Ssshh

We went to the library, F12 and I. Outside the doughty staff were waving placards and thrusting petitions for us to sign. I duly signed. This being the 3rd most popular library in the county it is due for closure. The council has spent a great deal of money on it in recent years, fitting automatic doors, modernising the Children’s Centre, installing self-service booths, streamlining the Wi-Fi area and polishing the coffee machine.
(Unexplained item in the Bagging Area. Remove. Oh, that’ll be a book, tsk.)

In all the improvements, I don’t see many new books. Plenty are for sale, an arbitrary selection of Think Yourself Thin to brand new picture books; the selection process of what to sell / what to keep is baffling.
The books which are there occupy an increasingly small footprint of the library. A healthy spread of rape and pillage – crime pays – and the paperbacks arranged in colour. That’s right: pink covers displayed with pink, orange with orange. Blue with – keep up.

Trouble is, books aren’t even books anymore. Not only are they the poor relations to DVDs, the homespun option to zingy CDs, they are reclassified as mere learning resource support materials. Or something. “Support” always seems to muscle in these days. It’s hard to think sometimes, once there, with the music blaring. The OAPs drift around to the pulsating throb of Eminem. I think it’s called making the library relevant. Or something.

I went in, trotting to save my scarf from doing an Isadora Duncan in the fierce sucking hush of the automatic doors closing in my wake and made my way to the FastBacks. I love the FastBacks. It’s all the stuff which is just out and you can only keep for a week. Which is more than you need to read a book. I did “War and Peace” in four days. An elderly gentleman and I tussled over the latest Michael McConnelly but breeding, respect and manners won through and he conceded the book to me.*

(*I wish. A girl can dream. In real life, and not in that crazy fantasy life where I end up with the thriller, I did my trilling “No, no, no!! I insist,” bit, all the while desperately hissing to self, Do Not Say, “you have it, while you can; you may be dead next week,” and it was he who tucked it under his arm and strolled off, whistling flatly through ill-fitting teeth leaving me with sub-standard fare like Rosamund Pilcher to pick over.)

Three girls, sub-teens, were squabbling over facebook, “Look, she’s called me a slag. The cow.” Fearful of being stabbed no one got involved. My friend Kitty said that she dreamed of being a librarian, of tucking small cards into the pockets on the tickets, of the satisfying thunk of the date stamp. We all had dreams about date stamps. Now it’s all processing and items and barcodes. Nothing to kick-start a gleam in a small child’s eye, apart from maybe the shiny name badge. Progress I suppose.

Pensioners silver-surfed or risked Maiming By Cappuccino at the coffee machine.

Eminem segued into Lady GaGa.

A sturdy lass with a string of children herded them all into the loo. The loo can take wheelchairs or families with half a dozen children. It’s why there’s only one. And a queue. Tena Lady Seniors formed an orderly line, edging in silent panic from sensibly clad foot to sensibly clad foot, pretending to ignore the stifled cries within as Shayne, Wayne and Dwayne peed somewhere near the lavatory. I know, I know, the SnobGod will get me.

Mr FastBack was struggling with the self serve, his wife hovering at his shoulder, the Rosamund Pilcher having found an appreciate home and pincered in her knobbly claw of a hand. He wasn’t sure what the “item” in question was meant to be, or the card he had to swipe, or what to do when that was your done.

“It’s your book,” I said, helpfully. Meaning my book. “And, here, your card, your library card.” He tucked his Tesco ClubCard back in his wallet and fumbled for his library card which he then held away from the scanner, dabbing it in the air nearby, frowning lest the red line bite. Another queue formed.

A member of staff, one of the few not out playing 1968 outside, hurried forward to help him use the self service. It’s all that’s left for them to do. The comments book bulges with praise for the staff, for their helpfulness, their kindly patience. Inevitable that they be phased out.

Some time later, significantly later than in what are rapidly becoming the Good Old Days, the transaction was complete. No one looked convinced. Beyoncé was urging the gathering Seniors to Put A Ring On It. Surreal, thy name is Library.

“Home love,” the old chap said to his wife, who was clearly still bemused. “A cuppa, a cracking read and ‘Deal or No Deal,’ what more do you want?” he smiled. The wife looked like she was tempted to offer “Whisky?” He patted her gloved paw. Technology taken on and conquered. They shuffled out towards the automatic doors, and triggered the alarm. The item had the last word. No way did it fancy being plonked on a sofa stranded with Noel Edmunds.

F12 ambled over with a teetering pile of books. “I haven’t got my card,” he said. “Will it matter?”

Ding Dong

The vicar sauntered on in slacks and a pully: holy casual. His hand toyed, casually, in the depths of his pocket. He seemed distracted, dippy-looking, as if he might break into a purr.
Despite the garb, and the soft porn gaze, when he got going he was pure vicar: deathly slow and fond of his own voice. Health and Safety had come to the church and he gave us several long minutes of frustrated trolley dolly guff about exits, in the hope of a fire. His hand reluctantly left his pocket, to point hither and thither with confusing enthusiasm for the correct quadrant, the apt exit; X had to filter here, Y must hurry along there. Candles wobbled in takeaway containers atop wonky piers. Several wanton souls perked up at the prospect of an inferno.
Til he spoiled it. We were told that come the end we should wait – for health and safety reasons – for all of the candles to be extinguished. Several hundred people bleakly scanned the church in quick count mode and took in several hundred candles. Trapped in tight rows, it was too late to adopt a “think I’ve left the gas on” face and leg it.

We were not, however, told that the end was so very far in the future, and most of us steeped in early onset dementia, that waiting obediently would be completely forgotten in the rush for the mulled wine. The fumes would be Siren-ing and we’d all be on a mission. Singed hair? Teetering flames? Elbow the slow and helpless. Get me to the grub and grog.

For it was the school’s carol concert and, being a high achieving school, there was not a wonky tea towel in evidence, no tears, no embarrassing silences, no Little Donkey. Just hours of, admittedly, beautiful singing, lovely readings, proper Christmas gravitas.
Lots of it, but conducted at a decent lick.

Each year I’ve stalked the town in search of a cracking carol service. And each year I’ve shuffled home mortified by the paucity on offer. Whether it was the tracksuit trouser and trainers vicar offering the drab metaphor of Asda light bulbs from a damp cardboard box (may the light be with you) on the way out; or the full-on horrors of enthusiastic arms-raised, closed-eye swaying to tuneless modern carols; or the linen-suited vicar, bounding on stage with big teeth, to read requests from the congregation for Toyota Landcruisers (really!) none quite hit the mark.
All I want for Christmas is a decent run of familiar tunes, and a little dignity and ceremony. What I get is quite other.

The worst of all the terrible occasions took place was when T14 was young, ahh, and the primary school choir was invited to sing at a nearby college. I think that that particular service lasted 2 and a half hours, fully 45 minutes of which was given over to Media Vicar. Media Vicar was a worthy wench, in a bust-hugging stripy jumper and shaggy hair, who’d spent too long in Africa and was prepared to share each and every moment. What we did not know at the end about rape, sodomy, AIDS and arson is likely to be thin pickings. Our primary banned whole grapes in the lunch boxes: they had to be sliced in half (health and safety). The head teacher emerged blinking, traumatised; genned up on genocide, grapes temporarily relegated. E still has a small scar from dripping wax on his hand in a semi-successful attempt to stay awake: we had to hold these little candles, all sermon long; yeah, yeah, may the light be with you.

Dutifully, we attend the village service each Christmas eve. It’s a dismal affair, and we know it even as we edge into our wellies for the stride across the field.
The vicar slides in, apologetically, clad in a Snoopy sweatshirt, waving. Some well-meaning, ancient, stout parties spend bloody hours dragging out the reading of a vaguely relevant story to toddlers strung out on smarties, and the rest of us dutifully freeze; the OAPs swaddled smugly in their factory shop anoraks, people like me wondering why we scorn them: suddenly seeing wisdom in Teflon fur. Tartan knee wraps are eyed with envy. Last time I was here was for a funeral. The vicar spoke endlessly about sex. The grieving daughter, her face a bruised chrysanthemum of sorrow, surely could not soothed by the intrusive image of her mother at it with old dad. I was suddenly grateful for my ill-thought through seat selection backing onto the flowers. I could hide my horror in holly and ivy.

Money is being raised for digital bells which no-one wants; meanwhile the wind cuts through ill-fitting windows and the glass freezes over both sides. A floppy hat does the rounds and returns home barely heavier, a mere one handed clap to its clink. The wailing plink plonk of Little Donkey kicks in and I remember what a long time an hour can be in a local church, how killing a song.

But last night was wonderful. The real thing.
Long, however, and wasted on the great British public, a breed unable, en masse, to sit still without coughing, rummaging or creaking. Within half an hour the texting was beginning. A series of Nintendo DSs pinged into action as small heads bent over pixelated screens. Every now and again, we were called upon to sing and I stood, with such anticipation that this time, of all times, I might actually be able to make something approaching a decent sound. Pitiful optimism. In speech, I’m like Princess Anne on helium, and in singing something even stranger happens as my vocal chords ricochet between emitting barrel-scraping grunts or desperate squeaks. Almost an art. I’d love to be able to sing well; of all the talents it truly is a gift. E is a lusty singer and I try to tuck my reedy croaks all unobtrusive in amongst his full baritone.

“It was OK,” said F12 as we scarpered, mince-pie rich to the car, “but that’s it, yes? We’re not going to the village one, too.”
“Why not?” I said, bracing myself. You have to feel strong to take on F12 and the humiliation of the non-singing had weakened me.
”I’ve already been to it. Lots of times. You won’t let me watch “The Simpsons” twice, why should I go to the service twice.”
He has a point. But we’ll go. Christmas is all about traditions. The good, the bad and the ugly. And the ones with wonky tea towels and Little Bloody Donkey. All 45 rotten verses of it. I feel a car coat purchase on the cards.

tree

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.

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.

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.