you had to be there…

Anyway, I’m not laughing.

I’ve been to B&Q twice to buy all the things that you might need to scrape the old grout out and put some new grout in.
I’ve cleared the shower of sticky bottles and old shapeless bits of soap.
I’ve had a coffee and I’ve researched it all on the internet.
I’ve procrastinated.
It didn’t work.

I climb in to the shower.

The window is wide open because it is the hottest day since they invented thermometers and the earth’s core is bubbling merrily a few feet beneath where I’m standing. (That’s in the shower, in case you’ve forgotten).

I climb out again and go and get myself a glass of water.

I climb back in.

I grasp my little orange plastic grout-scraping-tool and begin scratching away feverishly. I make some of my growling noises that I normally reserve for gardening or hitting things. The blades flashes and stabs and I’m sure it will all be done in an hour or so.

A little mark appears in the grouting.

I hack harder.

This is remarkable.

There are holes and cracks everywhere. ‘Porous’ would be an understatement. It is so riddled with holes that you would expect that it would all practically throw itself at me, in a sighing, hands-up-you-got-me resigned kind of way. But it doesn’t budge.

Bastard.

The grouting hangs on for dear life and I allow myself the luxury of swearing, just a tiny bit.

A miniscule speck of old grout, about the size of a flake of dandruff, floats to the ground.

It is lucky that I am so good at DIY because most people would be disheartened at this point.

I scowl at it and dig in once again.

The temperature is now about 35,000,000,00000000000 degrees centigrade in my shower cubicle and I can hear other people’s skin sizzling outside through the open window, as they get themselves a nice tan.

Another bit of grouting dislodges and drops to join the other microscopic bit of grout-dust at my feet.

A trickle of sweat launches itself from my chin and I whimper in despair.

2 specks down, only about 40 metres of grouting to go.

Another trickle of sweat; this time making a break for it down my nose.

I hold back a tear.

Sunday Game

2006-06-11T23:55:00.000+01:00

I realised this week that I missed my 1st anniversary.
Ah well. Serves me right for being so remiss in posting recently. That's what comes of spending two weekends in a shower cubicle.

Without further explanation, I'm sure everyone will understand (use your imaginations..) why I still feel like blowing things up.

This game gives you a chance to play three rounds of blasting your opponants then buggering off back to work. Three rounds, that's all you get, folks. Unless you reload everything, it doesn't seem to do anything else... but believe me, three rounds is enough to get you addicted enough to not mind.
I recommend taking a Sickie tomorrow morning.

This is Boyz in the Hood without the blood or language. Or the teenage pregnancies.

Well, actually it's nothing like it, but there you go.

Click

out of your tree

2006-06-07T23:46:00.000+01:00

I say ‘fucked’ and the teacher blinks.

I am standing at the front of a classroom faced by a row of 15-yr olds and dishing out the ground-rules for the session and, the rule is that no one can say ‘fucked’.

We are about to think of as many words as possible for being drunk. ‘Fucked’ is a good one, but now I’ve said it I’ve spoiled their fun and the giggling soon dies away.

“Of course, there are loads of other words that describe being drunk… and we can use those words in this session, but only because we’re talking about being drunk,” I explain.

An arm shoots up into the air.

I do my Serious Teacher Face and nod toward the owner.

“Yes?”

“Miss, what words do you mean, miss?” She has a gleam in her eye.

I wait until they are all quiet.

“Arse-holed,” I mention, gravely.

An entire room of girls snort at exactly the same time. It sounds like a mass sneeze. I duck to avoid snot.
The teacher looks a bit uncomfortable and I beam across at her.

“And ‘wankered’,” I add, enjoying myself enormously.

I have their attention, fully and without exception. Faces gaze up at me, temporarily forgetting that they’re supposed to be cool and aloof because that is the law when you are 15.

I love being a drugs worker. It means I get to say naughty words in school and I don’t get told off or sent to the Headteacher.

Enthusiastically and with heads down, they all begin madly scribbling, anxious to outdo me.

Sunday Game

2006-06-04T23:00:00.000+01:00

Sometimes you just need to say "To hell with it all," and blow a few things up.

Other days you just need to say "To hell with it all," and blow yourself up.

This is a blowing-yourself-up day.
In a fishing boat.
So don't expect it to be logical.

You have a tiny little planet, a tugboat and a load of missiles being launched at you. A bit of a bad day, then, at anyone's stretch of the imagination.

Obviously as everyone knows, rainbows are Good and therefore can be used to repair health levels or to use as barriers against all the naughty things.
I do it all the time, but I get funny looks in the street.

Oh, and don't forget to catch fish.

X-treme Tugboating is a really nice, colourful, slightly off the wall game. Wacky graphics and tidy little effects, once you've got used to the weird perspective. Hugely addictive and a fantastic coffee-break game.
Best of all, you only need one hand, thus leaving the other free as usual for Other Stuff.

Click

stinky

2006-06-01T22:45:00.000+01:00

I wash my trainers!

They are my favourite trainers and I wear them as often as possible. They even double up as slippers, as I am far too cool to wear slippers. It has been scientifically proven that only old ladies wear slippers.

My shoes really stink – enough to bring about cardiac arrest in fact - and the time has come to peel them from my feet and put them in the machine. I wipe away a tear, hold my breath and make a dash for the washing liquid...

***

The problem with having a landlord who switches the heating off in April is that, as well as having a bloody freezing cold flat and frostbite, nothing dries in less than 3 days.

My flat resembles a Chinese laundry. Without the heat.
Or anything Chinese.

Cold, damp clothes lie strewn on every radiator, slowly rotting and gathering mildew, while I sit shivering under my duvet waiting for October.

I balance my trainers upside down in the kitchen.
The kitchen is the only room in the flat that benefits from direct sunlight. I vainly hope that somehow the warmth of the sun will soak through the soles of my shoes and dry them out.
I’m sure they will be airy and fresh-smelling in a couple of days time.

I dig out my emergency trainers and go to stay at Imp’s house for a few days, where there is heating and breakfast-in-bed.

***

My trainers are dry and I am wearing them!

They stink of damp.

Imp politely turns her head away every time she needs to inhale.

underage

2006-05-31T22:42:00.000+01:00

We’re in Pizza Hut!
I grit my teeth and try to look Old and Female.

At first glance, from a distance, you might be forgiven for thinking that I am a teenage boy.
Short spiky hair, hoodie, jeans, trainers, unicycle.

At closer inspection you would realise that I have boobs, I am really quite extraordinarily tall for my age (33) and, I have a few white hairs and my first wrinkle, just there – in the middle of my forehead*.
Years of frowning at people finally has paid off.

I love Pizza Hut.
I love the fact that you can sprinkle chilli seeds all over your pizza and make it so spicy that your lips bleed. I love the fact that there isn’t a single, healthy morsel of food within a quarter mile radius of the building – even the salad tastes as though it is somehow packed with special Pizza Hut calories.
I love the fact that I am usually one of the thinnest people in there.

What I don’t love about Pizza hut is the fact that they are clearly as blind as bats, don’t pay attention and need a damn good spanking.
Or at least, they did last time I was there…

***

Imp, LittleImpA, LittleImpB and me. We nip in to Pizza Hut and we wait at that funny little lectern thing that they have at the door, waiting to be acknowledged and herded to our table.

The lectern thing is also on my list of Things I Dislike. I always feel uncomfortably exposed, as if someone might demand that I make a speech at once, with no notice and no autocue.

I stand next to the lectern, being formidable and sending out incontrovertible messages via aggressive body language, that I will not be giving impromptu talks and No, I don’t mind waiting and being ignored and, in fact I like it.

A pimply girl comes up to greet us. It’s Saturday and she’s earning some cash ready to spend on crack cocaine at the ice cream van parked outside the school gates on Monday morning.

She sniffs and does that I Work Here And Will Smile Till I Puke But I Really Don’t Care If You Live Through To Dessert-look and, eyes sliding past me, faces Imp and says,

“One adult, three children’s menus?”

I could murder her.
Instead I endure the laughter from LittleImpA and LittleImpB and slowly die a tiny bit more inside…

* The wrinkle is in the middle of my forehead, not the white hairs.

Sunday Game

2006-05-28T10:00:00.000+01:00

I love this game.

I've played many versions of Snake/Nibbles in the past but for some reason A Worm's Life has grabbed me by the neck, put me into a head-lock and just won't let go.

Well, that's what I tell Imp, anyway.

The twist is that there are tempting little power-ups to make life both easier and harder.
A blue shield protects you from bombs and allows you to clear light coloured bricks. A jug of yellow liquid slows you down, red speeds you up, green makes you bigger.
Bombs? You can work that one out for yourself.

The best thing is that you only need one hand to operate, thus leaving the other free for coffee, doughnuts, a beautiful woman or a shot of whisky.

Plinky plonky music (switch off-able, thankfully) completes the retro feel.

Click

fat and angry

2006-05-27T22:40:00.000+01:00

I weigh myself.

The diet hasn’t been going very well recently. I must complain.

It’s true, I took a couple of days off at the end of April so that Imp and I could celebrate our anniversary and I haven’t quite managed to get back onto it yet, but that’s a minor point and, the evidence is merely circumstantial.
I think a solicitor would argue that it would be a ‘moot point’ if someone ever decided to take me to court over my loads and loads of not losing weight.

I don’t know what a ‘moot point’ is, but it sounds pointy anyway, and that’s got to hurt.

The argument in my favour is that it is impossible and also against the law to celebrate anything (but especially anniversaries) without drinking lots of beer and eating naughty things and I think that there might be something to do with Human Rights in there too.. about being allowed to eat Hot’n’Spicy Pringles whenever it’s near, or nearly near, a weekend.

***

The classroom is boiling hot and I can feel my scalp beginning to sweat. My armpits are several gallons ahead of the game and I can feel my socks squelching.

Most of the 13-year olds in the room are doodling or planning their weekends, heads together conspiratorially.
That would be fine if it was break time but they are supposed to be listening to me. Someone sniggers and mimics me in a teenage falsetto.

I’m not taking any more messing.
I’m knackered, I’m hot and I can’t take my hoodie off in case they notice that I’m got a huge, enormous protrusion of a stomach.
I look down and it looks back up at me, largely.

I have a nagging but growing panic near the back of my mind that I should have planning permission for something of these dimensions.
That pisses me Right Off.

“You!” I yell, spitting and snarling in a way that would make Fred West nervous.

“Move to that seat over there and I don’t want to hear another sound out of you unless you’re having some kind of fatal asthma attack”.

The class goes silent.

“And you two. Speak to each other again and I Stop Being Nice…”

I do my Nazi Face.

Their faces drain. Their bravado makes a mass exit and they shrink back, reassessing me, their new goal to make it alive to the end of the session.

I’m almost disappointed that I can’t carry on shouting. I could get into this.

I suck my stomach in and calm down a bit, basking in my fake thin-ness and new-found power.

music

2006-05-26T16:50:00.000+01:00

It's that time again.

Those of you who have broadband, get yourselves over to the Mercedes site and download yourselves a free album of new music.

It's a mixture of chilled, trance, coffee-house jazz, pop and goodness knows what else. Fantastic!

Click

innocence

2006-05-24T22:55:00.000+01:00

I gape at the ten-year-olds gathered around me.

They are all so eager and innocent and I feel slightly guilty about spoiling it all for them and telling them about all the bad things in life like hangovers and drugs and buses being late.

They all smile back at me and continue looking eager and giggle a bit.

They are happy because we are in a pretend pub, and I am propping up the pretend bar and they are sitting around the pretend tables picking at the pretend beer mats and pretending to be grown up.
It is, in fact a real pub, built by real pub-builders but the pumps aren’t plugged in to anything and the bottles are all real but out-of-date and if any one is going to be drinking them it will be me and not them.

I place myself between the ten-year-olds and the out-of-date bottles of beer and leer at them in what I hope is a kind of Don’t Mess With Me Or The Beer-look and frantically try to remember what it is that I am supposed to tell them.

So far I have taught the same 10-minute session six times already, without a break, and I am starting to get confused. Did I tell them about liver disease a moment ago, or was that the last group?
Rather worried I get them all to do pretend Drunk-Walking, which they all enjoy and are remarkably good at and I am an instant hit again.

“Who knows the names of some drugs, then?” I ask.

“Ganja!” someone yells... and everyone sniggers.

“Well done!” I say, in my very enthusiastic Youth Worker Voice. “Any more?”
I try not to look like Keith Chegwin.

“Weed!” someone else calls out.

“Bush!”

“Cannabis!”

“Rocky!”

“Greens!”

“Dope!”

“Hash!”

“Grass!”

“Block!”

“Marijuana!”

“Blow!”

“Afghan!”

I step back, somewhat alarmed. They seem to know a lot of drug names.

When I was ten, I had a vague idea that fizzy pop might be bad for your teeth.

Luckily they don’t seem to know that they are all terms for the same drug and I’m glad that they are still innocent in their own little way.
I gently explain this to them and ask if they know any other drugs. I lean back, trying to look masterful.

“Cocaine!” a tiny little girl whispers.

She is tucked at the back next to the switched-off fruit machine, cute hair in pig tails and little ribbons. She probably is small enough to fit in my rucksack. I expect her parents are solicitors and well-to-do and they probably shelter her from the cruel world outside their door.

“Heroin!” she adds, still talking veryvery quietly.

“Good…” I begin.

“Crystal Meth” she mentions, matter-of-factly.

Bloody hell. These kids seem to know more about drugs than I do. I shift uncomfortably and hope they don’t ask me about date rape.

“GHB, Charlie, Ketamine, 2CB, Base, Whizz, Solvents, Magic Mushrooms, Steroids, Crack!” the group yells, clearly loving every minute of being allowed to talk about drugs.

I check the clock. 7½ minutes to go. Shit.

“My dad got drunk a few weeks ago and got stabbed”, a saintly little boy volunteers from somewhere near the door.

“My Auntie took an overdose and died”, someone else pipes up.

“My Auntie could drink a bottle of vodka in 10 minutes and now she’s dead” another serious-faced child calls.. and the entire group of ten-year-olds nod wisely and reminisce.

Panicking, I again check the clock.

7 minutes to go.

Sunday Game

2006-05-21T09:53:00.000+01:00

I like this game because it's mindless.
This is no reflection on me.. I'm actually highly intelligent and not blond at all. Not that I'm saying anything about blonds, I'm just saying.

Anyhow, it's an old one, and old ones are always the best (apart from the really good new ones).

Driller is incredibly, OCD-inducingly, meal-missingly addictive so you really need to make sure you've gone through your jobs-list before you try this one out.
Although if you write jobs-lists, the odds are you already have OCD.

(Imp, take note.)

It's easy enough.... drill to the bottom, collecting air canisters along the way to keep you alive.
My highest score is 253 on the Normal level, but I'm gonna bloody beat it if it kills me.

And anyway, it's better than doing the washing up and it is Sunday and I deserve to stare vacantly - breathing through my mouth - without anyone making comment.

Click

van

2006-05-18T22:53:00.000+01:00

I have the work van!

It’s all very complicated and my head is spinning from trying to work things out, but I have ended up needing to leave my car half an hour away from my flat outside Imp’s place, so that I can collect the van and take it home, ready for tomorrow morning.

It’s a bit like trying to work out how to cross a river with a raft, a fox and a chicken and a bag of grain, or something like that.
But without a raft, chicken, bag of grain or a fox.

Drive car to Barry (place, not person). Leave car, pick up van. Collect visitor’s permit from Imp’s car so that the van can be parked outside my house in Cardiff. Drive van to work. Drive Van to Imp’s. Drive van back home again… get stuck without car. Take painkillers to deal with headache. Scratch aching head and give up. Resign membership from Mensa. Catch train to retrieve car.

But for the moment I am happy. I am in a huge great big van, with scratches and dents and everything down the sides as battle scars - evidence of previous run-ins with bollards and changing lane where other cars are and other fighting stuff.
I chuckle in my most evil Van-Man cackle and swap lanes, safe in both my invincibility and the terror of others when they realise just what kind of driver they are up against.

I rule.

***

Vans are great.

I too, am a Great Driver and when I finally get home I scan the busy street for a van-sized parking space.
There is only one. Luckily it is not too far from my house.
I edge up to it and reverse expertly into it.

*Bugger*

I drive out of it again, having hit the kerb.

I try again.

And again.

And once again.

The problem of course, is not my driving, but the fact that the van is very long and the parking space is very short.
Also there is a tow-bar protruding from the back of the van, aiming right at the bonnet of the Very Posh Car behind the parking space.

There is also a long line of buses, cars, trucks and assorted other traffic queuing behind me.

Clearly they are taking the opportunity to marvel at my superior van-parking abilities. I don’t expect they are bothered at all that they can’t get past me to the traffic lights as I am poetry on a long wheel-base and therefore a spectacle of skill that no one would want to miss.

I try a couple more times, narrowly not colliding with a bus that is rudely and impatiently swerving past.
Obviously he doesn’t take any pride in his driving.

It becomes clear that the parking space might actually only be big enough if I could pick the van up and place it into the spot. Unfortunately I am talented, but not that talented.

Swearing slightly I manoeuvre backwards and forwards about 4,768,444,280000000 times, inch by bloody bastard inch.

Backwards.
Forwards.
Backwards.
Forwards.
Backwards.
Forwards.
Backwards.
Forwards.

Finally the van is squeezed into the parking space and the Very Posh Car remains unmolested.

Exhausted but triumphant; sweat drenching my neck, biceps bulging, clutch foot quivering, I stagger from the van and limp to the front door, unzipping the pocket on my rucksack where my house keys always are.

My house keys aren’t.

They are at Imp’s house.

working way past bedtime

2006-05-17T16:40:00.000+01:00

There are 900 kids in here!

I’m not short by any stretch of the imagination, but for some reason a large proportion of them seem to be taller than me. It appears that the organisers must have pitched the event at Very Tall Teenagers. I make a mental note to complain later, as I’m sure this must have breached some kind of human right that I think I might have.

Find a kid, ask a question, give a prize. Piece of piss. - I’m getting paid for this!

I gaze upwards at the nearest passing teenager, trying to find his face, and yell at the top of my voice. It really is very loud in here. Much louder than a Cliff Richard concert.

It is the Vibe event, which happens once a month. It’s a huge event, featuring the latest Hip Hop or Rap act, along with lots of noise, dance acts, drugs workshops and prize giveaways, street dance and of course, 900 kids trying to look cool.

Obviously I am looking very cool myself. I expect they all see me as a role model, with my spiky hair and clompy trainers*.
I'm glad I didn't wear a cardie.

*Note: I am actually wearing more than just spiky hair and clompy trainers. It’s just that I thought you might get a bit bored if I list everything that I’m wearing. Feel free to ask for details tho’, if you need guidance and direction in How To Look Cool.

I tuck my double chin into the top of my t-shirt and elbow my way into the crush of trendy youngsters, threatening them with tales of a lifetime in accountancy if they dull their minds with cocaine….

Sunday Game

2006-05-14T23:34:00.000+01:00

This is the hardest game of computer pool you will ever come across.
(EVERintheworldibetyouahundredpounds...)

Ickle Bro introduced me to this game a few years ago and we used to spend hours trying to out-do each other with amazing trick shots.

After a couple of years of not playing this I discovered to my horror that my previous astounding displays of skill and talent are a thing of the past. Somehow my ability has left me (probably in a strop) and I am now a total plank when it comes to aiming.

This must be related to my increasing skill with unicycling. Clearly it must be impossible to be good at the same things at the same time.
It'll be a physics-thing. I think it was the kind of thing that Einstein spent his life proving. And a life well-spent, if you ask me.
If only he'd been the bloke to invent sliced bread and he would have been famous...

Back to the matter in hand.
Unlike Lightening Pool, you can't control the power; you just point and click.
As if that wasn't enough, you need to keep an eye on the numbers on the balls... which represent how much time (in multiples of 10 seconds) you have to pot each one. Generally the pink is the most urgent.

Oh, and the table changes at each level, throwing new and more difficult challenges at you until you shakily swear never to even glance at a pool table ever again.

Of course, you'll be lying.

Click

singing competition

2006-05-11T22:59:00.000+01:00

This is a real treat!

Imp loves karaoke and I have never been able to get my head around it... I would rather stick needles in my eyes.
In fact, I can't think of anything worse than sitting in a room with a load of people who think they can sing, wailing embarassingly... and of course, there's always the danger that someone is going to try and get you up to humiliate yourself in front of your (ex) mates.

There's not enough beer in the world.

However, if this is the standard of karaoke on offer I would gladly go along. This woman needs shooting and I would like to be the person to do it.

Click 'play' if you dare.. but don't blame me if your ears bleed.

polka dot

2006-05-09T19:57:00.000+01:00

I do some gardening.

This makes me sound like an old fart, but actually it is an excuse to chop things and use sharp blades. I look for all the jobs that require wielding secateurs, while I leave Imp to push the mower around.

We go about our individual jobs.
Imp mows some very long grass – it is almost knee high and she makes it look like hard work, even though I expect it is quite easy.

It’s not as important, however, as the jobs I am doing, but I don’t tell her because I wouldn't want her to feel demoralised.

I think Imp is very impressed by my gardening skills because I make sure that I do my special Gardening-Growls. These are employed whenever I do any pulling or lifting.
The trick is to snarl in a manner similar to a weight-lifter and to look fierce. I'm very good at this because I used to be a gardener and it is one of the first things I learned, along with How to Make Compost.

I hack some ivy and throw it to the ground, accompanied by a very professional-sounding Gardening-Growl and, checking to see that she is watching, I wipe my forehead on the back of my hand, flick an ant off my arm and do my best to look worn-out.

We continue gardening for a while and Imp gets me a bottle of beer because I am obviously working so hard. It is a very successful afternoon and I have done some Herculean growls.
It’s no wonder Imp fancies me.

***

We collapse on the sofa.
It is then that Imp spots an ant on my jeans.

I flick it off and squash it, then realise with the kind of horror that makes your head go fuzzy, that there are about another 12,900,538,000000000000 ants; some on my trousers, some in my trainers and the rest happily chomping their way up my legs.

“Bastards!” I yell, trying my best to look calm while ripping my clothes off and hurling them on the carpet.

I jump about a bit (but in a cool way) and try my best not to appear frantic.

Imp hits them with her shoes and we stare at the floor, daring any ants to move. It is a stand-off and we wait with breath baited, occasionally leaping from the safety of the settee and beating the carpet as if it were possessed. The ants hide cunningly amongst my discarded clothes and then leg it, just to wind us up.

“Bastards!” I screech again, discovering some more in my hair and trying to remove them without knocking myself out.

Imp laughs and gets the hoover.

I whimper and naked, writhe on the settee a bit, hopefully squashing a few while Imp waves the vacuum cleaner around for a while.
They are everywhere and occasionally I find another one dashing its way up my arm, making a break for my head. I expect they are going to try and gouge my eyes out or something.

I hope that they haven't found any orifices.

Imp hoovers.
She looks suspiciously like she is enjoying herself.

I quake; a nude, slightly chilly Big Girl’s Blouse on the settee, managing not to squeal too much, scratching my now polka dot skin and hoping that Imp still thinks I am not a wimp.

Sunday Game

2006-05-07T20:35:00.000+01:00

This is one of those games that is so addictive you wished you'd never started it. Or never been born, thus not here and not reading this and not tempted in the least to play games when you should be working.

Either way , it's insideous and shouldn't be embarked upon unless your boss has got an all day meeting in a completely different building in a different continent, or you are the boss.

Anyhow, the scenario is that you are Professor Fizzwizzle (of course..) and you have to reach the exit tube. In your way are gaps, barrels, crates, ice etc., etc.
You need to solve the puzzles in order to reach the next level.

You have the option of playing online, or downloading and playing the full version.

If you manage to get past the level pictured, please PLEASE tell me how. I am nearing emotional breakdown and it is essential that I get past this level. I can't begin to tell you how important it is that I beat this one.

I need help, before I cry.
Thanks.

Click

not the comfy chair

2006-05-04T23:28:00.000+01:00

I am well enough to go back to work!

My blood results have come through and, although it was touch and go for a while, I have now been declared as strong as a post-viral ox and can resume my life again.
This is good news as I have exhausted my collection of ER DVDs and my neck is stiff from lying on the settee, plus I might now need a hip replacement.

***

Being ill in my flat takes a special kind of person, as my landlord hasn’t provided me with a very satisfactory settee.
It’s more a two-seater grannified armchair-type thing and it’s really very uncomfortable. I think I might have to complain to whoever it is you complain to when you are unhappy.
The lady in the post office or Esther Rantzen, maybe.

With the aid of my duvet and pillow I somehow manage to fashion something nearing comfortable (like, almost as luxurious as kipping on a rock-strewn front seat of a Fiat Cinquecento) and pound my spine into the bowed position required by the British Guidelines for Citizens at Death’s Door. I then huddle down and wait for my last breath to rattle its merry way out of my fevered lungs.
For a week.

Anyway.

I didn’t die and now I am only a bit deformed.

***

I stumble heroicly into the office and everyone looks me up and down. There is a noticeable lack of applause.
I straighten my posture as much as I can without crying and sway a bit.

“Feeling better?” someone quips.

I limp to my desk and, doing Bambi Eyes and my best Poorly Voice, I demand coffee.

pimp my blog

2006-05-03T20:21:00.000+01:00

If you can be arsed, follow the link and say something nice*.
Or half-decent, anyway.

*I'll give you the keys to my house and I'll sell my internal organs so that you can buy a new car.

Thanks ;)

weak

2006-05-03T16:56:00.000+01:00

I have been ill for days and now I have lost my appetite!

This is a disaster as everyone knows that you are supposed to eat crap when you are ill.
I have a pile of Easter eggs and assorted chocolate in the Secret Chocolate Place in the kitchen (don’t tell Imp) and I am feeling too ill to eat any of it.

Just. My. Luck.

I think my virus might be a special mutant virus and that is why I am aching all over (too much to even type) and I am getting extra grumpy. That is, even more grumpy than normal.

Obviously I am on my Death Bed - or nearing it - and must now think of special things to say so that when I go I’ll have said something clever like, “The wind is free and so, now, is my soul…” and not something stupid like, “I wonder why you can’t recycle yoghurt pots?”

So now, as well as being ill and losing my appetite and having weirdy bleeding under my skin and having to go to casualty and having loads of blood taken (nearly all of it) for tests and feeling ill and having painful arms…
NOW I’ve got to think of something bloody clever to say before I die.
Bastards.

All those people (you know who you are) who have complained about me not writing my posts will feel very, VERY guilty when I die from this virusness of agony and miserableness.

So there.

I force myself to eat a Cadbury’s Mini Egg (weakly), just to keep my strength up and, exhausted from the effort, crawl loudly and grumpily back into bed.

weak #2

2006-05-03T16:55:00.000+01:00

NOT MY BED

This is really freaky.
Clearly I am too ill to laugh out loud, but I might just manage a smile if someone will bring me beer...

doctor's waiting room

2006-04-28T14:15:00.000+01:00

I've been waiting an hour now.

The other patients stare straight ahead and occasionally I make eye-contact with someone.
We each immediately study the ceiling, in case the other thought we were actually looking.

At a rough guess, I would say that I was the most contagious person in the waiting room and, possibly, The World.

I think the others agree, as they are all crammed onto one bench (all 15 of them, plus a buggie complete with smiley Afro-Baby) whereas I have a whole bench to myself.

Unless they are all feeling a bit cold, which is possible, I suppose.

neighbour

2006-04-21T22:22:00.000+01:00

I lie in the bath.

This is one of my favourite times in the day. Or at least, it was until the Music Therapist moved in upstairs.

“Dum-de-dum-dum, dum-de-dum, dum, dum, duuuummmm”.

This is like water torture without the water. I had no idea that a guitar could sound so irritating.
Its irritatingness is around about the same as having Dot Cotton read the entire book of Leviticus, syllable by syllable, in time to a very slow metronome. Oh, while scraping her fingernails on a blackboard.

“Dum-de-dum-dum, dum-de-dum, dum, dum, duuuummmm”.

I don’t think she is doing actual therapy. This is because it is 11:30pm and it started at 6:15 this morning.

She must be researching the kind of mental stress it takes to make someone:
a) snap
b) remove all their clothes
c) smear themselves with organic gravy granules
d) stand in the middle of the street trying to direct the traffic using only their genitalia.

“Dum-de-dum-dum, dum-de-dum, dum, dum, duuuummmm”.

I am nearing stage a) and am hoping that I will never, EVER reach stage b)*.

*In public, I mean. I do remove my clothes to get into the bath.

It’s ironic, because music therapy would be the last thing that I would need if I arrived at point d) with my sanity unintact. A shotgun and a crowbar might be more appropriate.

I stare at the ceiling accusingly, blasting it with some floor-penetrating nuclear disapproval.

I hope that she learns a new tune by tomorrow (or suffers a tragic re-stringing accident which perforates her entire head and leaves her unable to even look at a guitar without setting fire to it).

What should Imp do for FTs birthday?
	Sell her possessions to get FT that once-in-a-lifetime trip to the Antarctic.
	Keep it simple. Meal and a pint.
	She peaked too early with the unicycle. Get FT a pair of socks.
	Other

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