Crazy in loves

'Can he fix it? No, he can't!'

2009-10-17T10:54:00.001-07:00

You would not be blamed for assuming that this post is to catalogue OH's DIY disasters - heaven knows, there's enough of them to list and smile wanly over. But I'll save that for another time. No, today's post is about song lyrics, subversion, philosophy and humour. So that's all right, then. :)

I'm not sure if tiredness, hormones, money worries or what exactly was causing my bad humour this morning, but Babe being a little pickle was not helping matters. And as we made a huge cut-out race track out of pieces of wallpaper stuck together (I add that piece of detail so that you know what a creative, generous-hearted, fun mum I am, even in the face of adversity), singing together as we worked, I found myself subverting song lyrics.

I usually do this in my head. There is one kids TV programme - I can't remember the title - whose theme tune goes something like 'Posituney, offirooney, big, bang, boo...' and at the end I always sing it's conclusion to myself thus: 'Stinky pinky poo'. And there is an ad on Channel 5 for awful and absurdly expensive girls' shoes that the hum in my mind's eye calls 'Smelly Kellys'. Perhaps this immature behaviour gives vent to some of my tiredness and anxiety, I don't know.

But today, as we were singing Bob the Builder - can you believe this is actually on nursery's repertoire of songs? - and shouting, 'Can he fix it?' I just couldn't help myself and out popped, 'No, he can't!'. Babe looked a bit shocked, so I shrugged cheekily and we both rolled on the floor and laughed. I felt way better afterwards, so subverted a few more: 'Postman Pat and his black and white pants'; 'Hokey Cokey cola' (anti-consumerist twang to that one, you understand, although that may have gone above his head) and 'Humpty Dumpty sat on the rubbish bin'.

My firstborn has developed a love of Dora the Explorer quite by accident (we were lent a Postman Pat DVD that had the wrong disc inside) and is begging me to invite her to his birthday party in a couple of weeks' time. (There's a fancy dress challenge for OH to meet;)) Babe particularly loves the pirates episode, in fact that's the only one he wants to watch, and I have been pleasantly surprised by its philosophical content.

Dora and the gang have to complete three challenges: Seas, bridge, treasure island. (Or, 'Treasure, I am' as Babe insists the lyrics go. I can't blame his misunderstanding as the characters do have terrible accents, nor his insistence that he is right, as I refused to believe that 'Mull of Kintyre' wasn't 'Margowyn Town until I was at least 25.) Once they have travelled the seven seas they have to get through this bridge by righting the song lyrics it wrongs.

It starts with: 'Twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder what you ate for breakfast!'. I wonder what post-modern deconstructions would make of that. It continues with, 'Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream. Merrily merrily merrily merrily, life is just a bowl of spaghetti.' I couldn't put it better myself. The final song goes like this: 'Old Macdonald had some pans, oye, oye oye.' Boy, did the writers run out of steam on that one, eh? Unless I'm missing something really clever and funny. Do let me know if that is the case. Babe prefers, 'Old Macdonald had some chocolate stars.'

Moving on (I cannot believe I am blogging this knackered, but I have to keep something in my life going as everything crumbles around me), my mid-life crisis and re-born desire to subvert are shifting their attention to Babe's wardrobe in order to find something to do.

I have never liked kids to look trendy; it seems inappropraite somehow to make them vehicles for their parents' fashion pretensions. And there is nothing worse than tarty-looking little girls, I'm sure you'll agree. I don't, however, like kids to look too 'Marks and spencers' either. You just know, looking at them, that they'll be the squares in the class at school.

To date, Babe most often just looks a mess, as I do. Sometimes a bit cool, sometimes a bit square and rarely matching as most of his attire comes from ebay job lots. I realise I tend to dress him as I dress myself - never quite matching, one or two nice items and quite a lot of tat.

Anyway, I've been given quite a few hand-me-downs recently that definitely have a bit of edge to them, and I'm kind of enjoying letting my son out of the house looking, well, a tad 'roguish' I suppose. But, I wonder, if he looks a bit edgy, will he be treated a bit edgy?

Before you accuse me of totally over-analysing all this, bear with me, please! If you and I judge one another quite heavily on how we look, don't we do the same with our kids? I know I pick out a mile off the ones I think look dull and the one that look a bit wild and the ones I think Babe might like to hang with, terrible tho' that sounds. And doesn't this lead to a subtle vibe in our reaction to them that might become self perpetuating, subtly re-enforced by the child him/herself, and reflected in his/her behaviour? Hum...

At my active birth group on Thursday Babe was exhausted and badly behaved. He and a little friend were allowed out into the beautiful garden that had a trampoline, slide, swings, etc etc. What did Babe do? He ran over the wood pile and start throwing logs around the garden. Could this have been because of the too-big baggy sleeveless Scooby Doo T he had slung on over his baseball top? Answers on a postcard, please...

New Babe crying, have to fly. OH out with Babe buying, I suspect, gifts for my impending birthday. Wonder what they'll get. I must do a post on some of the hilarious things OH has given me in previous years. Lots of love, then, xxx

Money matters

2009-10-12T11:38:00.001-07:00

My craving for sleep and the devastating impact of its absence from my life continues.

Last evening, I stood by the hob, to heat the vast vat of soup I had prepared earlier, in an attempt to get more vegetables into us. As I stared at the flames licking its bottom (so to speak) I could have sworn I heard a muffled cry. I leaned closer. Yes, I hear a tiny roar. Then another yell. I stood up straight and started at my reflection in the window above the sink. I was feeling and looking excessively knackered. Too knackered to feel disturbed or afraid.

I stuck my finger in my right ear (I think I've experienced some hearing loss since the birth of New Babe but the doctor assures me that nothing is punctured) and wiggled it around. Then listened again. 'Mum!' yelled the soup. I jolted backwards, somewhat freaked. Then with a thump from above, the realisation that Babe had not settled for the night after all, dawned. And I trudged upstairs to deal with him.

(FYI the soup was carrot, parsnip and ginger, and both OH and Babe refused to eat any. It gave me the most terrible abdominal pain and must have upset my breastmilk as well, as New Babe woke on the hour, every hour, last night, and it was his breaking wind, not his crying, that dragged me from sleep in the next room.)

(FYI2 I give Babe some great natural iron green vegatable supplements you can buy.)

(FYI3 It occurred to me last night, as I got back into bed having fed the baby and gone to the loo afterwards for the umpteenth time, that my bed is so close to the toilet, despite them being in adjacent rooms - our house is small - that it is kind of like having an en suite. Probably less distance between my bed and our toilet than from my brother's bed to the loos in his ensuite, I speculated at 4am.)

Anyway, OH has been laid off work again and money stresses are even more real than usual. So I have decided to dabble with ebay. I have lots of baby gear and maternity wear to get rid of, as well as other things I don't like or need anymore, and our roof is full of tools that OH doesn't use, as well as things like his tap shoes. (Long story, worn once - I thought tap dancing might be a fun activity we could share after work when living in London. Despite his general physical dexterity and high level of fitness, OH could not decipher the lingo - ShuFULLbullCHANGEetcetcetc - and was crap at it. I had the best laugh of my life that night but it was not £95 well spent.)

I thought I would start on ebay with something small. So I picked up a 'pale blue Acessorize angora cap-style beret, VGC' from the top of the pile. I then spent the best part of an effing hour, while NB slept, trying to capture it at its photographic best. If you manage to find the bloody thing on ebay, its the one with the terracotta breeze blocks in the background. Yes, the garden offered the best light and you can see a snippet of my brown sleeve in the pic.

It's harder than you might guess to take a photo of a beret with your hand inside it, trying to make it look appropriately full and not floppy, get the peak and the twiddley bit on top in, etc etc. I asked OH to model it - he refused, and his hands are hairy and it wasn't looking good when it held it up on various backgrounds. I considered putting it on a large stuffed toy, but feared it might trivialise the purchase to prospective buyers. I hope I haven't overstepped the mark by describing it as 'cute'. To cut a long story short, it doesn't even come up when you type in 'beret' - can some clever dick reading this explain why? - and I realise I've left the word 'outfit' or 'set' off my 'newborn boy winter jacket and trousers, VGC' and that isn't coming up easily either. Dang and blast.

So, if you wonder what I'll be doing for the rest of the evening (and probably the rest of my maternity leave, if not my life), it's trying to get my photos and keywords right on ebay. If any of you know a geeky adolescent who would take everything I possess and try and flog it for me, in return for a cut of the profit (or, I don't know, some lessons in the language of love or something - as I said, OH is without a job a the moment), please let me know!

Style icons

2009-10-05T06:59:00.000-07:00

My concerns that I am approaching a mid-life crisis continue. Yesterday I bought a hair clip in the hope that it could revive my flagging personal style (cute, buttony) (the hairclip, not my personal style, that is) but in fact it just makes me look like a wa**er.

When I was pregnant I felt so bloody awful that I vowed I would hit the treadmill in the gym just as soon as I'd given birth, lose loads of weight and purchase a capsule wardrobe that even Gok would be the envy of. I took a plain piece of A4 and listed a number of adjectives (and adjectival phrases ;)) I wanted my new look to say about me. They included: comfortable, feminine, organised, appropriate, practical, but with a hint of quirk, je ne sais quoi, carpe diem, etc etc, so that my True Self would shine through. (Would a bloke ever sit down and complete such an exercise I wonder?)

Actually, I'm not sure who my True Self is anymore. I'm a fairly passionate mouthy sort, with a reasonable sense of humour and a mega grumpy dark side that I blame on PMT. I am very organised (well I try to be) but am somewhat ineffective at 'sharpening the sword' (Seven Habits speak, as those of you who have done the course and bought into the ridiculously expensive filofax will know), also somewhat pedantic (I added that after re-reading the para above) and quite a scorpio I reckon. But more of all that another time.

In my youth (What?! Am I actually saying things like that now?) I thought of myself as 'alternative'. Or should that be 'Alternative'? or 'an alternative'? For F's sake! I had my nose pierced before it became de rigour (yep, I noticed the italics symbol tonight), wore a lot of tassles and purple and tights with big flowers on them and thought I was The Business. I have never been a follower of fashion, would hate to look cool, but would hate to look uncool and would hate to look as though I'm trying too hard. This must be boring you senseless. Total navel-gazing self-indulgence.

It's hard to get enthusiastic abut looking good when you spend your days arriving late at playgroups, sweating and pavement pushing, or hanging out in the park with your boob hanging out, dribble, crumbs mud and dog poo decorating your inner and outer wear. But I still aspire to being a woman that people would look at know I am just, I don't know, a bit different, not conventional, a liberal free thinker not run of the mill ho de hum diddley dee I don't know.

So, with Babe in nursery, and fired up by my recent hair clip purchase, New Babe and I hit the shops this morning. I wanted to purchase a gilet, what with the colder days approaching. (Now if that isn't sodding conventional, I don't know what is, but whatever. I need something I can thrown on fast and which will keep me warm, but enable me to cool down quickly when I open it.)(!).

I was immediatly distracted by a number of handbags - good friends will know of my search for the ultimate 'third lung' - a vessel that carries my daily requirements to perfection, both looking and feeling The Business - and also of my general obsession with all things of a receptacley nature (make up bags, wash bags, lunch boxes, pencil cases...). God, I'm sad.

In the knowledge that for the forseeable future I have need of nothing but a baby change bag, I managed to avoid the clutches of the clutches, saddle bags, satchels etc that kept crossing my path, and somehow or other ended up in the Disney shop, quite at odds with my anti-consumerist principles and bought an indecent amount of Cars film memorabilia for Babe's impending birthday.

Feeling bored and irritable, I decided to give TX Maxx a try, as there one can rely on variety under one roof. I bought Babe two jumpers and a coat. New Babe kicked off before I could continue shopping for myself, so I had an early lunch in a cafe while he bounced on and off my breast, leaving my nipple exposed every time a suave young man entered the joint.

Feeling bored-er and irritable-er, I bounced round a few more shops where I bought a few more things for my kids, before somehow ending up at a bakery where, yes, you guessed, I bought the equivalent of an early tea to eat on the bus on the way home. At approximately 12.45am.

I then sprinted along several pavements, trod in two turds and arrived sweating at nursery to pick up Babe. On arrival I lifted New Babe from the pram and he promptly posseted over my shoulder and down my back. Rummaging about my person for a tissue I noticed that my left boob had leaked quite badly en route. And that there was doughnut jam stain on my elasticated trousers. And that my shoes were muddy. My hair was tied back and I wasn't wearing any make up. Bloody hell.

I retrieved Babe, who was covered in paint, had sand in his shoes and was wearing girls' pants and trousers as he had weed and pooed himself senseless all morning and refused to use the potty and they had run out of spare boys clothes for him. We looked at one another as he took my hand, and despite his tender years I believe a mutual sigh of understanding was shared. We picked up some juice, bananas and chocolate buttons (half a pack for Babe, two-and-a-half for me) from the corner shop and headed to the park as it started to rain...

Thomas and the Mad Bomber

2009-10-02T11:57:00.000-07:00

I could write a lot about kids' tv and DVDs etc, and the merits or otherwise of each. I am interested in children's literature and media, in fact I've co-written a number of children's books, and have enjoyed writing for, teaching and working with children.

Personally, I had intended that Babe would not be introduced to tv until he was at least the age of consent but that was before I knew I'd have a baby who would be up at half five every day. These days my bottom line is that if the telly keeps him quiet from 6 - 8am, I'm not that bothered about him watching it.

A friend suggested recently that if I banned tv in the mornings, Babe may then stay in bed longer. Not a bad suggestion - tho' he has always been an early riser. I suppose I could buy a lamp he can switch on himself (he'd need one as he has a black-out blind) and insist that he plays with his toys in his room until 7am or something like that and may try it, once I have the energy to face the inevitable repercussions and tantrums. From OH that is...

OH has a certain Mediterranean (based on my experience, that is) adoration of the tv. I may have mentioned in a previous post my observation that in many households across Greece and Albania the tv acquires a shrine-like status in the sitting room, complete with croched doiley and ornament or religious icon on top.

It is not considered rude to continue watching tv if guests arrive, and I have cringed on numerous occasions when OH either refuses to turn the tv off when people come in, or will turn it on in the middle of conversation after a meal. Usually to tune in to 'Euronews' which he wrongly assumes our guests have the same interest in as he does.

He also has a Mediterranean liking of having all household appliances turned on at the same time: TV, stereo, radio, iron, etc, (well, ok, maybe not the iron) and then having to shout in order to make himself heard.

And being East European (sorry about these generalisations, I admit that's what they are) OH a) believes that most of what he hears on the tv is the 'truth' - thanks to communist brainwashing - he once suggested I try some wonder diet pills that were said to have been used by Princess Diana, because Albanian TV said they 'definitely' worked, and b) also has a dodgy liking for crap American movies, particularly the ones in which the plot centres around a canine with humanesque qualities. He will actually sit and laugh hysterically at such epics, cry at films about inept fathers and their sons/lost twin brothers etc, and was once asked if he was drunk on a flight back to the UK during which an inane kids cartoon (Tom and Jerry I believe) was making him roar out loud. But perhaps it's tension release at the strain of living with me.

Worse than all this, OH seems to be actively teaching Babe to sit and watch DVDs with him on Saturday afternoons, so that he can crash next to him on the sofa for a couple of hours. He has bought a huge number of kids' films from the supermarket and puts them on with great excitement, to Babe's bemusement. Although I strongly disapprove of this, I have had my own come-uppance in the films department and realise that I may be the bearer of double standards.

Recently a friend lent me a bunch of DVDs to take on holiday. I couldn't help but get excited about it. If I'm completely honest, I was delighted to discover you can get feature-length Thomas films and sometimes I put them on during the afternoon when OH is at work so that I can lie on the sofa and rest (see what I mean about the double standards? Why is it any less bad when I do it?).

One of the DVDs I was lent is about a tap-dancing penguin. It didn't occur to me to vet it. We sat down to watch, but a few scenes into the film, the cute baby penguin is being chased by horrible scary sea birds and gets stuck under the ice. I sat with growing discomfort, looking at Babe's face, and wondered how I could turn it off without worrying him further at my censoring of the material. I tried to interject with comments such as 'Oh, poor little penguin, I expect his friends are just about to arrive and play with him'. But when he got stuck Babe, with a look of horror on his face burst into tears and screamed at me, 'He's on his own and he's lost his mummy and his daddy!'

I can't tell you how bad I felt, that I had happened upon this experience unprepared. We kept watching until it became clear that the penguin was perfectly alright, but Babe had been confronted with a whole load of stuff I'd have preferred to introduce him to myself when I felt the time was right.

Also recently, I have taught Babe to surf youtube for video clips. He loves Thomas songs and one we had found on the official site called, 'What makes an engine happy? What makes an engine sad?' and which would make your heart ache to hear him sing along to, was suddenly removed.

In my efforts to track it down I had got as far as discovering the composer was a Lib Dem supporter living in the Totnes area, when a friend found the song for me on youtube. We were overjoyed! But I quickly discovered the frustration of either having to sit with Babe and watch all the related Thomas clips myself, or return to the computer every three minutes or so each time a clip ended. So it made sense to teach him to scroll through and click and select the clips himself.

I can't believe that as someone who works on the web, and on children's materials at times, it didn't occur to me to check that there weren't any dodgy clips among all those songs and episodes. But having watched hundreds with him, and usually being in the room with him while he watched them and not overheard anything inappropriate, I trusted the stuff and presumed it was all harmless Thomas fun for kids.

I certainly didn't expect to pop out of the room for a beaker of milk and come back in to hear a frightened Thomas call 'Help, help!', have his head blown from his tank and end up with it inverted, smoking, beside him on the tracks. I swooped to the laptop and slammed it shut (and we haven't been back to youtube since), but not before Babe said in a small voice,
'I don't like this one, Mummy, it makes me feel sad.'

Gah! The guilt! A steep learning curve and proof that you just can't be too careful with your kids. From now on, it's nothing but Thomas and Postman Pat, at tightly controlled and rigorous intervals...

Mid-life crisis?

2009-09-30T12:29:00.000-07:00

I confided in a lovely friend last week that I am feeling a bit low.

I think anyone getting as little and as broken sleep as I am would feel pretty rubbish. And things aren't good at work. I've been made redundant and offered another job but it isn't what I was expecting and I feel hurt and disappointed although I know the decisions are down to cost-cutting and not personal.

But it's neither of those things that are getting me down really. I think it's the view I now have of the open field ahead that the rest of my life represents. I've done childhood and I've done the pre-children years. I've done being pregnant and giving birth and now the next phase is on the horizon. There is no kidding myself any more that I'm not a proper adult (catch me off the cuff tho' and ask me what year it is and I'll tell you '1988') and I need to work out where I'm going in life.

Exciting, yes - I have some ideas for new career paths, but I realise now more than ever that the responsibility for our financial stability weighs upon my shoulders. I'm the one who's going to have to significantly increase our household income if we are ever going to have enough cash to enjoy ourselves with, move house etc. A challenge but a weight too. Especially as I don't intend to return to work full time, and don't want my kids going to every pre and after school club that exists once they enter full time education.

I suppose I also feel suddenly very aware that I'm approaching the big 40, and that I've had the first half of my life and am definitely into the second. I find it a bit scary and I feel unsettled. Could I be approaching a mid-life crisis?

Worry not! I'm sure this is a temporary phase. I will work on a cunning plan. I will turn my thinking around over the next few days and start seeing the glass as half-full. I have lots of ideas - if only I could find the time to make some of them happen.

Perhaps OH and I need to save up for and plan a massive joint 40th birthday treat so that we've got something fantastic to look forward to. (I must jot that down, nice idea...) Do something we've always wanted to do. Hum. Spend the night in a yurt? Have a holiday in one of those sheds on stilts above water? See the sun rise in Nepal? I've always wanted to swim with dolphins, he's always wanted to go to Florida, perhaps we could combine dreams. It would be nice to come up with something that doesn't cost an arm and a leg. Or anything at all.

Heigh ho, nice food for thought. Meanwhile, talking of birthdays, Babe's third birthday is on the horizon. Party dilemnas stressing me. I am a total party pooper. Worry about stuff. Like the horrendous materialism surrounding the concept of party bags yet my son's guests' likely expectation that we will have them. And I would like to have a naming ceremony for both boys but unless we get our skates on and organise that it won't ever happen.

Blah! There's no way I'm going to be able to work on any of this or my life plan until New Babe has stopped waking every blinking hour or so during the night seeking out my boob. I have inadvertently taught him a gamut of terrible habits: sleeping on his front, so he cannot tolerate pushchairs or car seats, and feeding him too often and feeding him to sleep which means I can't leave him for longer than a feed cycle, which isn't long. He won't take a bottle or a dummy.

I don't know how this happened, but we have agreed that from Monday it's boot camp for him, poor little blighter. I am prepared for two weeks of hell while we teach him to get to sleep on his back, on his own, in his cot, at regular intervals. I am also moving into the spare room with OH so that New Babe can have a room of his own where he can't smell me. I think this may help him wake a little less. Let's hope so, I'm desperate. Watch this space...

Water bombs and the like

2009-09-27T12:35:00.000-07:00

Today I was assailed by a group of young boys in the park, who attacked me with water bombs. I couldn't be bothered to move and my brain wasn't working fast enough to react anyway, so I watched, as if in slow motion, as two landed on the ground by my feet, and one popped against my knee, splashing soggily into my shoe. 'Good shot!' I thought vaguely, as I watched them run up the slope behind the slide.

I felt I should reprimand, respond, do something, but I wasn’t sure what to yell. It was bloody cheeky, but not the worst behaviour I’ve witnessed by a long shot. Babe took my silence as compliance and shot up the slope after them, the traitor, so I had to move my sticks and stones and get up there after him. Sure enough my soggy shoe slipped and my nose grazed the turf. My handy shopper did a 180 degree turn and my keys, mobile, purse etc. slid down onto the woodchips at the bottom.

Should I follow Babe, or gather my valuables? He was nearly out of sight, so I bolted after him (he’s only two, but bloody hell, he’s fast) and lo and behold the little buggers completed a circle and grabbed my… cheesy oatcakes, and made off with them.

Whatever! I don’t understand why other people in the park didn’t do something. Perhaps they were all catatonic through lack of sleep as well.

I seem to attract random and slightly ‘off the beaten track’, shall we say, incidents with small groups of eleven-year-olds.

This happened a lot during my university years. I was regularly harangued by one such small group of boys who hung out on a bridge round the corner from a flat I lived in, in Cardiff. The kind of kids who called you a ‘tight bitch’ if you gave them a mere 50p for the guy on 5 Nov, despite the fact that you were broke and saving a quid to call your mum with at the weekend. On my graduation day, another asked my step-father for a tissue which he managed to produce and then had it shoved back at him because it apparently had ‘huge greenies’ in it.

One evening I was walking in the dark to somewhere or other with my green umbrella. My granny’s. It had a long handle, not a modern folding jobby. But was smallish and stylish and I loved it. (Have sadly lost it but I digress.) As I walked up the steps and onto the bridge, I saw an eleven-year-old approach. As we reached one another, instead of stepping to one side, he blocked my way. And grabbed my umbrella. I wasn’t going to let go of it easily so we both held on, two hands apiece, staring at one another. I don’t know why neither of us said anything. It was quite a tense and physical stand-off. I remembering wondering when it would end, but was concentrating on maintaining my grip of steel.

Suddenly, he grabbed both my breasts. One in each hand. And squeezing them, shouted, ‘Beep, beep!’. Then ran off.
What a nerve! What a cheek! But at least he’d left me with my brolly.

Now that I think about it, a very similar incident happened in Barcelona, where I also spent a year as a student. Except that the intruder, so to speak, was a tall, greasy and very fat eighteen-year-old. I saw him lolloping towards me along the pavement, but didn’t expect him to grab my boobs as he continued past me and on his way.

As I am blonde, I expect he took me for a tourist and did not expect me to yell in fluent Spanish, ‘You perverted son of a gun! Stop that pig, someone!’ (“Pig” being an appropriate expletive given the context, in Spanish. I appreciate that it does not sit very comfortably in English.)(Ignore the 'son of a gun' bit, I'm exaggerating about what I said.)

He probably even less expected that I would give chase, which I did, shouting as I went so that a straggling line of pursuers joined me in my quest. Eventually he ran, panting horribly, into a square that had no exit, and stood, sweating and heaving behind the central fountain, which as it happens was a cast iron naked beauty.
‘What did he do?’ yelled an accompanier as they arrived and gathered round. All men, incidentally, and all panting too. I was trying to work out what I was going to do next.
‘Did he take your bag? Your wallet?’
‘No! He grabbed my breasts!’ I cried.
This met with confusion.
‘He grabbed your breasts?’
‘Yes. And now I’m going to sort him out!’ I threatened, moving towards the centre of the square.

Two of the men grabbed me. Another told the boy to run off. When he had disappeared, they let me go. By heck, I was angry. Perhaps they were saving me from myself? I think about that incident, trivial as it may seem, when I read of people who have a much harder fight for justice on their hands, and are not heard, do not have their rights respected, and worse.

But… back to Cardiff, and I was intending that this should be a happy, humorous entry.

One evening I was sitting alone in my flat, some time in November, when the intercom rang. I pressed the button to ask who it was, when two eleven-year-old voices burst into song. Quite quiet and somewhat pitiful and I couldn’t help but imagine that they were desperate for cash and the victims of abuse.
‘Once in royal David’s city…’ they droned.
I didn’t feel I could interrupt.
They continued. A full three verses. Perhaps they expected me to interrupt. My finger on the buzzer was sore. I had to imagine their pale little faces.
At the end they stopped and one coughed.
‘Hold on, I’ll be right down!’ I said, and ran back into the living room to find them some cash.

I didn’t have any. Or any crisps or biscuits. Half a cold cheese and onion Gregg’s pasty wasn’t going to cut the mustard. My last two Silk Cut (those were not the days)? Nope… All I had was two apples. I walked downstairs slowly and with embarrassment and went to hand them over.

But then realised they were just two of the bridge lads, blagging what cash they could out of people.
‘Oh, sod OFF!’ I said.
One winked and the other showed me his tongue, then laughing, they ran off.

Perhaps I'll dream about my Uni days tonight. They seem as long ago and as far away as they now are. We've all had a sick bug over the last few days (OH had to spend all today in bed, BTW, although he is sitting quite happily on the sofa watching X Factor and eating a sandwich as I write this). How I long for just a bit of tickety-boo normality. As least the kids are in bed and my mum is coming to stay for a few days tomorrow to help me get some stuff done.

Buenas noches...

In anticipation of a holiday

2009-09-24T13:33:00.000-07:00

Below are listed ten things I hoped would not happen during our [then] impending sojourn in the bosom of OH's family this month. As I am fairly superstitious I decided not to publish this post until we got back. I am now doing so, with annotations. Enjoy ;)

Note: the ten items are not listed in order of priority.
Note 2: neither, you may be interested to know, are the items on my 'to do' list. Which is why I am never properly on top of anything, despite an air of being organised that lingers about my person.

1 That OH's mother will drop her attempts at getting her grandsons to urinate on her head to bring prosperity and good fortune to the family. It is hard enough changing wriggling little ones on a broken bed without her nose-diving into their privates in order to achieve the effect outlined above. It is even more terrifying when she seizes them and throws them over her head, as she is old and not half as strong as she thinks she still is.
Repost: I gave it to her straight not long after we arrived: Babe will tell everyone at nursery that his granny is fixated on his privates and it will bring shame on the Albanian nation. All the males in the family immediately demanded that she stop.

2 That the hotel I am planning to stay in across the road will not be fully booked.
Repost: Mercifully, it was open. See previous post.

3 That Babe will not throw my valuables over the balcony like last time, having been taught to do so by mad granny.
Repost: He was instead taught to scribble on sheets, eat in bed etc - see previous posts. However I got close to throwing myself off the balcony a few times. (And not far off throwing mad granny off, either.)

4 That the water and electric shortages will not coincide like last time.
Repost: Only a couple of power outages, and I'd taken a solar powered lamp from Ikea so that I could read in bed and which I kept in the hotel. Hee hee. Water still goes off every morning, but I made sure we had bottled water in stock and that we all passed motions in the evening. Yawn.

5 That I will not lose my temper and insult the family every few hours like last time.
Repost: Only every few days this time, which is pretty good going.

6 That we will not be given any more naff souvenirs that fill our suitcase and prevent us from stocking up on olive oil, raki and honey.
R: Take a look at the window sill in my kitchen: mugs, plates, calendars, sea-shell covered booze bottles and an Egyptian (??) papyrus photo album.

7 That we will not get up close and personal with the carcasses of stray dogs and random rams if we go snorkeling in the harbour.
R: Snorkel did not leave suitcase. What was I thinking when we packed it? We are parents, now, for crying out loud.

8 We will not get ill.
R: We all got ill.

9 We will not get injured.
R: Babe was bloody lucky that he was not hurt when knocked down by motorbike on first day.

10 We will come back alive. (I had to word this in the affirmative, such is my primitive superstitious thinking.)
R: We did, God be praised.

Ten things an English Mummy should do

2009-09-18T13:24:00.000-07:00

Honestly! You would think the Albanian nation responsible for the propagation of the human species, given the amount of earwigging I've been getting about how to bring up my children. Quite how they think mothers in the UK rear children who survive and prosper I don't know.

One night on holiday New Babe got wind and cried quite a lot (for five minutes), and my sister-in-law was calling relatives in Athens for advice before I could catch my own breath. Meanwhile my mother-in-law harangued me to take him up to the hospital, and I found myself explaining to my (traditional, retiring) father-in-law that the milk flows faster from my left breast than my right and that sometimes the baby gets windy on it. Bloody hell!

So, for your amusement, here are ten things I am doing wrong and am asked about almost constantly:

1 Not putting New Babe to sleep on a pillow (surely this is a no-brainer??)
2 Not giving him a teaspoon of cooled boiled water every day (why would I when he hasn't got any problems to cure?)
3 Not giving him chamomile tea every evening (see above)
4 Not stopping him from putting his hands in his mouth. I should, apparently, be getting some 'equipment' (??) from the hospital that can achieve this (just f off and leave us alone)
5 Not putting him to sleep in crisp, white, 'fresh' sheets that have been ironed with a little chlorine each day (the last time I ironed something was for a job interview ten years ago)
6 Not bathing him every day (environmental concerns do not reach Albania)
7 Not putting him in the sea (he's three months old for Pete's sake)
8 Putting him in the sea (I did it to shut you lot up and now he's got a temperature)
9 Not taking him to hospital because he is small and not fat enough (Now you are really beginning to annoy me, Babe was not much bigger at the same age)
10 I can't remember 10 as I was crying in the toilet at the time. But it was something about feeding him only every three hours. I demand feed...

Not, you understand, that any of this is expressed with malice, quite the opposite - OH's family really do love me as a daughter and would hate to think they were upsetting me. But there are only so many times p day you can be asked the same sodding stupid question before you start to crack.

Despite the regime they would have me put New Babe under, they think I should back off with Babe entirely, let him have his own way over everything, and let him eat what he wants to (biscuits), whenever he wants to (all day) and wherever he wants to (including in the loo and in bed), and go to bed much later (close to midnight) so that he'll rise later (I have explained that I have tried everything in order to make him sleep later than 6am)... But they think I should force feed him a little honey each night before he drops off (good for his throat, apparently). I invited Granny to administer said honey and she backed off after nearly losing a finger.

The family think Babe is an angry, 'nervous' child and that he takes after me. (!) They seem unable to realise that they are bugging him to death and that' why he's been running around screaming and refuses to be left alone with them for five minutes.

Meanwhile cousin Alexandros (the same age as Babe, but quite a way behind him if you ask my opinion - I don't want to make comparisons but read on), so I am told, eats olives by the handful, loves his granny and hugs and kisses her constantly, and has been out of nappies for five months. I doubt the truth of this, as we saw him in Athens five months ago, and the only thing he was doing in the toilet was having his dinner with the tap running, as it was the only way they could get him to eat.

Whatever! I must turn in now as New Babe woke every hour last night and I am utterly tired, once again. It seems very exciting to be back at home and able to get online whenever I want to, but of course I have many other things vying for my attention now. Including that dancing programme on BBC1. Adieu!

We're coming home :) :(

2009-09-17T01:13:00.000-07:00

Home is on the horizon. This afternoon we get the boat back over to Corfu, where we'll stay the night with relatives, and tomorrow we fly home.

Yesterday we spent the entire day on the beach and it was beautiful, the water still and clear, a gentle breeze in the air and enough cloud cover to take the edge off the heat. Babe slept for nearly three hours with OH on a sun lounger in the middle of the day, and although I was really tired, as Babe is now waking four times p night, I was hugely relieved that his temperature had finally subsided and I was happy just to hold him and gaze at the water. I do so love to be by the sea.

All in all, it has been a pretty good holiday I guess, really. As good as it probably gets with kids, anyway. Much easier to be staying in a home environment than a hotel, and with the beach and promenade for evening jaunt just down the road, you can't really go wrong. Auntie Eleni has been hugely useful, holding New Babe so that I can attend to Babe or dip in the sea. We haven't had to cook a meal (although Babe hasn't eaten one...) and most of our clothes are washed ready to put in the suitcase. Along with more bottles of honey, olive oil and home-brewed booze than we can hope to make it back to Blighty unbroken.

Our soujourn hasn't been without its traumas, but when did we ever have a holiday that was? And although OH and I didn't really have time to connect, we have both managed to relax, and I saw glimpses of our old selves when he started to joke with me in front of his mum as he used to. How having kids changes your life completely! I didn't even consider feeling hacked off that we weren't getting off the beaten track to unspoilt beaches with them - it felt like a massive feat just to get to the beach with everything we needed to pass a couple of hours there in one piece. I guess things will be even harder next year (yes, I already realise the inevitability of these holidays...) with New Babe toddling around and putting everything within reach in his mouth.

Last night it rained heavily, and it's cool and cloudy today. Much better, this, than to be leaving on a beautiful beach day. I have come out as OH is trying to fix some electrical connections at home, it is muggy indoors, and Babe is crawling up the wall. Last night I had 'words' with my mother-in law when she let Babe scribble with a biro on some new bed sheets. I am close to losing my rag completely with her, and don't want to end the holiday on a bad note. I am preparing an entry on my mother-in-law, as she is a complex character, to say the least...

As things stand, I have been predicatably grumpy enough for them all to be quite relieved when we go. We're getting Auntie Eleni onto skype from a neighbour's house so that they can all see the kids between holidays.

I am very glad that we left the house clean and tidy, so we won't have lots to do when we get home, and can hopefully have a nice weekend together without OH moaning about the weather.
And I am already working on a new list of resolutions for when we get home that includes:

Agreeing on how we discipline Babe so that he doesn't play us off against one another
Agreeing on which second language - Greek or Albanian - we are going to teach both boys, and making this happen by scheduling a half hour per week for learning new words and phrases together
Trying to hold my tongue when I start to feel angry
Try and get New Babe to wake a bit less at night
Try and ensure that OH deals with Babe in the night.

As you see, I never let up on my attempts to improve and perfect my life. OH will baulk entirely in response. But hey. A leopard never changes its spots, so why should a dolphin? Or something like that...

No time to relax...

2009-09-12T09:25:00.000-07:00

There is much I would like to share, following my last entry. But time so limited. In fact, when I started this entry two days ago, I was called home because an angry clingy Babe was hurling himself around the ceramic tiled floor of the hallway in the family flat and in danger of knocking himself out.

Since then he has calmed down somewhat, thank God. He will probably fully relax and start to enjoy himself properly the day before we leave. I keep thinking that I'm starting to enjoy myself, and then something else happens to remind me that I'm not. Since yesterday, New Babe has had a blocked nose and temperature, a rash on his arms and legs that I'm told is probably heat rash, and a dodgy stomach. I'm told he looks small for three months old, that his poo 'just isn't right' and that I should be giving him chamomile tea every evening. I will try and write a full list of all the other things I'm apparently doing wrong before I leave. Suffice to say that of course I'm worried about him.

In the meantime, I am loving the hour or so we snatch on the beach every morning, and am making like a dolphin as I had dreamed I might. But the weather is hot and windy, some days worse than others, and it's very hard to gauge how far we can push being out, especially with the children being under the weather, and I fear that tomorrow I may not make it out at all. How selfish that must sound!

Anyway, back to Babe. He has really been impossibly badly behaved and clingy, and I feel as though I don't know the little boy I'm observing. For several days he complained of stomach ache, ear ache and a sore throat, poor chick, and I discovered he had mouth ulcers. He did not really eat for three days, or poo, and is utterly and persistently over tired. For the first few days, when we made it to the beach for an hour or two each morning, he didn't want to so much as put his feet in the sea, and just rolled his little bag of cars around despondently on a sun lounger.

So desperate was I for some sleep on Friday that I made it to the hotel across the road for the night. I think everyone within a ten-mile radius heaved a communal sigh of relief as I carried my bag over, as the way I am feeling is hard to disguise, and I was ready to scream. But by 2am I was standing outside in the dark, struggling to ignore the bi-hourly screaming cries for 'Mummy! Mummy!' coming from the family balcony across the road. I think everyone in the vicinity would have paid to have me back again - Grandad, who is ill, was close to throwing Babe off the balcony I think - but three nights later Babe has accepted our new nightly routine and at least I am only waking to feed New Babe now.

We must take Babe in hand when we get home. (How many times have I thought something like this?) He has been ill, and is coping very well with irritating relatives, but nevertheless I think we probably fawn on him too much, and let him get one over on us too easily.

Having said that, I am considered strict and harsh by the relatives here, where I observe the same treatment of kids that I have noticed in both Greece and Spain: pretty lax discipline, better integration into family life, treating children like little Lords and Ladies if I'm honest. But it seems to work, as they grow up into decent human beings! Hum. I'd like to reflect further on this right now, but no time! More tomorrow, perchance.

We're all going on a....

2009-09-10T06:53:00.000-07:00

So, here we are. Oh my gosh, yes, here we are.

Got our flights on time. Worth mentioning as there have been countless incidents of missing flights, thanks to OH's inability to keep time. This time I had everything ready the night before, the only thing outstanding being getting OH's stuff in the suitcase and shutting it. However, this task had yet to be completed at lunch time the next day, seven minutes in fact before the taxi taking us to the airport was due to arrive. He was held up collecting Babe from nursery, getting some cash out and parking our car outside someone else's house. ??? During aforementioned seven minutes I fed New Babe, heart in my mouth, and managed to dress Babe with one hand at the same, bribing him with promises of the treats I'd bought him for the flight. OH changed, wrapped his Wash and Go in an insane quantity of clingfilm and got his stuff in the case and padlocked it.

Our first disagreement was over whether to take the buggy for Babe or not. We had agreed to, as well as the pram for New Babe, but OH changed his mind at the last minute and I just couldn't be bothered to argue. Babe did of course, crash in the taxi to the airport, which meant OH had to carry him around over his shoulder when we got there, went through passport control etc. This meant I ended up walking around loaded like a packhorse.

Our second disagreement was over how we would handle the potty situation on the plane. My feeling was that to do a wee in the potty on the floor by our seats was a lesser risk than trying to get Babe to the loo in time and failing, but that poos should be done in the loo or in pants if that's what it came to, rather than subject fellow passengers to the smell if he used the potty. OH disagreed.

After walking down the aisle and getting stuck behind the drinks trolley during turbulence with a potty full of wee in my hand, I was convinced I was right, and I don't think anyone with an aisle seat would have disagreed with me. But an hour later I was breastfeeding New Babe when Babe, who OH was allowing to roll all over the aisle, picked up his potty, pulled down his pants and shorts in full view of everyone behind us (we were seated near the wings, bad choice on my part as Babe couldn't see much outside the windows, in case you're interested) and announced he was going to poo. I hissed at OH to move him but he wouldn't, worried I suppose (let's be generous, I'm trying to see his point of view over stuff) that it was too late. Then one of the air hosts came up and said, 'You can't let him use the potty in the cabin, guys, it's disgusting.' I was mortified, but OH indignant, and didn't do anything. So I yanked New Babe off the breast, grabbed Babe and the potty, and made it to the loo in time for him to do... nothing. Four more wolf calls later and still nothing. Babe had got our attention good and proper, and there wasn't a whole lot we could do about it.

Not entirely funny, eh? You're right. I hated most of that flight. Babe was in fact very good, but no two year old that I know is going to sit quietly for three hours, and whereas my policy is to distract him with Thomas magazines and snacks, OH thinks the British are uptight and is more than happy for Babe to make his presence felt, in both the physical and vocal sense.

Moving on... I was very relieved to arrive in Corfu. We were met by two of OH's now grown-up nephews, who he insisted on whistling and shouting to through the automatic doors separating baggage collection from the World Outside, waving his arms and making the Victory sign like a Japanese tourist. The eldest had bought a clapped out sports car, eighties style with huge reclining seats and dice hanging off the mirror, but when he opened the side door I noticed holes where the speakers had been ripped out; the car didn't go more than 40mph, and the smell of petrol on the ride home nearly asphixiated (no time to spell check that one) us all.

A fish the length of my thigh bone had been caught and grilled for us, and was ready on the table. Babe immediately fell in love with all his cousins and allowed them to feed him copious amounts. It's as though he tunes in to anyone under 25, and out to anyone over 25, whether they speak his language or not. Which is a real shame for grannies, grandads, aunties and uncles etc. But lovely for cousins.

That night was sweltering. I didn't sleep at all - and I mean that. New Babe only woke once, exhausted by the journey and heat I suppose, and his nappy, which is usually soaked in the morning was virtually dry. That's how hot it was. (28 degrees all night apparently.) I found this stressful, and was quite glad when the cocks outside started crowing at 4am. We had to rise at 5am English time, 7am Greek time, to get to the port. I was ready, with Babe dressed and New Babe fed and dressed an hour early. It wasn't until we got outside that I realised there wasn't a plan in place for getting a taxi.

OH walked up the road to a kiosk and was given a number. He asked his brother in law the address, but for some reason he didn't seem to know the name of the road. He snatched the phone impatiently, and his impossibly mad, rude, incoherent conversation with the taxi driver on the other end must have gone something like this:

[Shouting] 'Taxi! Here! Now! For Albania we going'
'Where is "here"?'
[Still shouting] 'Here! Now! Albania to. By supermarket the!'
Which supermarket?
[Going mental] 'Near port! Now! Bar Cappuchino!'
You mean by the rear of the Marinopoulos supermarket nearest to the port?
[Shrieking] Yes! Yes! Bravo! Bravo! You are here now!

I was about to be sick with stress - I feel sick writing this and remembering it, but that's because this Internet cafe is full of smoke and I've got thirty minutes of kid free time to write, as I've just stormed out of the house dramatically in a strop. I'm not going to have time to edit, so forgive me the lapses in spelling and punctuation - and was utterly convinced that the taxi driver would have sworn at his phone and not turned up, but amazingly he did, and we got to the port with about ten minutes to spare. True to form...

The boat ride was beautiful. Breezy, cool - I'd have traded my Macbook (given that it has a few faults) to stay on it for a day, alone with New Babe, drowsy and drifting in and out of sleep. Even I was moved by the raising of the pint-sized nylon Albanian standard as we left Greek waters. But we had to get out and face the family.

I now have to summarise the last two days in about five minutes but it's not hard. It's bloody hot. So hot that you sweat all night. We have all been ill with bad colds and OH and Babe have both had temperatures and dicky tummies. It is too hot to venture outside between eleven and four. OH's dad is ill (again - always ill) and OH ended up spending all yesterday morning in hospital with him, and we were all woken up to him groaning at 5am this morning. I am feeling somewhat better, but Babe is still complaining of pains in his head, ears and tummy. There is no hope of me getting to sleep until the rest of the family do - which is late, as they are used to rising late - although I am managing to get Babe and New Babe down at the usual time, despite the light and noise, by getting onto the bed as well. Babe is being predictably clingy and my plan for sleeping in the hotel opposite is delayed and in fear of being aborted.

BUT we did get out for an hour and a half at about half nine this morning and spent a reasonable time on the beach, so there is hope for us yet. Will keep you posted!

PS Babe was knocked over by a motorbike on the way back from the beach. I was pushing the pram and screamed like a woman jumping for her life as I saw Auntie Eleni grab at Babe, miss and he ran straight across its path. Amazingly, mercifully, he was not hurt but my sleep deprived nerves are in utter tatters. The jerk riding his bike down the pedestrian walkway saw us ahead, and didn't stop or slow down, don't think he even saw us. I gave him an earful the entire town must have heard and then walked home sobbing in shock. Where was OH? Talking to a friend and missed it and presumes I am being difficult and over-reacting as usual. I think I am, possibly, going deranged. Could write so much more but will have to wait until tomorrow.......

Utterly exhausted

2009-09-03T12:39:00.000-07:00

Ugh. Here we are again. I am so utterly, wretchedly knackered that I am having total sense of humour failure. Which is a shame because I was hoping to provide some slightly more uplifting posts this week.

But New Babe isn't going longer than 2 - 3 hours between feeds during the day, and not much longer than that at night, despite being three months old. Which has made me wonder if my milk is less 'top of the' and more the 'semi-skimmed' variety. First Babe was well-established on five feeds a day by this age.

So, this evening I got OH to offer New Babe a bottle of formula. Which he took straight away! (Having acted like he had no idea what to do with a bottle for me, and rolled it about in his mouth before dribbling all the milk back out). I'm hoping it might help him go a bit longer tonight. Will keep you posted! Just got both boys to bed now, so will have to dash off myself in a mo. Gosh, the thrills and adventure in my life... My step-father asked at the weekend if I do any singing or drama in the evenings at the moment. I could have knocked him around the head with a saucepan, so removed is he from the reality of my existence. (And for those of you feeling shocked or worried at the thought of me acting or singing, well I haven't since I left school.)

But back to the bottle, so to speak: I could dwell on the politics of breastfeeding, and the guilt I feel at putting some formula baby's way, but I won't. Suffice to say that people - well, other women mainly, let's be honest here - are pretty quick to judge your actions when it comes to the whole breastfeeing lark. A lovely woman at my active birth group told us today how, when she reached for her formula in a cafeteria the other day, the woman at the next table said loudly to her friend, 'You'd think she'd be able to feed it herself, wouldn't you?'.

What a bloody cheek! My friend went over to her and said quite calmly:
'This is my third child under the age of five. I breastfed the first two successfully, but for some reason this baby needs a formula top-up after each feed. Perhaps it is because I am totally, utterly, ball-breakingly exhausted and can't provide her with enough myself.'

Why should she have felt the need to explain herself?

Anyway, I'm hoping to start to see light at the end of the tunnel. I am neither energetic nor good-humoured, and sensing this, Babe is doing his best to keep me on my toes. Which backfires on him badly, poor little mite.

OH seems equally tired, but was wonderful last weekend. He took Babe off to kiddie-gym as usual, at 9am prompt on Saturday, agreeing to park, farm and fast-food establishment it afterwards so that I could have a couple of hours to myself while New Babe slept. When he hadn't, unusually, dropped off by half ten, I felt ready to bawl, as could see my one break slipping away from me fast, so called OH. Crying down the phone, somewhat hysterically, it has to be said.

He drove back, marched upstairs, put the plug in the bath and the hot tap on. Then he grabbed New Babe and the car seat, and disappeared with both boys until lunch time. (Think he had probably been letting Babe 'play' in Asda and the pet shop, but whatever...) Babe had fallen asleep in the car, and after a feed, New Babe finally dropped off too. So we had a blissful hour and a half to ourselves. Amazing how once you reach lunch time, and bed time is no longer an eternity away, you start to re-discover the will to live.

And amazing how a hot bath does revive. Think I'll have one now before I hit the sack. Wish me well :)

My son, the diplomat, Part II

2009-08-28T09:31:00.000-07:00

Of course, what Babe said at the end of my penultimate post, was repeating exactly what I had said when we set off an a Family Day Out to a rescue establishment of the bovine variety at 8am last Sunday.

A day later, he interrupted our bickering thus:
'Don't speak to mummy like that, daddy!'
'I'm sorry,' says OH.
'Mummy, daddy says sorry,' says Babe.
'I'm sorry, too,' I rejoin, giving OH an unpleasant hand gesture as Babe turns his back.
Shocking, I know.

I am determined to put this phase behind us, and some fun back into family life. I am sure the constant stressing and bickering is upsetting Babe. So I try to suggest we do something nice together at some point during each weekend. (Incidentally, we're all upset, not just Babe. New Babe probably thinks that people only communicate without shouting on birthdays and thier own Saint days.)

To be honest, I don't look forward to weekends at all as weekdays are simpler, despite being pretty heavy-going for me. We usually survive Saturdays and Sundays by taking turns to take Babe out while I clean the house or, when it's his turn, OH chills on the sofa. My ultimate aim is to achieve the cleaning, shopping and cooking during the week, so that I can get some rest at the weekend too, or at least not get irritated by how much there is to do and attempt to chill. Babe has started saying, 'Just chill, Mummy!', which drives me insane. Learnt from OH of course.

But, back to our last Family Day Out (sorry for all these bits in brackets, I am trying to cut down on them) unless we get Up And Out, Babe is likely to drop off en route wasting valuable RandR time for us. Which is why I insisted (begged, prostrated myself on the floor, cried, made offers of one BJ per month etc etc) that we leave early. Unfortunately I had not checked the opening times of aforementioned bovine establishement, and we ended up bickering in the car park in the drizzle for an hour when we got there. Not a nag in sight, but a clearly testosterone-fuelled young farm hand revving a quad bike desguised as a bull that pulls a line of passengers around the paddock for about £30 quid a head.

I am fast learning that Babe doesn't mind where we are as long as a) we are not arguing and b) he has a little mate or two to play with. He runs up to kids anywhere and asks what their names are and then stands as close as can to them until they start involving him in thier play.

Last Sunday, we were pretty much the only ones there. We made a cursory tour of the stables, slid down the slides whooping as loudly as we could, so that he'd feel the place was fun and lively, and then mustered the energy to leap over some kiddie-style horse jumps in the outside area with him. There were wasps everywhere which was making me nervous, as OH has a serious allergy but does not carry his epi pen with him. (I know!!) Then the one or two other visitors started to convene near the paddock for the 'bull ride'. We argued briefly as to weather Babe could go on alone, then agreed that he and OH should go on together. Just as well we did, as it bounced about all over the place. Babe loved it. I giggled a lot at the sight of a very cramped OH, knees about his ears, trying to control just how hard Babe bouced against his crotch.

We left, following some obligatory purchases in the gift shop: Babe, some mini aeroplanes, me some fudge - boy, did I need it, OH a horse brush (don't ask).

We arrived back home at about eleven thirty, every bit as exhausted as if we'd been out for the day. Which made the entry fee quite good value, I guess. Babe and New Babe were asleep in the car. So OH chilled on the sofa and I - well, I'll leave what I did up to your imaginations.

Homeland on the horizon

2009-08-25T07:15:00.000-07:00

It seems I have once again agreed to take our annual vacation in OH's homeland. How the F did I manage that? Especially after last year's protestations and this year's tantrums - in fact a decade of protestations and tantrums.

Thing is, I love the man, and realise that I was expecting something of him that I wouldn't have been prepared to agreed to myself. Plus I'm insanely tired and realised there wasn't a lot of sense in paying money we don't have to spend a week away together, having the 'family holiday' I aspired to, arguing over whose turn it was to sleep/chase Babe around the swimming pool. What's more, having lived abroad and feeling very comfortable in several European countries where one or the other of us knows the ropes and the language, I feel strangely insecure at the thought of going somewhere new. How very parochial!

So, in two weeks' time (I've bought the tickets, so let's hope I get New Babe's passport application processed in time, got an appointment tomorrow - eek!) we're flying off the Greek island that is a short boat ride away from his hometown. And to an insane number of fawning relatives. But hopefully, too, some simple excursions down to the sea front with aunties who will help with the kids while I dip in the ocean. Watch this space!

PS I'll be sleeping in the hotel opposite his home. That is my bottom line.
PPS Re para two and my comment about 'loving the man' etc: he was clearly not going to back down on this one anyway. I am going to take the pertinent move of buying cheap tickets for him and Babe to go to visit the family over the New Year as well, to avoid a month of argument that results in costly tickets. But for a week next May, the world will be my oyster :)

My son, the diplomat, part I

2009-08-22T01:33:00.000-07:00

We leave for our weekly jaunt to my active birth group reunion. The members live at diverse locations in our neck of the woods and it puts my driving skills to the test. I got my license relatively late and get very stressed about trying new routes. Today's involves using three motorways and I don't usually do motorways.

Once the car is packed and we're all strapped in, I turn the key in the ignition and call to the rear, 'is everyone ready for a new adventure?'.
New Babe cannot, of course, reply. But his elder brother responds at once:
'Yes! No more shouting or arguing, we're going to have a nice family time together!'

A quick one... or not. At all, that is.

2009-08-20T12:56:00.000-07:00

So, my mum has been to stay for a few days. Lovely to have some company and fantastic to have an extra pair of hands to help me through the day. Took Babe swimming this morning which was wonderful, despite the fact that he nearly froze and is constipated (see below) and therefore reluctant to embrace the full potential of his physicality. Incidentally, I dread to think what the temperature of the baby pool feels like in winter.

It's also been great to have someone to help with Babe when he wakes in the morning. I had a particularly bad night last night. New Babe is now 11 weeks old, and in the last week I've been getting him down by 8.30pm - 9.oopm. He has, on a couple of occasions, woken just once in the night to feed, but he's equally able to wake every three hours, which he did last night, starting at eleven - about an hour after I went to bed. For those of you who don't know, it is agony to be roused from little sleep from you are already exhausted.

Last night Babe woke about four times as well, and at pretty much equidistant intervals between new Babe waking: once for the potty - great (he's now slept without a nappy for three nights and been dry every night. I wonder if this is beginner's luck as he's just spent two entire days trying to poo and it has marred everything we've tried to do as he hasn't wanted to get off the potty); once for an apple he'd been dreaming about, which I had to pretend to try and find behind the bed, and twice because his head had come out from underneath the pillow (these days he can only sleep with it on his face. He's his mother's son all right - I'm a terrible sleeper. It took me twenty years to wean myself off the ear plugs I started wearing during my A levels. Not the same pair, of course, and I don't mean I started wearing them during the exams).

To cut a long story short, I woke up knackered. And because Granny was staying, Daddy was in Mummy's bed. So for once he was reminded of just how crap my nights are. But somehow I still ended up getting up to Babe as well, as I'm the one he calls out for and it is easier to go than withstand the shrieks he produces if his dad does, as I don't want new Babe woken if I can help it.

Having fed at 5am, got up to Babe at 6 and half 6, I was pleased when OH got up with him at 6.40. I say pleased, but I elbowed him in the ribs so hard he knew it wasn't up for discussion. At 7.15 I heard my mum get up, glad that I could stay horizontal while OH got ready to go to work. ASTOUNDED when, at 7.20, OH bounced up the stairs, into my (I don't say 'our' any more) room, stripped off, and jumped back into bed. He needed to leave for work in fifteen minutes.

'What the F are you doing?' I hissed, hearing new Babe stir in his cot and knowing he would wake soon. 'Don't you realise I need every last minute of rest I can get?'
'I thought we could spend five minutes being close together,' he replied.
New Babe started to cry.
'Close together?' I yelled. 'CLOSE together? Get out!', I continued, rolling out of bed and staggering over to the cot. 'If I didn't want to shag first thing before we had kids, what on earth makes you think I want to now?'

He didn't answer. He just looked, forlorn, at the monitor hanging on the wall next to me. The other end of which was on the sofa next to Granny and Babe. I groaned and put radio 4 on, so that I could be further depressed by the weather report and the 8am headlines. OH put on his orange casual trousers (yes, orange - bought at an East European street market and apparently very comfortable, but give him a matching sweatshirt and a broom and he'd pass for a street cleaner), I presume as a distraction. And walked downstairs very slowly.

More paving slab analagy

2009-08-16T10:49:00.000-07:00

Heck. I still have nothing either funny or interesting to say but must blog today, to preserve my self esteem and reputation as a woman to be relied upon. Hum.

Guess I could continue with the paving slab analagy: there are a few more similarities to share. I'm feeling worn at the corners, a bit cracked and somewhat heavy... In fact I weighed myself round at a friend's house last week and I am don't just feel heavy, I am heavy.

Everyone's been saying that I look like I've lost weight (well, two people have), so I said with confidence that I reckoned I was X stone. Was secretly thinking I was at least half a stone lighter, and would be able to feign delighted surprise, but as it happens I'm a whole stone heavier. Pistons and water tanks! Or whatever it is that Thomas says. Something has to be done. So I've added 'writing a diet plan' to my 'to do' list. Nearing the top is, 'write a three-week rotating food plan', which is followed by 'send Other Half on a cookery course', 'make a list of things to do before I'm 40', 'write a will' and 'list places it might be nice to move to'. Ha! I'm really getting into this being organised lark.

You may be wondering when I'm finding time to write this, as I still seem to be feeding new Babe until ten o'clock each night, when I just have to crash too. Well, I've got them both to sleep at the same time, would you believe?! (Other Half has gone out for some fresh mint so that I can make sauce to accompany the roast today, which I estimate will take him about two hours and he'll come from the shop down the road with either basil or oregano.)

Babe is in his buggy in the hall, and woke briefly a few minutes ago, and looked around, yelled 'I don't want to,' and then crashed out again. What a sweetie! New Babe is in the pram top. Upstairs. But that's a random boring detail I don't really need to share, except that I am obsessed with perambulators at present, since managing without a double buggy, when you've got two kids, limited access to a car and the weather is rubbish is not funny. I did buy a side by side model on ebay, which we had to drive some distance to collect. Unfortunately it won't fit through our front door and is now in the roof. Despite the fact that I discovered I could get it through the front door with two sleeping kids in it, by collapsing it a bit, as it is frankly just too heavy and unwieldy to use. I don't really like the 'one under, one over' models that cost £300 smakaroonies, especially as I'd have to haul a rucksack around with me or buy paniers that no doubt also cost an arm and a leg. Will keep you posted on this one, no doubt.

Potty training going really well again by the way. Last night Babe came and hung out with us for twenty minutes in the sitting room, before announcing casually that, 'there's a poo on the floor in the other room'. He's so helpful! Actually, I never guessed that potty training was going to cost us a fortune in Thomas locomotives, as we try and persuade him not to defacate in hidden corners or dark places that you'd only come upon by accident. Like under the seat of his ride-on digger. We're ending up with some really random trains as well - diesel10, for example - (what does he do, apart from have a slidey plastic thing on top that a toddler can try and pull off?).

Heigh ho. Better go and get my succulent quorn roast outta the freezer. Do any readers know of a tasty sauce I could knock up to accompany it? xx

To be, or not to be... a washing machine

2009-08-15T02:36:00.000-07:00

So there was I, knackered, with very little time on my hands, feeling about as witty and interesting as a slab of paving, and with a commitment to blogging twice per week but nothing to say. When the next little domestic issue springs on me.

I have had no working washing machine for ten days. I realised there was a problem with the rinse cycle - 'it's almost as if the water isn't entering the machine' - as I explained to Other Half, as the washing was clean, but hot, and still a bit soapy, when I opened the door. For a few days I managed, by rinsing off washing in the bath, then returning it to the machine to spin. But the number of smalls - baby clothes, and more Thomas and Bob the Builder underpants than I thought conceivable when I started potty training - (incidentally, I've spent more on underwear for my toddler in the last three weeks than I've spent on myself in the last three years. But Other Half never notices it in his eagerness to get it off, so why bother?) made this an arduous and time-consuming task.

Thing is, I was deliberating over whether I should find someone to come and fix the washing machine, rather than just buying a new one, this being the environmentally-friendly option. But the time and energy involved... and what would it cost? What to do?!

After a few days, Other Half looked at it, cleaned the filter etc, and said he didn't know what was wrong. So the next day, I used a couple of my precious 'toddler at nursery' hours to walk in the rain with the pram to a place that sells dented fridges and the like, to see if they had something cheap that would suit us better. They didn't - well, they might have, but there's no way I'm buying a machine without a manual as I'm not instinctively good at working out how things function, and OH is worse. So we went hurriedly to a well known outlet in OH's lunch break and I picked a new washing machine in the approximately four minutes I had available.

He went to collect it after work and brought it home. I smiled at him affectionately through the front window as I knew he was tired and hadn't stopped all day. We agreed that he'd remove the old one before bringing the new one in, as we haven't got much space.

Some minutes later he emerged from the utility room.
'Viola!' he called. 'I've worked out why the old one wasn't working! I'd turned off the cold water supply to stop the sink tap leaking!'
I looked at him with an expression he quickly recognised on my face. And I didn't say anything except, 'So you better return that one right now then, hadn't you?'
I then spent another hour and a half on my own with both kids while he did.

We had to go back together the next evening, as we could only get the refund put on my card, and as it happens our fridge freezer has given up the ghost after a twenty year innings and we thought we'd pick a new one. We gave ourselves four and a half minutes for this. Which is how long it took Babe to poo himself and then wee against a 15-inch flat screen TV. I'm ashamed to say that we dragged him away without 'fessing up. The one time I leave the potty in the car...

But next week a lovely new fridge-freezer is being delivered, and I am happily half-way through about fifteen loads of washing, using the old machine. And our downstairs sink now has no cold water tap as I needed it to hit OH over the head with. Actually, the hitting bit was in my dreams, but you get the gist. What's more, OH has persuaded our neighbours to take our old fridge-freezer, as he cannot get through the day without carrying out numerous acts of apparent kindness, despite the fact that he hasn't warned them it is crap, and the well-known outlet will remove and recycle it for free. Whatever... I'll have to visit them on Monday and explain the situ. But hey, I've got time on my hands, haven't I?

Long time, no see

2009-08-03T03:33:00.000-07:00

Apologies for the delay in updating my blog. As most of you know, I discovered I was pregnant when on holiday in Albania last September. Joy :)

But this was followed by nearly four months of appalling sickness and shivers, and then various other pregnancy ailments and I just couldn't do anything in the evenings except groan and crash once we'd got Babe into bed. I've kept a pregnancy diary to remind me how awful it was and put me off having any more kids. I'd always wanted a brood, but I just don't do pregnancy at all well.

Having said that, the birth was fine - see entry below, and our new arrival, another little boy chicken, is gorgeous, squidgy, sleepy and gurgley. I don't feel much more tired than I did when pregnant, despite night feeds and Babe being a little pain in the ar*e, quite frankly, in the sleep department, and knowing I'm not going to get any rest from the time Babe goes up til he goes down means that I'm in a psychologically much better position than I was first time round. Plus I know what I'm doing and I've got the kit :). And I haven't aged the way I felt I did with Babe, not the same aches and pains and immediate wrinkles. So, as for a third sprog, well, I'm not saying this to Other Half, but never say never...

I'm now working on getting my health and fitness back. Bollocks, am I! But I intend to. And have some career plans at last, that I may share at some point once I've started the training. And we're working on a plan for writing a plan for thinking about moving house and maybe upgrading our car at some point! The excitement! Before long I'll have a life map in post-its on the bathroom wall again. Other Half has banned marker pens which I think is reasonable.

BUT our immediate dilemna and source of perennial friction, as you know, is: where to go on holiday when we have a new-born, nay cash, and a horrible bunch of relatives you know where.
And that, combined with potty-training and another shitty British summer, is frustrating me enough to need to re-open this blog.

So, from next week, you can expect to see two updates per week. Lucky readers :)

‘It’s a beautiful day!’

2009-08-01T08:39:00.001-07:00

The day my second son started his way into this world was perfect. A beautiful June day – Monday June 1, one of my due dates in fact (the other was 3 June; two dates because the midwives couldn’t agree on a date following my dating scan!). It was warm and sunny, with a gentle breeze.

I had finished work four weeks earlier and worked myself into a sweat, panicking that this baby would come early, as his brother had, and that I was physically and mentally unprepared. As my due dates approached and nothing happened, it occurred to me that he might not be early at all. Indeed, he might be late! Then I started worrying about the cycle of intervention that might start, and which I was keen to avoid, if he didn’t start heading our way before long.

It was hard to imagine that any time soon I’d be holding a baby in my arms, he seemed so comfortably ensconced in my belly. Shame that I couldn’t just relax and enjoy having some time off work, with Babe in nursery part-time, ahead of the next arrival. But there was a lot to do; I was feeling pretty awful, and to be honest it’s quite surreal waiting for the second most momentous moment of one’s life to take place, and wondering when exactly it will be.

On the Sunday night I’d spoken to a good friend of mine, whose parting reflection was that she thought due dates are given for a reason and are often accurate. I went to bed hoping she was right. During the night I had one brief and slightly painful twinge, and wondered if things were starting.

Once Other Half had dropped Babe at nursery on the Monday morning, I set about pottering – despite the best of intentions to rest, as I hadn’t been sleeping well for some time and knew I needed to relax when I could.

I was watering some plants in the garden when I realised something was going on down below. I’d had a bit of a ‘show’ and was overjoyed and really excited. It meant things were happening, and bang on time. The anxious speculation could end!

Babe had been born six days after a show, so I didn’t expect things to start happening right away. I went and had a shower, cooked some food, and tidied round a bit, making sure my hospital bag was ready, etc. To be honest the bag had been ready for at least a fortnight. I am pretty anal in the organization department and after some initial panicking when I finished work, had got the house up together very fast. Ordered kitchen blinds, headrests for beds, you name it…! The only stuff that hadn’t been done was the long list of DIY tasks that Other Half had failed to complete, despite promises to the contrary.

During the course of the morning I had what felt like menstrual aches and pains, which I knew were a sign of early labour, and which hadn’t started straight away like this after the show with Babe. I had some lunch and laid down on the sofa to have a rest. The sun was pouring onto the rug through the grape vines we have outside our sitting room doors, and I felt really warm, relaxed and comfortable. Put on Monsoon Wedding, but couldn’t concentrate, so switched to TV and fell asleep for an hour. When I woke, the pains had gone – I guess as I’d been on my side and weight was thus off my cervix.

Other Half collected Babe from nursery at five and brought him home. I said I’d get him into bed, and that if OH wanted to go to the gym or whatever, to go early, just in case things kicked off. I’d spoken to my mum during the day, to warn her that things might get moving soon, as I wanted her with me during the birth and she had to get up from Dorset. I’d spoken to my younger brother as well, as the plan was for him to come round and look after Babe when I went into hospital.

My low platelet count means that I was to go into hospital as soon as labour started, so that they could test my level and give me a transfusion if required. But because my first labour had lasted four long days, I didn’t want to rush in until I was sure labour had actually started. I was also secretly worried that the reason I coped without pain relief the first time round was because I’d had so long to get used to it, and that I’d be screaming for an epidural hours into this one. Low platelets means that I’d need a transfusion in order to be given an epidural, so there were potential stresses ahead…

Babe had a snack and we played games and then I got him in the bath. I was getting intermittent pains by now (about 7pm – every 15 minutes or so?) but assumed it was just the start of a long process and didn’t pay them much attention. At half seven I called mum and we agreed that she’d come up in the morning, as I was pretty sure the pains would die down once I went to bed and laid down.

I started to feel pretty grumpy getting Babe dried and dressed, and while I was reading him his bedtime stories I had to lie against the side of the bed, stop reading and breathe long exhales during the contractions (although I was not yet admitting these are what they were) which were pretty painful. I was running out of patience and let Babe read to himself while I found the tens machine and laid out the wires etc on the sofa. Was beginning to wonder where the hell Other Half was, when he got back. He had been to a well known supermarket to buy… several pots of jam. The mind boggles.

‘Get Babe into bed’, I gasped. ‘Then help me get this bloody thing on!’
God know how he did get Babe down, as the little fella knew something was going on.

As OH came downstairs I stripped to my underwear and passed him a camera. I think he hoped we were going to try some of the rubbing and smooching recommended by my spiritual midwives book. ‘We haven’t got any pics of me pregnant,’ I said, and stepped out onto the decking for him to take some 360 degree shots. Then he stuck the tens on me and I got dressed.

‘Is your mum on her way?’ he asked.
‘No,’ I said, ‘I think this is going to wear off, so she’s coming in the morning.’
‘Are you mad?’ he replied. ‘Get her here, now!’
So I called. ‘Mum, this might be a false alarm,’ I said, ‘and I really don’t want to mess you around, but it might be as well if you come up tonight.’
‘Fine’, she replied. I then called my brother and arranged for Other Half to come and pick him up after work – about ten pm. It was now about half nine.

I walked through the kitchen to the loo. Other Half was eating.
‘This is going to be bad, effing bad,’ I said. ‘Shit, shit, shit.’ If this is what pre-labour is like, I was thinking, how the hell am I going to cope with the real thing?

I called the hospital and they said I should come in, to be on the safe side. I had to pause on the phone when I was contracting, but thanks to the breathing techniques I learnt in active birth classes I was coping fine. The sister in charge who had taken the call later said that she’d thought I was going to be a fast one!

I waited half an hour - God knows why, what was I thinking? - before calling my brother and asking him to get here asap. I think the pain must have intensified, but more likely, the contractions were coming at about every 4 – 5 minutes by then, so I knew that I should get into hospital, even if I was managing the pain.

I got Other Half to pack the car. Brother arrived at about half ten, and between contractions I told him there were pizzas in the freezer and that mum was coming etc.

We set off. The roads were clear and it wasn’t far. I had two contractions en route that it was fairly hard to deal with, sitting down in the front. So I twisted round and stuck my bum towards the front window.
‘Get me there before I have another one,’ I seem to remember pleading.

When I arrived at the delivery suite, I was asked to wait for a few minutes, and then shown to a room. ‘I’m not sure whether to bring my bags in or not,’ I said, ‘As I might be asked to go home.’
‘The midwife will have to decide that,’ the woman who had met me said, and led me to a room. Quite spacious, and a window! We had joked at active birth classes about not wanting to get one of the rooms that don’t have any natural light.

I think I was in there alone about twenty minutes. In that time I told Other Half to get the bags; we put the mattress and ball on the floor, and I took my socks, shoes and trousers off. Think I realised I’d be staying! The mattress, by the way, was a thin, self-inflating camping mattress. I left the stoppers out so that I wouldn’t burst it and would totally recommend it. It gave me a large clean space that was soft underfoot/knees to move around on.

When the midwife came in, I was coming out of the loo, with an ‘I’m having a contraction’ look on my face that probably wasn’t very welcoming as she introduced herself to me. I took to her immediately and was hugely relieved. She seemed to know what I wanted and needed, and I felt I could lean on her, both literally and metaphorically.

It gets a bit hazy from here – First Babe’s birth is still clearer in my mind than this one! She took blood from me, and I think checked my blood pressure etc and the baby’s heart beat (which was a bit fast, so had to be monitored, around my tummy. This didn’t cause me any problems as I standing all the time and not needing lots of room) before she looked to see how dilated I was. That check was at 11.40, and I was fully prepared for her to say I was only two cm gone. But I was six! I felt hugely relieved, and that I was in really safe hands.

At some point I started putting my arms around the midwife’s neck during contractions (OH was like rock and didn’t know what to do), but didn’t put much weight on her. I really focused on blowing out a long exhale, pushing the weight through my feet, circling my pelvis, dropping my shoulders, shaking my hands, and lifting my face up. Really tried to relax, smile, feel excitement and joy. Which doesn’t mean I didn’t mutter ‘help me!’ at the start of each contraction, but I knew that I had to keep calm, in control and enjoy the experience as much as I could to endure it. I wouldn’t say I entered a ‘zone’. I was pretty compus mentus between contractions, managing the situation. Not especially hot, but quite thirsty as the blowing was making my throat dry. Was I coping? (as our active birth teacher encouraged us to ask ourselves). Yes, I was.

My mum arrived at about 12. I cried something about not feeling ready and she misunderstood. I was meaning metaphorically, not literally. She pointed out that I still had four cm to go and that it would probably be a while yet anyway. I could see in the midwife’s face that she didn’t agree and that was hugely comforting. She must have been noticing my contractions speeding up and getting longer, and after a while asked if I wanted to give birth where I was, standing by the bed.
It didn’t seem real to me, that I was going to have the baby so soon. I was pleased, confused, shocked I think. I was very happy not to be told to get on to the bed, as I had been with Babe, and said that yes, I did, if I could. The midwife spread some plastic pads down, ‘to save my mattress’, and said she was asking them to bring in a resuscitator, which was normal practice. It was really good to have these things explained so that I didn’t panic.

[A while earlier, but after mum came, a man (the anesthetist?) had arrived to cannulate me for the platelets. Getting the pipe in my arm took a couple of shots as I was moving during contractions. It wasn’t very pleasant and I felt he was a bit ham-fisted if I’m honest, but that’s a minor detail, can’t have been easy for him.]

Not long after this, the midwife told Other Half that she and he were going to have to swap places while she put her gloves on. They did. I think around this time, maybe a bit before, I’d said I had a ‘needing to poo’ feeling (although I’d felt a bit like that since before I left the house), and she told me not to push, but breathe through it. ‘That’s the baby,’ she said. I can’t remember when she said it was ok to push – how did she know when it was ok? - but when she did, I wanted to break my waters. I bore down hard and they sloshed onto the floor, breaking all over OH’s lower legs and he shot backwards. He must have had a premonition as the only thing he’d put in the birth bag was a pair of toweling socks! Other stuff slopped onto the ground as well – the poo feeling wasn’t just the baby… That was about 00.35.

I think the midwife then asked if I’d like to get onto all fours to make things easier, and I wasn’t sure if I could move, but tried, and did. The sister-in-charge was with us by this time. With a huge push I got the baby’s head out – and a hand, against his ear. After a few minutes (?) seconds (?), I had to get the body out. I think they told me I was going to have to push really hard. With another mammoth push I got the body out – I could feel it passing through my cervix and leaving me. I think I remember some burning from when the head crowned, I can’t say what I was feeling was pain – but it must have been - so much as something that required tumultuous effort and concentration on my part to deal with. I was roaring – a low guttural ‘god this is hard’ sound. Vaguely aware that it might be disturbing to anyone who could hear it, but it wasn’t fearful or out of control, just the noise of someone working very hard. I was almost afraid I was going to lose my back package altogether, the feeling in that region was so intense, but amazingly I didn’t tear at all.

OH through this time was amazingly lovely and encouraging, and the physical support I needed. Think I was leaning on him now, so he must have been taking a lot of weight. He sure saves up his compliments for when I need them most.

The pushing was done in about ten minutes – just two big pushes I think. Huge relief! And delight that it had been so straightforward and manageable. Thank god that the midwife read me, understood what I wanted and needed, and handled everything so well. Time of birth was 00.45. The baby was smaller than Babe, at 7.9 (3.44) despite the fact that I’d been told to expect a big baby, and an additional scan had shown he was a month ahead, size-wise.

The baby was a bit a quiet and shocked when born. I asked for him to be handed to dad – I didn’t feel ready to take him. They must have cut the cord before that – I don’t remember them inviting OH to do it, and I don’t remember it happening. I was given the injection to remove the placenta.

At some point during labour my platelet count had come back at 28 – ie under 30, so the medical plan stated that I should be given a transfusion - and I remember asking where the platelets were some time after that – the response being that they were in a taxi. So, once the baby was born, the midwives wanted to get the placenta out, and the platelets, which had arrived, in. I was a bit surprised that they still wanted to give them to me, but as I say, we still had to get the placenta out. It must have been stressful for them, knowing I should have had the platelets before delivery, when they hadn’t arrived. When I reflected further on this, it seemed pretty shocking that they hadn’t had platelets on hand to give me, and I am following this up with the hematology department. I had a detailed medical plan that went pear-shaped at the last minute. But wasn’t helped by me not getting in to hospital sooner.

I tried to turn on the mats and lean back against mum, but was worried about putting my weight on her, so she took the baby and OH knelt behind me. This still wasn’t working, so I got up on the bed, and before long, and after a couple of checks/attempts, the placenta came out. Think it hurt a bit – my back passage area felt shot away! Once other stuff had been done, the midwife showed me the cord and placenta. It had been whipped away from me when I gave birth to Babe, and my birth plan for number two included wanting to say goodbye to it!

Babe was handed to me soon after, and took straight to the breast. Some time later we had a cup of tea, reveling in how fast and straightforward everything had been. I felt fine, excited, happy, a bit dazed. I didn’t feel the rush of intoxicating emotions I had with Babe, but felt calm and sure that everything was going to be all right. It felt strange to be feeling so normal when something so amazing had just taken place. I don’t think I could have had a simpler or more straightforward labour. The midwife said it was textbook and that I’d done really well.

I know I did do really well. Giving birth (twice, now) has made me feel the most incredibly powerful, strong and resilient person. I feel validated in a way that I never had before. I know I can more than cope in difficult circumstances. Millions of women give birth every day, I know, and many with no medical assistance. Millions more people struggle with other hardships I’ve never had to face. I’m not suggesting that I’m an incredible person! But in giving birth I came up close and personal with someone I’ve been afraid to look straight in the eye all my life. And I like what I saw.

Having said that, three reflections: I will never forget the midwife who helped me deliver my second son. She was wonderful, and I know my labour might not have been the same had I not been in her hands. You can’t put a price on that connection, which gives you reassurance and confidence when you need it most. And my active birth teacher – had it not been for the knowledge she shared with me, and the wonderful, inimitable way she shared that knowledge, I wouldn’t have known how to deal with labour, and I needed help. She will always be part of who I am, and I’ll always think of her on my sons’ birthdays. And thanks, too, to the old friend from home, whom I re-discovered when I was pregnant with Babe, and who suggested that I go to active birth classes. Do all things happen for a reason?

Egg timers and suchlike

2008-10-30T11:29:00.001-07:00

So, it’s been a while, guys, hasn’t it? Sorry.

Babe came down with foot and mouth when we got back from holiday. Well, the nurse at NHS direct said it wasn’t actually, but the spots on his mouth, soles and palms were exactly like the ones I found on the web (so to speak), and he really wasn’t very well. So as far as I’m concerned, that’s what he had – especially as I know there have been one or two outbreaks at nursery recently. Nice.

I am writing this against the clock, as Other Half has taken Babe off while I cook the tea, to find me a hot water bottle. God knows how I lost the two I had, but I have, and I am freezing. In fact I have been ill and shivery for nearly a fortnight, and going to bed very early every night. Hence the absence of blogging. Now Other Half is feeling ill and acting as though he’s on death’s door, despite absence of temperature and ability to go to gym for ‘medicinal sauna’ and watch TV ‘til the early hours each night.

Why are most men so utterly crap when they’re ill? It’s like they’re goading you into telling them they are annoying, useless idiots so that they can slink off with the hump and end up watching TV in bed. Grrrrrrr, I don’t know. (Any men reading who feel annoyed by this, please search deep into your innermost beings and then tell me, hand on heart, that it’s not true.)

Now Babe is unwell again too. It’s all go. Incidentally, my sister gave me a ‘bloggers egg-timer’ for my birthday, to help encourage me to write more often and limit how long I spend on it.

So, what of import do I have to share with you? Precious little actually. I have, as usual, been questioning my life’s path and the obvious mistakes I have made. I’ve been having quite a lot of anxiety dreams about work, including one particularly nasty one in which I was back at Uni – in Italy, for some reason, thinking I should jack it all in and start afresh, studying law as my mum had wanted me to. I woke with an exhausted groan, wondering where and how I should start, before I realised that I am a wife and mother with Responsibilities, and a career path that has not been without direction if not hugely successful.

A very dear friend and honorary sister (we both consider ourselves honoured) has moved from working as a volunteer supervised by me, to writing GB’s answers for PM’s question time. So, suffice to say that news of this has urged me to once again consider what I am doing with my skills and talents, and wonder in what new and exciting direction I and my appendages could move.

The construction industry has frozen up and Other Half has not worked since we got back from holiday. He can’t find anything at all, and to say we are stressed about money would be an understatement. Given the fact that I feel nothing short of a red hot poker is going to get me making a career move, that some unhappy decisions are making me feel unhappy at work, the fact that Other Half is without work, and the fact that I am so unbelievably bloody cold, I am wondering if we should rent out our house and move to Greece, where it’s easier to live in poverty and one can at least stay warm. Although I fear that if I left the UK job market, I wouldn’t know how to return to it. There are plenty of people half my age at work who could do my job much better than I can. Motherhood has robbed me of so much more grey matter than I care to admit.

I am in the meantime, considering becoming one of those people who lead humanist funerals, on the advice of another dear friend whose opinions I admire and respect. Incidentally, these references to ‘dear’ friends must be quite annoying, but I feel that in these days of meaningless Facebook friendships, I need to draw some distinctions in the terminology I’m using.

So, while you all smile at the thought, or groan, or whatever, I am going to google that very thing, for more info, before the men in my life (god, I wish there were a few more) return.

Mad cows and Albanianmen

2008-10-16T00:35:00.000-07:00

Apologies for not sticking to my 'two posts per week' promise lately. As you might have guessed, our holiday got pretty hairy, and Babe has had mad cow disease since we got back.

When I left you last, I was hoping that our car would be fixed when I got home. It nearly was, but we didn't know this, we were just worried sick as Other Half had left the house three hours earlier with a restless Babe and not yet returned. So his mum - who can barely walk and stops every three paces and jolts backwards, arching and pawing at her spine and gasping for breath - grabbed me by the arm, put her best jacket on and grabbed her huge, black, patent (and empty) handbag, and announced that we were going to look for him. She had an idea that if we walked up a particular road far enough, we would find him.

I didn't have the energy to refuse, so off we set. You can imagine what we looked like. I'm sure her grimaces and stretches were particularly exaggerated that day, so that she could explain to the many onlookers that the blonde with her was her English daughter-in-law. And add the entire story of our holiday so far that lead us to be walking up the road we were. And then ask at the end if anyone knew of a mechanic.

It wasn't filling me with confidence, I have to say, but eventually we did arrive at the top, and there was our car. Result! I understood the mechanic to say that Other Half had left half an hour earlier, but that the car was now ready for me to drive home. Bravo! Before I had time to explain that I hadn't actually driven on the right before and wasn't familiar with the one-way system and that I'm not really a confident driver, my mother-in-law had jumped in. Whatever. I joined her and started the car up. Three wrong turns and two jumped sets of red lights and a lot of shouting later, we arrived home, triumphant! And beeped the horn a lot :).

The next day we went off on our own to Other Half's dad's hometown. Not a day too soon. Saturday was spent with more family members who'd arrived to see us. And that evening, Other Half drove off to the border (the nearer crossing, to see where it was) to collect two nephews that wanted to see Babe.

I knew when he drove off, that something would go wrong. He got back close to midnight, the clutch having played up again, and he'd had to drive for two hours in second gear. It was supposedly fixed on the Sunday (by same mechanic - I forgot to mention that his breath stank of alcohol). And went again on the Monday. On the Wednesday, he re-fitted the old cylinder, saying that the new one was too small. For Pete's sake! (I am trying to reduce the number of expletives I use.)

He invited me to wait in his home and see some technical documents of car engines that his grandfather had drawn. (That 'honourary man' thing was kicking in again...) I embarrassed Other Half by saying in very basic Albanian: 'Look. I am not happy. I now have three clutch cylinders and the two new ones it seems I don't need. You told me to buy them. Now I have no money. I have a long journey ahead of me, to endure with a small child and a moron. This has not been a holiday, it has been a trip into hell. I beg you to fix my car now and I will send you a full set of Manchester United T-shirts when I return to my homeland.'
He got the drift and the car has got us home, but I dread to think what the service it is due will reveal.

We left on the Friday. I won't bore you with the intermittent detail. It includes a few happy hours on the beach, too much socialising with family members, and I spent four nights alone in a hotel across the road which was sheer bliss. I think we were all ready to leave, and I think the family were glad to see the back of me. Other Half said I had been a total pain in the arse, as usual. I think I did well to survive.

The journey home was 'seat of your pants' style - as is it tends to be, when Other Half is involved. Driving to the Greek border at dawn was incredibly beautiful though - through tiny villages, the scent of wild tea, thyme and origano in the air, and you even have to use a raft to cross a river at one point. Then we were hurtling along Greek roads - I've always thought of Greece as the back of beyond, but by comparison, it's like entering the gardens at Buckingham Palace. We joined the queue for the ferry to Venice with 20 mins to spare, but were told as we handed our tickets over to board, that we needed to drive back to the terminal building as we hadn't reserved our cabin. More sodding charges later, we ended up with a lovely cabin at the very front of the ship. In fact the captain called me at night-fall, asking me to close the curtains, so it seems we weren't the only ones with a good view.

The drive back was hell - although we did stop at Lake Como for lunch which was nice. And saw our friends in Switzerland which was wonderful but too brief, and before we knew it we were home again. And despite my fears, the trip does come highly recommended. If nothing else, because it felt like we were away for months, and boy, was I glad to get back...

More soon, on Babe. He's fine ;)

"Sh*t happens"

2008-09-25T02:09:00.000-07:00

..So a friend of Other Half's said yesterday, as he put a huge fish he'd caught that morning on the grill and opened a bottle of wine. We were sat under the awning outside the bar he's built in their home town.

I suppose he's right. And things could be worse. We could be seriously injured or dead. God, I wish I had a babysitter and little pile of spliffs with me.

I am losing track of the days, but Tuesday I think it was, that we spent in a whirl of maddeningly unclear conversations and confusion. The mechanic (a friend of one of Other Half's brothers) had told us the parts we required. Which I now know are the clutch cyclinder and 'the bit that goes underneath it, which is not broken but might break...' ???. An apparently reliable parts dealer told us this was not available in Albania so I found myself on the phone to a VW dealer in Corfu who told me said parts are not available in Greece either, as diesel golfs are rare there, and that they would have to be imported from Germany. This would take ten days, so we'd be lucky to get the car fixed before we had to leave to go home, and that depends on the borders being open again, as they are still closed to vehicles.

My euphoria at finding a solution, albeit a shitty bloddy solution, was dampened when the guy on Corfu then said he needed a cash deposit to order the parts. Bumpkin! So we then had to make another load of phone calls to find a relative (a nephew of Other Half's) who had to leave work to find the village and the shop and pay said deposit so that parts were safely ordered. Phew!

Older brother then gets back and says he's found the parts in Albania. What the f*ck?!! He had gone to a parts shop three minutes from the family home, and the owner had looked up the part in a catalogue, phoned Tirana, ordered it and it arrived last night. We went to collect it (he said we don't need the other part that was 'nearly broken' so I hope he is right, and wasn't covering up the fact that he'd forgotten to order both) and as I write, Other Half is with the mechanic, getting the car well again, I hope. I'll believe it when I see it and am resigned to the awful journey being the best part of this holiday, as long as we get back on the road somehow or other.

In the meantime, I am trying to get back on track, behaviour-wise, and hiding my irritation and frustration with being stuck in family home with a truculent Babe who has had enough of being poked and prodded and smothered in kisses by people he cannot understand. Two neices are staying with us who speak English and he loves playing with them, but he has definitely had enough of the rest of the crowd. As, frankly, have I. It took Auntie Eleni (who is a bit of a wild cat herself) less than an hour to teach him to pummel her with his fists, bite her (on the bum, so god knows what she was doing with him) and stab her with a fork. He can't stand the food, and ate nothing until yesterday when I took charge of the chaotic kitchen and made him chips. Getting him to bed at night amist the noise and excitment is near impossible, as is keeping him occupied in our room from 6am while the bodies strewn about the place lie in until ten-ish.

Gah! On the sunny side, they say that a change is as good as a break and I'm getting that, in spades.

And Saranda is a place of character and a certain beauty. Walking around is like being on some weird kind of demolition site, with huge concrete edifices in varying stages of completion towering above you everywhichway you turn. In between them are decaying old buildings, some with semi-wrecked entrances and street-level rooms full of rubbbish, but with upper-floor flats fitted out with air conditioning and brand new double-glazed windows and doors.

The seafront is a short walk from the family home and it is lovely to be by the water, although the beaches are litter-strewn and stony and I'm not sure how clean the water here is. The first two days were sunny, and I took Babe down and let him paddle. He is not afraid of the water at all and wanted to pull his clothes off and splash around.

Also on the sea front is a very old merry-go-round. It is, I think, from the USA, but instructions on the vehicles are in French - so Canadian maybe? It is an amazing piece of social history - hand painted images of men carrying out agrictultural tasks surround the outside of the top, and the vehicles include a tank (!), Harley Davison-type bikes - complete with leather saddles, an amazing fire engine, an old flying Mickey Mouse, a weird pig and a lion... It has bits that would have lifted and spun in the old days - I suspect it arrived here second-hand, and may try and find out more - and these days would fail to comply with health and safety regulations on many counts. Babe loves it, especially when his dad rolls his sleeves up and manages to push it around.

So we are having some happy moments amidst the chaos, and who knows, when I head back home now, there may be some happy news about the car awaiting me.

More soon! Miropafshim!

Strange but true

2008-09-22T09:40:00.001-07:00

In case any of you are doubting the integrity of the last entry, sadly it is all true.

Clutching the cold night air

2008-09-22T08:46:00.001-07:00

SO! I was hoping to regale you with happy stories in this blog entry, as intimated by the tone of my last Facebook status update.

Stories about how, despite setting off late after Other Half insisted on giving the car a quite unnecessary clean that took three hours on Friday afternoon, I didn't threaten him with murder over it; about how we argued about taking the buggy and I won and we squeezed it in, again without losing our cool completely; about how he drove like a Trojan from Calais to Venice, stopping briefly just twice, through the night, and caught our ferry with twenty minutes to spare, and then ate our evening meal as we floated past the sun-soaked old city...

Boy oh boy, teamwork of the utmost was required and we made it, with no arguments whatsoever. We nearly lost the plot around Basel, missing Germany by inches and only hitting Switzerland thanks to my linguistic prowess (all signs in German and no English) and a well-timed swerve by Other Half. Switzerland was a dizzy swirl of mountains, waterfalls and tunnels and quite overwhelming. Italy was beautiful - Lake Como, Verona and gorgeous fields of corn but marred by drivers who frankly take possesion of the road they way they do a football and it was a disconcerting experience.

Babe was amazing. Slept through the night, and was as good as gold- given that he woke in his seat at 6am and we didn't arrive at the port until 4.30 pm. I am in awe of his patient and sunny nature. The ferry journey was wonderful - nice cabin, and we slept like logs and ate well, and took turns sunning ourselves on the desk as we wafted past the countries that touch the Adriatic Sea.

All was very well, in fact, until we arrived at the Greek port of Igoumenitsa. The last leg of the journey was the part I had made the mistake of assuming Other Half would look after. But as we drove off (after pissing everyone off for forgetting on which deck our car was left- but then we'd had to grab a couple of bags and scramble when we parked it in the ship in Venice as it was leaving) and Other Half took the first sign for Ioannia and ignored my suggestion that we stop and ask for directions (to a new border crossing that has opened, that would put just 40 mins between the ship and his home town), I had a bad feeling in my bones. Twenty minutes later we were asking an old guy and his donkey for directions, ten minutes later we had phoned one of his brothers (Other Half's, not the old guy with the donkey's), ten more minutes later we were returning to where we started, ten more minutes later we were heading for the new crossing, ten more minutes later we were heading back up the road we had started out on, because brother had called back saying he thought it crossing closed at 8.30pm and it was already a quarter to nine.

Which is why we found outselves at a border crossing called Kakavia at about 11pm, after an extremely stressful and tedious journey through mountainous northern Greece, which consists of long winding and narrow roads, and junctions which say the place you're going to requires both a left and a right turn. All not-at-all fun in conditons of extreme darkness, which is what mountainous and unpopulated areas are like on moonless nights.

We were both dead nervous about crossing the border. The Greeks make your life hell if you're an Albanian, or interested in going to Albania, and I was steeling myself for some kind of horrendous body search, or a prolonged interrogation that would leave Babe in tears. Other Half was dreading the Albanian side, and the random taxes our visit might result in.

But we were in luck - The Greeks simply commented that we were lucky to have arrived that day (yesterday) because they're on strike from today for an in definite period of time during which it will be imposible to return home. So if I'm not back at work on 6 October, that might be why. On the Albanian side we were charged the grand sum of one Euro each and that was it, we were on our way.

Once we'd reached the crossing where signs for Other Half's home town started, I called Other Half's brother, to tell him we were safely homeward bound. As I picked up the phone five minutes later, to tell his parents we were nearly there, a pack of wild dogs crossed the road, and we commented on what a dark and cold night it was. And fairly bleak and deserted; not much in the way of settlements. Then there was a clunk, Other Half said, 'oh my God', and we ground to a halt.
'What is it?' I said.
'Look,' he replied.
The clutch pedal had popped off, and part of it was on the floor by his feet.
'Fuck my old boots,' is what I'm afraid I said.
'Don't start!' he said. And Babe woke up.

Thank God my phone had signal, as these are the kind of roads that have two cars pass along per night. I got his sister.
'Margarita,' I said. 'This is Viola. We have a serious problem! Please get in a taxi and drive to the border road. We're about an hour away, the car is buggered and the baby is hungry. We have money, please come now.'
'Yes,' she said.
I saw a car approaching from behind, and got out fast and made star jumps in front of our headlights. It carried on.
Then we started flinging all the travel debris from our initial journey into bags, as we knew we had to be ready to empty the car completely if we got help, as we couldn't risk leaving it with stuff in it. I could see my breath, it was freezing. We then started to discuss the possibility of Other Half staying in the car, to protect it. Not a nice thought. Babe, meanwhile, sat in the passenger seat, wrapped in a blanket, playing with his bear. What an angel!

Not long after, a jeep drove by and stopped. They were headed for the same destination as us, and took Piers and I without question. They had no English and my Albanian is dire, but their little girl was two and called Stacey, you may be interested to know. And had been throwing up all day, so I hope we haven't caught a nasty bug from her. I feel dodgy but it's probably stress. The driver also gave our car a shove, and Other half managed to coast downhill for about fifteen minutes ahead of us. At which point Margarita appeared, bless her, with a neighbour who towed us home. Blinking heck. We arrived at about 1am, not at all in the style in which Other Half had imagined.

Today was spent looking for a mechanic who is trying to track down the parts we need, which are probably only available in Greece - and the borders are closed! Which leaves us stuck in the family home, and no way of getting around. And pretty much all our spending money already gone. Luckily I have some plastic with me.

Bloody hell. I am taking this amazingly well, I think. Keep me in your thoughts.

Internet cafe playing awful music. I am so outta here.

I had a dream

2008-09-15T00:24:00.000-07:00

I must tell you about the dream I had last night.

I was on the road in London where the HQ of the charity I work for is based, with my mum and sister. We needed the loo, and decided to use the extensive public facility attached to a huge Peacocks retail outlet that is not located there. On entry, there was a large room to the right, and one to the left. They were both filthy. Rubbish and loo roll all over the floor, grotty dirty basins and WCs, and very smelly. While I was on the loo, a giggling French girl harangued me through the window in the door (?!) crying because she was desperate to use it. Hum!

After washing my hands, I walked to the centre of each room in turn, and yelled very loudly (I am known among friends and family for making complaints and a fuss about things I’m not happy with. I fear men would describe me as a Ball Breaker),
‘Can everyone in the loos and queue please complain to the management about these toilets. They are a disgrace, and unless we complain, nothing will be done about them.’

I then went off in search of the Management’s office. It was a bit like a ticket booth at the train station. I asked the woman at the window if I could speak to said Management. She looked at me (I think my face spelt Trouble) and said ‘Yes, I’ll just get her for you.’ Another woman appeared at the window and I asked if we could have a meeting. She came outside.

I was expecting a battle. ‘Your toilets are disgusting!’ I said. ‘No-one should have to use them. Will you come with me and see what I mean?’
‘Yes, alright then,’ she smiled, and off we went.

On entering, she looked around. ‘Hum. Yes,’ she said. ‘You’re right, they’re awful. I can’t believe no-one has said anything before now.’ Before I could interject and quiz her on how frequently she takes a tour of her empire, she had called over one of the cleaners (who wasn’t there before, may I add, and who was wearing a cook’s hat) and said,
‘Beryl, when will Tom and Jack be finished on the dining room project?’
‘Today, I think.’
‘Great, that leaves tomorrow and Friday to give this place a proper clean and lick of yellow paint. What am I doing for the rest of this week?’ It seems the cleaner was also her PA.
‘Your diary’s clear. In fact you were going to take annual leave tomorrow.’
‘Of course I was, silly me! Well, I’ll come in and give them a hand,’ and she turned to me and smiled again. ‘Is that alright?’
‘Well, yes, thank you very much,’ I said. ‘Thank you for listening and acting so fast. That’s wonderful, I’m really grateful.’ I left the toilets and caught up with my mum and sister in the street.

I don’t know what to make of a dream like that. Could changing the world be this easy?

PS Holiday packing going well at home, although we have reached deadlock on whether we’ll need to take the buggy or not. Other Half thinks not, as he wants space in the car for his diving gear. I think so, as I’m worried about my knee complaint and Babe’s need for peace and somewhere to crash during the day. And what we’ll do with him if we end up spending hours at an Italian port.

Otherwise, excitement is veritably mounting.
‘Are we going on holiday, Babe?’ I ask him.
‘Yes! Hooooooooray!’ he cries. ‘Butterfly!’.

I have been humming as I blitzed the house this weekend. Areas of my brain that were previously filled with Led Zeppelin and early pink Floyd are now awash with the theme tune to CBeebies Lazytown. (The hero of which, it happens, wears a blue leotard thing and is HOT.) How times have changed.

Road trip of the decade

2008-09-10T12:59:00.001-07:00

Apologies for the lack of updates following last week’s beautiful moment.

Other Half and I have been busy arguing furiously about our impending holiday. I have agreed – how could I refuse? – to holiday with his family, as he hasn’t seen them for nearly two years, and they have only met Babe once since he was born. But these holidays are, frankly, hell on earth from my perspective, and over the years I have found excuses to miss out on them occasionally. Now that we’ve got a child, instead of wanting us to have lovely family holidays together, Other Half is keener than ever to visit his. Bugger! What did I expect? Perhaps once we are off the bread line we’ll be able to have more than one holiday a year and it will be less of an issue. We can’t wait to get Babe on skis!

Now, there is a lot I could tell you about visiting Other Half’s family, but there are two salient points to note:

1 There is a f**k of a lot of them – he is the penultimate of 13 kids. All married, nearly all with kids. And extended families...

2 On these visits, I am proffered the metaphorical role of Honorary Man. This means I am plied with alcohol and sweetmeats, and generally treated like royalty, which is very nice. But in return I am expected to regale the assembled company with stories and evening-upon-evening of entertainment. When I’m in the mood, I achieve this to outstanding ovation (not a small feat, as they don’t speak any English at all, apart from some random phrases: ‘Hello, baby!’; ‘I like to move it, move it’ and ‘How you like you eggs?’). But when I’m not in the mood, it pisses me off that I can’t easily get out of these numerous visits to the homes of all and sundry. And now that I am a mother and have less patience and energy than before, I am dreading spending my holiday hanging around with hundreds of people I actually have precious little in common with.

The other issue is that of transport, which gets me back to the subject of this post.

We have had some utterly shitty times in Other Half’s home town. The part of the world he comes from is beautiful. Paradise beaches; goats, grapes and polyphonic singing; healthy fresh food, and lots of sunshine. But the roads are shit, and there are no car rentals because the rental companies wouldn’t see the vehicles they hire out for dust, once they’d driven off the forecourt. For the last few years, we have stayed in a beautiful four-star hotel on a mountain top, courtesy of one of Other Half’s brother’s girlfriend’s brothers (see what I mean?). But not even taxis will drive you up there because of the incline, so we usually have to walk. Not amusing, in 40 degree heat and six months pregnant, I can tell you.

So, this year, having both sworn we would never go back without transport of our own, Other Half is determined to drive. This involves driving to a certain Italian port that shall remain nameless, and then taking a 26-hour ferry to a destination that is about an hour from his home-town. My cunning plan was to fly out there with Babe. But when Other Half got lost again driving to Dorset last weekend, I realize that despite his protestations, I probably need to go with him, to read the map. He wants to drive through the night while Babe sleeps, resting for an hour here or there in lay-bys, as we haven’t got any free cash for hotels.

I am a nervous wreck! And the thought of a night without sleep – or worse still, a journey that Babe rejects wholly and completely as I suspect he will – is making me tremble, and it's still ten days until we leave. I will attempt to update you on our packing progress before we leave, and hope there will be Internet access on the ferry. I am taking my laptop, and have just bought two CBeebies DVDs for Babe, as I don’t think he can live without a daily TV fix in a language he understands.

In the meantime, I have a lot of lists to write. How many torches and blankets will I need in the car? Should I take a tent and plastic sheet for emergency situations? Will I need a whistle? Arm bands in case the ferry sinks? Biros and chocolates for bribing the police on the border, so that they let us through without insisting on playing 20 questions first? Can I manage without a buggy? Our hatchback is quite small.

So many questions and so many arseholes in the world. Oops, sorry, distracted by the news. Excuse my French. Bonsoir!

A beautiful moment

2008-09-02T05:21:00.000-07:00

Gosh! I’m in danger of exceeding my two blogs per week quota. But I had to share with you all something beautiful that happened to me yesterday.

Note to those of you I work with: I’m writing this in my lunch hour – I have a new ‘two full days per week’ regime, as well as the two halves. It’s kind of weird being here all day. Nice :).

I took the train up to Paddington yesterday – as I’m obliged to for work, a couple of times each month. I love these days in the Big Smoke, but since having Babe, the earliest train I can get is at 9am, after dropping him at nursery (Other Half having left the house hours before me) and I feel my late arrival is an encumbrance. I feel a bit lopsided when I get in, and out of psynch. And where it used to be a fairly tiring day in itself, these days the 50-minute walk to the station aggravates a knee problem I have developed since giving birth (diddums! and how is it that I haven't yet been to have it X-rayed, as suggested by my doctor?), and my general state of tiredness makes these day trips harder to get through than previously. (Good grief - was that another moan? I must stop referring to being tired in this blog or I will send you all off to sleep.)

Anyway, on arrival I walked briskly from the train to the underground, and had reached the bottom of the first flight of stairs when a man rushed up to me from behind, and caught my arm.
‘Excuse me!’ he called. He was about 50, I’d say. Nice face, nice suit, nicely-groomed. A confident and up-together air about him, and altogether quite a dish.

‘Yes?’ I replied, noticing that he was holding a bunch of flowers. Anemones. Pretty; unusual.
‘I just wanted to tell you I think you’re gorgeous!’ he exclaimed. ‘I was listening to you on the train and you sounded so warm and intelligent. Funny. Engaging.’

I’m not sure what my face was doing. Usually I struggle to hide what I’m feeling but for once I was quite taken aback and it took a while to register what he was saying. In fact it was quite surreal, us talking almost as though we knew one another. A lump formed in my throat and my annoying habit of crying when I'd rather not was threatening to kick in.

‘I’m not making a pass!’ he went on. ‘I’m married. But I wish I’d sat down next to you on a train twenty years ago. These are for you.’ And he handed me the flowers, which I suppose he’d rushed to buy on the platform above. My God, I hadn’t even noticed him in the carriage.

‘Gosh,’ I replied. Thinking fast on my feet is generally one of my strengths and I came back to earth with a bump.
‘That’s the sweetest thing anyone’s said to me for a long time,’ I laughed through the water that was starting to creep down my cheeks. ‘My husband would tell you I'm a pain in the backside!’
‘Aren’t we all, sometimes?’ he answered, and leant forward and kissed me on the cheek, before it occured to me to try and stop him (I'm the kind of girl who waves to lorry drivers in a friendly manner when they toot, thinking a friend of mine must be up in the cab) and then walked off into the underground, even turning to wave before he went through the barriers.

I stood where I was for a few seconds. My legs wouldn’t move and besides, I thought I’d give him time to get away. I didn’t want to spoil our beautiful moment by finding myself cheek to jowl with him on the Bakerloo line.

Then I looked at the flowers. Georgeous. But not really mine to keep, I didn’t feel. And I didn’t want to have to explain where I’d got them when I arrived at work. Ahead of me was a tired-looking mum, trying to cajole her toddler into the pushchair. As she turned to pick up her bags, I popped the bunch onto the folded-back hood, and quickly carried on. I hope that gave her a nice surprise and didn’t freak her out!

For the record, the last person who paid me almost the exact-same compliments (excluding the bit about wishing he’d met me twenty years earlier of course) was my dad, several years ago. We were with a group of people around the dinner table at his house, a place I don’t go very often. He sounded kind of surprised when he said it.

Silly Sunday

2008-08-21T13:51:00.004-07:00

So, we didn’t have a Special Sunday. It was more of a managed-to-survive, sicky, Silly Sunday. I think there may be some humour in the inane mundanaity (spelling?) of it – but there again there may not, so only read on if you really have nothing better to do…

Babe woke at six. Waking at six on a Sunday would be shitty if you hadn’t been doing it every bloody day of the week for the last two years, and given that we have, it was super-shitty.
‘Mummy, milk!’ he yelled from his room and I groaned, and the brain-ache I have spent so many consecutive days coping with, kicked in. I walked along the corridor, opened the door and waved vigorously. Which meant I could keep my mouth sleep-shut for a bit longer.

I put him down next to me in bed and gave him his beaker of milk. He took it and started drinking. This was a defining moment and I guess I now know for sure that he is no longer a baby – we have finally cut the bottles! Yesterday I bought him a purple sporty-drink bottle thing with a soft straw top that I thought might aid the transition from the bottle he has first and last thing, to cup of milk. I offered it to him last night and he hated it and tried to pull the top off, so I thought I’d try him with a beaker again instead, and he didn’t bat an eyelid – was just relieved to start downing the contents. Gosh, I had no idea it would be that easy. It helped, of course, that he was distracted by Charlie and Lola – he tends to have his milk in front of the TV these days.

So, there he sat in my bed, drinking his milk and scratching at the eczema patches on his legs while I tried to hold down the bottoms of pajama legs to stop him, and show him a picture of a bus which saved turning the telly on. I felt unable to tolerate even the tellytubbies. Babe is obsessed with vehicles, by the way. When he sees one, he repeats the word incessantly, and it becomes really bothersome. ‘Bus! Bus, bus, bus, bus………’ you get the drift. I wish I could find a route to nursery that didn’t involve walking past 500 or so parked cars, I can tell you.

Anyway, the door opened and who should walk in but… Other Half. A rare treat. He has been back in the spare room for a couple of nights as he hasn’t been feeling well, but having got away with spending most of yesterday in bed, ‘sick’, I think he’d had an attack of the guilts and wanted to do his bit. He picked Babe up and took him downstairs.

I rolled over and turned the light off. And then pulled the book and beaker out from underneath me. I should have felt delighted and able to stretch luxuriously under the covers and drop back off to sleep, but my brain kicked into overdrive. Within seconds I was stressing about work, money, impending Holiday of Doom XVII (much more to come on the that), the state of the economy, and whether the TV downstairs would be damaging Babe’s hearing and whether Other Half had thought to change his nappy.

After fifty minutes of tossing and turning, I went downstairs. 7.20.
‘You might as well go and lie down upstairs,’ I said to Other Half, who was lying on the sofa. ‘I can’t sleep.’
He went upstairs and fell asleep until 10.30.

I got Babe dressed, made us breakfast, hovered and cleaned the sitting room, emptied the dishwasher, put two lots of washing through, checked the tomato plants for slugs and watered them, tidied the toy box, and drew a large picture of cars, spiders and butterflies. All at an agonizingly dithery slow pace. It was a muggy day and I felt as though my head was blocked up. I needed to wash and dress myself – but I wanted to wash my hair – and try and get my brain into gear, but I just couldn’t shake the dreadful pain of wanting to be back in bed. Note to self: do not wake with greasy hair at the weekend! (Readers: I told you this would be boring…)

So, at half ten, we went upstairs to wake Other Half, who said he was still feeling ill, but gave me a shoulder massage and got dressed. By this time it was raining, but Babe was champing at the bit to be out of the house, so I suggested Other Half took him to soft play. In fact, I fancied going – I love the ball pit and the covered slide - but I needed to shower and get lunch. Like most parents, I do stress about getting enough of the right kind of food into my son. He has a penchant for the sweet things in life, and embarrasses me by waking from a nap in the buggy in the following way: stir, rub eyes, look around, and yell ‘cake! Biscuit! MUMMY!’ He is his mother’s son, for sure.

‘Wear him out for a while in the ball pit,’ I suggest, ‘and then bring him back at about 12. We can lunch together and then I’ll put him down for a sleep. He’ll sleep better and for longer if he’s not hungry, and then we’ll have got one good meal into him today. IF we don’t, he won’t eat properly after he’s slept, and will want to snack all afternoon…’

‘Ok,’ says Other Half. And I think we both know that the chances of getting Babe home, tired and awake, are slim. But because I’ve got brain ache and the air is muggy I put salmon in the oven, wash my hair, lay the table, and have a lovely meal ready for the ridiculously early time of 12 midday. Other Half turns up at half past, after several nagging phone calls – ‘we’re busy in the pet shop’ – and Babe is asleep.

So I get him into his cot, and we sit down, bickering and not really hungry, to eat Sunday lunch. See what I mean about ‘silly’? Just, I don’t know, ridiculous, daft, dumbass.

I can’t face more chores, and so I decide to go with my brain ache, and tell Other Half that I’m going back to bed. He isn’t tired – of course he isn’t bloody tired after a three-hour lie-in - but decides to come with me, so I make it really clear that my sole purpose of returning to the sack is to sleep. He looks at me and comes anyway.

We chat for a while, and he gives me another back rub, and then just as I am dropping off, Babe wakes. Other Half takes him downstairs and I hear him trying to administer cold salmon and broccoli. After half an hour I give up trying to sleep and go back downstairs.By three o’clock we have fussed and farted, changed babe a couple of times, packed and repacked a day bag and decided to go out. We walk by the river – for all of ten minutes as we forgot the buggy and babe refused to walk and is too heavy to carry far - take a little ferry to a teahouse where we buy huge slabs of not-half-as-nice-as it-looks cake that makes us all feel sick, and then drive back home, via the park, where I rest on the see-saw, wondering who Marjorie Daw was.

By the time we get home (half five-ish) Other Half is needing to rest again, so he sleeps on the sofa while I play trains, give Babe tea, and read books with him. We then play with a sticker book of fish, that provides us both with great fun. I love that babe seems to get what the pictures are of, but sticks them in really random places: stranded dolphin on the sand, treasure chest on the harbour wall, deep sea diver lying on the rocks etc etc, and then he decides he wants to stick the stickers on his pajama top instead of the pages – I can’t see why not and let him have a couple, and then he wants to stick a couple on me. For some reason he sticks them on my boobs.

After milk (yes, in beaker ;)), a bit more TV, another few books and cuddles and I get him into bed.

Then I do more chores, get things ready for a long day of meetings in London tomorrow, sniff the few presentable items of clothing I possess to make sure they didn’t need washing before I put them on tomorrow, and sit down to have a snack. The phone rings, I keep the call short, and then flop. I would like to spend some time on my Domestic Budget and my Life Plan but I haven’t got the energy. There is nothing on TV and these days I don’t read much. I look at the Michelin website, in a bid to persuade Other Half that we don’t have the time or money to drive to his home town when we have our holiday this September, but he gets excited and starts analysing the map.

So I push him away and start writing this blog as I just don’t know what else to do with myself. At least now it’s 11pm and hopefully I’ll fall asleep when I go to bed.

Goodnight!

Didn't touch wood

2008-08-21T13:51:00.003-07:00

The little so-and-so has woken three times while I tried to publish the last entry and is crying for me now. I sense a desperate night ahead. Arggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!! I should have kept my stupid bloggy mouth shut :(

Contented weekends and Special Stuff

2008-08-21T13:51:00.002-07:00

Ooh, such a lot has happened lately. Not! Such are the joys of wet weekends with Babe. And it doesn’t leave me with a lot to write about.

But actually, I can’t complain. Life is so much easier now than it was a year ago, when my weekends – wet or dry – were spent keeping Babe out of the house so that Other Half could continue digging to Australia underneath the kitchen floor.

If I listed here the work that properly commenced when I went into labour and continued for the first year and one month (yes, I was counting) of Babe’s life, you would be shocked. The sight of me turning into a human pumpkin over a period of nine months was not enough to make Other Half get his skates on, but seeing me writhing all over the floor once Babe was actually entering the world was what put his metaphorical foot on the gas. It’s just as well my labour lasted four days.

Yes, FOUR DAYS – from a few hours after I went to bed on a Sunday night to 10pm on the Thursday. And without pain relief. And after two sleepless nights in hospital with complications before labour started! I have to mention this, because surviving the experience has made me the woman I am today – frankly, a goddess of quite outstanding fortitude. I fully expected Other Half to spend the rest of his life kissing my feet and bowing most worshipfully before me for the rest of mine, having witnessed what I went through.

But in fact he spent the part at home digging like a maniac and the part in hospital in some kind of freaked zombie state. He spent eight hours massaging my back in the wrong place and irritating me to distraction (but I was concentrating too hard to communicate this to him), and then pulled the wrong lever on the bed in the moments before Babe arrived, forcing me into an upright position that my bump could barely accommodate, and was probably therefore responsible for his final arrival, seconds before the forceps made it into a part of me not designed to accommodate them.

So, back to our contented weekends. We have got into a comfortable routine in which I get up early with Babe, and do cleaning and housework around him while Other Half lies in. Then they trot off to the supermarket and the city farm for a few hours, while I do more cleaning and housework. We all have a sleep after lunch, and Bob’s your uncle, it’s nearly evening. Most satisfying! I should also point how here how very lucky I am to have an Other Half who comes homes from work every day overjoyed to see his son, and keen to take him out for a walk, or to the park for an hour or so, so that I can scrape baby mush off the carpet, shave my armpits and open the post etc.

The way I see it, you have two choices: live like relative slobs through necessity during the week, but make it into bed at a reasonable hour each night, and blitz the place at the weekend, or spend the week in overdrive keeping more than on top domestically so that your weekends can be spent in a sleep-deprived trance of Having Fun. The former works best for us.

We do aspire to having Special Sundays (as detailed in my highly-organised Domestic Year Plan) but they tend not to come to fruition. We fit in special stuff though, like dancing in fountains, singing in the rain, and sitting in the car outside the house listening to music while Babe turns the hazard warning lights and indicators on and off. Which is where we were, as it happens, when we took the photos I recently updated to my Facebook profile, and which some readers have said took them by surprise. ‘You both look happy and attractive, WTF is that about?’ asked one cheeky devil. I assured him that we had spent half an hour arguing about what my best angle was before said pics were taken. By me.

I think it’s time I went to bed. I’m aware that this is not the most exciting entry ever written. Despite the fact that for the first time tonight, I removed the internet cable from my laptop, so that I could sit in the window and see lampposts and stars, a la Carrie Bradshaw. (The resemblance ends there.)

You may, by the way, we wondering how the Sleep is going. It is much improved, thank you. Babe is now going down without a problem, during the day and at bedtime. So no more pushing him around to get him to sleep after nursery. And he now wakes for milk once per night, often at around half past five, and then sometimes sleeps for a further hour, which is quite joyous. I am feeling gradually recovered and definitely On The Up. So much so, that this week I have had to drop my own daytime nap, as it was giving me insomnia problems at bed time. Which means that I am finally finding time to cook and clean while Babe has his. So we may yet have a Special Sunday - perhaps even this weekend. Will report back next week :).

Fun and games

2008-08-21T13:51:00.000-07:00

Babe head-butted me this morning and gave me a nosebleed. It was extremely painful and not, I think, an accident. One minute we were singing ‘Twinkle, twinkle, little star’, laughing and jumping, (on the bed, 6am, Other Half pretending to be asleep so that he wouldn’t have to join in) and the next he had lurched towards me and biffed me on the nozzer.

Shocked and in pain, I grabbled a tissue from beside the bed and wondered how to respond. I decided to do what Babe would, and curled up in a ball, stage-crying. Peeking out from between my fingers, I saw him watching me and smiling, with his finger up his nose. So I decided to up the ante and yelled a few times in what I thought could be described as pain. At this, Other Half shoved me onto the floor and I landed uncomfortably, on a small wooden engine. This really did bring tears to my eyes.
‘That hurt!’ I yelled. ‘Say sorry!’.
‘Sorry,’ said Babe, and leant over and rubbed my arm.
Other Half gave me a look that had not a whiff of apology, and I felt angry and confused. Which pretty much set the tone for the next couple of hours, for all of us.

Thank god Babe goes to nursery. He knows how to mind his ps and qs I can tell you. What's more, he can count to ten, tell us to ‘Stop, please’ with appropriate hand gesture to accompany, knows the difference between shreddies and weetabix and can describe this in words and shapes, and has recently started asking to sit on the potty, as long as I sit on the toilet at the same time. He even comes home with his hair brushed, where I had just started calling him ‘Sonic’ and resigned myself to him having dreadlocks before long. I think my work with him is done.

He is also taught the concept of ‘time out’, which he had to have today, because he was throwing the toys around and not helping to pick them up. I could tell they’d had enough of him when I went to pick him up, but for my part I was just glad he was doing something normal for once.

Seriously, though, he does seem to benefit hugely from going to nursery. He was a very quiet, reticent little thing before he started (at six months’ old, when I returned to work) and now he rules the roost. This makes me glad, because I do want him to be able to stand up for himself, as he’s got a tough time ahead with us for parents. (I use ‘us’ in the loosest sense of the word.) I am also hoping that he will have a Mind of his Own and be prepared to stand up and be counted, and do something about the State of the World, but we shall have to see.

I did say to Other Half, in an offhand manner, some months ago, ‘I do hope Babe won’t be one of those children who is bullied at school.’
‘No son of mine will be bullied,’ he said.
‘And how do you know that?’ I retorted.
‘Because he will be big and very strong. I will teach him to defend himself.’
Right. So the onus will be on me to build his self-confidence. And make sure he understands, despite the best attempts of his father, that he is not living in a communist state, does not need to fight for survival, keep supplies of diesel in the shed with the tomato plants or tins of lentils and bottled water in the roof. It’s a blessing they check the contents of your baggage at airports, or we’d probably have Grandad Filipe’s Kalashnikov hidden under our bed instead of his, and little cousin Armando’s hand grenades (which he tried to give me once as a leaving gift) in the toybox. Some cultural differences take a while to dissipate.

Anyway, back to the theme of fun and games. We have had a brilliant evening together. I have always been a lover of games, coming, as I do, from a family who likes to play games together at every opportunity. Christmas at home is a whirlwind of pic-up-sticks, connect4 knock-out, and quizzes and IQ tests. All of which my eldest brother has to win. But his competitive spirit has made him a millionaire, which isn’t something we complain about during the season of goodwill…

Other Half approaches games with reticence and healthy cynicism. But then he grew up having to fish and catapult pigeons to help his mum put a meal on the table, and at military school was forced to ski naked and sit in snow until he froze, within eyeshot of a huge burning bonfire.

My idea of a perfect evening would be a few rounds of Ludo, and I can’t wait until Babe is old enough for one of those ‘Simon Says’ games, as I’m in my element on that. But tonight we discovered a whole new plethora of family evening entertainment. I’ll list the ideas here, in case any readers who are parents who may like to try them out at home:

1 Fit the shapes into the spaces (you know, the sets of cut-out wooden shapes that you have to slot into the right place on the board) – who can place them all correctly in the shortest time?

2 Fit the shapes into the space with your eyes shut (as above, but in the dark)

3 Guess the nursery rhyme (which is coming next, by putting the CD player onto ‘random’)

4 Hunt the bear (i) (ie favourite bedtime toy, one of you hides it five minutes before bed time, the other has to find it)

5 Hunt the bear (ii) (hide it and then go out on the razzle)

You know what – I’m going to stop here, as I can see more publication potential appearing before my very eyes. Oh, so much talent and so little time. Talking of which, I better dash, as have got to get bags ready for outing to buy new sunglasses in sales after work tomorrow, while Babe has sleep and then eats the many canapés I am about to prepare for him to keep him occupied. Will report back on success or lack of, and may even offer those of you who have my Facebook details a pic of the purchase.

So, as Babe would say (accompanied by wave and firm look in my direction, in the style of Queen Elizabeth from Blackadder, and usually whenever Other Half picks him up): Byeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Highlights

2008-08-17T14:19:00.000-07:00

By the way - I had my hair done too. The icing on the cake :)

Sons, friends and lovers

2008-08-17T12:54:00.000-07:00

There is nothing like spending time with an old friend to make you feel reassured and warm inside.

We have had a lovely weekend, with my dear pal from student days and her three gorgeous boys. Babe didn’t know himself and had the time of his life, running around after them. ‘Guys!’ he kept calling, and paddle-paddle-run-trip-splat went his little feet, in hot pursuit. Never before has he had three chums to play with from the crack of dawn. He was overwhelmed, loved every minute and cried his heart out when they left.

Apart from making life feel Great Fun and most holiday-ish for a few days, which is just what we needed, it also gave Other Half and I a useful insight into life with More Than One. Golly! I thought we were running a tight ship, or whatever the expression is, but she is running something of much greater depth and magnitude. Respect! (Generally-speaking, by the way, my use of expressions, similes and the like is down the pan, thanks to Other Half. In his country, you run like a horse where we run like the wind, swim like an otter, and a car in the hand is worth three on the road, or something like that. These days I talk of feathers in my bonnet, bees in my cap and top potatoes instead of top bananas…)

When they arrived and jumped out of the bus outside our house, my first thought was, ‘Three tiggers!’. Gosh, such a lot of bounce. You have to have eyes all the way round your head, not just at the front and back. I found myself wanting to nod in time with some kind of invisible human biorhythm, just to keep up with the life force and energy they exude. And do the hippy hippy shake on the spot, to keep up with their literal, physical, wonderful, being aliveness.

There was a time when I had bounce. Would be the first onto the dance floor and the last off; run home instead of catching the bus, impatient to be doing something else to fill the time between after work and bed, and spend weekends walking up hill and down dale, come wind or shine. These days, I guess it inhabits a different dimension. I bounce back more easily. Smile and laugh and lot and navel gaze a lot less. (Trust me, this blog is nothing by comparison.) But I would like to re-capture some physical sparkle. I am in fact saving up for some swimming lessons that will help motivate me to up the ante in my fitness stakes.

But back to the boys, and their joie de vivre. Such wit! Laughter and intelligence in buckets. (Is that expression right as well? I have a feeling it should be spades, or droves.) And so street-wise. I must do more to keep abreast of trends that will make Babe feel assured of his own street-cred as he gets older. I lost mine some time ago, I fear. If I ever had any - and I don’t want to be a mum he’s embarrassed to be seen with, as his dad is sure to humiliate him publicly all the time. If that sounds a bit mean, just go with me on this one. If he’s jumping over park fences instead of using the gates now, taking potatoes from home for the pigs at the city farm in spite of the notices forbidding this behaviour, and singing ‘I’m a Barbie girl’ as he walks round Tescos, just imagine what babe has lying in store for him, poor thing.

We were entranced and I could see Other Half thinking, ‘This is what I want. A houseful. To feel completely, all-consumingly alive.’ He is one of thirteen siblings and says he’d like us to have a similarly large brood. ‘In your dreams,’ I have replied tartly on the many occasions that he brings this up. But, as one of four, I know what he means. What is life about, if it’s not about family, love and laughter? (Ok, and kicking the living daylights out of one another at times as well.) Living well into the moment, instead of the past or the future.

I was thinking, ‘This could be what I want. But if I never get it, or decide not to go for it, I could be very happy sharing other people’s from time to time.’ This realisation has left me in a very calm and happy place. Taken the pressure off. Left me caring less that all my friends seem to be pregnant again now, just as I’m starting to enjoy life again, and get a little more sleep, and feel in no hurry to further procreate. Que sera, sera, and all that.

Really, it was quite the nicest weekend I’ve had in years.

Spoons

2008-08-15T02:20:00.000-07:00

I’m a happy bunny today! Babe slept all night, like a rock, and so did I. Too tired and rock-like to argue with Other Half about who was crossing the imaginary line down the middle of the bed, or whether or not it was fair of me to need to sleep in a star-shape or the recovery position (my two favourites). Grandad has been to stay for two nights, which means that Other Half and I have been sleeping in the same bed for three (clean bed made up in spare room night before of course :)).

Do real couples actually spoon, I wonder? Don’t they get as hot as hell? The most I can tolerate is other half resting his foot on mine – and that only works when I’m making like a star. If anyone so much as lays a finger on me when I’m in the recovery position I growl like a bear.

Anyway… it has been a joy to see Babe playing with my dad. He is the ultimate eccentric, beyond unorthodox and as funny and as annoying as you’d wish any person to be. I wasn’t sure how either would find the encounter. But seeing them together (dad lying on the cold kitchen tiles because that’s where Babe was sitting and shouting ‘book!’) has reminded me of many good childhood memories of my dad. Fun and laughter in abundance. Never, ever, dull:

Party games which stretched kids to their physical and mental limits; Christmas encounters with Santa’s dwarves on the top of multi-storey car parks; long car drives wiggling Vik inhalers stuck up his nose and waving at other drivers; ghost stories on holiday that had all us bundling in with him for the night (because he had scared himself witless) – and I’ve never heard another dad scream, ‘Run for your lives!’, drop his kids’ hands and hurtle himself into a parade of Rhododendrons at the approach of a flock of Canadian geese in the park. One day I will write a series of children’s books, full of these stories. They will be called ‘Adventures with Mr D’, and will make us both rich and famous.

It’s a shame that Babe doesn’t see more of his extended family. What child doesn’t revel in the attention? There’s no such thing as too much love. I realise how different things would be if we lived near Other Half’s family. Aunts, uncles, cousins in abundance. It would give me a nervous breakdown, as I’m typically English and like my own space, but there’d be no such thing as childcare worries, or lack of sleep. My sister-in-law gave birth a few weeks after I did, and the females of the family (females, yes, and they all work) took it in turns to sleep in a chair by her bed in hospital for the days she was in; her mum slept on the sofa for the next two weeks to make sure she got enough sleep and her sister now looks after the little boy every afternoon so that she could return to work. I don’t think she’s had to cook a meal since little Alexandro was born. As I say, it’s all swings and roundabouts, and there’s a lot more I could discuss on the subject, but it’s interesting that in this country you’re not allowed to have anyone stay the night with you in hospital. Great start.

Back to Babe and our sleep. Not only did he sleep through ‘til six, he then slept in bed with us for an hour until seven! Unheard of! Rejoice! This means he’ll be due his nap when I pick him up from nursery at lunch-time. Hoorah! Of course it also means that between six at seven I didn’t dare move, and at half past six had to wake Other Half without stirring Babe. Ten prods with my big toe did it. He slithered out and landed gently on the floor. Picked up his clothes and crawled around the bed, so that if Babe opened his eyes, he wouldn’t see him there and howl. We held hands briefly, and he was off.

So, you may have inferred that the deadlock at home is broken. I’m not sure if either of us gave in first - I think we just decided to have a good shag and then everything was ok again. Other Half immediately perked up (so to speak), and cleaned the house for me, as I was “feeling extremely poorly and unloved”, and then gave me a lovely massage, as I was “still fit to drop” and then Babe and I watched through the window as he hoovered the car.

We have yet to fully the resolve the issue of whether I am his ‘number one’ or not – aha! Now I remember, that’s how the argument started: when he said Babe was his priority, at which I hit the roof and bought a massive t-shirt with ‘Number 2’ emblazoned on the front – but I might let it go for a while as, at the end of the day, actions speak louder than words, and he’s being extremely nice at the moment.

Roll on, weekend! Aubergines ahoy!

Sex in the city

2008-08-10T12:55:00.000-07:00

I saw the Red Arrows today. My God, they're good. I swear there wasn't a woman in the crowd who wasn't thinking, consciously or otherwise, 'Get me a pilot for a right old rogering, now!'. Well, that's what I was thinking anyway.

There is something terrifically sexy about the control, tension and speed; those perfect formations - and the tinge of fear where they shoot close and noisily overhead. The atmosphere was subtly heightened by the general 'Ooohing and ahhhing' that was going on and I joined in with gusto, noticing from the corner of my eye that Other Half glanced at me suspiciously more than once. I must visit their website later.

I guess failing a pilot, someone dressed up as a pilot would do. Strong and silent and, I don’t know, powerful. (And wearing a helmet, or goggles and hat or thick scarf at least – this would have to be an anonymous encounter of course.) Other Half is strong (and particularly silent of late – more on that later). He’d be a liability to the red arrows, though, as is in no way a team player. He’d be the joker who gets expelled from the troupe for letting off orange smoke in the middle of their red, white and blue, and impersonating a solo flight of the bumble bee while they execute a perfectly-formed cupid’s heart. He’d hang back as they zoom forwards, then start to speed up as they slow down. I can see it now – an aerial version of the way we progress down the street.

I am generally several steps ahead of him (literally and metaphorically, and it’s not out of choice, you understand), and I just can’t bear to dawdle. He, on the other hand, walks at a snail’s pace unless I want to take in the scenery, in which case he will declare himself hungry or in need of a toilet and force us to move on quickly. I realise, writing this, that there was in fact a time when, despite our differences in tempo, we would walk around hand in hand. The closest we get to that these days is swinging Babe between us in an attempt to get him to speed up. Blinking heck, too much of life is spent hanging around waiting, or trying to catch up, but to escape it - how? Live in south-east Asia?

Hum. Back to the pilots. Much more fun and I’m not in the mood for nostalgia – I’m in a bad mood on purpose, original reason now forgotten, but cannot back down first as am on strike from being the first one to say sorry. Yes, that’s how grown up things are chez moi at the moment. And now, darn it, I just can’t get back into the swing of my earlier sense of frissance, as I’ve noticed my initial assumption that all pilots are male, and am also starting to feel worried by my use of the word ‘powerful’. I think I had better take some feminist theory to bed with me tonight.

So, any readers out there wondering whether I might be prepared to take it all the way with a red arrow can be reassured that no, of course I wouldn’t. Because it’s rare for me to go with flow and stop analysing what I’m doing and why. Plus it would, of course, be highly immoral.
You lot go to bed, and I’ll surf awhile…

Apologies...

2008-08-07T13:55:00.001-07:00

...for not updating this blog for the last couple of weeks. We are seeing a Sleep Specialist and I am focussing my every waking effort on getting through the day and hitting the sack as soon after Babe as I can.

I am also in a very dark and fed up mood, wondering where my life is going, how many years of my career (if you can call it that) are going to be interrupted by motherhood, how I can be more positive and put myself forward at work when the possibilities are few and far between, how will I ever be able to change jobs when I'm stuck in the trap of working part-time in an office down the road from nursery and where I live for quite a good salary, and when will I be able to afford to get my hair done. Etc.

In fact, now that I have just read that through I am feeling even more fed up. I fancy packing up the contents of our house and moving to live on the other side of the world. But as we generally rely on my salary that would hardly be a holiday for me. I need a new life, new aspirations, a change in focus, a new body, a new Cunning Plan.

I think it is time to start buying lottery tickets. And in the meantime perhaps I can flog Other Half's tap shoes on ebay to pay for my highlights.

I will endeavour to share the delights of sticker charts and power struggles with you all, dear readers, by this weekend. xxxxxxxxxxxx

Belly buttons and shirt-lifting

2008-07-23T14:17:00.000-07:00

The other thing Babe has noticed is belly-buttons. And he can more or less say that, too. Although it sounds a bit like ‘bliggy buttoms’. But he doesn’t seem to get that they are generally located on - aha! - your belly. Instead, he has become obsessed with trying to gain access to your back, so that he can lift your top and see if he can spot a belly button there.

At home, this seemed like harmless enough fun. But at nursery it is another matter entirely. He has made himself unpopular with all his little friends, by chasing them around, trying to lift their shirts. And was socked on the jaw by one little girl when he tried lifting her skirt. Clearly the carers have had enough of it too, as they’re constantly having to pull him off the other kids, and the implication is that this behaviour is both uncommon and odd. I feel obliged to reassure them that at home he has not witnessed Other half and I crawling around the floor, lifting one another’s shirts, and looking for new crevices we can stick our little fingers into, but you can feel their scepticism as you blather on, and the brains behind the raised eyebrows wondering where he’s learnt to behave like this if we haven’t taught him.

Yesterday, he upped the ante and played in a whole new way that has been recorded (so I was told in a private meeting) in the ‘abnormal behaviour book’. It seems he was simulating sex with a small plastic doll, rubbing his face into hers, and lifting his shirt and rubbing his tummy against her plastic one. Poor little mite – I must introduce more sensory pleasure into his routine. And double check that he hasn’t tuned into a pornographic channel that we’ve yet to discover, with the remote.

It would be nice if he could do something a little more normal. The folk at nursery already know we listen to Greek music at home, smash plates, roast lambs in the back garden and worship the television, decorating it with doilies and ornaments on top. I’m worried that we’ll get social workers on our case if we’re not careful.

If anyone has read a book on how to make your child kick and bite, please let me know.

Apologies

2008-07-21T13:18:00.000-07:00

I'm sorry I didn't update my blog last week. I was at a wonderful festival, feeling utterly miserable as it dawned on me that looking after a toddler on a camp-site would be no less labour intensive than it is at home. Instead of meditating, ecstatic dancing and sitting in a late-night hot tob under the stars, I was tiptoeing around sleeping campers with a muddy, dew-damp Babe and his football at dawn; developing a terrible knee injury thanks to the wet conditions and the fact that I was carrying him everywhere instead of pushing him in the buggy; struggling to find vegan food that he didn't spit out in embarrassing disgust, and by the end of day one feeling generally pissed off with the World At Large.

Other Half came to relieve me on the last day, but the Thai massage I'd booked for myself was nothing short of agony, as my exhausted body told me in no uncertain terms that I am in need of complete and utter re-conditioning. Plus it seems that these days you're expected to undress completely without so much as a blanket to conceal your privates, ahead of your massage, and thanks to the fact that the masseur in question had a faulty zip on his tent door, quite a few people wandering by got a view of said privates when leg was raised in said agonising postures that not even Other Half has had for some years now. I thought it was ok to be modest, and not to want to reveal yourself to anyone you happen to be paying to lay hands on you? Is nothing sacred any more?

I feel ancient, out of touch and in need of six months at an expensive spa. Instead, I have emailed a local Buddhist group, asking if they will waive the fee they usually charge for drop-in meditation so that I can get a weekly fix of feeling calm and as though I'm coping. (Since when did it cost to pray? Am suprised and saddened by state of world.)

In order to bring love and good energy back into my home, I am going to build a healing pyramid on the decking in the back garden. (As it happens, the decking is our back garden and I think aformetioned healing vortex may enrage Other Half and result in temporary karmic deficit but hey, needs must...) You probably think this is a joke but it is not. I will keep you posted on my progress. Am off to find tape measure and string before practising yogic poses that will apparently get energy flowing through my body - whahay! - and then breathing pranic life force into my knee joints. The mind boggles.

Spots and titties

2008-07-10T13:59:00.000-07:00

Babe is learning tens of new words each week. It is a joy to witness. He’s such a clever little chicken.

But it raises questions about what to tell him to call some of the things he points at. Chicken or hen? Leopard, cheetah or jaguar? See what I mean? I need to go back to school myself to work out some of the differences. And Other half is already having to avoid some early-learner books as he knows his vocab range doesn't cut the mustard. Even the alpahabet flashcards have him on his knees begging for mercy: 'net', 'igloo', 'xylophone' (hardly everyday words, and if I can't spell them, how can he be expected to?)... God only knows what we’ll do when Babe is revising for his GCSEs. Run for cover, I imagine.

I have a small mark on my leg that he pointed at yesterday. I didn’t see the point of introducing ‘bruise’ or ‘cut’ so I said ‘spot’. Now he is calling every small blemish on my being, ‘spot’. But yelling it while pointing at my neck/arm/cleavage as we walk down the road does not float my boat.

Talking of cleavage, he has noticed and starting pointing at my breasts. For some reason, the word that sprang from my lips when he first noticed them (and which I have never used before in my life!!) was ‘titties!’. Gordon bennett! I’m living to regret that, too, as you might imagine.

Why is it that sometimes random and previously-unused words pop out when you least expect them to? I was walking along the street on holiday abroad once, looking at my reflection in a shop window, when I walked straight into someone approaching me from the opposite direction who’d been doing the same thing. Strangely, the only part of us that made contact was the top of our heads, and the impact caused us both to fall over backwards. (I know you think I’m making this up, but I swear it’s true.) Thanks to my linguistic skills, I could have produced expletives in a number of world languages, including that of the place in which I was staying. Which was not Italy. But what did I shriek? ‘Mama mia! The mind boggles.

Anyway, going back to words for the more private parts of our anatomy, Babe has also discovered his ‘privates’. And I didn’t hesitate in using the word ‘willy’ to describe them for the time being. But what do you call a girl’s private parts? What word doesn’t sound faintly embarrassing, or imply that they’re something to cover up, or sound somewhat insulting? Suggestions, please! I won’t bore you here with a diatribe on the sexism that is so inherently embedded within our society and perpetuated by language. Thank God it’s Friday tomorrow.

Coming soon: belly buttons and shirt-lifting

Points of clarification

2008-07-06T13:34:00.000-07:00

Further to my previous post, I feel I should elaborate on one or two things. Firstly, I AM crazily in love. Oftentimes it feels like more of the crazy and less of the love (hence this blog) and I can’t deny that to describe our relationship as turbulent would be the understatement of the millennium. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. Probably.

Also, you may have wondered whether Other Half knows he is being committed to online pagination in this way. Well, yes, he knows. He sits on the sofa watching me giggle and squawk delightedly as I write, and then throw myself onto the floor gasping when the pins and needles kick in (internet cable only a short distance from the TV set so I have to perch on a stool at the coffee table to write). I even read bits to him sometimes. He says he wants me to pursue my creative endeavours at any cost if that's what makes me bearable to live with, and just isn’t bothered about what I share with you all.

'It's me, I loves you'

2008-07-06T13:24:00.000-07:00

You have possibly been wondering why this blog is called ‘Crazy in Loves’ and not ‘Crazy in love’, after the popular Beyonce hit.

A week or so into our relationship, Other Half took my hand, looked sincerely and lovingly into my eyes, and announced ‘It's me, I loves you.’ Wow! I had never experienced such a bold declaration of love. What’s more, it was followed by the question, ‘Why not you me gettin’ marry?'

Obviously, I was swept off my feet. Unlike any other man, he had immediately realised what an amazing catch I was, and wanted to land me fast. His confidence and assurance were a key factor in me persuading myself that he was the one. And to this day, grammatical errors involving the letter ‘s’ take me back to the romantic moment that changed the course of my life so bloody dramatically :). And as it happens, 'Crazy in love' was already taken.

Incidentally, eleven years down the line, Other Half completely denies the aforementioned declaration of love. He says his English was not good enough to have made such a proposal. And that he would not have fallen in love so quickly. And that I must have misunderstood. Hum! To wit: how many other decisions of unspeakable magnitude might have been rushed or taken as a result of misunderstandings? George Bush take note!

Techno-whizz and not yet two

2008-06-29T13:41:00.000-07:00

Yesterday evening, I made the mistake of leaving my mobile on the floor for a fraction of a second. At least that’s what I assume I did. When I went to check it before turning in for the night, I found it on the sofa with the Bluetooth light flashing. My first thought was, 'Excellent! So finally the Bluetooth is working! I can copy my pics of Babe to my laptop.' (I had spent hours recently, trying to turn the Bluetooth facility on, and failing.) This thought was closely followed by another: 'Hang on, who exactly has got it working?' (Other Half is not a techno-whizz - well, actually that's the understatement of the decade, but suffice to say, I knew he wasn't involved.) Closer inspection of the screen also revealed a 'signal disabled' message. My powers of deduction led me to Babe... But how on earth had he succeeded where I had failed, and how the hell had he stopped the phone working in the meantime?

I spent a good fifteen minutes scrolling through the Bluetooth facility, trying to turn it off, and getting increasingly incensed. Meanwhile, I realised that the phone must have stopped receiving calls and messages at least three hours earlier, and I’d been expecting a couple of friends to be in contact that evening. Bloody hell! Grrrrrrrrrrr!

I decided to try turning the phone off and on again. Twice. On the second attempt, the Bluetooth stopped flashing. I considered tinkering with it, to see if I could now get it working again, but my priority was to have my phone working before I left for work at ten to eight the next morning. I know from bitter experience that on the one occasion I haven't got my phone with me, something bad will happen. (Last October; morning off work; Babe at nursery; me lolling in bath for first time since he was born; Other Half calls, screaming hysterically down the phone; Babe bitten by spider at nursery; ambulance has been called; I run down road in trousers-no-pants, shoes-no-socks, dressing-gown-no-bra and wet hair flapping in the wind.) (You're thinking this is made up, too, but I swear it's not. Babe was fine - when I arrived, the spider in question was in a plastic cup with cling film on top and the two ambulance men were looking at spiders on the Internet. I was about to expire...)

So, eventually, after a whole lot more fiddling, swearing, throwing the phone at the sofa (I held it together sufficiently to restrain myself from chucking it at the wall, but it was a close call) and raised eyebrows from Other Half (I don't often hold it together), it occurred to me that trying to call someone might re-activate the signal. It did. ‘Re-activate signal?’ the screen display asked. Unfortunately, ‘Yes, effing please’ was not an option available to select.

At least I have now learnt the hard way not to let Babe anywhere near my phone. It is small and not hard to put on a shelf he can't reach. The same can not be said for the oven. Which is why the timer has been set for a casserole that will be done to perfection some time in the year 2015.

Monday tomorrow... hooray!

Two more choking espisodes

2008-06-25T10:39:00.000-07:00

I’m not sure about including both these anecdotes today. The second is not really about motherhood or being married to an East European. It is simply horrifically revealing about me, personally, and the sad thoughts I have and the pathetic ways in which I entertain myself. I fear some readers will be embarrassed for me as they digest it. But there does seem to be something in the air – all these near-choking episodes are quite a coincidence. So – gulp – here goes.

***

A dear friend nearly lost her life on a fishbone a few days ago. Not a very original way to choke, but that is exactly what happened. Sadly, her son (Babe's Best Friend) had to watch her other half pounding her on the back to dislodge said fish bone, and became distraught, convinced that his dad was assaulting her, and hasn’t yet fully recovered . So I should at least be grateful that my ear-plug choking episode took place when Babe was safely out of sight.

The other choking episode this entry relates to unfortunately once again involves me:

Other Half and I pay an extortionate monthly fee to belong to a gym. And our sole reason for belonging is that the only exercise I can tolerate is swimming, but where some people are afraid of snakes or spiders, one of my day-mares is the thought of slithering around on a dirty changing room floor. Ugh! I’m getting shivers down my spine just thinking about it. All those bits of soggy loo roll and matted hair, and I slip and fall and get all mushed up in it… AGH! AGH! AGH! Hold that thought!

So, we belong to this very expensive gym because the swimming pool changing rooms are clean. And I love it. I’m a different person around water. Calmer, more relaxed, full of joie de vivre etc. And at our gym, they turn the lights down at 9pm, so people going for a late night swim benefit from underwater lighting, which is perfect for floating, or pretending to be a gentle but sylph-like dolphin. Or whatever.

Now, I am not what you’d call a flirt, and I’m obviously not on the pull, but neither am I an idiot and I can see that some gym members use the pool to eye up potential life partners (or shags, or animal counterparts, or whatever), and sometimes it’s hard not to get inadvertently drawn into this. No matter how hard you try not to make eye contact – easier to avoid when you’re wearing goggles but mine are a bit tight so I only put them on for underwater stunts – you find that you do occasionally. And once you’ve accidentally caught the eye of someone a couple of times, before you know it, you both think there’s a bit of a potential thing going on, even when there quite definitely isn’t… This can be really annoying if the person in question is the wrong gender/type/swimming too close up behind you with goggles on, etc, but can be flattering if not.

Last week, I accidentally caught the eye of someone. He’s a bit of a hunk (although much too hairy and tall. I like my men about my height and quite compact. When I say compact, of course I don’t mean, OK, WHATEVER – the Ed) and I wasn’t too annoyed about it. And when I went back last night he was there again.

Apart from the fact that I still look five months pregnant in my swimsuit, my hair was down and though I say so myself I was looking kind of cute. I definitely caught him checking me out as I slid into the pool as elegantly as I could. And I continued to bask in the attention as I executed a few dolphin lengths, did a few more sitting on a float and moving in a backwards direction (which is great for the arm muscles but probably looks a bit weird and definitely annoys other swimmers) and I stared pointedly at the ceiling whenever we passed, so that I was in no danger of giving him the come-on.

Gradually the pool emptied itself of swimmers and it was just him and me left. I felt it was time to leave, as I didn’t want to get myself into a situation, but I didn’t want him to see how big my bottom is as I pulled myself out of the water. Plus I really wanted to have the place to myself. It’s like a blue, if oblong, lagoon. And fun :). So I hung in there, did a few more kicking lengths with the float, and he bailed first. Hooray! But joined two other men in the poolside jacuzzi. Not so hooray – as I still had to work out how to leave elegantly. Still, I was pretty sure he was still looking at me, and I couldn’t resist the temptation to show off a bit. I had a captive audience, as there isn’t really anywhere to look, other than into the pool, when you’re sat there in the bubbles.

After a few lengths of different strokes with the float, I decided it was time to impress with what I like to refer to as my ‘shark-slice one-breath’. I went to a very good (utterly dull, but good) girls’ school, which means there is nothing I can’t do reasonably well, and this includes swimming. Well, it used to include swimming. These days, I’ve still got the strokes but somewhere along the way I forgot the breathing techniques, which is how and why my shark-stroke developed. It involves stunningly good, fast front-crawl, in which I slice through the water in a very straight line, but also necessitates doing the entire length on one breath, because I can’t for the life of me re-capture that ‘turning your head to the side’ breathing thing. So my fitness level (poor) means that I can only do a few of these each session.

I did a few casual stretches, put on my goggles, and off I went. Slice! Slice! Slice! (Thirty-nine slices is what it takes) and then I was there. Yes! I knew that had looked bloody good. The trick at this point is not to reveal that your lungs are about to burst. I flicked off my goggles, did a few quick pretend-stretches, grabbed a float and then headed back up the pool, kicking like mad to disguise the heavy breathing. I could feel this guy’s eyes upon me, and imagined him saying to me at the bar later on (although of course we never would meet at the bar later on) something like, ‘Viola, you were mesmerising in the pool tonight. Truly captivating.’

At this point I should have left the pool. Cut my losses while the odds were high, or whatever the expression is. But my shark-side needed nurturing, and I couldn’t resist the temptation to unleash it a second time. Even as I pulled my goggles over my eyes I knew it was a mistake, but before I knew it I was taking a deep breath and had lurched into the water. Slice! Slice! Slice! Uh-oh! I was losing speed – too many strokes in, and I’d only got as far as the club logo, located on the floor of the pool at the half-way mark. Several more strokes, and I knew I wasn’t going to make it to the end. Several more, and my shark was lost to a jellyfish. I slooped towards the surface, desperate for breath, and took a deep intake of air…just before I reached it.

Bugger! The coughing fit that followed had all three men staring at me in concern. And through streaming eyes I observed that Hairy Man had been joined by a gorgeous, slim blonde. One of the other two (skinny, ugly, prawn-to-my-dolphin) left the jacuzzi and ran around the pool towards me.
‘Are you alright?’ he asked.
I nodded, choking and spluttering.
‘Are you sure?’ he said, jumping in beside me.
I nodded, still coughing. He passed me a float and stood there until I’d caught my breath. About seven minutes.‘You had us worried,’ he added.
‘Sorry,’ I muttered. And swam carefully to the corner of the pool furthest from the changing rooms, and climbed the stairs slowly on purpose, as penance, and to remind myself not to play silly games.

Does everyone, I wonder, have an over-active imagination, like me? Should I be analysing the shark/dolphin imagery? Be deleting all this and researching world development issues? I wish it was Friday tomorrow and that it could be the weekend for ever. I need time for relaxation and recuperation.

Two more eventful things

2008-06-18T07:49:00.000-07:00

As this blog entry suggests, two more things of note have happened. Gosh. It all makes my life appear rather exciting.

The first was yesterday, and involved Babe’s first real bolt for freedom. It was my turn to cook – hang on a minute, who am I trying to kid that we take turns? – and, would you believe, I was doing aubergine again. Honestly, I was. But I’d forgotten to remove the grill pan from the oven and it didn’t take long for the burning remnants of fish-finger coating to fill our kitchen and small house with a burning smell.

Other Half was in the sitting room with Babe, watching more Euro 2008 football. SIGH.
‘I’m opening the front door for five minutes,’ I said. ‘Because I’ve burnt something and the house smells.’ You may remember from a previous blog entry that Other Half has almost no sense of smell. Which is his excuse, by the way, for rarely realising that Babe’s nappy is pooey.

Other Half looked at me and then carried on watching TV. Babe looked up from his train set and then carried on playing. I went back into the kitchen and carried on reading my book and sipping wine. Oops! Slaving over a hot stove, I mean.

Ten minutes later, Other Half storms in, shouting.
‘Why have you left the front door open? Look where he is! Are you mad?’
I look past him, down the corridor, towards the front door. Babe is on the second step, a mere toddle or two from the pavement and the World At Large. He looks at me in the same knowing way he had when he looked up from his trainset, and I realise that he had listened and understood where his father had not.

I feel shocked but decide not to over-react.
‘You'd better fetch him in then,’ I say mildly.
‘What were you thinking, you *** *****?’ he responds angrily.

‘Look!’ I reply. ‘I told you I was opening the door. All you had to do was watch him and keep him safe for five minutes.’

‘I didn’t know you were leaving it open!’ he replies. ‘You should never leave the doors open when Babe is in the house!’

‘But, you ***** ********,’ I say, losing my rag, ‘I told you I was opening it.’
‘But I didn’t know what you meant. And I didn’t hear you,’ he shouts.

‘That is total crap!’ I retort. ‘This is yet another instance of you ignoring what I say, so that I feel forced to repeat myself incessantly, so that you can then accuse me of nagging and blathering on, so that you can then justify only listening when you want to. It’s sexist effing crap and I’ve had enough of it.’

I slam the kitchen door and gather the aubergine into a bowl. For thirty seconds I intend to slop it down the toilet.

‘And your bloody aubergine is going down the toilet,’ I yell through the kitchen window into the garden, where he and Babe are now playing football.

‘You should not leave doors open,’ he yells back.

‘Communist demon-blockhead!’ I scream.

I return to the bowl and consider launching it into the garden and onto his head. But instead I spoon it back into the pan and then add some extra coriander on top. I feel sorry that all he’s had to eat for the last two days has been ‘rabbit food’ and fish fingers and wish that, despite my desire to be a career woman, I could feed my family well. I feel that perhaps I don’t do anything very well. But more of that another time.

***

The other thing that happened was actually probably not exciting enough to detail here. It involved Other Half leaving a sleeping Babe in the car in Tesco’s car park while he came to help me carry back the shopping. I thought this rash and a bit rich after the door episode. But have expressed my feelings on the matter several times now and am pretty sure Other Half has heard and realises it was a mistake.
‘You should not leave doors open,’ he repeats in a muted monotone response. Which I think is man-talk for, ‘You’re right.’

Two significant things happen

2008-06-16T12:26:00.000-07:00

Two things of particular significance happened last week. So I'm combining them into one big entry in place of the two I should have added then. Hope that's ok?

One was Babe’s first assassination attempt. And I was the assassinee. Does that word exist, I wonder? There is nothing like speaking baby talk and pigeon English at home to make one’s linguistic abilities disintegrate.

Anyway, it followed Other Half cooking our evening meal for the first time this year. It wasn’t fish, or ‘lamb in the oven’ (as opposed to on a piece of fence railing in the back garden - more of that another time), it was what I like to call his ‘omelette surprise’. And yes, not a very witty joke to crack, but the surprise is just how disgusting it is, even with practice.

Other Half’s favourite food, by the way, after fish and lamb, is aubergine cooked by his mother. Which is frankly a pain in the arse. In part, because clearly I am not his mother and therefore severely disadvantaged before I even step into the kitchen, but also because there is only so much you can do with an aubergine, and I know, because I’ve tried. But I digress.

So, on Wednesday last week, it was omelette surprise, cooked by Other Half while he watched the Croatia V Austria match. And given that the TV is not in the kitchen you can imagine what a catastrophe it was. To save himself time, he chopped the veg in front of the TV, then filled a pan with oil on the hob, and forgot to wait for it to heat before dropping in the mushrooms etc. It was a dripping oily sludge and didn’t go down well.

In an attempt to veil its revolting taste, he added extra salt. And trust me, you don’t want someone from where he is from ever adding ‘extra’ salt to your meal. Which is why I woke in the early hours, for once not because Babe was wailing, with a terrible thirst.

I reached for the glass of water on my bedside table and gulped thirstily before something caught in my throat, causing my eyeballs to nearly burst from my head and a jet-stream of water to crash up my nasal cavities. Other Half was, of course sleeping in the spare room and not there to assist me in my hour of need.

Winded and terrified, I threw open the bedroom door, staggered across the landing and into his room. By now I was about to expire. I threw myself onto him, fists pummelling his prostrate body, and he sat up in bed, reaching for the large kitchen knife he insists on keeping on the bedside table during the night in case we are attacked by vagabonds. Luckily, he sleeps with the blinds open, to make the most of daylight hours (it’s hot and sunny where he’s from) and quickly realised it was me. I saw a flicker of ‘What the f*ck does she want now?’ cross his face before it dawned on him that I was in serious trouble. Whining like a horse caught in a trap – I assume that someone, somewhere does trap horses – I tried, frantically, to slap myself on the back, indicating what I needed him to do.

Thank God he had been forced through years of military school under a communist regime. Grabbing me from behind, round the waist, he began to crush my ribs. On the third attempt, something small and soft that I spat straight onto the floor dislodged from my throat. What blissful relief! Fresh clean air coursed through my being and we collapsed, gasping, onto the bed. (Yes, I know what you’re thinking, it has been a while since we did that.)

Some time later, I started whimpering helplessly and Other Half held me in his arms. (This happens quite a lot, usually around the middle of each month.) Later still, I decided to look and see what had nearly taken my life prematurely. It was foam, conical in shape, and orange. An earplug. And must have been left, discarded, under my bed many months ago until Babe found it earlier today, while I was scrabbling around looking for his ball. And dropped neatly into the glass by my bed, for once without knocking its contents onto the floor. Little bugger. Just wait until I put woodlice in his bottle…

***

The other thing of significance that happened, was us realising that Babe has started producing words in Other Half's second language, that he and I often communicate in. Other Half speaks to Babe in his mother tongue – which I can only produce the most basic of sentences in – as often as he can remember to, which isn’t that often. And he gabbles it really fast, giving him b-all chance, in my humble opinion, of picking up so much as a word. But Babe has, as I’ve said, started producing some words of our other shared language, in a whiny and irritated voice:

‘Come on, X’ (‘X’ represents Other Half’s name), and ‘Don’t!’.

Obviously, it is not me he has learnt these utterances from me; they reveal nothing of the dynamic of my realtionship with Other Half and I do not need to reflect on them or consider possible learning outcomes. Good night and sleep well.

Highs and Lows, and ferries

2008-06-06T13:11:00.000-07:00

I don't know what to write about today. I'm very tired and not feeling very funny but am committed to updating this blog twice-weekly. Perhaps I'll share the highest and lowest points of the last 24 hours.

As predicted, Babe did not sleep well last night. In fact, he woke every twenty minutes or so between midnight and 3.30am, which was much worse than usual, and he was up by half past six this morning, despite our disrupted night. Other Half and I had agreed to be firm with him, and make him go back to sleep in his own bed, but this weighty resolve had not been tested by the three previous nights of sleeping through, so it was last night that I had to be tough. And Babe didn't like it at all, yelling angrily when I insisted repeatedly on putting him back into his cot.

At 2am, Other Half threw back the duvet and stormed around the bed, shouting that Babe was 'traumatic'. For a minute I wondered if he was being sympathetic, and taking his turn at the being tough. Unfortunately it was simply a linguistic error and what he actually meant was that he thought Babe was 'traumatised', and wanted to bring him into bed with us to calm him down. (Yes, 'us' - we are trying to return to sharing a bed but this will not be a go-er if Babe is hell-bent on sharing it with us.) The ensuing argument, in the corridor outside Babe's bedroom, resulted in Other Half storming into the spare room, as I didn't want to undo the hard work of the last couple of hours.

But by 3am my resolve collapsed and Babe was in with me, snuggling against my back and tucking his feet into my pajama bottoms. It took me another half an hour to drop off myself, and I laid in bed, tears welling up behind my eyelids. Angry with Babe, angry with Other Half, angry with myself for not knowing what to do and for being fat. I woke up thinking I would just have to take the day off work, and then realised I couldn't as I had a meeting to attend. That was a low, low point, what with Babe being tired and grumpy still, and an hour and a half left to kill before dropping him at nursery. I don't know how I survived the morning at work, trying but failing to complete simple tasks in logical order.

I am struck by what a creature of habit Babe is. With some obvious exceptions in the sleep department of course. He loves to have his feet massaged while having his morning and evening milk. He starts to take his shoes off while we're waiting for my friends to open their front doors. He likes to wear a hat.

We have come into the habit of snuggling up on the sofa at lunch-time, when I've picked him up after work. I put CBeebies on and close my eyes, while he watches for twenty minutes or so. If I forget to wrap a blanket around us he goes off to get it and pulls it over both of us.

Today, after the traumas of last night, he wanted to be especially close to me. (Other Half helpfully pointed out that this probably means I did traumatise him.) We were leaning against one another, my arm overlapping one of his, and he was sharing my crisps and sandwich. I sat up to reach my drink and he sat up a bit too, and then waited for me before snuggling back down and shuffling so that I rested my arm back in the position it had been in. This isn't an obvious high point of the day, is it? But it made me feel so tickley-fluttery tickety-boo happy. Just being quietly, acceptingly, comfortingly beautifully in-company with my son. Similar in feeling, for me, to lying with the sun on your face on a ferry crossing the oiled-calm surface of the Aegean. Spray in the breeze and a beer on the bench. Rare moments when, for a second or two, your brain stops whirring and the intrinsic beauty of life takes hold of you. Long may such precious moments last.

Pants on fire...

2008-06-05T00:41:00.000-07:00

Babe has slept through the last three nights. Clearly this was because Granny came to stay, and he wanted to expose the lying, half-crazed banshee whose mission in life is to moan and grumble unremittingly that he knows his mother to be.

Daggers at dawn

2008-05-29T13:14:00.000-07:00

Babe woke at 5.13 this morning. And at just after midnight, 1.11am, 1.23am, 1.46am, 3.24am, etc etc. As we didn't get him down until 10pm last night I knew the 5.13 screaming was because he was exhausted and pissed off at being awake so early. Which made two of us.

I didn't know what to do with the little mite, feeling closer than I have been yet to pulverising him. I haven't had an unbroken night for going on for a month and I swear he's out to break me. Why? I'm his loving mother! So, I bring him into bed with me. More back-writhing and screams. His milk is ready, cooled, on the windowsill (it's not going to curdle overnight in the Uk in May, is it?)(actually his milk did curdle during a brief hot interlude a couple of weeks ago and I didn't notice 'til he was half-way through it - oops) so I put it into his little hands. A nano-second of contentment was swiftly followed by more screams, and my mummy-radar detected the desire for milk that had been warmed.

I open the bedroom door and yell onto the landing,
'The little ba**ard wants warm milk and if he doesn't get it in five I'm going to kill myself.'
Other Half emerges from the spare room, zombie-like, and makes his way downstairs at a reasonable pace for the time of day.

Meantime, Babe points, screaming, at the TV I now keep on the farside bedside table.
'Mine! Rahhhhhhhh.'
CBeebies doesn't start until 6am.
'Not, now, it isn't, sweetheart.'
'RAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!'.

Other Half returns with the milk, which he hands to me gingerly through the door, which is ajar. He then retreats. Twenty minutes left until his alarm clock goes off. He starts work at seven, and sits in a vibrating excavator for eleven hours with two 30min breaks per day.

The warm milk has done the trick. Babe lies against the pillow, guzzling, while I frown into my eyelids, wondering for the umpteenth time where I've gone wrong.

Half-way through he runs his soft little index finger across my bare shoulder and removes the bottle from his mouth. 'Mummy,' he smiles. I am filled with joy and know that actually, I haven't gone wrong at all. Well, not recently anyway.

Then he stabs me so hard in the iris that I gasp in pain.
'Eye.'

When Other Half returned from work this evening I asked for thirty seconds of his time.
He looked at me and sat down.
'We need to get this sleep thing sorted,' I say. 'From tonight, we agree a bed time and he can scream as much as he likes, but he goes when we say he does.'
'I agree with you,' he responds. Right answer. And we play games, just like a happy family, look at flash cards, get our little chicken washed and ready for bed. Then it's milk time and Bed Time. My heart starts to beat faster. But twenty-five minutes of screaming later, it has worked. Babe is asleep.

I go into the kitchen and wearily attack a bag of mini mars bars. Other Half comes in. I look at him in what I think is my "Little (well, ok, medium) women needs big (well, ok, medium) man to look after her" expression.
'I need a hug,' I say.
'And I need a shag,' he tartly responds. 'But am I going to get one?'
I'm not sure what my face says, but he picks up his gym bag and walks out of the front door.

New Year's Resolutions

2008-05-27T12:51:00.000-07:00

Well, New Week's Resolutions, actually: several readers (possibly all of them) have asked why my blog died such a fast and sudden death. Good question. Well, stupid question really - I'm a working mum who lives with a man, for crying out loud, which doesn't leave time for applying deodorant, let alone written contemplation - but it has given me cause for thought. I must find a way of re-building the person I always thought I was. I must find myself. I must seek a more productive way of letting off steam than turning the air blue and worrying our neighbours. So here it is. I commit to updating this blog twice-weekly for the forseeable future. And now I'm going to watch the second round of Britain's Got Talent. Anything, anything at all, to kurb the onslaught of hugely intelligent and important thoughts that pursue me night and day...

PS On the subject of blue air, Babe has said 'sh*t' about ten times now. And in context, so there's no mistaking it. The first occassion was about a week ago when he rolled off my bed, ran around the side and richoched into a chair. Things must change.

Goat-yoghurt 'me' time

2007-12-11T14:41:00.000-08:00

I finally had some 'me' time tonight: a bath. And took Trinny and Susanna's advice and put goat yogurt on my face to soften it up. Now I've got sodding weird dry patches. Liars! I should do them for... well, lying. Because I've got loads of time for complaining and the like these days... not. At least I hadn't made a special trip out to get the stuff.

No, I had plenty of said yogurt in my fridge. Such fancies are the by-product of living with a man of near-Mediterranean descent. We are never without such trivialities as olives, feta cheese (five packs per week minimum), huge amounts of crusty white bread, olive oil, pale lager and wash-and-go. Oh, and apple turnovers (??). We are, however, regularly without such life-sustaining necessities as a kitchen, bathroom, toilet paper and washing up liquid. Heigh ho.

All is not well, it seems, with the down pipe that was laid under the dining room floor while I was in labour. Pooey odours were reaching for my nostrils as I laid in the bath, and for once they weren't coming from Babe. Blinking heck. Other Half had a bad motorcycle accident shortly before we met, and amongst his injuries was the almost entire loss of his sense of smell. And he is concerned that I may be exaggerating said pooey stink to get my own back because I so utterly, literally and physically (ie prostrating myself across his shovel) opposed his digging up of said dining room floor. More about our DIY disasters on another occassion, but a great proportion of my four-day labour and birth story are given over to them. I can see nasty things lying in wait for this weekend, though.

So, on that happy note, I'm going to recklessly fritter a portion of my evening on e-bay. I should have learnt my lesson yesterday when I bought a wonderful baby carrier with sunroof, wind protector, luggage compartment and god knows what else for £4 - RRP £159! Except when I received the payment confirmation I discovered its size XXL. Rats! That will be too large even for my expanding, sagging waistline. And Other Half is obviously much trimmer than I am. I'll have to strap it around a pillow or something as well as my tummy.

Anyway, as Christmas is approaching, I thought I'd ask Other Half what special things I could search for him for on E-bay, and he asked me to look for a spare car key. I'm not sure if he's taking the piss. Still I like a challenge.

Watching TV and crying

2007-12-01T08:30:00.000-08:00

Good grief! What has my life come to? I've just caught the tail end of some film for kids about whales and surfing or something and within five minutes I started crying. Other half is crying too, but children's films tend to have that effect on him. Think he must yearn for a simpler life at times. Not that I make life complicated, you understand. (Yeah right - the ED.)

So, back to the film, and the fact that I'm writing this sniffing. Must be the evocative music. Or the fact that's I've been up since half five again this morning, and it's taken both of us two hours this afternoon to settle an increasingly manic Babe down for a sleep. Poor little mite has been given about ten bottles of formula, as that's what usually gets him to drop off. OOPS - BORING MOTHER DETAIL ALERT... And it's been windy-rain-hailing outside so pushing him out in the pram wasn't an option. He did sleep for half an hour at 8am, which is when I should have had a nap too, but I decided to tidy the loft, and have filled the dining room with dusty boxes to sort. And now I'm going to go and make stuffed aubergine for dinner. I think there's a learning point here somewhere, but will ignore it for now. So much to do, and so little time...

Ok, so I lied

2007-11-28T14:28:00.000-08:00

You probably guessed that my other half didn't get tangled in the helicopter outside TKMaxx. That would have been silly. So I've been musing about why I lied. I suppose it's because I felt I was building up to a crescendo and then realised I didn't have one so made one up. The story felt a little empty without something else on top.

But what none of you realise is that nearly every day for us is a story like that one. Life for me is kind of like scootering along, gripping the handles for all I'm worth, knowing that as soon as a corner approaches I'm going to have to indicate, and that's the point at which I just know my shoelace is going to get caught up in the wheel spokes. So I cunningly decide not to indicate at all, or change direction mid-journey, and that's when the contents of the ice-cream van I hadn't noticed ahead of me by the kerb shoots it's load across my path.

Sunny Sunday

2007-11-25T12:59:00.000-08:00

Today was going so well. We got up (good start:)) around 6.45 which was a lie-in by Babe's standards. Had breakfast, made animal noises, piled up and knocked down plastic bricks a few times (Other Half), put several loads of washing through, cleaned the kitchen, cooked, washed hair, hoovered and cleaned the windows (me)... you can picture the scene. Except no, you can't, because we had glorious smiles on our faces! This was our first DIY-free weekend in months. Life seemed delirious and carefree. We sipped coffee in between our respective tasks, chatted about nothing, relished the cuteness and clearly intellectual outputs of our offspring, and even had time for a bit of the other while he had a nap midday. Gosh!

After the obligatory 'see how much of the surface area of the kitchen we can spread our lunch over' feast - wrestle with the Babe for his spoon and somehow he always wins, catapulting whatever's on it into your hair (well, they do say they're born with enough grip to hang off washing lines) - we decided to go into town. The excitement in the car was tangible. A day out with mummy AND daddy!

And you know what? We had quite a nice, argument-free afternoon. Didn't really do anything, but it was nice. Different. Strange :)

And then it was time to come home. We shouldn't really have left it so late. Babe had been happily helping me choose carving knives in TKMaxx when he suddenly started screaming with hunger, in the way that only babes suddenly can, and a packet of organic raisins wasn't going to cut the mustard. So we ran to the car, in a loving, nearly hand-in-hand, smug, 'we're a family and we've spent the day outside the house together and we're still alive' kind of way.

Then Other Half (who had been rummaging in his pockets in an exaggeratedly casual way) asks me for the key. My brow darkens. 'Why the f**k would I have the f**king key?' I reply. 'I can't drive, I have no pockets, and you parked the car while I went on to the shops with Babe.'

I can see in his face that he is tempted to argue with me on the technicalities of whether I can actually drive or not, but fortunately he applies restraint and we quickly decide to re-trace our footsteps in search of said key.

Where had we been? Well, Babe had messed himself as soon as we arrived at the shops, so first we'd gone to the baby change facilities. No key there. Then we'd gone to buy some water as I was thirsty. No key at the newsagent's. Then we'd waited outside the lifts for a while, to go up to the third floor to take some clothes back. No key in either lift. In case you were wondering, we'd ended up accidentally getting out at the second floor and having to wait for another one, and then it turned out that the shop in question was, actually, on the second floor after all so we had to go back down again. Then I'd needed the loo. No key there. The woman in the cubicle I'd used had great boots though. Then we'd chatted with a woman who tried to flog me a gel-filled bottle heater for 20 quid outside Santa's grotto - no key there. Then had gone to travel agent so that Other half could get brochures on Florida, which I tolerated as people have to be able to dream, but frankly I have no intention of ever visiting the USofA, and no key there, so that left TKMaxx. I told you we'd had a great afternoon.

By this time, we were being warned that the centre was closing in five minutes, so we decided to split. Other Half went to TKMaxx while I went to press the Help button on the ticket machine. Thirty seconds later, I'd arranged to have a camera put on the car, to get a taxi home, for Other Half to pick up car in morning (lucky he's not working, but that's another story) and for the all-night fee to be waived. Other Half had, meanwhile, got himself stuck inside the kids helicopter outside TKMaxx - god knows how he got one of the blades tangled in his rucksack but now I know where they were while I was in the lav - and an angry-looking security guard was trying to get him out, in a 'rabbits and all his friends and relations' kind of way, while straggling shoppers gave them bemused stares.

And he hadn't found said key. We can't even have a sodding simple boring afternoon without something happening that you'd prefer not to...

Smelly house...

2007-11-24T11:55:00.000-08:00

Am annoyed. Entire house smells of lamb meat. Other Half making bi-annual visit to kitchen and frying everything within reach. At least there's no fish in sight. I've lost count of the times I've turned the corner at the bottom of the road and known immediately that it's fish for tea. Bloody hell. Kitchen like the engine room of an Atlantic steamer.