Carbooty

I love junk shops, carboot sales, charity shops. When I was 16 myself and my friends used to get up early on a Saturday morning and trawl through church jumble sales, coming away with fabulous 40's and 50's dresses,  austere or garish, nipped in, fabulous. Add a pair of black or white long suede gloves with dozens of tiny buttons running from wrist to elbow, a pair of seamed stockings for 50p from Woolworths and a £1 a pair of impossibly high stilettoes from the back room of the ancient cobblers shop on Lumley Road where my boyfriend worked as an apprentice, we would dress to the nines for less than a fiver. During lunchtime at college, we would walk to Dead Mans Alley (or Ball Pit Lane - our name was more apt) near the church, and rifle through old suits that a shop there held in dusty piles, remnants of house clearances. Poor mum would get the job of taking them in, taking them up and generally feminizing them. Bees knees indeed.
You can still get bargains these days, but jumble sales seem to be a thing of the past. People realised you could make cash from unwanted belongings, and so the humble jumble drifted away into past tense. Shame.
Still, I love to hunt for a bargain anyway, and though the days of 40's dresses are long gone (not to mention the tiny waist that slid so easily inside the post war clobber. That's what I need, a bit of cake rationing) I still wander round car boots and my eldest daughter and I regularly haunt the charity shops for unusual clothes or ornaments.

I found last week, a set of three buddha faces designed, I imagine to go on a garden wall  - painted dark green with gold smeared on the eyes and lips, they were awful.. but... a can of matt cream spray paint, and they look fab on my wall. £3! For them all! Barg.
I also picked up a set of two long wooden frames with three cut out mounts inside - £1.50 for both.. They each held 3 cartoon postcards of winnie the pooh (dont go there) but then I found a book of 1950 film posters for 75p, clipped out six of my favourite kitchen sink and polanski favourite films, sprayed the frames cream too, and voila.


Proper chuffed with the results.

And the patio... oops.

Conversational Nonsense.

I don't think my friends actually understand me much. *Huff*

21:29 Pesk
I am starting to have little patience with men

21:29 Fish 

Is that an improvement on your previous position of Fucking None?

He's behind you... 

(apologies to the Americans for a probably nonsensical entry)



"Look" I shouted to the girls. "Look at my new boots!"

I'm standing at the top of the stairs in my black knickers and jumper and boots. (I was trying them on after partially disrobing ok?)

"I could be in the panto!" I say, grinning as I raised one leg and slapped my thigh, principal boy style.

"As a dame" said Wibs.

Thanks Wibs.


My boots.

Not me.

Birthday Girl

Had absolutely the nicest birthday for years yesterday. Rabes came over, straight from Phoenix, which started it off well... totally spoiled. Presents coming out of my ears.. how lovely. Not had such a sweet time for years. He even bought perfume for the children to give me, which really choked me. Not the perfume, that was gorgeous, but the act. Kind. Went to Lincoln for the day and sat on the wharf with juice and wine, wandered up steep hill. Felt a little odd, but the day was so gorgeous and warm... home, tacos for dinner. Early night.

Happy day. Found myself overwhelmed with it... A really happy day. 

Apropos of Nothing


Bonny and her rabid feminism.



























Dad with an apple on his head. Mum's out of shot, with an arrow.










Tiny snail. Not my nose, my finger.

Girls are Messy

Ok, I'm not perfect. My dad bought me a painting once. A sofa, draped with books, cushions and a teacup on the floor: "Dull Women", the painting proclaims, "Have Immaculate Houses."
Thanks Dad! Such a compliment... at least I think it is.

My children are messy too. They put ME to shame. Today is the annual Massive Cleaning of Bedrooms. Wibs can do her own she announced. Ten minutes later it was finished,TEN MINUTES? Where was the washing? Hrmm. I checked to see, and couldn't open the door for a flip flop wedged under it. Purposely. "Itttttt ISSS DONNNNE!" Wibs yells. I leave he to it, and attack Bonny's room.

I can't begin to describe how appalling it is... Bonny cannot throw ANYTHING away. We used a whole roll of bin bags. Cans, plastic bottles, and an entire Bolivian rainforest worth of paper (lots of drawings and notes for friends - Heidi you are my BBF!) Packets of glitter on the rugs, boxes of beads popped open and emptied under the bed, half of M&S knicker dept stuffed down against the wall. Cd's, DVD's, Bratz dolls with their spooky missing feet, all jumbled together.

Wibs wanders in snootily later, wet haired and smudgy eyed from her bath in her silky pyjamas. "Poo" she says. "It smells." No sodding shit Sherlock.

Perhaps the scent was me, eau de non stop frigging toil. We put on an audio book so that we didnt have to talk to each other. I was ready to spiflicate the child.

I'm sat now, listening to the washing machine which was on its last legs anyway, groaning away as it spins its 7th load of the day. The clothes aren't dirty mostly ... they are clothes I have washed and ironed once, and left by her door "for hanging". Hanging! Ha, ha haaaa.

So, you get the children you make. I leave the dusting, I really can't be arsed. Better to read a book, play a game, paint a picture. It's my own fault.

I go out later for cigarettes. Driving home, its Vaughn Williams on the radio, and a MASSIVE moon, like a mother of pearl disc sliced precisely in half hangs over the estate. I can feel my frustration dissipating, then when I get in, Wibs has made me tea and Bonny kisses me a sorry.

Tomorrow I think, we'll get cracking on having fun instead.

BonnyLogic

Shopping today for school uniform. Most children pass the time spent on a long journey by playing the red car blue car game... not Bonny. She uses the time it takes to get to the next big town, by musing on inventions. Past inventions have included a tube that goes up ones bottom to enable poop to emerge stripey and rainbow coloured, a la Aquafresh toothpaste. This is, apparently, to cheer us up. We have had to draft a letter to Ford Motors which suggests a single top mounted windscreen wiper (like a train has?) instead of two which sweep in arcs across the screen. No reply.
Today, after discussing the swine flu epidemic (down nationally, way way up locally) Bonny suggests that someone needs to design an outfit to keep swine flu at bay. This outfit will consist of trousers, hat and jumper. These items are peppered with valves which puff out sprays of disinfectant, and should be worn in all public places. A letter to Versace may do the trick.

Other fantastic news - whilst standing outside Asda to receive an important phone call, a sudden gust of mean spiteful wind resulted in my skirt whipping up around my chin. There were no wolfwhistles, however a surge in the purchase of over the counter anti emetics was reported at the pharmacy counter in store.

Email.

You want me? Come get me.

pesnikinja'at'gmail.com

Dreamy.

The Measure of a Man

When a man tells you you who he is, believe him. Maya Angelou, apparently (and unfortunately) but it is a fabulous quote anyhow... I was reminded of this recently by The Fish, and she is right. So why do we not do this? Trust your instincts, we remind others, with a sage nod of the head, yet we are SO shit at managing to do this for ourselves. We meet someone, we like them. We pluck out the fabulous things about them and wave them in the air gleefully, like a prized nugget of gold. What we should do, is remember to take note of the stinky silt that surrounds the gold. (Not that we dont have stinky silt of our own of course)

Once, I dated a man a couple of times. The first time we met each other with mutual friends and much wine was drunk, rendering the evening hazily pleasant. The second time, we met with just our own selves, and went to a popular and by all accounts excellent Turkish restaurant in Islington. I am going back several years here, the name of the restaurant but alas not the details of the date, elude me. The service was shocking. The food was borderline edible, being barely warm and rather overcooked. This was compensated for by a liberal use spices and herbs. My mouth was cold yet hot. The courses were half an hour apart, allowing the diner to drink too much and not mind the shocking service, the surly waitress and the crappy food. Top marks for distraction techniques Islington Turkish Restaurant. Anyway anyway anyway, the end of the meal and the bored and tetchy waitress clears the table (with her hands, though she could've blown the pots to the kitchen with her sighs of irritation and boredom).
"Please give the chef my finest compliments!" beamed my date. I searched for a hint of irony. None. "The meal was fabulous!" he gushed, oil of a million shish kebabs oozing through his every pore. The waitress stared at him as though he was mental. She knew it was crap. I knew it was crap. He was mental, I think. I wanted to slide under the table. She walked away, without even answering.

After the meal, he walked me to the train station, and attempted to kiss me. I got on the train. Yet, I STILL met this man again. Why? Because I couldn't quite believe my instinct. I didn't believe how he was, though he'd shown me.
Some years later I met a man who made me laugh. In a pub on our first date, he shocked me with his intensity. We sat outside in the snow so he could smoke, which he did angrily. On our second date, he belittled a Polish guy, who (whilst being a bit of a tosser and a bit of a pillock) was pretty harmless. In a manner designed to confuse the polish guy, he was over friendly (whilst accepting his whiskey and beer) and gave him his phone number, whilst all the time poking fun, dragging me into it by the very dint of me being there. Nudge nudge eh Pesk?
He rarely spoke to people who served him in shops. Just took his change and walked, leaving me to smile and say thanks. He shouted at a train clerk sarcastically and rudely. Vile. Did I believe the man he showed me he was? No. I ploughed on regardless for at least four more dates. What a prize pillock I am.

A man I used to know, planned everything, and if I didn't fall in with his plans, or fancied doing something else, he drove over me like a tractor in springtime, a man on a mission to get his work done. Eventually I always concurred. Did I spot this? Nope. Klaxon HOOTED at me on one particular occasion, but no, my ears were stuffed with the Cotton Wool of Hope and Admiration. In restaurants he was polite without being oily which was good, but generally distant. And with me too. Didnt see that either.

I date someone now who is gentle. In restaurants, he sets himself up to become the butt of a joke between the waitress and myself. I like this. This is sweet. This is a man who sets others at ease. Will there be something I am not seeing? Stay posted.

Happenings and Holidays

I finished my work today. I have Five Weeks Off. Five whole weeks! Now all we need, is for the rain to finish.

Three patients saw a ghost on Sunday night. Hmm. The fact that two of the patients were in one bay, and one in a side room a few yards away makes it a little more interesting, but meh, as my younger friends say. During shift handover, staff nurse was matter of fact, describing the ghost as though it were a new patient admitted to the ward at 4am... "Mid forties, female, shortish brown hair".

"It's me, I said. "This place has sucked all spirit out of me"

Glances were cast. Ah well.

Bonny however is terrified by and interested in this hospital ghost. Wibs seizes on this interest and tells her that she has seen a ghost in OUR house, sitting in an empty bath. "I see it when I clean my teeth" she nods, evilly and seriously.

"Rubbish", I tell Bonny "As if Wibs EVER cleans her teeth". Bonny nods, but she has wide eyes, threatening to spill fat tears. Wibs, encouraged, adds further details to her spook. "He has a beard" she says, "and he opens his mouth WIIIIIIIIDE like he is screaming in agony..."

Bonny begins to cry. I thank Wibs, who is delighted with herself and cackling away like the worst witch herself. I glare at her.

Wibs apologises and says that she was only joking. Bonny is not convinced and is still boohooing in the way only an 11 year old with a vivid imagination can do.

"Come onnnnn" says Wibs. "What could a ghost do to you ANYWAY?"

"Punch you with it's misty fists?" I offer.

Wibs looks at me. "Misty Fists?" she says.

Bonny looks at me. "Misty fists?"

"Yes. It could run at you and start punching you. With its fists, made of mist." I say solemnly.

"Misty fists...." muses Bonny, offering a ghost of her own, that of a smile.

I grin.

Wibs grins.

"Misty Fists!" we all shout, and soon we are rolling around, hooting and shrieking with laughter, punctuating our mirth with breathless "misty fists!"

Maybe you had to be there. I think its holiday madness. Five weeks off!

I say.

Ted.

Bonny is once again obsessed with Sylvia Plath. At the age of four she took to reading various Plath / Hughes biographies and collections whenever she had a poo - the top shelf of the lav bookshelf used to house a Hughes and Plath collection. I moved it because she began to obsess over Ariel (true) and also because I fancied a little lighter browsing myself on occasion. Currently - Dear Fatty, by Dawn French. Oh how the mighty reader has fallen...

Yesterday I painted and varnished the mahoosive bookshelf in the living room. This entailed hauling many many books off, and doing a fresh sort out. Bonny helped me to reinstall, and as she passed them across, we had a running commentary.

Bonny - ... hmmm. I might read this.."The Journals of Sylvia Plath"

Pesk - (silently) Oh no. (Aloud) It's VERY big.

Bonny - (pause) She put her head in the oven didnt she?

Pesk - Aha.

Bonny - And that second wife, Asha Weevil. She killed herself too didnt she?

Pesk - Assia Wevill, yes, she did.

Bonny - Did he get married again, Ted?

Pesk - Yes.

Bonny - Hmm. I wonder if he went out on dates in one of those false moustache/nose/ glasses things to find another wife. *I* wouldn't marry him, would you? Men. Huh.

I don't know so much. I have always been a little in awe of Big Proper Men who stroll around in big tweed overcoats with serious frowns, a trout in each pocket and a well thumbed copy of a book called "I can build owt wi' three lengths of wood & a mouthful of nails" in one hand. Add to that his poetry magnet of a soul in torment and I think I might've definitely given him the glad eye.

There is no gas in my village.

Safe.

Old Bag.

I am awake. It is 6.30am, and I am in bed, listening to BBC Radio 2, and drinking a large mug of tea.
In my pyjamas.

I am old, suddenly. Oh my God.


At least it wasn't made with a teasmade. I can't help thinking I'd like one though.

Ho hum. Last day at uni today for a while. All tasks and essays done, all exams sat.

Dear Mrs Blackbird

I am remarkably patient with you. I am not whinging when you wake me at daybreak as you fly in and out of the eaves under my roof, and then flap around in the loft space above the bedroom where every morning I lay and listen. I know you are being a Very Good Mother, feeding your babies. I do not grumble, even when I think of the blobs and globules of bird shit that will no doubt be spattering my water tank (not to mention my Christmas tree), or hear the flapping and rustling that you make. I marvel, you sound like a whole flock of seagulls, how do you manage that? Do you have tap shoes I wonder? Anyway. I do not call someone to block up your entrance to my house. I know that to do so, would ensure certain death for your little lovelies, being the featherless little gannets that they are at this time in their lives. I sympathise. I have myself mothered three graceless, ungrateful, feeding/pooing,pooing/feeding machines for what feels like years. I do feel your pain.

However Mrs. Blackbird, I must point out that my patience has a limit. When I go outside to stand on my patio for a rare 5 minutes peace with a mug of tea, I do not expect to be shrieked at as though I am an expenses heavy MP strolling round Lidls in the Wirral, waving my rolex and flashing my Amex. I do expect to be able to hang my washing out without you perching on the clothes prop giving me the evils and hopping up and down, bellowing your miserable beak off in an impersonation of a mid rage Rumpelstiltskin.

My life, Mrs. Blackbird, is not peaceful often.

Do me a favour and shut the fuck up for five minutes.

Thanks,

Pesk.
xxx

Procrastination

I bought a new radio yesterday. A pink one, with a CD player and a usb port to allow hook up to my MP3 player. If only I hadn't dropped my ipod shuffle into a vat of oil.

Bonny - oh no will it still work?
Pesk - *glare*

I cleared the old non functioning DAB radio off the shelf in the kitchen which is also home to a clock the size of one you might find at Crewe station, 12 cookery books, various powders, herbs and spices,a blackbird pie funnel,pickled garlic and chilis and a string of neon blue fairy lights. And a huge metal hand mincer (for mincing potatoes a la bramborak, not hands). All this when I should've been finishing an essay on the importance of the family in the nursing process. Did I say finishing? Starting, finishing, whatever. Anyway, I found two pennies. Not tiny bright coppery pennies you might find in your purse, but dull oak brown birthday badge sized pennies.

I lay them on the table later and the three of us stare at them as we listen to the radio and wait for the tacos to be ready. The most noticable thing is how the design is worn away. Wibs offers that a million people have probably rubbed the Queens face. 1887! says Bonny, picking up the oldest one. 1887! That's like 130 years ago (she had her SATS maths exam today, so she's confident).
Wibs drops one on top of the other and remarks how they sound different to pennies.More serious. Like the Victorians, she says, as though they manufactured the coins to resonate with the mood of the era. They sound like when Scrooge counts his money in A Christmas Carol, she says.
Well, Dickens could've handled these coins, I say, (exaggerating slightly for effect, yes, I know he died in 1870 thanks) eliciting a goggle eyed look from each child as they pick them up and weigh them in their hands.

Or Hitler? says Bonny, who is hideously obsessed with all things Nazi presently.
Wibs (scoffing)- Hitler was GERMAN
Bonny - So? He might've been here on holiday.
Wibs - *considering*
Bonny - And brought an ice cream with it.
Wibs - silly. You could've bought like 50 ice creams for a penny then.
(inflation eh? tsk)
Bonny - I wonder how many murderers have touched this coin?

The penny is now worth 49p on ebay it seems. The conversation is priceless.

Books, Books.

Had a gorgeous day. Yesterday I bought a shameful book on a whim in a chazza shop. Julian Clary's autobiog, A Young Man's Passage. I started it last night, fell asleep reading it and continued reading it at 6am when I woke. It is deliciously bitchy yet so incredibly touching. So many autobiographies skim the surface of truth - this was was painful it was so honest - and you can never trust the biogs written by others (even worse than this, the life stories as imagined by novelists. I once read one of these about Plath and Hughes that made me actually do a small scream of horror, so bad was it).

Had to take Wibs to work at 12, Bonny expressed a wish to visit her gran, and the sun today was intense. Drove to Halton and had an hour in the pub with a friend - or rather outside the pub. Talking about books over a Batemans in a sunny garden - this IS the life. Took the mutt too, she's a happy Hats. Drove home listening to The White Lies which my friend had copied for me - so thoughtful. Liked it well enough, but it needs more listens. Another cd which needs listening to, I've had for three or four years now - Kate Bush's Ariel. I cant get enough of it right now, it's perfect for driving in sun, its perfect for feeling happy to, its perfect for feeling sad to. Yum.

Got home, picked the young ones up, went and bought three more books, and then finished Julian. Tried not to race to the end, couldn't help it. Loved it, recommend it.

Foof!

That's me, blowing off the cobwebs.

So, what's happened? Resigned. Retracted. Resigned. Got new job (NHS blood and transplant thanks for asking), applied to do a further degree in nursing, got accepted, got called to the loony test twice (and finally passed, go figure). Went to Prague, came home. Ooh, life is strange. Change is afoot...

Cutbacks.

I have been pondering lately whether to cancel my Sunday paper delivery. I actually did for a while during my 3rd year oh-god-i-haven't-started-my-dissertation-yet-and-I-have-7-billion-due-essays crisis, but restarted it once that was all over. Lately though, in an effort to pull back on unecessary spends, I have been analysing the use I get for my money. The Observer remains the SP of choice, but I seem to throw away so much of it. Sport? Get lost. Media & Business? Life is grim enough thanks. These go automatically onto the log basket in their pristine, flat, unread state. Review, the main paper and Escape make it onto the tray that goes upstairs with the giant cup of tea. Then Escape, with its pale blue crystalline sea smug cover, is the first to be flung. I used to have a travelling life, I do find other countries fascinating and long to visit, but, and this is the thing you see, I can't right now. Anything other than my frequent (and hugely fun) Prague bound weekends which cost approximately £50, is out of my league, and I can't bear to see anyone else spouting on about it. Escape, is only mildly less annoying than those TV programmes where some middle aged couple (you know, the annoying ones who didn't split up and sell their house at a loss) prance around buying holiday flatlets and villas with their spare change in up and coming bulgarian seaside areas. Those programmes turn me into a rabid psychopath.

Anyway, to return to the point. Is it worth it? I seem to pay the paper shop the cost of a small mortgage for the priviledge of chucking this lot out every week. Every Sunday it invariably wakes me up when the grumpy git who delivers it crams it all in once lump through the letterbox. Kerrraphhhhchunkperlunk. Boom. Thats me then, 7am. Then more than half of it is burnt. And the magazines - Observer Music Monthly is often worth a read, but when it is Food or Sport monthly, more wasted money. I do like cooking, but I'm not about to throw a dinner party for 12 where I will cook individual black puddings in apple sauce and mustard, so that's a waste of time too.

Then we have Euan Ferguson, and this is my dilemma.

Euan Ferguson, is the most fabulous man in the world. I look at his cocky sneer, his ginger tufted spiky hair, his sharp suited hand in pocket stance, and I think 'cor'. Today he is writing about his rubbish life with no central heating, and his ex who has loaned him a Noddy duvet, and I think, yes, Euan, I love you deeply and you are entirely worth a small mortgage every month.

So the paper stays. Now, how else can I cut back?

Book Stuff Pinched from Azahar...

Four childhood books -

1. Susan's Secret Garden. I used to demand this again and again and 'read' it aloud at the same pace as my parents were telling it to me. What a fucking annoying child I must've been. Found it for sale at a car boot sale a couple of years ago and almost weed myself with excitement. Read it aloud to my parents during Sunday dinner and almost got a pasting.

2. Polly of Primrose Hill. Originally in a fusty smelling slightly furry pale green hardcover, I bought this from abebooks for my own children recently. I read it to them, and the descriptive passage about the orphan Polly shopping for her first party dress (pale lemon and fluffy like a chick) still had the power to make me sniffle a little. My children loved it too, which just goes to show that little girls will always be thrilled by stories of invalids, grandpas, secret tunnels, orphans and evil housekeepers. Sigh.

3. Helen Keller's Teacher. A badly written, indulgent, shmaltzy tale about the life of Annie Sullivan, the woman who 'rescued' Helen Keller from her 'life of darkness'. Passages from that book stayed with me for years, until (finding it on amazon) I read it to my own daughters (are you spotting a trend here dear readers?). Annie and her brother Jimmy, cast out by a cruel distant relatives after the death of Just About Anyone Who Ever Loved them, are sent to a poorhouse where they shared beds with foul smelling old women with no limbs or eyes or ears (or something like that). Bonny loves it so much she sleeps with it under her pillow. It gave me the bleddy nightmares. Kids are weird.

4. What Katy Did. More invalids. I fear I'm a bit sick myself when I analyse this lot.

Four authors I will read again and again -

1. Milan Kundera. Especially Laughable Loves. Made for the loo.
2. Slavenka Drakulic. Especially... well no. All of her stuff.
3. Ted Hughes. Poetry counts, right?
4. Pat Barker - but only Union Street.

Four authors I will never read again -

1. Jodi bloody Picoult for starters.

2. Jackie Collins.

3. Emily Bronte. Yes yes, I know. Shut up.

4. Joseph Conrad. Bleurgh. Even if he was Polish, he's rubbish.

The first four books on my to-be-read list -

I have a wicker picnic basket by my bed, stacked high with two wobbly piles of books I have yet to read. The four top ones...

1. Patricia Highsmith x 2. The names escape me, but I am recommended them, and lent them by a dear friend, so I shall. Soon. The writing is just so bloody small and my eyes arent what they used to be. (Pass my pension book and ear trumpet)

3. Magda Szabo, The Door. I'm a whore for east/central european books/writers. I want to read this, but still it sits there. I might move it to the top.

4. Iain Banks, Dead Air.

The four books I would take to a desert island

Hmm. Difficult.

1. Slavenka Drakulic - Taste of a Man.

2. Nicholson Baker - Vox.

3. Ted Hughes, Collected Works. I love him.

4. Shakespeare- Collected Works. And I'd learn to love him.

The last lines of one of my favourite books -

"She's never found peace since she left his arms, and never will again till she's as he is now!"
(the exclamation mark rather ruins it, but Arabella always was a hysterical type)*

*(that last was me incidentally, not Hardy)

take it and run dear readers...

Old Prune

Today will mark my fourth day in a row, pruning the runners off the strawberries that grow on the tabletops by the farm shop that I work at during the summer months. I cannot tell you how cold it is there - coast road, November. The next person I overhear in Tescos remarking on the unseasonal warmth with feel the wrath of my secateurs I can tell you.
The day before yesterday, severely berating Wibs for leaving her art book at her dads, I managed to leave the house without my coat or my wellies (flip flops are not ideal in wet mud). Luckily my dad came up trumps with a pair of workboots and a rather fetching lime green anorak (with oil stains) so I didn't freeze to death. (It was hard to see where I should be pruning mind, with the paper bag I wore in case anyone drove past and recognised me). Yesterday I managed to trump even that, grabbing the wrong kagoul as I legged it out of the house, I ended up pruning in a kagoul aged 10-11, with a 32" chest. At 2.30 I had to leave, what with the pins and needles taking over my whole torso.
No lav either in the field... imagine me, arms straight out either side because of massive jumper (and baps) stuffed into said kagoul, bent double, running along the plants making very fast very tiny baby steps to get to the car (and find a lav) before I peed myself.

On Friday, I have an interview. At a school no less, teaching English. Please, please God I will be successful, and I can finally get out of the part time farm/part time medical work that I've been doing for the last few months. Fingers crossed. And legs again today no doubt.

I Like.

As much for me, as for anyone else. I shall keep this as a work in progress. To start, Billy Collins.
And this too. I love this.

Boom Boom.

(Afternoon break at the hospital, Pesk and Debs are drinking coffee.)

Pesk - I had a patient in this morning, lifted up her blouse, and all around her middle she had this band of crusty yellowish scabs.

Debs - Ewwww!

Pesk - Yes, ewww! I said, have you seen the doctor with that? I reckon you've got pringles!

Debs - Pringles? (pause) Is that like shingles?

Pesk (waiting)

Debs (blank)

Pesk - (waiting)

Debs - (blank)

Debs - Is that a joke then?

Pesk - Yes.

Debs - Oh! Ha. Ha. Pringles! Shingles! You got me there.

Pause.

Pesk - Did you know that the word gullible isn't in the dictionary?

Debs - Is it not? Wow!

Pesk - Actually it is...

Debs - Oh. Oh... Is that another joke?

Pesk - Yes.

Debs - I don't get it.

Pesk - Is that the time already?

How to be a lightning tree.

It's been an age. Sometimes I don't feel like coming here and writing things down. Other times it feels like the only thing that makes sense. Then you can get stuck, how do you do it? Things used to be easy.

So it goes.

On a road -
1. An old woman leaning heavily on one stick to bend and scratch her fat labrador under the chin. The dog looked like he appreciated it. I wondered how she might straighten up again from such an angle.

2. An old man on a bicycle pedalled very slowly along. On the front of the bike was a basket, and in the basket was a very big, very elaborate bouquet of flowers. The man was smiling, a lot. I hope someone loves me that much at 80.

3. A child in a red hat and coat was staring at a puddle by the kerb. The puddle had an oil sheen across it, and the child looked like it was the most exciting thing he had ever seen. His mother stood by, looking the other way and smoking a cigarette. I thought - this wont last forever. Save it for yourself too. I tried to push the thought at her, but she carried on smoking looking off into the distance. She missed the rainbow.

4. I saw the lightning tree that I've seen a thousand times before. This time it looked as though it was beseeching. Those long bare arms raised heavenward.

Sometimes we miss rainbows. We miss the tiny things like scratching a dog, riding a bike, giving flowers to someone. We carry on looking for something better, someone better, and we gaze right over the top of that which we have. As though we are stuck with someone boring at the most perfect party, we search and dismiss, search and dismiss.

So it goes.

Physiology, Vermin and Warriors.

So, after the major maths triumph, I now discover that I also need a GCSE in a science. Apparently the A level psychology won't do. Hmm. It's a conspiracy. I signed up for the first class and duly went last Thursday night, after a days work at the hospital. Can anyone tell me the seven things that prove a thing is/has been alive as opposed to not, i.e a table? I could feel myself slumping lower and lower through the two hour lesson. Oh easy, said Elle, the babysitting daughter when I got home. MRS. NERG -

Movement
Respiration
Sensitivity
(MRS)

Nutrition
Excretion
Reproduction
Growth
(NERG! Clever isn't it! Ha!)

Theres two hours well spent then. Could've got it for free from the smartarse.

Whilst she is telling me all this mnemonic nonsense, I'm putting the kettle on, she's lecturing me on cell structures, and then I notice the dog and the cat being suspiciously and uncharacteristically matey, sniffing around the table. A sense of dread began to creep slowly over me. The cat shoots to the end of the (non mrs nerg) table. I'm torn between watching, finishing making the mug of tea I've been dreaming of since lunchtime, and getting the hell out of the kitchen, when Elle realises that Something Is Up. Her conversation peters haltingly to a stop and she follows my gaze down to the feet of the table. I'm edging out of the door at this point, and then she screams.

Very loudly.

And shouts. "RAAAAAAT!" (and it's definitely a MRS NERG rat, as opposed to the footless, headless, plastic one that the dog carries around with it).

I slam the door closed and leap onto the little footstool. Elle is still in the kitchen (I'll be writing my speech for Mother of the Year later thanks). She wrestles the handle down and skedaddles into the living room, almost knocking me off my perch. The phone rings. Faintly, as it is in the kitchen. Elle and I look at each other in a woebegone fashion. It's my mum, who is ringing to check all is ok before they leave for London in a few hours. Realising that no one is picking up, mum then wanders off around her (rat free) house chatting to my dad with the phone still in her hand. We are treated to a conversation about signposts, a rather loud burp and some scuffly shuffly noises. Terrific. I cant even ring her back from my mobile because she's forgotten to hang up her phone.

Elle bravely goes back into the kitchen and I ring dad's mobile. "There's a rat in my kitchen!" (sing it to the UB40 tune if you wish) I gabble. "Again?" says dad. (Oh yes, this happened twice last year too.)

We're on our way, he says. Dad my hero. The dog then barges her way into the room, rat in mouth. Elle screams, startled dog drops it, Elle screams again. I peek through a crack in the door to see Elle grab the TAIL OF THE RAT, run across the room with it SWINGING FROM HER HAND, open the window and fling it out!
My admiration knows no bounds. I rush off to find my sterile handstuff from work and spray her madly. I call dad back and he says they'll come over anyway. They too, are admiring.

I finally get my tea and there's a knock at the door. Mum and dad are there, dad like an assigai warrior, a large thick length of garden bamboo in his hand, the end of which has a large chisel inserted within it. He seems disappointed that he won't be making a kill, and looks fleetingly yet longingly out of the window. "Are you sure it's gone? Have you checked for any others?" (as though I live on the council tip). He peers under the table, says mournfully - "I made this spear especially when you had the last rat". And sighs.

Can someone, anyone, swap lives with me? Please?

The Scent of Success

On Sunday, we cleaned out the office. Wibs starts at grammar school today, and as Chez Pesk is miniscule, we needed to create a warm, quiet place for her to study in. I converted the coal hole (don't laugh) when I was at uni a few years ago, and it was perfect. It has a radiator and plug sockets, a desk, a filing cabinet and two bookshelves. Perhaps 'coal hole' is a bit of an exaggeration, it's more of an internal shed, but anyway. In the gap between me being at uni and Wibs starting Big School it had semi reverted to shed status, but we got cracking and soon it was once more fit for purpose. We left a pile of things that came out of the office in the kitchen for More Sorting Later (yes I know). Then Monday we were exhausted and it was sunny. Tuesday was my dad's birthday so we were out, and yesterday - bad smell. Really bad smell. Every time we came into the living room, there it was. Passing through into the kitchen - there it was too. Strange. And not nice - like a exceptionally strong and severely vintage frankfurter.
So, rubber gloves on, bleach out. We moved the cooker away from the wall, swept out crumbs and mopped the tiles - nothing there. All the surfaces washed down, floor swept and mopped. We needed to clear the pile of papers from the office. Chatting away with Wibs and Bonnyholding out the recycling bag, I sorted and riffled. Then I saw it. With a comedy whooooOOOoooooarghh and a jete that Darcy Bussell would be proud of, I leapt two kilometers away from the table.
There are times that owning a cat is not a good idea. This happened last year too when I discovered a writhing brain of maggots underneath the bookshelf in the living room, all feasting on a vole.
I got the trowel from the garden, put seven carrier bags one inside the other, and troweled it up off the table. It left its skin behind.

Perhaps those motivated moms should enter mouse hunt onto their daily chores list. I might join up.

A Full Heart...

This ad really moves me - I find it just astonishing. When I saw it last night, I watched as the gorilla breathed, eyes closing and opening, nostrils flaring, that barely perceptible lunge at the camera, and was almost moved to tears at the grace of it. The perfect background of swirly Phil Collins (yes, I am inordinately fond of Phil Collins and often play his albums when no one else is around. Tell anyone and I will hunt you down and hurt you), I suspected a save the gorillas charity appeal any second. When the drums kicked in, the camera panned out, and well. Have a look if you haven't seen it yet. I laughed out loud in surprise and delight, and the memory of it has had me grinning all day.



Fantastic. And very clever.

I'm gonna master all kinds of kung fu.

I spent last week with some oddbods. A woman who spoke about herself in the third person, an enormous woman who talked about her horse endlessly (I hope it has reinforced steel legs) two young men who whistled, tapped and played with their phones every minute of the day. A fragile blonde psychology teacher, two teaching assistants and a slight, fragile buddhist girl. All of us there because we need a maths qualification. A more unlikely gathering of people you can't imagine, but commonly, thickos when it comes to maths.
Maths. I can't trust anyone that can do maths. Like celery eaters, they are - well, weird.
The man taking the class was brilliant. Faced with the prospect of getting seven duffers through GCSE Maths in one week, you might think he would've been verging on the edge of panic. He was however, the most patient person I've ever encountered, going over and over the same points endlessly, trying different tactics to get things to 'click' for us in some way.
I have spent my entire life freezing up at anything remotely mathematical, teacher after teacher have tried to din the most simple formulas into my head. Even my oldest most favourite, gentlest teacher used to bang his head on the desk when faced with my brain freeze. My second year junior report said "Pesk still insists on trying to take the top line away from the bottom". It's a metaphor for my life I think.

Anyway, I needed this qualification to teach - I have a BA (hons) degree (2:1), I dont need to know about maths, but no - I must have it. I have A levels and GCSE's coming out of my ears - not enough. So I bit the bullet and booked a week off work to take this 35 hour course. Start to finish, from simple addition to algebraic calculations in 150 easy steps. And I actually did it. And passed. I can't tell you how amazed I am. How proud I am. Having been told I was stupid (harsh) to discalculaic (sympathetic), I have done the impossible. I'm more chuffed than when I got the degree, I really am. It makes me feel that now, anything is possible. I could really, do anything couldn't I?

Registering now with the GTP agencies. Whoo... watch out kids, here I come.

You know who you are...

Spines are on special offer at Morrison's this week. Call me when you treat yourself to one.


Grrr.

Something like a Pagan Wedding ...

I have been outside with my (on loan from my dad) Garden Groom. A hedge trimmer advertised as 'ideal for the elderly and ladies' (I know) it is a marvellous looking thing. Fish says it looks like an enormous flip flop. Lightweight plastic, it is the hovercraft of the privet shearing world, zooming and zipping over the hedge seemingly of it's own accord. The intimation is that all the operator has to do is hold it down. A kite, one might say, with teeth. Here it is -


The tail attached to the clipper - sorry, groom, inflates and the whizzy lightweight ( lie - more later) blades shoosh and suck the clippings (which are chopped into mini pieces) down the tube and into that black bag that you see at the bottom. What could be finer, easier, more fun than this? At seven am I am awake, eagerly peering out of the window in search of hedge grooming weather. Eventually it stops raining and I go outside the the short yet overgrown 6ft hedge out front. It's windy and the tube lashes back and forwards like a giant angry cobra, I am spattered with bits of chopped privet and the dog is having an epileptic fit at the noise. I retire with faintly shaking arms for a cuppa and then go out the back to the 300ft long hedge. I call Wibs to come help, and Bonny to hold the bag at the bottom of the tube. Smash slash heave, we are a team. Wibs goes on ahead with the shears lopping off the big bits, Bonny solemnly and slowly walks with the bag and hose, she is a bridesmaid. Slash whip grind, bits of the hedge are decimated. We get halfway down. More tea. Bonny has to make it, I am Parkinsonian with effort, my hands are vibrating like a navvy's pneumatic drill and I am liberally covered with a confetti of garden mulch. I look like the Green Man.

Suitable for the elderly and laydeez eh? There is a slowly dawning sense that my father has played an elaborate practical joke on me. I shall get my revenge.

Domestic Daze


Innocently reading one of my favourite blogs the other day, I was assaulted. I know that some of our Sisters over the Pond can do and say things that show us Euros what madness goes on in that wild ol' frontier land, however this little gem was linked to in all seriousness as a wonderful thing.
I hardly have words to describe this ... take a minute to feast upon the free sample page.

Now, is it just me? Is this completely fucken bonkers? There is even an option to purchase a version which not only plans out the time you spend cutting coupons (wtf?), but slips in a rota for scriptural reading, so that you can read the ENTIRE BIBLE IN A YEAR! Whoo! Go sisters. Change the hand towels, cut the coupons, plan the menus, weep for Jesu? I really can't get my head around it. Are housewives minds being so eroded that they need a calendar to prod them to clean the oven, check the toilet rolls and play with the children?
I might do one myself. It might look something like this.

Sunday - Make tea and toast, go back to bed.
Ring the pub and find out what time the carvery starts.
Read blogs.
Read the paper.
Go to the pub.
Come home, wash uniforms, read blogs.

Monday - Wake up, congratulate self that only work part time.
Make tea, go back to bed.
Make pastry for pie, congratulate self at housewifely skills.
Read blogs.
Go to toilet. Ten mins later realise there are no toilet rolls, shout kids to bring tissues.
Play Disney Triv.
Check watch, pour wine. Watch film. Flick through magazine.

Tuesday - Wake up, lean back & look out of window. If sunny, get up. Find bikini.
Walk to hammock. Lay down.
Go back inside six hours later. Find aftersun, make evening meal.
Go to bed.

Etc.

Really, do people need to be told what to do? My house is tidy. My kids are happy. I am happy(ish). We are all well fed and clean. Why does this thing exist?

Enough Already.


Unless you are between the ages of three and twelve, I promise that you look like a twat.

Today, I shall be mostly saying....

£1 a 1lb if you pick them yourself... no, bring them back here and I'll weigh them when you're finished... yes, plenty over there just before the raspberries...



It's not my day for the farm shop, but I agreed to do it after looking at the weather forecast (cloudy). Of course, the day dawns and it's not bloody cloudy at all, it's brilliant blue sky. I hate the BBC. I could do a better job of predicting the weather with a handful of raisins, a wet copy of the Guardian and a sodding pine cone. Still, it's all money.

Click on the picture and look at the lovely signs... notice that there isn't an aberrant apostrophe in sight. Am I letting the side down? I might add some for the hell of it today. Strawberry's... Cherry's. I might even put some quotation marks around things too, 'Carrot's'.

My grocer has a sign which says 'Plumb's'. You have to go a long way to beat that one.

The Ex Files

Went to the beach again... yesterday was fabulously hot. This time we stocked up on longer teeshirts, buckets and spades and factor 25. It was busier than the previous day, but somehow quieter, which was good. Ex husband came down midway through the afternoon which felt a bit odd, but nice as he went off exploring with the girls while I was left with my mp3 player, a bottle of beer and my book for some real peace. Managed to catch a picture of Wibs early on. Wibs hates being photographed and often looks sullen and scowly on pictures. This grieves me as she is a smiley beautiful child. I managed to get this as the camera was on my knee. She didn't realise.



Bonny has no such qualms and regularly stands gurning and demanding a picture. In my Czech Republic teeshirt - it looks so much better on her.



That sky was so blue. We played a game of I spy later - SS? Soggy sandwiches.
Today is cloudy, I can do some housework without a grudge.
Working tomorrow. It better be cloudy then too.

Flap, Rattle n' Burn

After consulting Lord Hog who advised that the weather was bad, we journeyed into town and bought a 7ft x 13ft windbreak. Nothing stands between us and the beach on an August weekend.
It whipped around like a bastid as I hammered it in with the rusty headed claw hammer I found in the garden. Never mind. Settled down with my bottle of budvar and The Interpreter, and sent Wibs and Bonny off to collect shells. The weather picked up. The book was good, the soundtrack of the Enormous Stripy Windbreak gusting back and forward in an east coast typhoon was slightly annoying, but ah well. Beach eh? Living by one, you know, you just know, that it's crap really. You spend an hour in the kitchen boiling eggs and lovingly packing your baps (into a coolbox, not a swimsuit) and off you go, you and the children all thrilled with the notion of a Whole Day at the Beach, because a whole big long cold winter followed by the wettest early summer ever has made you forget about annoying things that will definitely be there. Like wasps. And warm eggy baps with boulder sized bits of sand inside them. And the fact that your beer goes warm in a nanosecond. And that jellyfish have invaded. Again. And that other people will park their arses right next to you and then yell JASMINE I'LL SMACK YER ARSE IF YER DON'T BRING THAT BOTTLE OF FIZZY POP BACK NOW over and over again for three hours. Still, I'm steely. The raffia windbreak flapped and flopped at fifty decibels, but oh, we stuck it out. I'm sat here now, very carefully typing, because to move is to die in a writhing sunburnt agony. Yes, I did it again.

And tomorrow, we have 30oC. Guess where we're going?

I like eggy baps.

Reading Matter(s)

When I finished uni, I swore that I would never read a worthy book ever again. That anything I read from that point on would either have a pink jacket, or a title spelled out in glittering prismic letters. And I did try for a while, the summer after finals saw me stretched out in the hammock reading Tesco specials, you know, books bought on a whim with groceries. But like eating burgers and plastic cheese instead of asparagus pie and Camembert, the kitten heeled heroines began to leave me not only unsatisfied, but feeling mildly nauseous. I still tried, only paying even less, I bought them in Oxfam and Cancer Research. 50p copies of Lets Meet on Platform 8 cooed to me, "we're not so bad... we're built for the hammock and a glass of red, come on..." Daisy Falls in Love, It's my Party, FourPlay, I've brought them all home with their fluffy promises of an easy read, a pally gossip in the garden. They just don't cut the mustard. Now I once again work hard at my books. Uni ruined me for fluff. Thanks uni.

Beach day today. The local BBC weather forecast promises us a decent enough 25oC, the fat faced full little sun last night loomed off the webpage grinning and pointing at the picnic hamper. So at 9pm I merrily drove to the Co op and bought mini sausage rolls, hummus and egg custard ready to pack up. 4am this morning saw me awakened by the sound of a wind usually only captured on 1930 black and white films about the Russian Steppes. It has time to cheer up though, no? I shall make the eggy sandwiches and then choose my book to take.

Now, Painter of Signs, or Faye King Goes to Town?

Spotted on the Trampoline Yesterday...



And today, I shall be mostly sunbathing and cooking. Probably in equal quantities, as I'm cooking Czech. As every good Czech woman knows, when they cook Czech food, it keeps them in the kitchen for most of the day. As every Czech man knows, this is the whole point of their national cuisine. Today I am cooking the horribly time consuming but incredibly tasty Bramborak. After that I will make kuře with houba, smetana and cibule in the remoska. For afters, almond thins soaked in Grand Marnier and covered with more cream, served with a strawberry granita. It's not Czech, I know I know, but man, is it gorgeous.

It's sunny, I can't believe it.

Summer seems to be looking up somewhat.

Please Remove your Shoes ...

and whisper while you're in here. The day after Suffering Sunday, and I'm still in some agony here. Please readers, next year when I post whoohooing about the brewery down the road having it's open cask day, could you all say "Liana! NO! Back away from the brewery, NOW!". I promise I will take notice. Open cask plus persuasive friends and a rare day of freedom might conspire to allow me to forget quite how shit I feel for days after the event. I would like any faithful readers to link back to this post for me, because I am stupid, and I Will Forget how ill cask beer makes me. By five o' clock yesterday I was practically inside out with puking and sorrow. Luckily I had had a cracking evening. That lessened the pain a tiny teeny bit. Oh yes, a cracking evening. Two hours sleep. And cor.

A Song, a Scent and a Memory.

Talking to somebody lovely last week, we swapped our desert island discs. I found this really hard... this weeks D.I.D wouldn't be next weeks D.I.D, and last years held only a couple of keepers. It's all to do with sense of place and emotion isn't it? Aaaand the brand new number one slot this week goes to... Bat for Lashes, Horse and I. What a cracking song. In number two place, hanging on for the last eight years is the double A side from Jeff Buckley with Lover, You Should've Come Over and Last Goodbye. Making a surprise re-entry at number three is Portishead's Sour Times. Number four goes to Stipe and Hersh's Ghost, a song never far from any of Pesks gramophones. At number five, Massive Attack's Angel is a non mover (as usual), and at number six Carole King sings the Sunday morning anthem, So Far Away. Number seven holds The Doobie Brother's What a Fool Believes, for the simple fact that it makes Pesk dance like a loon and grin, even when she is feeling like poo. Finally at number eight, holding on, is Iva Bittova's Uspavanka, for reasons I just can't go into. Or can I? Ok. I saw it first on some Czech music channel. Black and white, a bus full of gypsy children and a beautiful violinist singer. I love that song. The Buckley, Portishead and Massive Attack traces back to a beautiful and doomed love affair in the late nineties. For a time I couldn't bear to listen to them, now they just give me a reminder of how glad I am that I had such love for a while. Bat For Lashes is newly discovered and I adore it so much. Carole King is good to hear mixed in with the crackleSwish of The Observer.

Scent is much the same for me. I have a little trick with perfume. A new love affair, or a holiday, or a major event, is always, always marked with a fresh perfume. I graduated to the scent of Ghost, I walked through That Love Affair wearing Rochas' Tocade, and Prague is always glad to meet me in Donna Karan's Cashmere Mist. Belgrade, and it's Prada, absolutely. (Even if it was described by a dear friend as 'pungent'). I went to Cambridge once in Paul Smith's Woman, but I don't intend to repeat that particular experience. It's good though... a song, a scent, both bring the past back into sharp focus. It's as though my memories are kept under wraps until another sense, hearing or smell, snaps them back to the surface.

I wonder which perfume is next...

And so it goes.

I think I've mentioned before about the patients I have that are often near to tears (please people, avoid the obvious inference). You can tell when they sit down how close to the surface their emotions are. A____ came today, a really sweet patient I've had for almost a year. Come in, take a seat, how are you is the stock welcome to all my patients from me and impersonal as it is, it's sometimes it's the cue for a wobbly chin. A____ was really upset. Married 55 years, her husband doesn't beat her anymore, but only because she begs him, tells him that she is too old and frail now. He sends her to the hospital ten miles away with only the exact bus fare, nothing extra for a cup of tea. I wish I was dead, she tells me. What to do? Anything I say sounds crap. Five minutes per patient, five minutes per patient. I took five, asked about her children then counselled her on approaching her daughter. He listens to all her phone calls at home, apart from when he is sleeping underneath the newspaper. She can't make phone calls without his consent. Once, when she was younger, he broke her arm.

So, to the elderly people who notice my lack of a wedding ring; before you start in on the lecture I hear so often about youngsters not realising that you have to 'work at a marriage', look at that case.
I caught up with her ten minutes later in the corridor and sat for a couple of minutes, then gave her a hug. She kissed me and thanked me. For what?

The waste of that life makes me want to rage.

I Don't Belize it

First day yesterday working at the fruit stall. Absolutely, totally, brilliant. Bagging up fruit and veg, breathing the fresh air, running back and forward with sacks of potatoes to customers cars as they pull into the layby. Everything sold is grown by the farmer that runs the stall, a lovely woman who ran off to Belize at 18 to attend an army training course, and still lives there each winter in a mad house with five street dogs. A woman with an MA in Latin American politics and geography, she is really good fun, and we nattered all day as hungarian fruit pickers traipsed backwards and forwards with fresh fruit punnets. The weather could be better, but you can't have it all I guess. Feels like I do at the moment. The beer festival at the weekend, the Fish + Fish friend + Fish daughter are visiting, and school is out for summer. Hurrah!

Sing Sultanas, Sing Sultanas to the King of Kings

Pesk - anyone want a slice of cake?
Wibs - yes please.
Bonny - has it got hosannas in it?
Pesk - ?
Bonny - hosannas, does it have hosannas in it?
Wibs - it's lemon cake.
Bonny - yes please then.
Pesk - ?
Wibs - she means sultanas.
Bonny - yep.



It's a parallel universe in here, I'm sure of it.

Crash Team Racing

Took the girls to see some stock car racing last night. We sat in the middle of great fat tyres set into grass, guzzlemunched on hamburgers and full fat coke then waved our flags as the contenders whizzed past. Bonny was a bit prim lipped at first. Look at the pollution! she said, as massive articulated truck cabs zoomed and screeched around our corner, belching great fat gouts of black smoke into the air. She soon got into the swing of it though, yelling and woohooing, all thoughts of saving the earth went to pot as she screamed out for Joe 90 to COME ONNNNN!.


The skydivers didn't make it, it was too windy and then airstrip was a bit soggy anyway they said. Ah well. What a great time we had anyway. Two artics had a huge smash into the crash barrier (no one hurt) and Bob had to be manoevred out of his car by paramedics (broken ankle). We left early at 11.15 after a teenager got stuck in her mini, smashed into by several others. I think things like this bring out the worst in people. Every crash brought huge waves of people from all over the stadium to rubberneck in case there was any gore. At one point Wibs said quite loudly, God how disgusting. But that was at me taking pictures of drivers bottoms as they attempted to fix the rope.






We also left before the fireworks and the Caravan Destruction Derby, which was a shame. I might've leapt over the barrier and taken an axe to the caravans myself.

Marlon Dingle made an appearance, and Bonny swooned as he told her what a beautiful name she had. Cain Dingle is at the next meet. My Emmerdale cup runneth over.



Both Wibs and Bonny are making plans for the next outing there. We will buy flasks and folding chairs and take a picnic they eagerly suggested as I drove home, ankle deep in mud with my teeth chattering. Marvellous.

Oi, Mush.

This blog is for me, to remind me when I need it.

It's school report time... Wib and Bonny brought theirs home this afternoon. Some choice excerpts...

- In a grey old world, Wibs certainly adds a little colour to the school. Not one of the crowd, she is 'happy in her skin' and I shall miss her.

- Wibs has been a pleasure. I can always rely on her approaching a task from an unexpected yet brilliant angle to produce work of a high standard.

- I hope Wibs keeps her quirky writing style - she is always interesting to read, and will certainly achieve a (rare) level 5.


- Bonny has great imagination. Her stories are a joy to read.

- Bonny is kind and has many friends. She has great empathy for others.

- when Bonny is not drawing or painting, she has her head stuck firmly in a book. No wonder her imagination is so vivid.


And this morning, I woke to this, stuck right where I'd see it -




And the point of this pile of braggardly mush, is this.

As parents, and especially as single parents, we beat ourselves up. We never have enough money to give our children the things we would wish to treat them to. We worry constantly that we didn't do enough, weren't there enough, didn't take sufficient notice. We rail and tear our hair, that we haven't done it right, that we could've done better and now it is too late. We see other children whose hair is neater, clothes are ironed better, shoes are polished more brightly, and we chastise ourselves and swear we will do better. I have a close friend who does exactly the same as I do. I am sure many of us do. Yet together, we have managed to raise, pretty much singlehandedly, (while working and often studying) six fantastically bright, happy, secure kind and imaginative children. So to all the other hardworking, loving, exasperated single parents, I say well done us. We are brill.

Rapunzel

The elderly gent who lived next door died a couple of weeks ago. He'd lived here for decades, and his back garden was used for the purpose the council intended, to provide a large vegetable plot. A market gardener all his life, Joe set it out with military precision. Raspberries at the back, potatoes following, onions, garlic, carrots and finally, pea nets marking the edge of the border.
His wife, Winnie, has not been home since his funeral, and daily I gaze out of Elle's bedroom like the pregnant mother in Rapunzel, craning her neck to see the vegetables from her window, at the chickweed and rough grass that is steadily encroaching. The onion leaves are mustard yellow and wilting. Rain rotted perhaps, or just desperate to be dug up. The last time I spoke with Joe just a few weeks ago, he'd placed a tupperware bowl full of raspberries for my children on the hedge which joins our properties, and told me, matter of factly that he had lung cancer. "Ah well, I've had a good innings" he said. "We'll just see how long they can stave it off, nowt else to do lass". Winnie smiled by his side.
There's a special kind of stoic about old English people. They accept things, and do the best they can with what they have. Old people in general maybe.

The rain has half destroyed the crop of potatoes in the field behind our gardens too. Every day, the farmer comes with his tractor and his mate and they rattle back and forwards, desperately digging them all mechanically, and then a big motorised escalator style thing raises them up and riddles out the earth before depositing them into a lorry that trundles alongside. When I was 16, I worked in a potato field, much like this one (could've been this one) and a lone tractor dug while teams of us ran from one side of the field to another, filling supermarket type baskets then dropping them and running to the other side, where we'd start again as the tractor came back. Another person tipped the potatoes into a huge trailer. Times change. We'll have a huge glut of potatoes, cheap as (chips?) anything, and then there'll be a dearth, and they'll be outrageously expensive.

The rain is relentless. It reminds me of when we were in Prague, in 2002 for a few months. At night it tipped down, ferociously, and we sat in bars, steaming ourselves dry as we drank vodka and joked about the 500 year flood. It wasn't a joke, it happened shortly after, and it all but destroyed many villages, towns and cities. Germany had some of it too, and responded with typical German vigour, closing down the borders with the Czech Republic. As though by nipping off the tide of Czech refugees, they could stem the flow of flood water. Communism doesn't exist there any more, but it felt like it for a few weeks.

People get on with it though don't they? I'll ask Winnie when she gets back, if anything can be saved, or if we've lost the plot entirely.

I must get on with going to work.

Strawberry Surprise.

I have another job! Oh yes, the universe provides indeed it does. The person that offered me the work seemed afraid to say it, lest I shriek "I beg your PARDON?!" No chance. I snapped her hand off. As of next Wednesday, I shall be working selling strawberries and raspberries at a stall by a farm, on the coast road. What larks. It pays me 15p an hour less than I earn at the hospital, with no hierarchical aggro. At least I hope not. I can wear jeans and a teeshirt and hopefully sunglasses as I wrap parcels of strawberries and read my beloved books between passing cars. Marvellous! I can't wait. I'd almost do it for free.

In other news, my ex husband has split from his partner of three years. The children are more concerned that she has taken the kitten which was theirs, back to Dudley than the fact that they won't see her again. We can't take the cat, can't possibly offer another feline sacrifice to the Dog. The cat we already have is clinging on for dear life as it is, spending more than half her life balancing precariously on top of bookshelves, lamps and cupboards as the whiskered woofing one stands guard waiting to grab her in the jaws of instant death. I must say though, I am very glad he has ditched the Pole Dancing Pikey, as my patience was wearing thin. Constantly blowing cigarette smoke out from between teeny, brown and sharp teeth, I marvelled that the man I used to love (ten lifetimes ago) could be happy with this asinine trout. Aaaaanyway. So, on the same day, he got evicted. This poses more of a problem, as we pretty much share custody. I shall now have to force the kids out of bed at 6.00am two days a week, and shall rarely get a weekend off unless I park him in the house whilst I go gallivanting*. He's over for dinner tonight. It starts already.

Bloody men. Still, strawberries! Yum.


* obviously, it's more of a problem for him than me. Just adding that, as anyone might think I'm totally without heart**.

** But then again...

Here's looking at you kid...

I love site meter. It tells me who is looking at this blog, why they're looking, where they live (roughly - it thinks I live in - alternately Mansfield and Rotherham. I don't. I would be more miserable (if possible) if I did). It tells me where they clicked into Pesk from, if it was through Google, it tells me what they were searching for. The latest searches - 'venn diagrams + restaurants'. 'Hard to pronounce Czech words'. 'What snails eat' (everything in my opinion - don't get me started). 'Pesk for free' - (eh?) and 'Tiny Gatling'. They're not too bad - a friend had someone to her blog through the search tag 'dog sex videos', so it could be much worse. Almost as disconcerting as that, is the fact that they were able to arrive at her blog from that tag. Brrr.
Someone in Manchester has searched using my full name on Google. I know who that is, as the unusual isp gives it away. A couple of Norwegians have arrived at my blog, probably because of the post I made about how awful their hometown is. Site meter doesn't tell me if they were affronted or not.
We should have a feedback button. 5 stars for I like this, 4 for could do better, 3 for distinctly average, 2 for mildly offended and 1 for How bloody dare you, you sanctimonious foulmouthed shit.

Work today. Oh hurrah.

Dogs Dinner

Look at this. Notice it's an American company. I think you'd get stoned to death in Europe if you walked a dog wearing that.
Quite right too. I sometimes think our American cousins are - quite aptly - barking mad.

The East Wind.

You may feel a draught. Today, everyone here has a huff. The fence inspector has a huff that I was not in on Friday when he wanted to inspect my fence, the dentist had a huff because his assistant told him he was wrong (he was) and she was right (she was - this doesn't fill me with confidence as she is about 10 years old with lots of lipgloss). The left side neighbours are keeping Hairy Eddie away as he has not been castrated and so Hats has a huff because she misses wagging her bottom at him all morning. Bonny has a huff because she doesn't like 'grey smoothies' (blueberries and banana with honey) and Wibs has a huff because Bonny got fresh orange instead. I got a huff because blueberries don't come cheap, then I got a bigger huff after mowing half the lawn and running out of petrol. The fence inspector says that he cannot be expected to visit one fence in TinyVillage when he has lots of work in other places, and he would be in effect wasting his time. I apologised for having a job (quite huffily) and told him that I had cancelled the appointment they sent because I would be at work. I had informed them when BOOKING the appointment that I was at work. Clearly there is a communication breakdown between himself and the agency that took the booking, I said. Huffily. And that I think to say that he would be wasting time inspecting my fence is very rude. I didn't say that, but my huffy tone may have intimated it.

I don't even work on Mondays, and I have caught everyone else's huff it seems.




I shall now go huffily, to pick my children up from school.

Patients dear, Patients.

Clinic this morning was delightful. Many patients I haven't seen for a couple of months, all full of questions. How is the dog, the family, have we had floods, did my trip to Aberdeen go well? For a bunch of pensioners, the memories they have are startling and sharp. They are kind. Before I did this work, I would never have imagined that I would feel so fond of elderly people. Having been on the admin side of so many grumps on the telephone for more than a year, these people it seems are transformed by the sight of a uniform, a smile and a conversation which stretches out for months at five minutes a go. My regulars are all smiles, and me too. How cheering they are. "Ooh, you have lost weight!" "You have done your hair differently, I like it!" "Come dancing with me sweetheart".

Maybe it's the human face rather than someone on the end of a 'phone, I don't know. But they are kind, and for this I am grateful and happy.
Mind you, had B____ in. Deaf and utterly without social skills, he wears enormous glasses. B____ is almost exactly like the dad from the Royle Family will be in twenty years time. "How are you B____?" I asked.

"TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE!", he bellowed. "I'VE NOT BEEN WELL AT ALL! BEEN SLEEPING IN TEN HOUR STRETCHES, I ONLY WAKE UP TO SHIT!"

My head snapped up like a puppets. Sniggers from the corridor and a muffled good Christ from the phleb next door. I must've had the broadest grin. Look on the bright side B____ I said. At least you DO wake up to do it".
I like B_____ as well. He doesn't much give a fig, and that's terribly freeing I think.

I used to work with deafblind students, mostly with learning problems. There are many similarities between the elderly and those students. Mostly in that no one has time for them, and no one, if they can help it, touches them. Imagine that... to be so isolated and have people avoid you. I walk the patients back up the corridor arm in arm, I usually put an arm around their shoulders when i fetch them into clinic. It stretches me past the requisite five minutes often, but meh.

In other news - a colleague told me that when her dog was on heat, a rottweiler that she'd never seen before climbed up her trellis and in through the kitchen window to ravish her dog. I can't bear it.

And the meeting was ok. Air clearing, and ok.

iTunes

I am rediscovering the magic of party shuffle while sitting here this morning. Better than daytime television. Well at least better than Jeremy Kyle, though yesterday's Phil and Fern gave me an unexpected Rupert Everett bonus, so I'm glad that I saved my scorn and didn't iTune 'til today.
I'm talking to the Fish about acupuncture, and party shuffle is flinging some marvellously unexpected treasures at me. As we scoff about homeopathy (definition - throw a bottle of Stolichnaya into the sea at Portsmouth and then fly to Manhattan Island , scoop up some water in a shot glass and expect to feel pissed), the 12" of Human League's Love Action beeps jollily at me. The thing about party shuffle, is that you hear things that you ordinarily wouldn't choose. I had been giving The Hours album a listen (not bad. Not brilliant, could improve with more listens) but Human League cheered me right up, despite me not liking it at the time. It is followed by the Cure's Cut Here, and Frank Black's Lone Child.
Someone told me once of a game that you can play with iTunes. Ask it a question and press shuffle, and the song is your answer. So, I think, how will the meeting go tomorrow? Answer - Death in Vegas' - Hands around my Throat.


Rubbish game.

Leave Box Empty if not Applicable.

To the person who tried and failed to contact me yesterday - there's my email address over there on the right.
*points*

Fences, Landlords and Meetings

Called the landlord about the fence a few weeks ago now. There is a field at the bottom of my huuuuge garden, and when the tractor comes round every few weeks, it reverses and turns, backing into my fence more often than not, stabbing little holes in it with the big bouncy metallic bridal train it pulls along. I said to the landlord that it is full of holes after the last ploughy type activity, and there was much huff and bluster. "Well I don't see why we should pay for it! Who is the farmer?". I have no idea, I said. But I am not home Thursdays or Fridays, so if you come and have a look, don't come then. Got a letter this morning saying that they will come on Friday. To look at it. I rang them back and said that I have a dog on heat and it needs doing quickly. I could hear myself becoming unreasonable. Surely not Liana, you say, you, unreasonable? It's true alas. I am getting a big bruise on my forehead these days.
Boss called - can we have a meeting. Bugger. I was thinking of resigning with immediate effect yesterday. Looks like I'll have to go in after all and endure this meeting. Unless they re-expand my job, I will have to go anyway - at least this gives me a chance to put my side of things across. Feeling impotent about life changes is such a negative thing, this lets me be proactive (jesus, I'm already into bullshit bingo). The Fish says that the universe is backing me into a corner so that I have to alter the bad. It's true possibly. I hope I don't puncture a fence as I'm reversing.

Time of the Season

I wonder if Hats and I are on some kind of psychic wavelength... after last nights dream, while walking the girls to school I notice (don't ask, it's gruesome) that Hats is experiencing her first heat cycle. Googling tells me that it lasts almost a month, but that I shouldn't have rushed home like a distressed maiden aunt with the vapours, as she will not allow a male dog to mount her for the first ten - twelve days of the cycle. After that apparently she will let any old mongrel in to have a go. The slapper. It lasts approximately twenty days. The website tells me that the most noticeable sign during this time, is that male dogs will hang around the house.
Oh please.
I can't get her spayed yet because a) I don't have £150 and b) during the cycle, if on heat, complications are a distinct possibility.

So, can I take her for walks or not? Do I have to carry a gallon of icy water in a bucket everywhere we go? I can't see either of us being willing to forego our three mile walks. Especially when I noticed a very handsome Italian Spinone on the last one. Poor Hats. Poor me.

Welcome Dreams.

Following on from my camping trip with Johnny Depp, I am pleased to report that I spent a significant portion (fnaar) of last night with Rupert Everett, having jolly fun on a sofa. The dream was incredibly realistic, so much so that I still have a huge grin on my face. Of course this is not my first dalliance with Dame Everett, he kissed me once. During waking hours too. I know, it's incredible - picture if you will, a 20 year old shop girl sent off to fetch milk belting down Oxford Street, turning into St Christopher's Place and subsequently running straight into a tall man in a long brown mackintosh. He grabbed my shoulders and said "My Darling - you can't come in here, we're making a film" then held my face in his hands and kissed me. It was him, filming Dance with a Stranger with Miranda Richardson in the mid eighties. He was straight then you see. I have hope that it wasn't our brief snog that sent him across to the other side.

I have the poster of the film in my bathroom these days. It was probably seeing that while brushing my teeth that set me off.

Am going to stare at it for another half hour before I go to bed tonight.

Cor.