Got a new Christmas tree from B&Q (the glamour).
I only ended up with it out of spite, really. A real one was ruled out because of the extra hoovering duties incumbent on ownership of same. Plus they’re always wonky and bald when you spring them from the net.
Then Homebase had been hopeless, simply hopeless, and I’d found myself in that Mecca of tat, B&Q staring blankly, like the dog at her empty bowl, at the displays of plastic trees there, trying to make sense of the new vocabulary. The snow-tipped, the self-lit, the pop up.
Just as I decided I’d made a decision (oh giddy day) I noticed the gap behind the display tree. Typically, they'd all gone, the kind I had my eye on. The kind, moreover, that was half price. Who can resist? So I went on line and fiddled on my phone trying to see if could get one delivered, when I spotted a B&Q bloke huffing and puffing over a fork lift truck and asked him.
"Not getting any more in, no,” he said. Then, “you can have that one, if you want, the display one."
"Oh," I said, thinking about it. I couldn’t weigh up if it was really quite a good find or truly vile. The children were doing that near death thing children do when waiting on a parent and my decision making capacity has never been good at the best of times, still less when confronted with a possible bargain, possible big mistake.
Then a really oiky couple – him a big bruiser with a bald head and bulging eyes and her all fake fur coat, high heels and S American attitude – said, "Oi! We'd'a had that!" She munched up her lips and clutched her fake fur coat at impressive poitrine point and He left hooked the air making his car coat ride up.
"Are you together?" asked Mr B&Q. Did he really need to ask.
"No," I said quietly.
"I'll put it in your trolley, shall I?"
“Do,” I said.
So I got it. Whether I wanted it or not really which is not a part of my psyche I’m happy confronting.
Am still worried that it might be more than a little chavvy, particularly given the nature of the other couple’s interest, miaow, but overall it is really rather nice. I think.
I’d been to a drinks thing the night before where there was the most immaculate tree in the world. You could but stand and stare. It was the sort of house with garlands on the stairs and wreaths of dyed ostrich feathers. In November. Startling.
“Don’t mention the tree!” sighed my hostess, her hand shooting to her brow. “Stress! I’ll give you stress.” Her children skulked in the background. “Course the girls want to help,” she continued. “I thought about it. For a moment. But it always gets nasty. They haven’t got a clue. No sense of balance. I’m there, twitching. And that’s no good for anyone. So I sent them out with the dog and did it myself. Had a little sherry.”
With this in mind – and strangely familiar, bar the sherry – I determined to do ours with the children this year. So that in their memory bank was at least one instance in their bleak little childhoods of me playing the Merry Mum and not the vicious dictator. This meant not shooting out my hand to rearrange their cack-handed attempts. It meant Bye Bye to tasteful silver and Hello There to a more gaudy combo of bronze (by which I don’t mean orange, I mean bronze), lime green and purple. It meant it was all actually quite good fun. And, most importantly, up.
-------------
Just to say a big thanks to Ben at Appliances Online for sending me some yumtastic chocs. I wanted a washing machine where the door shuts without using your knee but chocs will do nicely instead. Nice company.
Thursday, 9 December 2010
Friday, 13 August 2010
a little learning
F11 was crashing around in his pyjamas, over which was stretched his new rugby protective top (think: ‘80s meets slut: black netting and big big shoulders, not improved over bulky wincyette), thick socks and brand new school shoes. He was clutching Catty, and a cane, and was in search of his monocle. It’s possibly disloyal to share that he was miaowing, too. Ornaments quaked at the swish of the cane. The miaowing segued into something even more tuneless.
How can he possibly be big enough (isn’t) and mature enough (most def isn’t) to be going to secondary school in 3 weeks’ time? He isn’t.
“Chemistry, Physics, Biology, English, German, French, Maths, RE, PSCHE, History..” I said. I felt wretched at the range of subjects. The too-much-ness.
“ICT,” he said. Silly mummy.
“Geography,” I finished.
My heart sort of sinks for him.
Perhaps because even today I feel all pig-ironed out. Geography is very popular now but back in my childhood geography was just pig iron; pig iron, ox bow lakes and market bloody gardening in Denmark. Really. Christ, it was dull; the highlight was the end of term treat of watching the volcano film run backwards. No wonder my reliance on Sat Nav is so great. But if geography strangely flourishes (I’ve not investigated, I’m just grateful), history is on the ropes.
We’ve done virtually nothing this holidays. Just dossed around. The children have watched far too much rubbish telly. They’ve gone to bed far too late and got up far too late. It’s been fantastic.
There have been odd flirtations with real life. A man, big Jim, came to fix the drains and told us of that he's been banned from America for ten years. For hitting Wolfman at Universal Pictures. “I’d paid $300 for a tour,” he said. “I told 'em, I said, 'you can kick me out at 6 o’clock but not before.' Besides, Wolfman hit me first. It’s on CCTV and everything.”
But the joy of such time, the freedom from routine and the tyranny of the lunchbox, is occasionally tempered by memory of that from which we are temporarily free. I’ve been saddened by the struggles which T13, a very sparky boy, seemed to be having with some subjects.
Take history. Last term, I was trying to make out what it was that he was actually learning and, naturally, blaming him for the inexplicable randomness in dotting chaotically through centuries and continents. I couldn’t see the connection.
I asked his teacher, “Er, last month it seemed to be Henry VIII, then Cecil Rhodes and now it’s the English Civil War …?” I shrugged a ‘has T13 got it wrong’ shrug at her.
She blushed. “It’s the curriculum,” she mumbled. “We have to teach in, er, themes. This is Empire…. I know, I know, it seems crazy.”
“But there’s no context,” I said, “no sense of chronology, or consequence, or of … history.”
“I know,” she said meekly.
With a sense of dread, I rummaged through his English. He was ‘doing’ “Frankenstein.” From photocopied pages.
“Don’t you have the actual novel?” I ask.
“We read bits of it. In class. Joe’s rubbish at reading and gets all the long paragraphs.”
“But why?”
He shrugged. Shrugging seems to be integral to modern education. “Dunno. Something about Gothic novels. And then we write our own.” His, it goes without saying had been light on monks, and shadowy cloisters; no whey-faced heroine or evil uncle. He’d adopted a more slasher approach. Murder in a ski chalet. But that’s an interpretation, mkay, so that’s fine.
It goes without saying that while one rightly deplores our old friend Dumbing Down, there is also something deeply stupid about foisting ‘bits’ of “Frankenstein” on 12 and 13 year olds. It is a book which I loved … at about 17; the language is complex, the themes sophisticated, both lost on young boys and designed to anti-encourage them. I find it very depressing.
Randomness when self-instilled is one thing, having it imposed is quite another.
“Do you know,” F11 said, order restored with his monocle back screwed into his eye, and busying himself spreading almond butter (yum) mainly onto a wonky muffin and only a bit on poor, beleaguered Catty, “that China had some pyramids? Yes. They’re missing and the Greeks had a god for everything? Even cupboards? And their god of the sewer was called something like Cloaca…”
“Cloacina?” I said, the word landing from somewhere. Possibly too much time spent cleaning lavatories.
"Weirdo," said T13, strolling by in his cricketing helmet to log onto Facebook.
“Yes. (Shut up T13, freak) you’re so clever. Shall I tell Big Jim?”
I thought of Big Jim, in his stained beanie, jabbing furiously at the drains, frequently wiping a gloved hand across his face, tiny splatters. “Best not,” I said.
“Yes, and if an organism doubles itself 3 times in an hour then after 24 hours there are … well, I don’t know how to say it, but this many.” He showed me a piece of paper riddled with 72 computations, leading up to an impossibly long number which I can’t even type correctly (possibly 2361183241434822606848 but it was really really hard to do). I started checking on a calculator – which gave up at 2147483648, which tallied with his 32nd sum. I blinked. The teachers better not waste all this.
“I did it in my head,” he said. “Watching the Turtles. You just keep doubling. It’s easy.”
There is a God. Whether of the sewers or not.
How can he possibly be big enough (isn’t) and mature enough (most def isn’t) to be going to secondary school in 3 weeks’ time? He isn’t.
“Chemistry, Physics, Biology, English, German, French, Maths, RE, PSCHE, History..” I said. I felt wretched at the range of subjects. The too-much-ness.
“ICT,” he said. Silly mummy.
“Geography,” I finished.
My heart sort of sinks for him.
Perhaps because even today I feel all pig-ironed out. Geography is very popular now but back in my childhood geography was just pig iron; pig iron, ox bow lakes and market bloody gardening in Denmark. Really. Christ, it was dull; the highlight was the end of term treat of watching the volcano film run backwards. No wonder my reliance on Sat Nav is so great. But if geography strangely flourishes (I’ve not investigated, I’m just grateful), history is on the ropes.
We’ve done virtually nothing this holidays. Just dossed around. The children have watched far too much rubbish telly. They’ve gone to bed far too late and got up far too late. It’s been fantastic.
There have been odd flirtations with real life. A man, big Jim, came to fix the drains and told us of that he's been banned from America for ten years. For hitting Wolfman at Universal Pictures. “I’d paid $300 for a tour,” he said. “I told 'em, I said, 'you can kick me out at 6 o’clock but not before.' Besides, Wolfman hit me first. It’s on CCTV and everything.”
But the joy of such time, the freedom from routine and the tyranny of the lunchbox, is occasionally tempered by memory of that from which we are temporarily free. I’ve been saddened by the struggles which T13, a very sparky boy, seemed to be having with some subjects.
Take history. Last term, I was trying to make out what it was that he was actually learning and, naturally, blaming him for the inexplicable randomness in dotting chaotically through centuries and continents. I couldn’t see the connection.
I asked his teacher, “Er, last month it seemed to be Henry VIII, then Cecil Rhodes and now it’s the English Civil War …?” I shrugged a ‘has T13 got it wrong’ shrug at her.
She blushed. “It’s the curriculum,” she mumbled. “We have to teach in, er, themes. This is Empire…. I know, I know, it seems crazy.”
“But there’s no context,” I said, “no sense of chronology, or consequence, or of … history.”
“I know,” she said meekly.
With a sense of dread, I rummaged through his English. He was ‘doing’ “Frankenstein.” From photocopied pages.
“Don’t you have the actual novel?” I ask.
“We read bits of it. In class. Joe’s rubbish at reading and gets all the long paragraphs.”
“But why?”
He shrugged. Shrugging seems to be integral to modern education. “Dunno. Something about Gothic novels. And then we write our own.” His, it goes without saying had been light on monks, and shadowy cloisters; no whey-faced heroine or evil uncle. He’d adopted a more slasher approach. Murder in a ski chalet. But that’s an interpretation, mkay, so that’s fine.
It goes without saying that while one rightly deplores our old friend Dumbing Down, there is also something deeply stupid about foisting ‘bits’ of “Frankenstein” on 12 and 13 year olds. It is a book which I loved … at about 17; the language is complex, the themes sophisticated, both lost on young boys and designed to anti-encourage them. I find it very depressing.
Randomness when self-instilled is one thing, having it imposed is quite another.
“Do you know,” F11 said, order restored with his monocle back screwed into his eye, and busying himself spreading almond butter (yum) mainly onto a wonky muffin and only a bit on poor, beleaguered Catty, “that China had some pyramids? Yes. They’re missing and the Greeks had a god for everything? Even cupboards? And their god of the sewer was called something like Cloaca…”
“Cloacina?” I said, the word landing from somewhere. Possibly too much time spent cleaning lavatories.
"Weirdo," said T13, strolling by in his cricketing helmet to log onto Facebook.
“Yes. (Shut up T13, freak) you’re so clever. Shall I tell Big Jim?”
I thought of Big Jim, in his stained beanie, jabbing furiously at the drains, frequently wiping a gloved hand across his face, tiny splatters. “Best not,” I said.
“Yes, and if an organism doubles itself 3 times in an hour then after 24 hours there are … well, I don’t know how to say it, but this many.” He showed me a piece of paper riddled with 72 computations, leading up to an impossibly long number which I can’t even type correctly (possibly 2361183241434822606848 but it was really really hard to do). I started checking on a calculator – which gave up at 2147483648, which tallied with his 32nd sum. I blinked. The teachers better not waste all this.
“I did it in my head,” he said. “Watching the Turtles. You just keep doubling. It’s easy.”
There is a God. Whether of the sewers or not.
Wednesday, 4 August 2010
soup
I don't like soup. It goes cold while you're talking, during which time it develops a granular texture which makes my stomach turn. It involves a slurping, bits of the gunge bleed from other people's mouths and a nasty dragging of the spoon across the china bowl is akin to nails on a board. The anonymity of soup disturbs, too. Just how bendy was that friendless carrot prised from the botton of the fridge, how damp that seeping of celery?
If I manage to deal with that lot, then there's the miniscus of leavings lining the bowl to hate plus that, around now, someone always breaks off some bread to drag across said miniscus. It can make me really quite faint, but then I'm a delicate soul in permanent need of an excuse to collapse on the chaise longue.
However, this is very nice.
I mentioned on Facebook that I was going to make some soup mainly because for me it's quite an event when I put aside my shuddering and twitching and pretend I'm a normal person without Little Ways. Lots of people contacted me later asking for the recipe, so, for the nicest possible Roasted Tomato Soup, what happens is this. Quantities are vague. En passant, the pulped stage, of the roasted garlic and the toms alone, is a lovely base for pasta, for pizza bases. I use it a lot. The amount I've mentioned here, the 25 toms, will do soup for about 6 twice over, and a tupperware-ful for a pasta meal and pizza bases. Time well spent and easy peasy.
So, roast some tomatoes - I've just done about 25 big chunky ones, vine attached, and a bulb of garlic , bulb being the whole big thing - slug of oil, s&p, scattering of basil if it pleases you. The lot for 40 mins at about 190/200 (mine is a fierce oven). The success lies solely in the roasting. All the rest is window dressing. There is no need for any of that steeping in boiling water business, to de-skin, or to fiddle about with the seeds. Not if you have a beast of a food processor there isn't, anyway. Here's mine. Click and weep.
Meanwhile fry up a couple of red onions - last time I just chucked in some salad onions, too, because I only had one dismal little red chap and I felt embarrassed for it, knowing it wouldn't be up to the job without help.
When fried, blitz the onions in a processor (last time, I did indeed add some sad celery and a couple of predictably ropey carrots, too. As we all know, it's that or the compost bin. In the past, I've put in a couple of anchovies - not that I like them (cue more jerking), but in small quantities they add a nice saltiness and, again, the fridge needed clearing. Pesky tiny jars.)
[note: In retrospect, it's worth affirming that messing about with naff veg is a mistake. Particularly if you've princess stamped through your DNA like me. Keep it simple. The compost bin IS your friend. No need to pretend you're half way to being All That with bloody stock. Celery, my arse. It must be the most over-rated food-type substance on the planet.]
Put in a large pan.
When the toms are done, blitz them, maybe in batches, including the greenery: sometimes you have to fish out the fibrous bits which won't fall dutiful victim to the swishing blades, but it's all flavour-enhancing stuff so worth doing.
When cool enough squirt out the pulp of the garlic (a waiting game you only get wrong once... owch!)
If have 'em, blitz half a dozen of those sullen turds which go by the name of sun dried tomato. Don't think about it, just drop them in the machine. And don't fret if don't have, no one will die.
(at this stage you can save some of the thickened mixture for other recipes, it's a playing by ear thing)
Stir together in the pan with a tad more olive oil, a spoon of sugar (I don't always bother, toms are sweet enough, but sometimes the children like to "help" (the lies bloggers tell the world, me and my magazine children) and it's the sort of thing they can do without too much disaster); a hefty shake of Bouillon (vegan, reduced salt) powder and maybe a litre of water. Or, if you must, if you're a bone keeper and have bits of old carcass hanging around, real chicken stock. Bit of s&p.
While it's just sitting there simmering gently - for maybe 40 mins or until you're bored or hungry - make some pesto with random amounts of parmesan, olive oil, pine nuts and basil. Or, failing that, just grate some parmesan in. If I'm feeling uber-mummy, I'll have knocked up some tiny bread rolls in individual tins. Really.
The colour is that comforting orange of Heinz tomato soup, the taste is out of this world. Even for ghastly princesses. Just wear blinkers and ear puffs to save you from your fellow eaters.
If I manage to deal with that lot, then there's the miniscus of leavings lining the bowl to hate plus that, around now, someone always breaks off some bread to drag across said miniscus. It can make me really quite faint, but then I'm a delicate soul in permanent need of an excuse to collapse on the chaise longue.
However, this is very nice.
I mentioned on Facebook that I was going to make some soup mainly because for me it's quite an event when I put aside my shuddering and twitching and pretend I'm a normal person without Little Ways. Lots of people contacted me later asking for the recipe, so, for the nicest possible Roasted Tomato Soup, what happens is this. Quantities are vague. En passant, the pulped stage, of the roasted garlic and the toms alone, is a lovely base for pasta, for pizza bases. I use it a lot. The amount I've mentioned here, the 25 toms, will do soup for about 6 twice over, and a tupperware-ful for a pasta meal and pizza bases. Time well spent and easy peasy.
So, roast some tomatoes - I've just done about 25 big chunky ones, vine attached, and a bulb of garlic , bulb being the whole big thing - slug of oil, s&p, scattering of basil if it pleases you. The lot for 40 mins at about 190/200 (mine is a fierce oven). The success lies solely in the roasting. All the rest is window dressing. There is no need for any of that steeping in boiling water business, to de-skin, or to fiddle about with the seeds. Not if you have a beast of a food processor there isn't, anyway. Here's mine. Click and weep.
Meanwhile fry up a couple of red onions - last time I just chucked in some salad onions, too, because I only had one dismal little red chap and I felt embarrassed for it, knowing it wouldn't be up to the job without help.
When fried, blitz the onions in a processor (last time, I did indeed add some sad celery and a couple of predictably ropey carrots, too. As we all know, it's that or the compost bin. In the past, I've put in a couple of anchovies - not that I like them (cue more jerking), but in small quantities they add a nice saltiness and, again, the fridge needed clearing. Pesky tiny jars.)
[note: In retrospect, it's worth affirming that messing about with naff veg is a mistake. Particularly if you've princess stamped through your DNA like me. Keep it simple. The compost bin IS your friend. No need to pretend you're half way to being All That with bloody stock. Celery, my arse. It must be the most over-rated food-type substance on the planet.]
Put in a large pan.
When the toms are done, blitz them, maybe in batches, including the greenery: sometimes you have to fish out the fibrous bits which won't fall dutiful victim to the swishing blades, but it's all flavour-enhancing stuff so worth doing.
When cool enough squirt out the pulp of the garlic (a waiting game you only get wrong once... owch!)
If have 'em, blitz half a dozen of those sullen turds which go by the name of sun dried tomato. Don't think about it, just drop them in the machine. And don't fret if don't have, no one will die.
(at this stage you can save some of the thickened mixture for other recipes, it's a playing by ear thing)
Stir together in the pan with a tad more olive oil, a spoon of sugar (I don't always bother, toms are sweet enough, but sometimes the children like to "help" (the lies bloggers tell the world, me and my magazine children) and it's the sort of thing they can do without too much disaster); a hefty shake of Bouillon (vegan, reduced salt) powder and maybe a litre of water. Or, if you must, if you're a bone keeper and have bits of old carcass hanging around, real chicken stock. Bit of s&p.
While it's just sitting there simmering gently - for maybe 40 mins or until you're bored or hungry - make some pesto with random amounts of parmesan, olive oil, pine nuts and basil. Or, failing that, just grate some parmesan in. If I'm feeling uber-mummy, I'll have knocked up some tiny bread rolls in individual tins. Really.
The colour is that comforting orange of Heinz tomato soup, the taste is out of this world. Even for ghastly princesses. Just wear blinkers and ear puffs to save you from your fellow eaters.
Friday, 30 July 2010
Let's
Let it be known that any sentence beginning with an enthusiastic “Let’s …” plays host to an utterly idiotic idea which needs slaughtering right there and then. Kick it to the kerb and turn the TV up loud instead.
We’ll take – let’s take – the recent instance still raw in the flesh of the Milla household of “Let’s have a party.”
I suggested eagerly, E shuddered and went to lie down and I got busy with a list.
“You must be mad,” my mother said; a sentiment that’s come this way from that a few times now.
On the fridge was a yellowing invitation sent out by Mrs Efficient in November. Yes, November, to chime with the Christmas cards. Yes, the Christmas cards, in November. The mind boggles, an Escher unfolding of things which should not be. Still, this shiny rectangle is witness to the fact that even such grotesque planning can go tits up. Minutes after ripping open the envelope on that chilly day, long, long ago, came the breathy phone call. The venue (this was a party with a venue, and a ceillidh, and caterers, 3 things ours was going to go shy of) had double booked and the party had to be shunted on a week. Into July. I decided to forego invitations.
But just deciding who to have forced problems to bob to the surface. Friends aren’t that simple. It used to be that you knew people or didn’t know them. I have 200 names on my mobile phone but I scrolled through muttering, “no, no, maybe, no.”
To cull numbers further (the merry hostess admits) we ditched anyone long distance. They might want to stay. Can you imagine anything worse? Than friends staying? Sheets. Small talk over croissant served in the debris of day old dead brie and evil glasses sticky with the night before. All the hot water going. Besides they wouldn’t know anyone. It would be an unkindness.
We closed tired eyes to the notion of having anyone from school, to eager huddles discussing the 11+.
There was a quorum from the village beyond the ones we like whom we were obliged to have – and when you have X there’s always a Y and a Z too. So we set the party date in close sight and luckily lost a few to a wedding and some more to the summer holidays.
Around this time the weather started changing. The endless Enid Blyton summer got bored and the wind moved in.
I panicked, and thought, “Why don’t I...” (a close cousin of Let’s) “Why don’t I … make some bunting?” Within seconds, elderly knees were busy creaking up the attic ladder and years of dust and 7 bags of ancient fabric came crashing down with me a mere sneeze behind.
Do not be fooled. Bunting is not “a few triangles sewn together and put on a string.”
The West Wind woke up. The acceptances came flooding in. E said, “Have you thought about food?”
Bunting is, in fact, an hour’s ironing, a day’s cutting out and pinning – well, it is when suddenly you are a 101 triangles in through fabric choice paralysis … if I have just this and this … oh and this (calling for 202 backs and fronts). The kitchen disappeared under piles of material.
The North Wind thought, “Might as well …” and bashed at the newly planted borders and E said, “Where are we going to put all the drink?”
Bunting is several hours on the sewing machine cursing and kicking as the wretched thing prats about with self-important tension issues and needle snapping; anyone would think I should run to a service after 30 years of ownership.
E was not impressed. But what he failed to understand is that 80 people’s not that many people to feed, not really, not when the bunting was assuming a life of its own. Displacement activity he called it. Can you believe?
To keep the peace I had to make bad tempered forays into the kitchen to cook. We didn’t want anything approaching plates and knives and forks. Mouthfuls only, there was to be no post-party broaching of teetering piles, separating gummy plates, fags in the butter, fingering abandoned cutlery stiff with smeary somethings. So I chopped and whirred and 100 little mini quiches (mushroom duxelley stuff; asparagus and parmesan) emerged and baby toads in the hole and weeny pizza-ettes and tiny goats’ cheese and cranberry soufflés. The best bit was a pleasing hour in Lakeland resulting in a happy shopper bent double under 3-for-2 baking trays. A friend lent a fridge. Everyone needs a friend with a spare fridge.
And then the stringing.
The East Wind moved a little nearer.
I dyed the stringing tape bright zinging pink. Foolishly, I didn’t wear gloves. And then ironed the tape, all 150 feet of it, down the long skinny middle, edging mountains of cheese straws out of the greasy way. E fretted about the effect of the sun (ha!) on the beer. I pinned and pinned.
The day came, my shoulders ached through being hunched over the machine, my lobster hands throbbed through a bain marie incident and a run in with the iron, and I eyed the sky in pain and nervous defiance.
With six hours to go on the Saturday, we decided we needed an iPod player to play our ancient, but never used (couldn’t face learning how) iPod. We found a real bargain within ten minutes but it seemed a good idea to go and check out 3 other shops before returning to the first place; the only surprise being that there was actually one last one left, rather than missing it by dumb moments. How often is one treated to such serendipity?
Back home, the oil cloth flapped on the trestle table, the bunting strained and tugged at the guttering, the platters I’d thought were under the hob were actually inaccessibly behind the borrowed fridge.
The weather was behaving like a child at a wedding: OK, just about, sort of getting away with it, but pissing you off at the same time. 2 friends called, along the lines of, “Do you want to borrow a gazebo, it’s a bit dusty but …” I resisted, without screaming. It was all a massive strain on the patience just as the rain itself strained at the leash of the glowering clouds.
Was fast all hummus and olive’d out and headachey from eyeing the sky with such grave concern. It mocked me with sudden gusts of wind and flurries of clouds but no actual wet stuff. “Four hours,” said E shunting crap off a sideboard and into an open drawer.
We set off for Tesco for the glasses (free hire!) with misplaced confidence, a sign the rain took to prompt gently the windscreen wipers into play. In the queue, a troublesome neighbour, a duty invite, who mercifully couldn’t come – interminable unnecessary explanation involving a lesbian niece – sidled up to me, “What are you going to do if it rains, Milla?” he wheedled, a delighted smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
Fuck off you old fuck, I thought, “Nothing,” I said, desperate for a random, aerial source of intravenous gin, that and a sledgehammer.
A party gains its own impetus. Plates were dropped off. Mini everything, Hunca Munca but yumtastic, no shards of plaster. My chums came up trumps. A dozen or so of them came bearing offerings. I started to worry that there was going to be far too much food and foresaw myself flung face first in a bowl of salsa sucking desperately to show that it was wanted.
The dog walkers en masse revealed a worrying inclination to bosomy puddings – delicious tiny meringues with splodges of raspberry atop wobbles of cream a favourite. There were dips and canapés and fudge and focaccio, and spicy popcorn. Mrs Very Rich got the gold star for lending magazine-esque levels of goodies: glass bottles with flip lids for water, pails for pinks, baskets lined in Glass towels for casual loveliness and staggering in laden with Michelin standard lovelies and champers and a present. Ditch fridge owning friends; everyone needs a Mrs Very Rich as their friend.
The sun edged out of hiding and the wind buggered off.
Shame was that guests had to come along and ruin it all, really. The pleasure, such as it was, I now realised, had lain in the planning and the anticipation and to be stilled in aspic in a moment of never quite arriving would be a pleasant state of affairs.
At ten to 8 I rushed upstairs and donned some odd thing I’d bought in an All Saints sale at Gatwick airport at 6 in the morning in January and spent all night shedding tiny sequins, and E wore his running shorts and dinner jacket. He has good legs. Strong men carried out the good-looking but crap sofa and everyone arrived at once bringing on an attack of quite extraordinary nerves. A glass of wine did nothing to quell the anxiety and I thought, what a shame. Were I to go to a party and see this lot I would be thrilled but, somehow, in my own house it did nothing but occasion extreme dread.
What’s to say? It went really well. Apparently. Good noise levels. Packed.
No spats, no sulks, no sobs and no-one threw up in a plant pot. Making it sound rather dull really; all I can offer in the disaster stakes is a woman (wearing white) a victim of a mobile glass of red wine.
I started enjoying it at about 1 in the morning.
The food was snaffled up and pronounced delicious; there was a long session of shame at the bottle bank next day. The thank yous have been touching. Lots of nice people brought presents.
But, say it slowly, and clearly, and loudly: Never Again. Ever. Let’s Just Not.
We’ll take – let’s take – the recent instance still raw in the flesh of the Milla household of “Let’s have a party.”
I suggested eagerly, E shuddered and went to lie down and I got busy with a list.
“You must be mad,” my mother said; a sentiment that’s come this way from that a few times now.
On the fridge was a yellowing invitation sent out by Mrs Efficient in November. Yes, November, to chime with the Christmas cards. Yes, the Christmas cards, in November. The mind boggles, an Escher unfolding of things which should not be. Still, this shiny rectangle is witness to the fact that even such grotesque planning can go tits up. Minutes after ripping open the envelope on that chilly day, long, long ago, came the breathy phone call. The venue (this was a party with a venue, and a ceillidh, and caterers, 3 things ours was going to go shy of) had double booked and the party had to be shunted on a week. Into July. I decided to forego invitations.
But just deciding who to have forced problems to bob to the surface. Friends aren’t that simple. It used to be that you knew people or didn’t know them. I have 200 names on my mobile phone but I scrolled through muttering, “no, no, maybe, no.”
To cull numbers further (the merry hostess admits) we ditched anyone long distance. They might want to stay. Can you imagine anything worse? Than friends staying? Sheets. Small talk over croissant served in the debris of day old dead brie and evil glasses sticky with the night before. All the hot water going. Besides they wouldn’t know anyone. It would be an unkindness.
We closed tired eyes to the notion of having anyone from school, to eager huddles discussing the 11+.
There was a quorum from the village beyond the ones we like whom we were obliged to have – and when you have X there’s always a Y and a Z too. So we set the party date in close sight and luckily lost a few to a wedding and some more to the summer holidays.
Around this time the weather started changing. The endless Enid Blyton summer got bored and the wind moved in.
I panicked, and thought, “Why don’t I...” (a close cousin of Let’s) “Why don’t I … make some bunting?” Within seconds, elderly knees were busy creaking up the attic ladder and years of dust and 7 bags of ancient fabric came crashing down with me a mere sneeze behind.
Do not be fooled. Bunting is not “a few triangles sewn together and put on a string.”
The West Wind woke up. The acceptances came flooding in. E said, “Have you thought about food?”
Bunting is, in fact, an hour’s ironing, a day’s cutting out and pinning – well, it is when suddenly you are a 101 triangles in through fabric choice paralysis … if I have just this and this … oh and this (calling for 202 backs and fronts). The kitchen disappeared under piles of material.
The North Wind thought, “Might as well …” and bashed at the newly planted borders and E said, “Where are we going to put all the drink?”
Bunting is several hours on the sewing machine cursing and kicking as the wretched thing prats about with self-important tension issues and needle snapping; anyone would think I should run to a service after 30 years of ownership.
E was not impressed. But what he failed to understand is that 80 people’s not that many people to feed, not really, not when the bunting was assuming a life of its own. Displacement activity he called it. Can you believe?
To keep the peace I had to make bad tempered forays into the kitchen to cook. We didn’t want anything approaching plates and knives and forks. Mouthfuls only, there was to be no post-party broaching of teetering piles, separating gummy plates, fags in the butter, fingering abandoned cutlery stiff with smeary somethings. So I chopped and whirred and 100 little mini quiches (mushroom duxelley stuff; asparagus and parmesan) emerged and baby toads in the hole and weeny pizza-ettes and tiny goats’ cheese and cranberry soufflés. The best bit was a pleasing hour in Lakeland resulting in a happy shopper bent double under 3-for-2 baking trays. A friend lent a fridge. Everyone needs a friend with a spare fridge.
And then the stringing.
The East Wind moved a little nearer.
I dyed the stringing tape bright zinging pink. Foolishly, I didn’t wear gloves. And then ironed the tape, all 150 feet of it, down the long skinny middle, edging mountains of cheese straws out of the greasy way. E fretted about the effect of the sun (ha!) on the beer. I pinned and pinned.
The day came, my shoulders ached through being hunched over the machine, my lobster hands throbbed through a bain marie incident and a run in with the iron, and I eyed the sky in pain and nervous defiance.
With six hours to go on the Saturday, we decided we needed an iPod player to play our ancient, but never used (couldn’t face learning how) iPod. We found a real bargain within ten minutes but it seemed a good idea to go and check out 3 other shops before returning to the first place; the only surprise being that there was actually one last one left, rather than missing it by dumb moments. How often is one treated to such serendipity?
Back home, the oil cloth flapped on the trestle table, the bunting strained and tugged at the guttering, the platters I’d thought were under the hob were actually inaccessibly behind the borrowed fridge.
The weather was behaving like a child at a wedding: OK, just about, sort of getting away with it, but pissing you off at the same time. 2 friends called, along the lines of, “Do you want to borrow a gazebo, it’s a bit dusty but …” I resisted, without screaming. It was all a massive strain on the patience just as the rain itself strained at the leash of the glowering clouds.
Was fast all hummus and olive’d out and headachey from eyeing the sky with such grave concern. It mocked me with sudden gusts of wind and flurries of clouds but no actual wet stuff. “Four hours,” said E shunting crap off a sideboard and into an open drawer.
We set off for Tesco for the glasses (free hire!) with misplaced confidence, a sign the rain took to prompt gently the windscreen wipers into play. In the queue, a troublesome neighbour, a duty invite, who mercifully couldn’t come – interminable unnecessary explanation involving a lesbian niece – sidled up to me, “What are you going to do if it rains, Milla?” he wheedled, a delighted smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
Fuck off you old fuck, I thought, “Nothing,” I said, desperate for a random, aerial source of intravenous gin, that and a sledgehammer.
A party gains its own impetus. Plates were dropped off. Mini everything, Hunca Munca but yumtastic, no shards of plaster. My chums came up trumps. A dozen or so of them came bearing offerings. I started to worry that there was going to be far too much food and foresaw myself flung face first in a bowl of salsa sucking desperately to show that it was wanted.
The dog walkers en masse revealed a worrying inclination to bosomy puddings – delicious tiny meringues with splodges of raspberry atop wobbles of cream a favourite. There were dips and canapés and fudge and focaccio, and spicy popcorn. Mrs Very Rich got the gold star for lending magazine-esque levels of goodies: glass bottles with flip lids for water, pails for pinks, baskets lined in Glass towels for casual loveliness and staggering in laden with Michelin standard lovelies and champers and a present. Ditch fridge owning friends; everyone needs a Mrs Very Rich as their friend.
The sun edged out of hiding and the wind buggered off.
Shame was that guests had to come along and ruin it all, really. The pleasure, such as it was, I now realised, had lain in the planning and the anticipation and to be stilled in aspic in a moment of never quite arriving would be a pleasant state of affairs.
At ten to 8 I rushed upstairs and donned some odd thing I’d bought in an All Saints sale at Gatwick airport at 6 in the morning in January and spent all night shedding tiny sequins, and E wore his running shorts and dinner jacket. He has good legs. Strong men carried out the good-looking but crap sofa and everyone arrived at once bringing on an attack of quite extraordinary nerves. A glass of wine did nothing to quell the anxiety and I thought, what a shame. Were I to go to a party and see this lot I would be thrilled but, somehow, in my own house it did nothing but occasion extreme dread.
What’s to say? It went really well. Apparently. Good noise levels. Packed.
No spats, no sulks, no sobs and no-one threw up in a plant pot. Making it sound rather dull really; all I can offer in the disaster stakes is a woman (wearing white) a victim of a mobile glass of red wine.
I started enjoying it at about 1 in the morning.
The food was snaffled up and pronounced delicious; there was a long session of shame at the bottle bank next day. The thank yous have been touching. Lots of nice people brought presents.
But, say it slowly, and clearly, and loudly: Never Again. Ever. Let’s Just Not.
Thursday, 10 June 2010
electrical
By some uncharacteristic serendipity, I could lay my hands on the receipt stapled into its little Electrical Goods folder and clearly showing that the purchase was well within date. It promised a hassle-free experience should a fault develop. It’s not often that happens, I thought, too willing to believe jaunty print and anticipate an easy ride. The folly of one fundamentally unable to learn from experience.
F11’s Nintendo DSi had broken and it truly wasn’t down to him. (A DSi for the elderly or fortunately-oblivious is some small thing which folds in 2 and on which you can bugger about with pixels. He calls it playing games and gets most excited.) He cherishes it; moreover, it’s caged in some sort of OTT iron lung for its own good, armour enhancing the chances of long and happy life, say 6 months. But on the first occasion of him successfully tracking down the Emerald City of Wi-Fi, the touch screen went kaput. No, I don’t understand any of that sentence either.
So I took a book (for the queue), and the DSi, and the receipt in its folder, and went to Sainsbury’s to return the thing. There was a pleasing number of staff at the Service Desk but the gold of a hopeful quick turnaround turned to the dust of a long wait when it transpired that one’s on her mobile, one’s either ditzy or in training and the other 3 were working in an inverse version of multi-tasking, being multi-staffing, where many do the job of one. With commentary. Leaning with good natured interest at the return of mismatched bikinis and inadequate cutlery sets.
Oh, and one cross-looking one. Whom I got when the queue eventually shuffled forward.
Confident (fool) that even under a steely gaze, my transaction would be brisk, with right on my side and a valid receipt in a folder (imagine!) I presented the goods. I spieled my spiel only for some pursed lip action to kick in, domino’d with the apparent need for further consultation. Seems like the rules have changed. So predictable in retrospect.
“No, that’s between you and Nintendo, ‘fraid,” Mrs Cross said, with no discernible sorrow, her impatient glance suggesting “Next!” suggesting “Fuck Off Fool.”
Another, one of the chorus of commentators, muttered that the “hassle-free” promise on the guarantee should perhaps be honoured, that the wording was pretty unequivocal, that –
“Rules have changed,” said Mrs Cross, swivelling her disapprobation to the chorus member. “Besides, it’s not an electrical item.”
“It is!” I said, “And,” (because mere fact is never enough), “it’s in an electrical item folder,” I said, “look!”
“Well, it’s not,” she said, “Electrical. I can’t be held responsible for it being put in there. It shouldn’t be in there. It’s not electrical.”
No it’s a bloody pork pie. Silly me.
“Well, it wasn’t me, was it,” I said, fuelled by boldness. “I didn’t reach across the counter and staple it in.”
An unpleasant silence grew.
“You haven’t got the charger, anyway,” said Mrs Cross.
“I thought you’d just send it away to be fixed.” I worried that I might cry if I tried to work into the conversation that a charger, with its plug trailing out the end of a piece of wire, might be the tipping point for the item being upgraded to consideration of status: electrical.
So I went home, broken DSi in hand, drenched with foreboding at the prospect of an afternoon spent on the phone. Just me and Greensleeves, and menu options and press 2 for electrical items (would I dare to press 2?? A taxonomy of potential Kafka meets Alice nonsense Hydra-headed before my eyes, the quibbling over a term). The value of the DSi leaked away against the size of ensuing 0870 phone bill.
First, I thought, I’d break myself in by braving the Sainsbury’s helpline. I felt we had unfinished business, them and me; plus, it was free: a no-brainer therefore. And came upon one Jamie.
“You shouldn’t have had this experience at all,” he purred with real concern. “Let me see what I can do.”
He called back within half an hour and said that he had contacted the store and learnt that someone had given A Lady (presumably me?) a stroppy turn, and that if I could bear to go back (a pause for us both to feel my pain) then they would be more than happy to exchange it. He was so nice that it was actually quite hard to get him off the line. Toffee paper on shoes.
Back I went. Mrs Cross was prowling the concourse in front of the customer service desk. I flinched before saying bravely, “I can swap it!” I brandished not only charger but box, too (the joys of an OCD child). Get you, Mrs Cross.
“You should see my paperwork,” she said, “Rules’ve changed. You should see the paperwork. I’m off now or I’d show you.”
The new DS sits in its box in the kitchen. F11 is fearful of opening it, that its wonderful newness will be tarnished. “Consequences,” he said, “that’s what happens when you open things.”
Mrs Lovely on the dog walk was relishing a session at TKMaxx regarding a Patrick Cox handbag. “The strap looks like it’s cut,” she said, “It just went, boof, like that.”
“Have you got the receipt?” I said
“No,” she said in surprise, “I bought it a couple of months ago. But it’s broken.”
I trembled in awe: middle aged woman undaunted by lack of receipt, certain in her rectitude. I told them about the DSi.
“But you were in the right,” said she and Mrs DIY Helpful.
“That’s what retailers do,” said Mrs Helpful knowledgeably. “They put you in the wrong and you give up.”
“Well, I did get it eventually,” I said, “and Jamie was so nice.”
“You shouldn’t have had to,” she said firmly. “I’ve got a book. You must read it. Terrible title, something American about “How to Say No Without Feeling Guilty.””
I nodded weakly. I didn’t fancy it at all. I want to read Steinbeck and thrillers and the new David Mitchell, not a bossy book which will lead to some grim assertiveness prowess. But until I read the book I didn’t know how to say so. So I said, “Thanks,” with a meek smile. Mrs Helpful won't mind.
F11’s Nintendo DSi had broken and it truly wasn’t down to him. (A DSi for the elderly or fortunately-oblivious is some small thing which folds in 2 and on which you can bugger about with pixels. He calls it playing games and gets most excited.) He cherishes it; moreover, it’s caged in some sort of OTT iron lung for its own good, armour enhancing the chances of long and happy life, say 6 months. But on the first occasion of him successfully tracking down the Emerald City of Wi-Fi, the touch screen went kaput. No, I don’t understand any of that sentence either.
So I took a book (for the queue), and the DSi, and the receipt in its folder, and went to Sainsbury’s to return the thing. There was a pleasing number of staff at the Service Desk but the gold of a hopeful quick turnaround turned to the dust of a long wait when it transpired that one’s on her mobile, one’s either ditzy or in training and the other 3 were working in an inverse version of multi-tasking, being multi-staffing, where many do the job of one. With commentary. Leaning with good natured interest at the return of mismatched bikinis and inadequate cutlery sets.
Oh, and one cross-looking one. Whom I got when the queue eventually shuffled forward.
Confident (fool) that even under a steely gaze, my transaction would be brisk, with right on my side and a valid receipt in a folder (imagine!) I presented the goods. I spieled my spiel only for some pursed lip action to kick in, domino’d with the apparent need for further consultation. Seems like the rules have changed. So predictable in retrospect.
“No, that’s between you and Nintendo, ‘fraid,” Mrs Cross said, with no discernible sorrow, her impatient glance suggesting “Next!” suggesting “Fuck Off Fool.”
Another, one of the chorus of commentators, muttered that the “hassle-free” promise on the guarantee should perhaps be honoured, that the wording was pretty unequivocal, that –
“Rules have changed,” said Mrs Cross, swivelling her disapprobation to the chorus member. “Besides, it’s not an electrical item.”
“It is!” I said, “And,” (because mere fact is never enough), “it’s in an electrical item folder,” I said, “look!”
“Well, it’s not,” she said, “Electrical. I can’t be held responsible for it being put in there. It shouldn’t be in there. It’s not electrical.”
No it’s a bloody pork pie. Silly me.
“Well, it wasn’t me, was it,” I said, fuelled by boldness. “I didn’t reach across the counter and staple it in.”
An unpleasant silence grew.
“You haven’t got the charger, anyway,” said Mrs Cross.
“I thought you’d just send it away to be fixed.” I worried that I might cry if I tried to work into the conversation that a charger, with its plug trailing out the end of a piece of wire, might be the tipping point for the item being upgraded to consideration of status: electrical.
So I went home, broken DSi in hand, drenched with foreboding at the prospect of an afternoon spent on the phone. Just me and Greensleeves, and menu options and press 2 for electrical items (would I dare to press 2?? A taxonomy of potential Kafka meets Alice nonsense Hydra-headed before my eyes, the quibbling over a term). The value of the DSi leaked away against the size of ensuing 0870 phone bill.
First, I thought, I’d break myself in by braving the Sainsbury’s helpline. I felt we had unfinished business, them and me; plus, it was free: a no-brainer therefore. And came upon one Jamie.
“You shouldn’t have had this experience at all,” he purred with real concern. “Let me see what I can do.”
He called back within half an hour and said that he had contacted the store and learnt that someone had given A Lady (presumably me?) a stroppy turn, and that if I could bear to go back (a pause for us both to feel my pain) then they would be more than happy to exchange it. He was so nice that it was actually quite hard to get him off the line. Toffee paper on shoes.
Back I went. Mrs Cross was prowling the concourse in front of the customer service desk. I flinched before saying bravely, “I can swap it!” I brandished not only charger but box, too (the joys of an OCD child). Get you, Mrs Cross.
“You should see my paperwork,” she said, “Rules’ve changed. You should see the paperwork. I’m off now or I’d show you.”
The new DS sits in its box in the kitchen. F11 is fearful of opening it, that its wonderful newness will be tarnished. “Consequences,” he said, “that’s what happens when you open things.”
Mrs Lovely on the dog walk was relishing a session at TKMaxx regarding a Patrick Cox handbag. “The strap looks like it’s cut,” she said, “It just went, boof, like that.”
“Have you got the receipt?” I said
“No,” she said in surprise, “I bought it a couple of months ago. But it’s broken.”
I trembled in awe: middle aged woman undaunted by lack of receipt, certain in her rectitude. I told them about the DSi.
“But you were in the right,” said she and Mrs DIY Helpful.
“That’s what retailers do,” said Mrs Helpful knowledgeably. “They put you in the wrong and you give up.”
“Well, I did get it eventually,” I said, “and Jamie was so nice.”
“You shouldn’t have had to,” she said firmly. “I’ve got a book. You must read it. Terrible title, something American about “How to Say No Without Feeling Guilty.””
I nodded weakly. I didn’t fancy it at all. I want to read Steinbeck and thrillers and the new David Mitchell, not a bossy book which will lead to some grim assertiveness prowess. But until I read the book I didn’t know how to say so. So I said, “Thanks,” with a meek smile. Mrs Helpful won't mind.
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