...that's apparently how long it takes to master anything, according to the old premise, referred to in an interesting article in the Saturday Review in the Times by Melvin Burgess, who went to the same school as me, and has praised his English teacher to the skies in several articles that appeared both when I was at said school, and - including in the article I read this weekend - thereafter. She never taught me. I hated school. And I can't say I'm particularly a fan of Melvin Burgess either, but maybe I should give him another go.
10,000 hours and a skin like rhino hide, apparently. I head for the spreadsheets (any excuse) and discover that if I wrote for three hours every day, it would take me nine years to become a master, according to this oft-referenced little formula. Nine years - that's nothing. Nine years ago now feels like yesterday. Nine years from now, I'll be 42. Tchaikovsky was 42 when he first had success as a composer (I seem to remember this fact, should probably Wiki it and confirm). Well, there or thereabouts.
10,000 hours...I bet you could walk 5,000 miles in 10,000 hours. 40 weeks of pregnancy is only 6,720 hours, so all those soppy people who think their children are their life's creative masterpieces - FAIL. Ah well. Nobody's perfect. Not on these sums, anyway.
10,000 hours, then, to master...anything. What, though? What can I master? Picking small stones from the grooves of trainer soles? Opening drinks and passing to the back seat while keeping both eyes on the road whilst driving? Making jam sandwiches while talking to/begging bank managers on the phone? None of these are marketable commodities. Perhaps they should be. Hmmm, how to make these skills pay...
Monday, 15 April 2013
Wednesday, 27 March 2013
Who Am I?
Not the Jackie Chan film of the same name, no, although it is, of course truly wonderful. I love kung fu. As do the Axis, who demonstrated this fact with near-fatal aplomb the other morning when they should have been chowing down on their organic bran flakes (note to self: do not bother with organic, it only feels doubly irritating when the gruesome twosome splatter themselves, each other and the walls with the more-expensive gloop instead of the Lidl GMO stuff). I walked in just as the Kong was leaping, Karate Kid/Eddie the Eagle Edwards style, from the top of the dining table, directly onto his brother's head. It all seemed to happen in slow motion, which gave the Pie time to assume a suitably combative position, raise his hands high in the air, catch his airborne younger sibling and spin him round in the air like a plate. Much screaming and yelling ensued. I calmed down quickly, however, and recovered enough to interrogate the Axis without too much swearing.
"What the HELL was that?"
They looked at each other and shrugged. The Kong decided to pipe up. "It's who we are, Mum. We're superheroes! Arrrrr!" (Superheroes? Pirates? That's what you get for birthing and raising your kids in the West Country).
The boys are pretty confident in who they are. They don't see it as a problem to assume other identities when the mood takes them, either. For example, on picking them up from holiday club, I couldn't help but notice that the other children were all calling the Kong, 'Superman'. The staff at our local Sainsburys all address him as 'Batman'. A very dear friend of ours used to call him 'Little Loo Brush Head'. Bet you can't guess why.
Since they were born, however, I have had little or no idea who I am, or what is going on half the time. I'm lucky if I know which way is up most of the time. Added to that, in the three years since I've been the sole adult resident at Axis Towers, I have relied heavily on the support of Mr T and Wolverine for most of my life decisions. "Oh, Mr T," I sigh, "Will I ever find love again?" Mr T looks at me quizzically. "Don't gimme no back talk, sucker!" I ponder his response. "True, true. I do appreciate the concision of your appraisal of my situation. I suppose it's true that I have a preponderance to fall for men not on the basis of whether I find them attractive, but on whether or not they find me attractive. This reverse reasoning, or 'back-talk', as you so winningly put it, is completely self-defeating. But I can't seem to help it! Whatever should I do?" T scowls at me in contempt. "Shut up, fool!"
Mr T is right, of course. Several of my other friends have said as much. Wolverine is no more help. His face is permanently tightened into the clenched growl sported only by the chronically constipated. If I push the buttons on his back, I can make him growl, turn his head, and kick his arms and legs. He's the most biddable boyfriend I've ever had. "Tell me, Wolverine. Should I apply for this fantastic-sounding job? We'll have lots more money and I won't feel like such a loser all the time. But I don't know if I can do it. I'm just a de-skilled, depressed single mum now. It's been years since I did anything interesting and challenging like this. But I want to be at home with the Axis as much as I can, and I'll never see them if I get this. But we need the money, we're brassic. If I could clone myself, and send the clone out to work to earn money, that would work! What should I do?" Wolverine is furious, clearly, at the unfairness of my desolate situation. "Uuuuuuuurrrnnnnnggghhhhh!" he replies, and kicks both his legs above his head, causing him to flip over and land in the Playdoh Pizzeria. Luckily I manage to reach down and rectify him before he's turned into a Fiorentina.
I go to pick up a friend who has offered to help detoxify Axis Towers, and, while I'm waiting, gaze at the goldfish in its bowl in her kitchen. The fish gapes wildly at me, banging its head against the glass, looking horrified and pleading. Three seconds later, it has forgotten and is swimming around, seeing it all for the first time. Again, it leans into the wall of the bowl, performing its horrific pantomime, without any control over its destiny. You never hear, I think, of a goldfish that really wants to be mayor, or a writer, or anything at all, really, and I suppose it's just not possible. I felt a bit like that goldfish. In the bowl, swimming along, relying on the goodness of others to keep going, permanently petrified. Still, if your memory's wiped every three seconds, it can't exactly be a bad life, can it? The water looked pretty clean and comfortable. The fish was clearly well-fed. Perhaps it's a more enviable existence than we realise, I think. Perhaps, if you're really lucky, you get to come back as a well cared-for goldfish. Perhaps that could be me. I look at her swimming around the bowl. My friend's husband comes in, flicks the bowl with his thumb and tuts. 'Bloody fish. Think he's got dropsy.' I turn, alarmed. 'Really? What does that mean?' He mimics the poor creature. 'Means he's just gonna get really fat and, well. Kind of explode.' I bend to look again through the bowl at the goldfish. Disconcertingly, my, holographically superimposed on the body of the doomed pescean, face stares back at me through the reflective glass.
As Wolverine said, later tonight when I told him that story, Unnnnnnnghhhhhh.
"What the HELL was that?"
They looked at each other and shrugged. The Kong decided to pipe up. "It's who we are, Mum. We're superheroes! Arrrrr!" (Superheroes? Pirates? That's what you get for birthing and raising your kids in the West Country).
The boys are pretty confident in who they are. They don't see it as a problem to assume other identities when the mood takes them, either. For example, on picking them up from holiday club, I couldn't help but notice that the other children were all calling the Kong, 'Superman'. The staff at our local Sainsburys all address him as 'Batman'. A very dear friend of ours used to call him 'Little Loo Brush Head'. Bet you can't guess why.
Since they were born, however, I have had little or no idea who I am, or what is going on half the time. I'm lucky if I know which way is up most of the time. Added to that, in the three years since I've been the sole adult resident at Axis Towers, I have relied heavily on the support of Mr T and Wolverine for most of my life decisions. "Oh, Mr T," I sigh, "Will I ever find love again?" Mr T looks at me quizzically. "Don't gimme no back talk, sucker!" I ponder his response. "True, true. I do appreciate the concision of your appraisal of my situation. I suppose it's true that I have a preponderance to fall for men not on the basis of whether I find them attractive, but on whether or not they find me attractive. This reverse reasoning, or 'back-talk', as you so winningly put it, is completely self-defeating. But I can't seem to help it! Whatever should I do?" T scowls at me in contempt. "Shut up, fool!"
Mr T is right, of course. Several of my other friends have said as much. Wolverine is no more help. His face is permanently tightened into the clenched growl sported only by the chronically constipated. If I push the buttons on his back, I can make him growl, turn his head, and kick his arms and legs. He's the most biddable boyfriend I've ever had. "Tell me, Wolverine. Should I apply for this fantastic-sounding job? We'll have lots more money and I won't feel like such a loser all the time. But I don't know if I can do it. I'm just a de-skilled, depressed single mum now. It's been years since I did anything interesting and challenging like this. But I want to be at home with the Axis as much as I can, and I'll never see them if I get this. But we need the money, we're brassic. If I could clone myself, and send the clone out to work to earn money, that would work! What should I do?" Wolverine is furious, clearly, at the unfairness of my desolate situation. "Uuuuuuuurrrnnnnnggghhhhh!" he replies, and kicks both his legs above his head, causing him to flip over and land in the Playdoh Pizzeria. Luckily I manage to reach down and rectify him before he's turned into a Fiorentina.
I go to pick up a friend who has offered to help detoxify Axis Towers, and, while I'm waiting, gaze at the goldfish in its bowl in her kitchen. The fish gapes wildly at me, banging its head against the glass, looking horrified and pleading. Three seconds later, it has forgotten and is swimming around, seeing it all for the first time. Again, it leans into the wall of the bowl, performing its horrific pantomime, without any control over its destiny. You never hear, I think, of a goldfish that really wants to be mayor, or a writer, or anything at all, really, and I suppose it's just not possible. I felt a bit like that goldfish. In the bowl, swimming along, relying on the goodness of others to keep going, permanently petrified. Still, if your memory's wiped every three seconds, it can't exactly be a bad life, can it? The water looked pretty clean and comfortable. The fish was clearly well-fed. Perhaps it's a more enviable existence than we realise, I think. Perhaps, if you're really lucky, you get to come back as a well cared-for goldfish. Perhaps that could be me. I look at her swimming around the bowl. My friend's husband comes in, flicks the bowl with his thumb and tuts. 'Bloody fish. Think he's got dropsy.' I turn, alarmed. 'Really? What does that mean?' He mimics the poor creature. 'Means he's just gonna get really fat and, well. Kind of explode.' I bend to look again through the bowl at the goldfish. Disconcertingly, my, holographically superimposed on the body of the doomed pescean, face stares back at me through the reflective glass.
As Wolverine said, later tonight when I told him that story, Unnnnnnnghhhhhh.
Saturday, 16 March 2013
Cadenza, schmadenza
When I was young, I used to play the piano. For quite a few years, in fact, and our family piano now takes pride of place in Axis Towers, thanks to an act of unusual beneficence on the part of my father on my thirtieth birthday. It's the one item in AT that the Axis are forbidden to damage in any way - they are encouraged to play it, but if I see them lurking near it with sticky fingers, jagged toys, or even looking at it funny while eating or drinking, all hell breaks loose, and they know it.
Today was a particularly trying day - one of those days where you just know that the neighbours may well be on the phone to social services if it's the same again tomorrow, and I just pray that there's a nice foster family willing to take ME into care - and I felt completely frazzled. Pie, before bed, had gone upstairs to take his frustration out on his drumkit, and I, equally wound up and being particularly vicious with the cleaver to an innocent piece of squid, considered my relationship with the piano. Having been so deeply in love with it as a child, I now hardly ever touch it. Why?
It was always a bit odd, me playing the piano. I was relatively good at it, too. I liked playing classical music, the more technical and regular the better, something a lot of people I met as an adult couldn't understand. Many people - nearly always men - have asked me why I don't play jazz, why I don't improvise (a short spell in a swing band as a teenager demonstrated that although I could just about do it, I didn't like it, and I felt really silly doing it), why I like the 'old dead white man's music. Then they scoff at me, or ask me if I can 'play keys', or if I can start improvising. I can't. I won't. They can go fuck themselves.
I think it was reassurance; the knowledge that playing the notation exactly as per the sheet music would yield a successful result. If you can read music, you can look at it and hear it in your head as you go along. It's certain, guaranteed, anchored. I could disappear into my own private world and all the anger and horror and emotion I could never, ever tell to my parents came out on the keyboard. It completely negated the need to say anything to anyone, ever. I could express my fury at the world by walloping the shit out of a Khatchaturian Toccata or a really fast passage (played very badly) in a Chopin Mazurka. Funnily enough, since I've stopped playing, I've been in therapy of one sort or the other almost continuously.
I came back to it today, after, as I've said, a very trying day indeed. The Axis woke me with double hairdryer treatment at 6am ('MUUUUUUUMMMM!!!! I know it's not time to get up yet but my programme's been moved forward fifteen minutes and if you don't let me watch it now then we'll never see it again and that would be awful because you're always saying I have to make good choices and I'M HUUUUUNGRYYYYY!!!!') Pie's football match got relocated, the Kong refused to stand neatly with the other younger siblings on the touchline, having rumbled my 'let's see how many times you can run around this 400-year-old oak tree, Leo' ruse very early on, and both boys spent the entire day claiming to be extremely hungry but refusing every single meal put in front of them. Grr. Things improved slightly when my friend Paperclip took us to Bristol Dogs' Home, where the Axis managed to overexcite the dogs and themselves into a semi-rabid frenzy before being bundled outside with a terrified-looking pup named Heidi. Paperclip held onto the dog and we took her for a walk down the canal, but the poor canine looked as if her eyes were going to pop from their sockets out of fear of the Axis. Gradually, however, she began to realise that their running commentary on everything can, like static on the radio, be tuned out, and was soon happily chomping away on the bacon bit dog treats the RSPCA had given us before we went.
That's when I noticed Pie was chewing something and looking quizzical. He saw me looking and his face instantly flooded with guilt. Now, the Pie is the worst liar in the whole of the world. Sometimes, I don't even have to ask him the question before he starts to confess. However, now he's in school, he's seen that other kids are far, far more skilled in the art of untruths than he, and he's decided to give it a go himself. Unfortunately for him, he's still completely pants at it.
Me: Noah! What the hell?
Noah: (chewing) Er...what?
Me: What are you eating?
Noah: (still chewing, embarrassed smile creeping over face) Er...what?
Me: You're eating dog bacon, you vile child! Aren't you?
Noah: Er...(attempts to swallow, gets pet treat lodged in throat, starts choking) Er...uhughugh...no I...ughuhguhguh...not eating...uhuhughghguh...anything...(turning blue)...
At this point I whacked him between the shoulderblades, and dislodged the offending piece of dog bacon, which flew out of his mouth onto the canal towpath squarely between my feet. I raised my eyebrows at him. He raised both his hands and attempted to muster surprise. 'How did that get there?' he said, innocently.
After I had rebuked Pie for blatant lying, unauthorised snacking, and stealing food from a homeless animal, and revoked all his TV privileges, my attention turned to the Kong, whose hand was sliding towards Paperclip's pocket, in search of dog biscuits. Suffice to say TV is now a thing of the past for him, too. When we got home they managed to break the DVD player. They both claim they didn't do anything, but I'm pretty sure the now-empty seedling tray that did have newly-sown runner beans in, and the compost near, around and probably inside the DVD, didn't happen by itself. Cue hideous bouts of screaming, shouting, crying and bad language from all three of us, ending with the Pie 'accidentally' upending his drink everywhere and being unceremoniously chucked into bed.
When I came back down I fumed for a short while, finding nothing on the telly that didn't just fan the flames of my displeasure. Eventually, I started thumbing through the small amount of sheet music I have left and picked up Bach's Siciliano, which I probably haven't played for about 15 years or so. Haltingly, hesitantly, my fingers found the notes again and the harmonies, long-embedded in my brain, begain to guide them. It's a very emotional melody, very sad and dramatic and introspective. Puts one in mind of one's inevitable demise, my teacher used to say. Deeply moving. I started to laugh.
What is this ridiculous reinforcement that we, as parents, perform on our children? I have a child who is boisterous and noisy and a bit of a loon, and I send him off to play the drums. Conversely, my parents had a child who was incredibly introspective, unnaturally melancholy, shirked the outdoors and sport in favour of Thomas Hardy, and so they sent her off to play the piano, to enter this world of emotion, hysteria, highly-strung-ness; overwrought sugarwork, Eisteddfods, petticoats and starchy, middle-England craziness.
I have to reset the balance. Pie can join Embroidery Club next week. And Kong can start his batik kaftan project while his brother's getting to grips with doilies. That should fix their wagon. And I'm just going to pretend I didn't hear either of them saying anything about guitars or trumpets or trombones. Uh uh. Parental engineering, here I come.
Today was a particularly trying day - one of those days where you just know that the neighbours may well be on the phone to social services if it's the same again tomorrow, and I just pray that there's a nice foster family willing to take ME into care - and I felt completely frazzled. Pie, before bed, had gone upstairs to take his frustration out on his drumkit, and I, equally wound up and being particularly vicious with the cleaver to an innocent piece of squid, considered my relationship with the piano. Having been so deeply in love with it as a child, I now hardly ever touch it. Why?
It was always a bit odd, me playing the piano. I was relatively good at it, too. I liked playing classical music, the more technical and regular the better, something a lot of people I met as an adult couldn't understand. Many people - nearly always men - have asked me why I don't play jazz, why I don't improvise (a short spell in a swing band as a teenager demonstrated that although I could just about do it, I didn't like it, and I felt really silly doing it), why I like the 'old dead white man's music. Then they scoff at me, or ask me if I can 'play keys', or if I can start improvising. I can't. I won't. They can go fuck themselves.
I think it was reassurance; the knowledge that playing the notation exactly as per the sheet music would yield a successful result. If you can read music, you can look at it and hear it in your head as you go along. It's certain, guaranteed, anchored. I could disappear into my own private world and all the anger and horror and emotion I could never, ever tell to my parents came out on the keyboard. It completely negated the need to say anything to anyone, ever. I could express my fury at the world by walloping the shit out of a Khatchaturian Toccata or a really fast passage (played very badly) in a Chopin Mazurka. Funnily enough, since I've stopped playing, I've been in therapy of one sort or the other almost continuously.
I came back to it today, after, as I've said, a very trying day indeed. The Axis woke me with double hairdryer treatment at 6am ('MUUUUUUUMMMM!!!! I know it's not time to get up yet but my programme's been moved forward fifteen minutes and if you don't let me watch it now then we'll never see it again and that would be awful because you're always saying I have to make good choices and I'M HUUUUUNGRYYYYY!!!!') Pie's football match got relocated, the Kong refused to stand neatly with the other younger siblings on the touchline, having rumbled my 'let's see how many times you can run around this 400-year-old oak tree, Leo' ruse very early on, and both boys spent the entire day claiming to be extremely hungry but refusing every single meal put in front of them. Grr. Things improved slightly when my friend Paperclip took us to Bristol Dogs' Home, where the Axis managed to overexcite the dogs and themselves into a semi-rabid frenzy before being bundled outside with a terrified-looking pup named Heidi. Paperclip held onto the dog and we took her for a walk down the canal, but the poor canine looked as if her eyes were going to pop from their sockets out of fear of the Axis. Gradually, however, she began to realise that their running commentary on everything can, like static on the radio, be tuned out, and was soon happily chomping away on the bacon bit dog treats the RSPCA had given us before we went.
That's when I noticed Pie was chewing something and looking quizzical. He saw me looking and his face instantly flooded with guilt. Now, the Pie is the worst liar in the whole of the world. Sometimes, I don't even have to ask him the question before he starts to confess. However, now he's in school, he's seen that other kids are far, far more skilled in the art of untruths than he, and he's decided to give it a go himself. Unfortunately for him, he's still completely pants at it.
Me: Noah! What the hell?
Noah: (chewing) Er...what?
Me: What are you eating?
Noah: (still chewing, embarrassed smile creeping over face) Er...what?
Me: You're eating dog bacon, you vile child! Aren't you?
Noah: Er...(attempts to swallow, gets pet treat lodged in throat, starts choking) Er...uhughugh...no I...ughuhguhguh...not eating...uhuhughghguh...anything...(turning blue)...
At this point I whacked him between the shoulderblades, and dislodged the offending piece of dog bacon, which flew out of his mouth onto the canal towpath squarely between my feet. I raised my eyebrows at him. He raised both his hands and attempted to muster surprise. 'How did that get there?' he said, innocently.
After I had rebuked Pie for blatant lying, unauthorised snacking, and stealing food from a homeless animal, and revoked all his TV privileges, my attention turned to the Kong, whose hand was sliding towards Paperclip's pocket, in search of dog biscuits. Suffice to say TV is now a thing of the past for him, too. When we got home they managed to break the DVD player. They both claim they didn't do anything, but I'm pretty sure the now-empty seedling tray that did have newly-sown runner beans in, and the compost near, around and probably inside the DVD, didn't happen by itself. Cue hideous bouts of screaming, shouting, crying and bad language from all three of us, ending with the Pie 'accidentally' upending his drink everywhere and being unceremoniously chucked into bed.
When I came back down I fumed for a short while, finding nothing on the telly that didn't just fan the flames of my displeasure. Eventually, I started thumbing through the small amount of sheet music I have left and picked up Bach's Siciliano, which I probably haven't played for about 15 years or so. Haltingly, hesitantly, my fingers found the notes again and the harmonies, long-embedded in my brain, begain to guide them. It's a very emotional melody, very sad and dramatic and introspective. Puts one in mind of one's inevitable demise, my teacher used to say. Deeply moving. I started to laugh.
What is this ridiculous reinforcement that we, as parents, perform on our children? I have a child who is boisterous and noisy and a bit of a loon, and I send him off to play the drums. Conversely, my parents had a child who was incredibly introspective, unnaturally melancholy, shirked the outdoors and sport in favour of Thomas Hardy, and so they sent her off to play the piano, to enter this world of emotion, hysteria, highly-strung-ness; overwrought sugarwork, Eisteddfods, petticoats and starchy, middle-England craziness.
I have to reset the balance. Pie can join Embroidery Club next week. And Kong can start his batik kaftan project while his brother's getting to grips with doilies. That should fix their wagon. And I'm just going to pretend I didn't hear either of them saying anything about guitars or trumpets or trombones. Uh uh. Parental engineering, here I come.
Thursday, 14 February 2013
Valentine's Day Massacre
Not the most original title, nor the most enigmatic, but needs must when Cupid does not, in fact, drive, and romance is not so much dead but lying squawking bathetically beneath the remains of the Big Mac meal your truly hopeless self has attemped to smother your feelings in.
Valentine's Day, another singularly joyless festival for those of us who remain freakishly unattached. This year, the rot truly set in last week at the Co-op when, attempting to simultaneously prise free a baguette that had become wedged in the basket, pack three large bottles of lactose-free milk in a string bag and maintain control of the Axis, who were setting about the teasingly leaning Malteser pyramid with alarming dexterity, I was asked if I'd like to buy a raffle ticket. A raffle ticket? At the Co-op? Is it now doubling up as a school PTA? Not bloody surprising, as long as Gove sticks around, I thought darkly. 'Erm...why are you selling raffle tickets?' The unnecessarily expansive lady at the till was, for once, silent, marking a great change in her demeanour from last time she tried to assist me with my shopping ('Ooooh, Chilli Chilli Bang Bang pizza. Lovely and spicy. What've you got to go with that then? Some lager? Lovely. And what's this...? Ah. Gentleman friend coming over tonight is he?'). Growing scarlet at the memory of the landlord's son, lurking in the queue behind me and whistling 'Something for the Weekend' as I'd grabbed my purchases and ran, I too said nothing but followed her gaze, which rested upon an hideous pink wicker hamper, stuffed to the brim with what was either the entire contents of Alastair Campbell's shredder or a year's worth of used hamster bedding. Dotted around the mouldering debris were a half bottle of extra fizzy Lambrini, two plastic champagne flutes, a packet of savoury rice cakes and some cheese with a scribbled-out sell-by date. Half a Flake was also sticking out, in the corner. I didn't dare look around at the vile Kong as I was pretty sure I knew what had happened to the other half.
'Valentine's hamper. For two,' she added, pointedly, nodding conspiratorially at me. I cleared my throat, but my voice still came out in a slightly ridiculous squeak. 'Erm. Well, I won't have one. I've...er...got no use for that, you see.' Her head cocked to the side in sympathy. 'Ahhhh. And with those two so small, as well. Well, you do very well,' she said confidently. I smiled and nodded, slightly dazed, wondering what had just happened.
What do I do very well? It isn't work, that's for sure. My peers are all shooting off into the career stratosphere, while I, emphatically, painfully, am not. I am a lousy parent, always trying to sneak ways of escaping from the Axis and being mean to and about them. My house will never be burgled, because anyone looking in through the windows could quite confidently assume we'd been done already. I'm unfit, I like drinking far more than I should, I never have any money and I am exceedingly grumpy. Yep, why I'm still single is beyond me.
On the blessed day itself, I am recovering from a hangover induced by accidentally consuming the entire contents of Miss Whippy's spirit cupboard the night before while the Axis were at their dad's. (Miss Whippy is an ice cream maker of some repute, and a good friend of mine, whom I won't shame by naming). It had been some time since we had seen each other, and in the ensuing enthusiasm of reunion, we had discovered that a rum and ginger beer sorbet went well with port, tequila, red and white wine and pomelos. The following morning, both close to death, Miss Whippy presented me with a gift. 'For you. Happy Valentine's Day,' she added, handing over two bags of milk chocolate eyeballs and a soap that looked like a goldfish. I was touched.
Several years ago, when we had first started going out, Daddio had very nearly disgraced himself by turning up over an hour late to our very first Valentine's Day dinner together. When he did finally show, I was pretty livid, even more so when he refused to explain himself. I supposed that he had gone for a couple of thoughtless lunchtime beers with a chum and inconsiderately missed his train. Somehow, we got through the meal, although I spent most of it planning exactly how I was going to chuck him. When we were leaving, he stopped me, told me to wait a minute, and ran back inside, returning with a large box. I was mystified. What on earth was going on? He handed it over, and told me to open it. Inside was a beautiful handmade teapot that we had seen in a shop in Bath the week before. I had admired it, as teapots are to me what shoes and jewellery are to most women, and, sighing over the hefty price tag, had left it. Daddio, who lived in Reading at the time, had got the train to Bath to get the teapot, but when he arrived, couldn't find the shop, spent most of the afternoon walking around trying to find it, and then, when he did find it, found it closed. He had had to ring the owner and beg her to turn up to sell it to him, just so that he could get back on the train to Bristol and give it to me. That was why he had been late. The teapot was beautiful and I was overwhelmed by the effort Daddio had gone to to get it for me. What a wonderful token of love.
Last week, the spout fell clean off and smashed.
Ah well. The Axis and I climbed Cabot Tower and looked out over the city. As they chattered and giggled and harangued the pigeons crapping overhead, I realised, fondly, that my two little cherubs are far better than any amount of hearts and flowers and romantic claptrap. That's love. That's what St Valentine was all about.
Happy Valentine's Day to all.
Valentine's Day, another singularly joyless festival for those of us who remain freakishly unattached. This year, the rot truly set in last week at the Co-op when, attempting to simultaneously prise free a baguette that had become wedged in the basket, pack three large bottles of lactose-free milk in a string bag and maintain control of the Axis, who were setting about the teasingly leaning Malteser pyramid with alarming dexterity, I was asked if I'd like to buy a raffle ticket. A raffle ticket? At the Co-op? Is it now doubling up as a school PTA? Not bloody surprising, as long as Gove sticks around, I thought darkly. 'Erm...why are you selling raffle tickets?' The unnecessarily expansive lady at the till was, for once, silent, marking a great change in her demeanour from last time she tried to assist me with my shopping ('Ooooh, Chilli Chilli Bang Bang pizza. Lovely and spicy. What've you got to go with that then? Some lager? Lovely. And what's this...? Ah. Gentleman friend coming over tonight is he?'). Growing scarlet at the memory of the landlord's son, lurking in the queue behind me and whistling 'Something for the Weekend' as I'd grabbed my purchases and ran, I too said nothing but followed her gaze, which rested upon an hideous pink wicker hamper, stuffed to the brim with what was either the entire contents of Alastair Campbell's shredder or a year's worth of used hamster bedding. Dotted around the mouldering debris were a half bottle of extra fizzy Lambrini, two plastic champagne flutes, a packet of savoury rice cakes and some cheese with a scribbled-out sell-by date. Half a Flake was also sticking out, in the corner. I didn't dare look around at the vile Kong as I was pretty sure I knew what had happened to the other half.
'Valentine's hamper. For two,' she added, pointedly, nodding conspiratorially at me. I cleared my throat, but my voice still came out in a slightly ridiculous squeak. 'Erm. Well, I won't have one. I've...er...got no use for that, you see.' Her head cocked to the side in sympathy. 'Ahhhh. And with those two so small, as well. Well, you do very well,' she said confidently. I smiled and nodded, slightly dazed, wondering what had just happened.
What do I do very well? It isn't work, that's for sure. My peers are all shooting off into the career stratosphere, while I, emphatically, painfully, am not. I am a lousy parent, always trying to sneak ways of escaping from the Axis and being mean to and about them. My house will never be burgled, because anyone looking in through the windows could quite confidently assume we'd been done already. I'm unfit, I like drinking far more than I should, I never have any money and I am exceedingly grumpy. Yep, why I'm still single is beyond me.
On the blessed day itself, I am recovering from a hangover induced by accidentally consuming the entire contents of Miss Whippy's spirit cupboard the night before while the Axis were at their dad's. (Miss Whippy is an ice cream maker of some repute, and a good friend of mine, whom I won't shame by naming). It had been some time since we had seen each other, and in the ensuing enthusiasm of reunion, we had discovered that a rum and ginger beer sorbet went well with port, tequila, red and white wine and pomelos. The following morning, both close to death, Miss Whippy presented me with a gift. 'For you. Happy Valentine's Day,' she added, handing over two bags of milk chocolate eyeballs and a soap that looked like a goldfish. I was touched.
Several years ago, when we had first started going out, Daddio had very nearly disgraced himself by turning up over an hour late to our very first Valentine's Day dinner together. When he did finally show, I was pretty livid, even more so when he refused to explain himself. I supposed that he had gone for a couple of thoughtless lunchtime beers with a chum and inconsiderately missed his train. Somehow, we got through the meal, although I spent most of it planning exactly how I was going to chuck him. When we were leaving, he stopped me, told me to wait a minute, and ran back inside, returning with a large box. I was mystified. What on earth was going on? He handed it over, and told me to open it. Inside was a beautiful handmade teapot that we had seen in a shop in Bath the week before. I had admired it, as teapots are to me what shoes and jewellery are to most women, and, sighing over the hefty price tag, had left it. Daddio, who lived in Reading at the time, had got the train to Bath to get the teapot, but when he arrived, couldn't find the shop, spent most of the afternoon walking around trying to find it, and then, when he did find it, found it closed. He had had to ring the owner and beg her to turn up to sell it to him, just so that he could get back on the train to Bristol and give it to me. That was why he had been late. The teapot was beautiful and I was overwhelmed by the effort Daddio had gone to to get it for me. What a wonderful token of love.
Last week, the spout fell clean off and smashed.
Ah well. The Axis and I climbed Cabot Tower and looked out over the city. As they chattered and giggled and harangued the pigeons crapping overhead, I realised, fondly, that my two little cherubs are far better than any amount of hearts and flowers and romantic claptrap. That's love. That's what St Valentine was all about.
Happy Valentine's Day to all.
Tuesday, 5 February 2013
No Church in the Wild
The vexed question of faith and religion seems to be ever-present these days, particularly at Axis Towers, whose inhabitants attend church, loosely and lazily, my belief in God being considerably more robust than my alarm clock. Daddio, a confirmed atheist, is none too impressed with this and is still pushing for membership of the Woodcraft Folk rather than the Scouts - fine with me, as church parade is, to my mind, a torture for all involved. In true obstinate, arrogant fashion, I've managed to perpetuate my belief that, er, my beliefs are no-one's business but mine and the Almighty's, and, consequently, I will do what I like. Happily, 'what I like' does not involve gunning down old ladies, selling class-A drugs to preschoolers, or committing obscenities in the street (I said in the street); so the worst I have to deal with are a few raised eyebrows and the occasional tut-tut at the surprisingly ample number of empties in the recycling box; the odd loud burst of profanity coming from the back garden; and the occasional insult of bad singing along to R Kelly or the Flaming Lips at 5am (sorry about that, next door).
The Pie is pretty ecumenical about faith, as he is in most things; he asks a lot of questions, drawing ever closer to a conclusion, thinks aloud about everything, seeks the input of others into his decision making process. 'Mum, who do you love more? Leo, or God?' Thus, he is thoroughly transparent, a developmental psychologist's dream. A,B,C; X, Pie, Z. The Kong, however, is a thoroughly different kettle of fish.
One day, he wandered into the kitchen, a funereal expression lying heavy upon his exquisite features. 'Mum. You don't love me.' Horrified, I dropped the potato I was peeling and knelt down, sweeping my darling into my arms. 'Kongie! No! How can you say such a thing? Of course I love you. I adore you, little boy. You are my beautiful little lamb.' Undeterred, he shook his head. 'No. You don't love me.' My heart was beginning to palpitate; I could feel my eyes stinging lightly and tears rising to the surface. 'No, Kongie...why are you saying that?' The huge, chocolate-brown saucers of eyes, rimmed with the longest eyelashes in Christendom, turned up towards me. Solemnly, seriously, the Kong addresses me. 'I said, you don't love me. We prayed in church for our parents who love us. I said, my mum, if she will love me, she gives me biscuits. You said, 'No biscuits Leo', so you don't love me.'
QED, evidently. Kong has apparently - hopefully - missed the point of what was being taught in that session. I suspect this might have been the same session where this was produced:
What?!
What is it? I ask the Axis. Pie looks at me as if I am a pitiful imbecile. 'Mum. It is a rock. With 'God' written on it. Honestly.' He throws his hands up in exasperation, shakes his head and walks off.
By now I am thoroughly perplexed. Is there some sort of new dogma being taught in church? Am I missing something crucial?
I've never got on well with the language used in churches and other religious organisations, to be honest. I can't ever employ the stock phrases, can't describe faith as a 'walk with the Lord', can't 'just lift myself up to you in prayer, Father'; it feels a cop-out to speak unnaturally and yet pretend it is natural. I know it works for some people; as with everything I can't grasp, I'm happy for those that do and don't find it odd or offensive for others to use it. It's just, when I do, I feel as if God is going 'Oi! Stop showing off.' Consequently, when asked, one Sunday, to come to the front of the church and discuss a course I'd attended, I ended up giving the ringing endorsement of 'well, you might as well give it a go. You never know,' before sidling off to appease the Kong with some malted milks filched from the vestry.
A lot of my friends are very spiritual people, yet deeply opposed to organised religion. I can sometimes see why. It can seem that the focus is very much on the minor rather than the major; that the personal morality of the individual, the victimless choice, is of more concern to the body corporate than it ought be. It's something to be wary of, and can, sadly, limit how engaged we become in our faith. I can't help but feel jealous of these people for whom everything seems to make so much sense, who can make a choice and be perfectly assured of its consequences.
I stumble through life with a great deal of confusion, to be honest. It's often a surprise to me that I function at all, let alone that the Axis are fed and clothed and relatively clean. I feel keenly the disapproving looks flung at me and my wild children on Sunday mornings, as we're not quiet and calm and biddable like the other children. I'm fed up of fielding questions about my lack of husband and it annoys me that so many people think my sex life is more their business than their tax arrangements are mine.
Perhaps Sunday mornings will be better spent doing things with the boys, rather than telling them to be quiet and sit down the whole time. I remember my mum coming to a similar conclusion when I was a little older than the Axis. But then she was always a bit odd, too.
A lot of my friends are very spiritual people, yet deeply opposed to organised religion. I can sometimes see why. It can seem that the focus is very much on the minor rather than the major; that the personal morality of the individual, the victimless choice, is of more concern to the body corporate than it ought be. It's something to be wary of, and can, sadly, limit how engaged we become in our faith. I can't help but feel jealous of these people for whom everything seems to make so much sense, who can make a choice and be perfectly assured of its consequences.
I stumble through life with a great deal of confusion, to be honest. It's often a surprise to me that I function at all, let alone that the Axis are fed and clothed and relatively clean. I feel keenly the disapproving looks flung at me and my wild children on Sunday mornings, as we're not quiet and calm and biddable like the other children. I'm fed up of fielding questions about my lack of husband and it annoys me that so many people think my sex life is more their business than their tax arrangements are mine.
Perhaps Sunday mornings will be better spent doing things with the boys, rather than telling them to be quiet and sit down the whole time. I remember my mum coming to a similar conclusion when I was a little older than the Axis. But then she was always a bit odd, too.
Monday, 31 December 2012
Fat Mum No More
New Year's Eve. Having spent a goodly part of the past two weeks feasting, drinking, carousing and generally living high, I am feeling a bit worse for wear. I also have a stinker of a cold. I'm sorting through a vast pile of vile-smelling undergarments belonging to the Axis when the Kong appears, nonchalantly chomping on what I later discover is the last of a half-pound box of Roses. As I wrestle with his Batman costume, which has inexplicably become entangled with an old sports bra of mine that contains an alarming number of hooks and eyes, he saunters past and addresses me. 'Mum. I love you. You got a big fat bottom.' The two statements are apparently not connected. He proceeds back downstairs to demolish the next diabetes-inducing Christmas present he can lay his hands on, and I sigh, knowing that he is right. It's alright for the Axis - they have inherited their father's tall, slender build, and need never worry about their weight. Daddio is a man who can eat a whole box of cream cakes at a single sitting and apparently inhale a lasagne in seconds but, despite being six foot three, has never been described as anything plumper than 'gaunt'. Fat does not cling to that man. I suppose from that aspect, I chose well; my squat, round genes had to be cancelled out somehow, and he does also have a very symmetrical face. Accordingly, the Axis are gorgeous, and use this fact to their advantage wherever possible.
I don't enjoy this advantage, however, and my South Asian genes are not designed to process the huge amounts of dairy and wheat that they imbibe as a UK resident. Consequently, although I am frequently told what a pretty face I have (ha!), I am, well, plump, to be kind to myself (which, as I frequently tell the Axis, you must be, because if you aren't, why should anyone else?). Just before Christmas I embarked on a bit of a health kick, initially to impress a date, but then, I found I was really enjoying it. My heart rate was down, so was my dress size and, for the first time in my entire life, I discovered that I could not only run, but I liked it. I felt better than I had for ages, and in only a few weeks my confidence shot up - I went from being someone who'd never leave the house without at least one cardigan to easily conjuring up alternative uses for wrapping paper that would very definitely upset the vicar and probably several of the neighbours too...life was fun again. However, being something of a greedy idiot, over Christmas I have wrecked it all - hence the Kong's comment.
It all started with my birthday weekend. I packed the Axis off to Daddio's and somehow resisted the lurking temptation of a few quiet drinks with GBF and Slut Drop (our partner in crime, so called because of her extreme proficiency with that particular dance move), knowing full well it would never end there, as the three of us have extreme difficulty shutting up once we get together. Instead, on the Friday night I did a moderate amount of exercise, treated myself to a Chilli Chilli Bang Bang pizza and had an early night. On the Saturday, I was going to have a leisurely day around the house, pottering, perhaps going swimming, before going to karaoke with some friends later. Well, I thought, I'm knocking on a bit. Meeting up later and not staying out too late is good for us. Time to chill.
Like that was ever going to happen. By lunchtime I was in the pub eating steak and chips with GBF and telling jokes so filthy the teenage boys next to us were looking a bit revolted. Thus began a weekend of complete overconsumption that seemed to act as a warm-up for Christmas. Two turkeys, ten gazillion gallons of booze, several ex-boyfriends, a few bouts of oedema and a lot of cadlike behaviour later I had to concede defeat and am now sitting here writing instead of playing the bodhran and swilling Guinness with friends. The Axis slumber upstairs (the Kong got his just desserts when he was sick from eating too much chocolate) and I ponder the situation.
How to do it? Simple, really, use the calorie-counting app one of the Drunken Mums showed me. As our various children skipped, hopped and punched each other in the face around us, we fiddled about with our smartphones. 'It's so easy,' she said, as the Kong twatted her daughter over the head with Buzz Lightyear, to howls of disgust. 'You can measure everything really accurately. And actually, once you realise what you're doing, you can save loads of calories dead easily.' 'And use them for GIN,' noted another mum darkly, having noticed her son was about to plunge headlong down the stairs on a tea tray. 'Or wine,' added another. 'But the real benefit,' continued the first mum, seemingly oblivious to her daughter turning the oven on behind her and sticking her head in it, 'is that when you do exercise, you log it, it links it in, and then you can have more calories. Darling, don't put your baby brother in the oven. We're having chicken kiev for tea.'
I tried it, it worked. So now, here I am, my blissfully un-size-ist children calling me fat to my face, and I have decided that, like a Frenchman's breakfast, un oeuf is enough. The Chinese takeaway I had for tea was an unpleasant struggle and I am more than ready. I am going to be lithe and slender by this time next year. Hmmm. OK, this might be a bit of a reach. But I can run 4k already and will do a race in April. I can do it, I think, and open up the laptop to place an online order with Sainsburys for ten tons of fruit and veg.
It's nearly midnight, and the bells of the local church have been going for half an hour. I turn off the lights and open my curtains so I can see the fireworks that are flying up all around us. I feel very lucky and grateful that now, I'm able to think about such things as diet and fitness when 12 months ago, things were in a very different, deeply dire state. As my elbows get colder from leaning them on the windowsill, I notice a noise behind me. It's the Kong, woken by the fireworks, clutching his toy rat and looking a bit shell-shocked, big brown eyes blinking in bewilderment. He brushes up to me and points at the window. I lift him up onto the wide windowsill and he burrows into my neck, much as he did when he was a tiny baby, as we watch the fireworks.
'Mum,' he says, 'I love you.' This time, that's it. Happy New Year to my wonderful sons.
I don't enjoy this advantage, however, and my South Asian genes are not designed to process the huge amounts of dairy and wheat that they imbibe as a UK resident. Consequently, although I am frequently told what a pretty face I have (ha!), I am, well, plump, to be kind to myself (which, as I frequently tell the Axis, you must be, because if you aren't, why should anyone else?). Just before Christmas I embarked on a bit of a health kick, initially to impress a date, but then, I found I was really enjoying it. My heart rate was down, so was my dress size and, for the first time in my entire life, I discovered that I could not only run, but I liked it. I felt better than I had for ages, and in only a few weeks my confidence shot up - I went from being someone who'd never leave the house without at least one cardigan to easily conjuring up alternative uses for wrapping paper that would very definitely upset the vicar and probably several of the neighbours too...life was fun again. However, being something of a greedy idiot, over Christmas I have wrecked it all - hence the Kong's comment.
It all started with my birthday weekend. I packed the Axis off to Daddio's and somehow resisted the lurking temptation of a few quiet drinks with GBF and Slut Drop (our partner in crime, so called because of her extreme proficiency with that particular dance move), knowing full well it would never end there, as the three of us have extreme difficulty shutting up once we get together. Instead, on the Friday night I did a moderate amount of exercise, treated myself to a Chilli Chilli Bang Bang pizza and had an early night. On the Saturday, I was going to have a leisurely day around the house, pottering, perhaps going swimming, before going to karaoke with some friends later. Well, I thought, I'm knocking on a bit. Meeting up later and not staying out too late is good for us. Time to chill.
Like that was ever going to happen. By lunchtime I was in the pub eating steak and chips with GBF and telling jokes so filthy the teenage boys next to us were looking a bit revolted. Thus began a weekend of complete overconsumption that seemed to act as a warm-up for Christmas. Two turkeys, ten gazillion gallons of booze, several ex-boyfriends, a few bouts of oedema and a lot of cadlike behaviour later I had to concede defeat and am now sitting here writing instead of playing the bodhran and swilling Guinness with friends. The Axis slumber upstairs (the Kong got his just desserts when he was sick from eating too much chocolate) and I ponder the situation.
How to do it? Simple, really, use the calorie-counting app one of the Drunken Mums showed me. As our various children skipped, hopped and punched each other in the face around us, we fiddled about with our smartphones. 'It's so easy,' she said, as the Kong twatted her daughter over the head with Buzz Lightyear, to howls of disgust. 'You can measure everything really accurately. And actually, once you realise what you're doing, you can save loads of calories dead easily.' 'And use them for GIN,' noted another mum darkly, having noticed her son was about to plunge headlong down the stairs on a tea tray. 'Or wine,' added another. 'But the real benefit,' continued the first mum, seemingly oblivious to her daughter turning the oven on behind her and sticking her head in it, 'is that when you do exercise, you log it, it links it in, and then you can have more calories. Darling, don't put your baby brother in the oven. We're having chicken kiev for tea.'
I tried it, it worked. So now, here I am, my blissfully un-size-ist children calling me fat to my face, and I have decided that, like a Frenchman's breakfast, un oeuf is enough. The Chinese takeaway I had for tea was an unpleasant struggle and I am more than ready. I am going to be lithe and slender by this time next year. Hmmm. OK, this might be a bit of a reach. But I can run 4k already and will do a race in April. I can do it, I think, and open up the laptop to place an online order with Sainsburys for ten tons of fruit and veg.
It's nearly midnight, and the bells of the local church have been going for half an hour. I turn off the lights and open my curtains so I can see the fireworks that are flying up all around us. I feel very lucky and grateful that now, I'm able to think about such things as diet and fitness when 12 months ago, things were in a very different, deeply dire state. As my elbows get colder from leaning them on the windowsill, I notice a noise behind me. It's the Kong, woken by the fireworks, clutching his toy rat and looking a bit shell-shocked, big brown eyes blinking in bewilderment. He brushes up to me and points at the window. I lift him up onto the wide windowsill and he burrows into my neck, much as he did when he was a tiny baby, as we watch the fireworks.
'Mum,' he says, 'I love you.' This time, that's it. Happy New Year to my wonderful sons.
Sunday, 30 December 2012
Conspicuous Consumption
The excesses of the season have got to all the inhabitants of Axis Towers. While I have lost my voice completely following a couple too many dry sherries, the Axis have taken on a slight crazed glint in the eye and the ability to prick up their ears at the slightest rustling of what may be wrapping paper within a two-hundred-yard radius. They then charge over any old ladies and dogs smaller than a racehorse in order to lay their sticky little mitts on a PRESENT, no matter what it is - the virtue is in the getting.
I find watching this spectacle fairly dispiriting, so was happy to let the boys go to Daddio for Christmas Day so I didn't have to watch their inner Gordon Geckos manifest over huge piles of Playmobil. I managed to slow their present-opening here at Axis Towers so that there was not too much screaming, and I had hoped that this signalled an end to the consumerism, but no.
As I was recovering from a night of extremely bad behaviour on the Balchinator's sofa, the telephone rang. It was a somewhat exasperated Daddio, apparently calling from some kind of witches' coven judging by the background noise of incessant demonic laughter. When I'd calmed him down, he finally spilled what the problem was. 'Your eldest son is hatching EVIL and GREEDY naughty boy plans!' It transpired the Pie, proud recipient of his first wobbly tooth, was planning to lie in wait for the tooth fairy, kidnap her when she arrived by tying her up with his tape measure, and hold her to ransom for as many gold coins as he could get. He also stated an intention to marry someone who does not want children so he can accumulate as much treasure as possible for himself. Daddio was speechless at this mercenary streak in our previously loving and considerate boy.
I was too, and was about to demand the Pie come to the phone to be firmly admonished and booked in to Basic Human Decency 101 at Sunday school when I stopped, and thought. He's a bright lad. He's seen this before, and now he's decided to do it. He's seen what happens when you don't, when you stop and consider other people before seeing to your own needs, and he's obviously decided that the prevailing attitude - 'I want that, I'm having it, I don't care about you' - is the only way to get ahead.
He's wrong, right? Right? I'm going to tell him he's wrong, but how many times is the opposite view demonstrated to him over the course of the year, the month, the week, the day, even? How many times do I do it? Do we all eventually succumb to this?
One of my New Year's resolutions was going to be to stop letting people upset me so much. I'm a sensitive soul at heart and I'd decided I was going to be a little bit more selfish and tell everyone to kindly cock off if they were going to behave badly. But now, I find I have to reconsider. I don't want them to be selfish, arrogant little jerks. I want them to be nice to people and for people to be nice to them in return.
Niceness, however, can be a big front for utter bonkersness. Recently, someone asked me for my phone number, and if I would like to go out on a date. Shocked, but not unpleased, I conceded. At about 4am the phone rang and there was a voicemail. The next day, I listened to it with my friend. Instead of the pleasant and complimentary chap I had given my number to, there was a very, very drunk woman, with some giggling in the background. 'Hello. I have your number on my phone. I was just wondering if your last name was Hands and if you would like a good fisting. Give me a ring. Bye...'.
Well, I wasn't going to stand for that. Time for revenge...
I find watching this spectacle fairly dispiriting, so was happy to let the boys go to Daddio for Christmas Day so I didn't have to watch their inner Gordon Geckos manifest over huge piles of Playmobil. I managed to slow their present-opening here at Axis Towers so that there was not too much screaming, and I had hoped that this signalled an end to the consumerism, but no.
As I was recovering from a night of extremely bad behaviour on the Balchinator's sofa, the telephone rang. It was a somewhat exasperated Daddio, apparently calling from some kind of witches' coven judging by the background noise of incessant demonic laughter. When I'd calmed him down, he finally spilled what the problem was. 'Your eldest son is hatching EVIL and GREEDY naughty boy plans!' It transpired the Pie, proud recipient of his first wobbly tooth, was planning to lie in wait for the tooth fairy, kidnap her when she arrived by tying her up with his tape measure, and hold her to ransom for as many gold coins as he could get. He also stated an intention to marry someone who does not want children so he can accumulate as much treasure as possible for himself. Daddio was speechless at this mercenary streak in our previously loving and considerate boy.
I was too, and was about to demand the Pie come to the phone to be firmly admonished and booked in to Basic Human Decency 101 at Sunday school when I stopped, and thought. He's a bright lad. He's seen this before, and now he's decided to do it. He's seen what happens when you don't, when you stop and consider other people before seeing to your own needs, and he's obviously decided that the prevailing attitude - 'I want that, I'm having it, I don't care about you' - is the only way to get ahead.
He's wrong, right? Right? I'm going to tell him he's wrong, but how many times is the opposite view demonstrated to him over the course of the year, the month, the week, the day, even? How many times do I do it? Do we all eventually succumb to this?
One of my New Year's resolutions was going to be to stop letting people upset me so much. I'm a sensitive soul at heart and I'd decided I was going to be a little bit more selfish and tell everyone to kindly cock off if they were going to behave badly. But now, I find I have to reconsider. I don't want them to be selfish, arrogant little jerks. I want them to be nice to people and for people to be nice to them in return.
Niceness, however, can be a big front for utter bonkersness. Recently, someone asked me for my phone number, and if I would like to go out on a date. Shocked, but not unpleased, I conceded. At about 4am the phone rang and there was a voicemail. The next day, I listened to it with my friend. Instead of the pleasant and complimentary chap I had given my number to, there was a very, very drunk woman, with some giggling in the background. 'Hello. I have your number on my phone. I was just wondering if your last name was Hands and if you would like a good fisting. Give me a ring. Bye...'.
Well, I wasn't going to stand for that. Time for revenge...
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