A Squeal of Thanks and Homework

How exciting is that!! I go to waste some time on the site ("how rude," as F8 would say, "how offensive") and trawl through some favourites, bits of which I might have missed while idiotic enough to live life, go on holiday to avoid flood-cum-droughts, and wrestle with slippery beasts.
(Enough Lolly-talk, you’re losing your audience.)
And in my cyber trip to the gorgeous @themill what do I find but a RGB award?
Long have I wondered how the blessed get these honours and now I know. Actually, I think we can all just nick the image, but I want @themill to know how embarrassingly pleased I am by this, and for the rest of you to know that it was really and truly conferred and not just the product of a burgling spree.
(You are right to have entertained the thought, however; although I am a little bit hurt that you did so.)

According to @themill I can nominate 5 more. And knowing that several of you already have this, you will forgive me for not selecting you, so I will go for, in no particular order (the power, the power):

LittleBrownDog: my kind of girl, albeit with an absurdly strong sense of responsibility towards her Akela: step back from the beige uniform, put down the cheesy balls!
ChrisH: those paintings (by association, if not her actual mitt on the brush) and that assiduity – so shaming to the lazy – (even if she can’t undo her own bra. Honestly!)
Frances for bringing the unknown world of New York retail into our (largely) British lives.
KittyB for being naughty but a horribly accomplished role model. Those flower photos, those cushions and All Those Plans for Christmas! KittyLand in December, anyone??
IrishEyes, a true teller of tales, an old fashioned and absorbing style, witty and warm and thoroughly readable every time.
and
Elizabethm for being inspirational, yet still dry and funny. Anyone who’s not read the story of her illness should hie them over and be prepared to be awed. Still waiting for an invitation to That Cottage, mind.

Oops, can’t count. Oh well.
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Still a-flush with my award, I am finally tackling my homework, with which I am several days late – and I was such a Good Girl when young, wail. The smells and sounds one.
Now, you’re going to have to like me a lot to hoick the old carcass around the world like this to prompt me from my coma, but here goes.
All pretty obvious stuff:

That wall of heat that wallops you when you get off the plane on holiday. The worst of the preparation is done – you’re there, for God’s sake – and, from grim grey skies to that muzzy warmth: who cares if you left the oven on? You didn’t. Enjoy.

Later, unpacked, the sea can lap round my ankles, feet disappearing into fudgey sand. Getting ready for supper, my back will feel tight from the sun, my nails white from swimming and my lungs pure from sea air. Aaaah.

The smell of my children. Don’t wince, they’re young and fragrant, their skin soft as Teflon. Plus they’ll immediately start bickering about who kisses first or second so I’ll have to rise from the dead to thwack them.

Various commercial scents, the lifting of the lid gets me full throttle in the solar plexus, kick-starting a terrifyingly powerful drag back to the past:
Cachet, which my friend and I used to wear to go to parties in the 6th form: a welter of unhappy memories, slights, disappointments and waiting in the cold for a lift home can flood back with that one;
Paco Rabanne for Edward, and happy hours spent in duty free buying it having sprayed on everything else just in case;
Royal Secret for my mother, although I don’t know if they do it any longer? But it’s her, and her getting ready to go out and looking beautiful and glamorous and coolly jewelled.
Obsession for my father;
Miss Dior, if I’m being solipsistic (and, let’s face it, why not?) for me. My mother first gave it to me at 16 and despite going wild in duty free (see above) I’ve never really succumbed to anything else.

Someone whispering, “Supper Is Made Forever...” or, oh let’s say AND, whispering, “We’ve Arranged Fairies To Do The Laundry …. Forever...” Who could die with that offer on the table? Go on, let’s complete the trio with that immortal promise, too-little heard, “My Turn To Drive…” A girl can dream.

The crunch of snow beneath the skies on the first day of a skiing holiday. The sky is blue – it was pleasingly grey in comparison back in Blighty, remember, for schadenfreude is part of the deal; the promise of vin blanc shimmers in the pleasingly near future and the queue for the ski lift is minimal. Heaven.

Flowers, the old faves: David Austin roses, wallflowers, sweet peas, Freesia, Elaeagnus angustifolia “Quicksilver”, honeysuckle and jasmine, night-scented stocks and Nicotiana. Greedy nostrils sated, the hayfever pill was taken earlier.

A gentle pop and the fat fizz of champagne glugging into my glass. My big glass.

Cool, clean sheets, and one’s legs scissoring in them, back de-clicking after a long day.

The smell of a damned fine Indian meal, accompanied by the sizzle of chicken on tandoor. Seated opposite me will, I know, be my glorious little F8 tucking in bigly, while T11 anxiously nurses his coca cola, knowing it has to last the whole meal. It’s these inevitables which are so comforting.

Children singing. Sobbed when they did Land of Hope and Glory at a recent school concert, ditto when their orchestra performed a joyously rambunctious version of English Country Garden.

The bit before any meal with friends or family. That first glug of wine and the hand reaching for a shiny olive. The anticipation, always the anticipation, that indefinable sense of things being in train, the work all but done, the enjoyment about to begin: Christmas Eve over Christmas Day. It’s all but palpable.
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There’s no-one to pass the homework on to, aren’t I the last?