Why I Still Love the Man who Plays With Whoopee Cushions at the Dinner Table

Our Valentines day has been marked by a trip to the local tip so that we can set foot in the garage without being killed by an avalanche of crap left over from Christmas, and some spicy noodles in Wagamamas accompanied by the children.  We know how to make an effort. 

We always celebrate the wider meaning of Valentines day anyway.  We get the children a card and a small gift each.  I think it’s important to remind ourselves that we love them, particularly when the horrific emotional scars of Christmas are slow to fade and being cooped up in the house together surrounded by snow for most of January has left us jaded and stir crazy.

This year we bought them each a gorgeous, heart shaped, light catcher from Mrs. Jones excellent Etsy Emporium, Shards of Light.  They were thrilled, and we have hung them up very, very carefully so that they can continue to be thrilled for some time to come.

I bought Jason a wooden heart this year.  I buy him a different one every year.  I would have bought him one of Mrs. Jones’, except he’d already seen the children’s and I wanted it to be a surprise.  I will get him one next year when he has forgotten about them.  He got me two hours of peace and quiet yesterday to have a bath, while he took the children out on an adventure to the local car supermarket.  He is a good boy.

Today we exchanged cards.  Mine was a frothy, Roger De La Borde cut out in deep red with a soppy message.  I love those paper cut out things.  They’re so pretty.

Jason gave me this.  It is what I like to think of as a ‘found’ object.  He saw it, modified it and presented it:

Note the hand drawn beard/moustache combo.  The handwritten text points to this follically challenged child and reads: ‘Me when I was a baby, waiting for you.’

It made me cry.

In a good way.

My, How we laughed…

I don’t know about you, but I, as an adult, have visions sometimes,  wavering mirages of gorgeousness in which my husband and I sit round our dining table, accompanied by our three charming children, eating a delicious home cooked meal, and chatting animatedly about life, the universe and everything.  It’s wonderful.

It’s utter bollocks.

Take this evening.  One child was missing, gone gallivanting off to a friend’s (not that you’ll hear any complaints from me on that score.  One less mouth to feed is always a bonus day in our house), the other two were balanced precariously on their seats in various states of undress and acrobaticism.  Both were eating fish fingers and potato waffles (bad mummy, bad mummy), smothered in ketchup and flinging forkfuls around with gay abandon whilst talking simultaneously at the tops of their voices about two entirely different things. 

I was still standing, filling drinks, wiping fish finger based gunk off of household appliances and trying to cobble together something edible for adults that had vitamins in it somewhere.

Jason entered stage left.  He commenced to produce a Whoopee cushion in the manner of the Great Soprendo; ‘Icky, Acky, Tracky’ or whatever gobbledegook he used to say.

He then spent a hilarious twenty minutes blowing up said Whoopee cushion and sitting on it in a number of comedy poses for the edification of the children.  Cue more fork flinging and general fish finger detritus.  They particularly liked the faces where he pretended he had a terrible stomach ache which only a fart of epic proportions could eradicate.

He then spent another twenty minutes teaching the children to do the same thing.

He is a comedy God, and his star as top banana father remains ever glowing and entirely undiminished.

My dreams of sophisticated dining ebb like the tide on a wet bank holiday in Skegness.  Currently they are six miles out and still going.

Holiday Reading

Weekends pass, as weekends do when you have family, in a haze of chores, jobs postponed from the week, and in our case, taking it in shifts to have naps so that we don’t a) crash into a tree falling asleep at the wheel or b) slaughter everyone in a sleep deprived frenzy.  Tallulah enjoyed her second week at karate, and I failed to go for the second week.  I will also fail to go for the third week as I will  be in London.  I may actually go for the fourth week but let us not bet hard cash on it.  It would be a shame to be disappointed.

I have been studying hard.  I have finished an entire month’s worth of study in a week.  I should now be limbering up to write my essay.  I am just waiting for an e-mail from my tutor before I sally forth. This is good because it means I have the perfect excuse to stop and make inroads into the ever increasing pile of books by my bed.  I am quite grateful for the hiatus.

As I have been trying to think deep and meaningful thoughts about postmodernism and its influence on children’s picturebooks, and this is quite wearing, I have been amusing myself drawing up lists of books that I may or may not take on my forthcoming holiday.  Jason and I have discussed this and he is going for the daring, minimalist approach.  About four miles from where we will be staying is a rather pretty little town called Sydney by the Sea.  It is famous for its second hand book shops.  As you might imagine, we visit it quite a lot when we are on our holidays.  Last time we went, Jason forged a fruitful bond with one of the bookshop owners.  He read the books he had brought with him from the U.K., sold them to the bookshop chap and then promptly spent all the money buying new books to read.  Repeat to fade.  He has decided to only take one or two books and then go and see his supplier when we arrive.

I applaud his decision, certainly in terms of the weight of our luggage.  I cannot possibly think of doing it myself though.  I would rather go without underwear than be underprepared in the reading material department.  It makes me nervous if I haven’t got a book in my handbag, one in the car, one hidden in every room etc.  I fear having nothing to read.

Here is my tentative short list:

A Dance to the Music of Time: Summer by Anthony Powell

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest by Stieg Larsson

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

Catch 22 by Joseph Heller

The Sword of Honour Trilogy by Evelyn Waugh

Selected Diaries of Virginia Woolf

It’s quite weighty isn’t it?

The thing is, that I actually really want to read all of these books. Then I have so many other books, most of which are miles shorter and promise to be an ‘easier’ read, that I tend to put all the goliath’s on the back shelf for later when I have time.  I am of course, totally fooling myself on the whole ‘more time’ thing.  There will never be any more time unless I make time.

I find that when I am on holiday I make more time to read, especially in North America where the television is abysmal and I’d rather jab my eyes out with sticks than watch anything.  I also have to read what I have bought with me, because there is nothing else unless I buy new books.  Of course, I always buy new books, because I am me, and I am incapable of not buying books, but I do tend to read what I have bought with me before I embark on my new, shiny books.  This way I actually get significant amounts of backlog shifted whenever I go on holiday.  Last year’s holiday in France saw me reading some Grahame Greene I had been putting off for an eternity, and Lark Rise to Candleford, both of which I’d had kicking around the shelves for about five years.  I can’t say that I enjoyed either of them, but I had significantly less book guilt after I’d finished them, and I left them in the house so I didn’t have to think about them again.

I think my greatest achievement was going for a holiday a few years ago where I finished the entire Avignon Quintet by Lawrence Durrell.  I gave myself eye strain in the process but it was worth it.

And if I finish War and Peace this year I will actually have achieved one of my new year’s resolutions as well as being able to be a smug literary toff in the process. What’s not to like?  At the moment I am poring over Beatrix Potter’s ‘The Tale of Peter Rabbit’ in order to write 2000 words of meaningful intellectual argument about it.  I shall probably need the light relief of War and Peace after that.

So, what are your holiday reading habits?  Do you go for the beach bonk buster, or industrial espionage or the literary greats.  Answers on a postcard smelling of Ambre Solaire…

Medea My Dear?

Sometimes I find that the busiest days are not actually the best days to blog about.  I often don’t have time to think, and thinking, even rubbish things, makes for better blogging.  At least it does in my house.

Yesterday was absolutely bonkers.  After dropping the kids at school and nursery I had half an hour to blog and hide all the breakfast pots under a tea towel before my friend Saj came round for tea and biscuits.  We had a free and wide ranging discussion covering all manner of girly things including our upset at the death of Alexander McQueen, and the ignorance of our respective menfolk as to who Alexander McQueen actually is.  This is the whole gender debate writ large. 

I had planned on either McQueen or Galliano making my next wedding gown.  I’m not getting married to anyone else, but I feel that when I am a bajillionaire I’d like to get married to Jason again with a better frock, more cake and a huge party.  Now it looks like it’s a one horse race.  I was reading about his death in The Times.  There was a section at the end of the article which commented that his long term civil partnership had ended last year, and that recently he had been seen out and about with a porn star known as Mr. Stag. 

There was an e-mail from a pensioner underneath which firstly announced that he had no idea who Alexander McQueen was and why everyone wasd making such a fuss when world economies were disappearing down the toilet.  Was this really news?  He finished with the lines (and I paraphrase wildly) ‘Is it really necessary to give all this personal detail?  Why not just write: ‘He was a gentleman who chose to live alone?’!  Now, I don’t claim to be an expert on such matters, but it is clear that McQueen was quite troubled and deeply grief stricken recently, and I think that he probably would have quite liked what was a shocking and tragic story in which he ended his own life in despair, to be enlivened by the news that in happier times he had managed to be squired round town by an athletic man with a giant trouser snake who was quite happy to let it all hang out.

Or maybe that’s just me.

Anyway, after this morning of biscuit eating, I hot footed it across town to visit my friend Kim, who had invited me for an afternoon of pampering.  She had met a lady who worked for a cosmetics company called Mary Kay at a networking event, and the woman had offered to come round to her house and showcase all her products by doing facials, manicures and makeovers.  Kim had thought I might want to come and play.  And she was right.  I have quite a lot of makeup.  I don’t use it very often, but I do like it, and I love being fussed over, despite looking like a woman called Edna who sits on a park bench drinking meths out of a bottle wrapped in brown paper.  I am full of contradictions like that.

I had a fab time, and Barbara, who is the Mary Kay lady, has promised to send me her before and after photos so I can do a proper blog write up for you later on.

I zipped back across town in time to pick the children up and made it by the skin of my teeth.  I decided to retrace the route I had taken to get to Kim’s house, which is always sensible and would normally work a treat, except for two things, 1) there was a diversion thanks to spectacular road works.  I had to follow it.  I followed it faithfully and ended up somewhere other than where I wanted to be.  I knew exactly where I was.  I knew exactly where I wanted to be.  I wasn’t sure how to get between the two places.  I did a bit of radical freestyling and all was well.  I was back on track and congratulating myself when I ran against 2) that the road I had sailed down so confidently on the way there turned out to be a no right turn on the way back, and right was where I needed to go.  Nor was there any easy way of getting there.  This necessitated another ten minute diversion.  It was most entertaining, and it was a wonder that I hadn’t sweated half of my new face off by the time I got home.

I hurtled to pick up the children and also accumulated Aunty Squirrel en route, who had arrived bearing cakes of joy to celebrate passing my driving test.  She is a good woman.

We got home and I cooked everyone tea.  We had two teas because the tea that Aunty Squirrel likes, and comes round for, is not tea that the children like, and as Aunty Squirrel had bought cakes of joy I felt I could not deny her tea of delight.  Then Jason arrived home and I cooked for him.  Shortly after this Aunty Squirrel left and Andrea arrived.  I cooked different tea for her because a) we had run out of everyone else’s tea and b) she didn’t like what the children or Aunty Squirrel had either.

I have to say that Friday dinner times at this cafeteria are very wearing, but are good practice should I ever wish to throw over life as a lady of leisure and become a short order cook.

Andrea and I went to see Medea at the Belgrade theatre in Coventry.  You remember, the one by Northern Broadside, ecky thump, flat caps and whippets, alongside magical swans and child murdering?  How could you forget?

Just as we were leaving to do battle with Coventry’s frankly appalling road system, Jason’s friend Guy arrived and more food appeared.  By then I had washed my hands of the whole affair, and was very glad that someone else was rustling about in the fridge instead of me.

Medea was very odd.  At times it was very good.  At other times it was rather like an earnest sixth form production in which everyone has tried terribly hard, and someone’s aged mother has made all the costumes so you have to give them marks for effort.  It is not an easy play.  Greek drama doesn’t translate very well into modern life I have found.  It is quite stylised for a start, and the word ‘unrealistic’ springs to mind quite often.  This production wasn’t helped by some truly appallling costumes, particularly for the men, in which they looked like they had raided a bridal catalogue.  There was lots of shot silk with embroidered buttons and fancy waistcoats.  They were teamed with what looked like Ugg flip flops in some cases.  I found this quite troubling.  More troubling than Medea hacking her sons to death and dancing about in their entrails.  Crimes against fashion should be stamped out, no matter what the century.

There was also a lot of music in this performance.  The chorus, who were, for the main part, very good, often broke out into blues and soul.  Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn’t.  The jarring electric guitars to symbolise Medea in a frenzy of gore reminded me rather too much of Jason trying to master Enter Sandman on Wii Guitar Hero, but that’s a personal thing.

Still, for an hour and a half where I got to sit down and didn’t have to cook anyone anything it was brilliant.

I wouldn’t recommend it if you want a) nice frocks, b) believable story lines or c) a laugh, but if you’re willing to suspend disbelief and surf the edges of experimental theatre it might be just the play for you.  Or if you’ve got a house full of hungry people and need an excuse not to get the frying pan out again.

The Elifnt in the room

I vaguely remember sharing with you somewhere Tallulah’s obsession with blessing things.  Where this has come from I am not entirely sure.  Her theological knowledge is somewhat hazy.  Now that they study all the major religions at school, and in no particular order, it seems very easy to get confused.  And it’s not like religions are not confusing even if you go at them one at a time in some kind of order.  ‘You mean that wafer there…What?…Oh. Sorry.  That ‘bread’ there, turns into the body of Christ? Oooo kaaaaayy.  And what was that again? The wine, yep. That’s blood. Hmmmm.  And that woman, Mary.  Yes? She’s his mother.  Good.  But Joseph isn’t his dad? A single mother? No. Immaculate what?’  Don’t even  get me started on the holy trinity.  It’s head melting stuff.

Anyhoo.  I have purloined evidence for you of Tallulah’s daily time table, in which ‘blessing’ takes a role.  Apparently it’s the last thing you do in a day.  You have to work up to it. You just can’t rush a blessing.  I expect you need to limber up and find things to be grateful for, do a bit of genuflecting first, get your fingers supple for the whole papal manoeuvre.

See fig. 1.

There would be hell to pay if you got cramp in your blessing finger because you hadn’t done enough stretching.

Luckily Tallulah has a punishing fitness regime to fit in before the blessing, ensuring no emergency trips to the osteopath will be needed.

See fig 2.

Now then. Just in case your eyes are not used to reading six year old writing I will provide a translation, complete with authentic spelling.  The weird V shapes by the way, are ticks.  This indicates that the work has been done to a satisfactory level.  She is nothing if not methodical.  I do not know why each section is duplicated, unless the column on the right is today’s list of jobs and she is being thoughtful with her use of paper.  Unlikely knowing Tallulah.

Fig 3.

Translation:

1. Yoga
2. Exasize
3. Elifnt
4. Reading
5. Rest
6. Streching
7. Bath
8. Bles

All very good.  All very useful.  Yet I am troubled by the third point on her list.  What is this elifnt of which she speaks?  She seems very definite that it has been managed with aplomb, judging by the good strong tick she has placed by its side.  Clearly whatever the elifnt is, she has dealt with it magnificently.  So magnificently that I remained entirely unaware of it.  Nobody said that there were elifnts roaming the streets of Glenfield when we moved here.  You think that sort of thing would show up on the survey at the very least.  Although it might explain why the render is falling off the front of the house at an alarming rate.  The seismic tremors brought about by the elifnts trampling all over the gravel.

I will get back to you when I have tortured the information out of her after school.

De Car! De Car!

I went driving with my instructor today, as part of the Pass Plus course I signed up for in the heat of the moment last week. 

Aarrrghhh!

We went motorway driving.

Aaarghhhh!

I am not the Stig. I am not the Stig. I am not the Stig…repeat to fade.

It is hair raising.

The thing is, that he had to teach me all the death defying manoeuvres, going really, really fast, and over-taking, really, really fast, and looking at things really, really quickly as they zipped by you really, really fast.  It was quite frightening, and there were lots of big fuck off lorries, and me.

I did not like it.

I am grateful that he showed me how to do these things, and that we will do more.

I did make a great discovery though.  I discovered that I will not drive like this when I am on my own.  No.

I will be the bloody irritating woman in the slow lane, doing the speed limit and pootling along contentedly without climbing up everyone’s arse and overtaking because it’s cheaper than respraying the car, just sliding alongside someone else whose colour you prefer.

It gave me inspiration.  I have thought of a name for my car.

I do not love my car.  It is a navy blue, VW Polo.  There is nothing much to love. It is not old enough to be retro.  It is not shit enough to fill you with love like the dog at the RSPCA with three legs.  It is not whacky.  It is just a very sensible car.  As such, it suits me down to the ground.  It is very forgiving of my faults, and it allows me to be very sensible as a driver.

I have felt guilty that I have not bonded with my car, and that for the large part I have passed by it on the street wishing that either a) it wasn’t there or b) it would spontaneously combust and not be there.  I felt that giving it a name might be a step in the right direction.  The trouble was, I have not been able to think of anything suitable, due to all the reasons above.  It has just been too sensible.

Then I realised today that this was in fact the key.  I drive like a granny, and I am always getting flustered because I think I cannot see enough of the road, rather like Mr. Magoo.  So my car is now called Granny Magoo.  I feel much better about it now.  I feel we might stand a chance of getting along together quite nicely in the end.

Of course, now that I have decided this, it will spontaneously combust at the side of the road.

Leicester U Like

As regular readers will know, I am always happy to sing the praises of London as a top, spanky place to live and the city which has my heart, despite the fact that I live in Glenfield, not by the sea.  Glenfield used to be a charming village.  Now it is a suburb of Leicester, which is joined to the throbbing metropolis by a distinctly unpleasant housing estate called New Parks.  Let’s just say that despite its proximity to the city centre, property in New Parks is always cheap.  You could probably get a three bedroom semi there for round about a hundred grand.  This is never a good sign.

Apart from the Co-op, for which I have developed a strange passion, mainly because of its utter randomness (It has a branch of Dorothy Perkins in the middle of it, and the boy who works on the cigarette counter is a ladyboy type person who used to look like Amy Winehouse, and now looks like early Mark Almond crossed with Pauline Prescott), there is not a lot to recommend Glenfield.  One of the best things that can be said about it, is that it is not New Parks.

Leicester, on the other hand, is actually not too bad at all.  It is a surprising city.  It can seem quite dull, but a little digging around and some patience, can yield some rather lovely results.  I thought I would share some of them with you.  All the places I am talking about here are within minutes walk of each other and in the city centre.  There are some areas further afield which are just as much fun, but I will save those for another day.

The Good Earth Restaurant

This is a vegetarian restaurant tucked down a tiny back alley.  The entrance is just a doorway, and you then go up some absolutely killer steps, but it is worth the effort when you get to the top.  If you have buggies, there is a shop next door, run by the owners of the restaurant, and they will let you park your buggy at the back of their shop, and even guard your shopping for you should you so desire.  It makes it easier than trying to lug it all upstairs with you.

Once you get up there you take your tray to the counter and the staff will explain to you what is available.  The menu changes every day.  It is all freshly cooked, and there is a limited supply. The restaurant opens at 12, and by 2 p.m. you are wasting your time, so you need to be quick off the mark.  I went there for lunch today and had a deliciously creamy pasta bake with pesto and cheese.  There are huge bowls of different salads along the front of the counter and you can fill one of two sizes of plate to go with your main meal.  They do at least two, fresh home made soups a day, which are reasonably priced at £3.25 a bowl with bread. 

You cannot get fizzy pop or alcohol.  There are fruit juices, tea or coffee, or water.  The deserts are mainly cake based and again, all home made.  Today I had a piece of the most calorific, and therefore gorgeous, tiffin.  In the summer they make huge bowls of syllabub with fresh fruit.  I would kill for a portion right now.  It is divine.

I have been going there since I was tiny.  It has been around forever.  My aunt used to work there as a waitress back in the sixties.  It was called The Hungry I then, and was a pancake house, but it was still owned by the same people who own it now, which is great.  The decor has not changed a jot in the nearly forty years I have been going there.  It is hideous, rustic spinning wheels and garden implements mounted on dark, wood panelled walls, and red swirly carpets.  But you don’t go there for the decor, and I find it very comforting.  There are not many things in my life that have stayed the same for as long as I  can remember, but this is one of them.

The lady who reviewed this place on the link I have put in above, said the food is expensive for what it is.  I beg to differ.  Today I had the pasta bake, which was a huge portion and came with a bread roll, a small plate of salad, which was heaped about a foot high, a coffee and a piece of tiffin you could have used as a raft, and it came to £10.20.  I don’t think that’s dear at all, especially when you figure that everything is freshly prepared with good ingredients.  If you do go, they only take cash, so be prepared.  It is definitely worth a visit.

The Market

Leicester market used to have a glowing reputation as one of the best fruit and veg markets in the country.  Nowadays it is a little past its sell by date as rising rents and health and safety palaver rear their ugly heads, but it is still worth a visit if you like your shopping on the lively side.  It is slap bang in the middle of the city centre, and well sign posted from the Clock Tower, which is the geographical epicentre of the shopping area.  It is quite sprawling and roughly divided into different sections.  It is open every day except Sunday, and I love it. 

The fruit and veg stalls are brilliant.  You can get everything from traditional apples and oranges to fruits you’ve never heard off.  There are stalls specialising in Thai cuisine, Afro-Caribbean cuisine and Asian cuisine. There are the most amazing herb and spice stalls, and if you ask nicely some people will let you try before you buy. 

There’s a section that’s like a permanent flea market selling all kinds of random items.  There are some great fabric and needlework stalls.  The man on the fabric stall has bags of offcuts stuffed under his stall which he will sell you really cheaply if you need things for craft projects.  There are clothes, and shoes and hosiery, and books and pet supplies.  It’s endless really, and the stalls change from day to day, so it’s worth going back again and again.

There’s a permanent, indoor section at one end which has a fantastic fish market, and cheese stalls, and a butcher’s.  And you can keep going up all the floors until you get to the top where there is still a greasy spoon where you can have double egg and chips with brown sauce and bread and butter and huge mugs of builders tea.  It’s called Rossis, and I used to go there with my gran a lot when I was a little girl.  I do love  a good, greasy fry up.

The Lanes

Leicester has a faux Brightonesque section which the town planners are now calling the Lanes.  It’s a collection of small shopping streets just off the high street (again, easily signed from the clock tower), which have a lot of the hip, funky, boutique style shops that people like me love.  Silver Street is the main artery of this quarter.  It used to have a fabulous Victorian arcade just at one end.  It went up in galleried floors of Victorian, wrought iron, splendour and was full of budding clothes designers, ceramicists, metal workers etc.  Then the council closed it down.  Bah! Lots of the shops have now relocated, and stayed close by.  You should check out Well Gosh for funky alternative clothing, and some gorgeous bags. They’re doing Moomin bags at the moment which are to die for.  Well Gosh is on the corner of another little arcade, at the other end of which is a great, independent shoe shop called Tin Fish.

Silver Street also boasts a gorgeous Fair Trade shop which has some really wonderful things.  Not just the usual food stuffs, but jewellry and clothing and beautiful toys.  It is on the corner of a posh shopping square called St. Martin’s Square.  There is a glorious clothes shop here called Pollys, which sell lovely items by labels such as Noa Noa and Avoca.  There is also a cracking cook shop called The Original Cookware Company.  They sell all the things a cook’s heart wishes for from the ridiculously expensive but entirely needful Kitchenaid mixers, to edible glitter.  They also do Nigella Lawson and Emma Bridgewater crockery.  The staff are really helpful, and nothing is too much bother.

At the end of Silver Street is another street called Loseby Lane.  Here you will find the wonderful Mrs Bridges’ Tea Room, which is another venerable establishment. My mother took me there for chocolate eclairs after I had to visit the hospital with a broken nose.  Their food is lovely, and the staff are really nice.  The only problem with it is the lack of space. It is a really tiny shop and if you have buggies and children it is not ideal.  There is an upstairs, which is equally tiny.  In summer you can use the square at the back, which is a lovely sun trap and has tables and chairs, but otherwise I recommend going when you are without encumbrances.

Loseby Lane also has a fantastic second hand bookshop run by Help the Aged, which is a treasure trove of finds.  For the more fashion conscious I recommend Mimi & La Vey, who make the most gorgeous burlesque style corset dresses and have some wonderful accessories including shoes to die for.  Next door to them is an exquisite lingerie shop whose name I have forgotten, but which is delicious.

If you like interior design I recommend Harlequin, also on Loseby Lane. I love it there. I  cannot afford any of their furniture, but I want it all. The last thing I nearly cracked and bought was a small occasional table in Japanese cherrywood.  It was exquisite.  On the rest of the street you will find a great health food shop with really helpful staff, some rather lovely jewellers, a fabulous hat shop should you need to go to a wedding and make a splash, a lovely little flower shop, a very tempting children’s clothing boutique called Clafoutis, and the shop Niche which I have blogged about before.

Frog and Mouse

These are my lovely, lovely picture framers.  They also sell pictures, and some sculpture and ceramics, and do a nice line in greetings cards.  The staff are eternally helpful, really welcoming of small children, and full of brilliant ideas if you have no idea what you want doing with something arty but you know you want a frame round it.

Ye Olde Sweete Shoppe

This is great.  It has been here forever and hasn’t changed a bit.  If you want some old fashioned sweets out of a jar, weighed and put in a paper bag, this is the place for you.

Charity Shops

I am a charity shop fanatic.  I can browse all day and I love a good bargain.  Leicester has tonnes of charity shops.  I’m not going to list them all, as there really are oodles of the things, but if you’re into books I recommend the Oxfam shop on Market Street.  It is a regular charity shop at the front, and a treasure trove of books at the back.  My other favourite at the moment is the British Heart Foundation shop on Silver Street, where there is many a good bargain to be had.

Places to Eat

Apart from the Good Earth I would also recommend The Case on Hotel Street.  This is another door with many stairs, but the food is good enough to merit the climb.  The waiting staff are always nice.  The space is gorgeous, stripped back brick, wooden floorboards and the whole warehouse vibe with floor to ceiling windows all the way along one side of the room.  Fresh flowers, crisp linens, good wine.  It’s all good.  If you want a good greasy spoon you will need to find Cafe Rialto in Malcolm Arcade (just off Silver Street).  It’s properly greasy, and like all the other places I have recommended, up a lot of stairs.

Places to Walk

New Walk is one of my favourite places to wander.  It’s right in the middle of the city, and is a charming, pedestrianised road that takes you from one side of the city centre to the other.  It has pretty churches, gorgeous Georgian Houses and the New Walk Museum, which is fairly crap, but houses dinosaurs, decrepit mummy’s, stuffed shrews and an exhaustive collection of German Expressionist painting.  It will take you about twenty minutes to amble from one end to the other and it is a nice thing to do.

Granby Street is the road that takes you from the railway station to the town centre.  It is busy, lined with meh, shops and meh, eateries and fairly blah until you look up.  You need to saunter for this bit.  If you look up and stare at the passing architecture you will see all kinds of gems, including gorgeous 1920′s Valkyrie style stone heads, and Art Nouveau tiling from the facade of the Turkey Cafe.  It’s gorgeous and surprising.

High Cross

High Cross is our new and shiny part of the city.  It is just a fancy shopping centre, but I like shopping and I like fancy, and it works for me.  It has a John Lewis, which is always good.  I highly recommend their haberdashery department to while away the odd hour.  There is also a Wagamamas, a Carluccios and a Yo Sushi.  There is an All Saints and a Reiss and other good, solid shops.  It works. We like it, and their multi storey car park is very forgiving.

A Very Boring Blog Post

I cannot believe how tired I feel this evening.  It’s that gritty eyed tiredness.  The one where you keep on rubbing your eyes even though it doesn’t make any difference, and after a couple of hours you start to resemble a raccoon.  That sort of tiredness.  My sleep has been pretty bad for the last two weeks, so I expect I’m due to crash and burn any moment to make up for it.  I have not an ounce of blogging inspiration in me, so I am afraid that this is going to be one of those ‘I got up. I brushed my teeth.’ blog posts, just for the sake of recording the day, rather than because the blogging muse is upon me.

I have felt gritty since the moment I woke up this morning, along with a nasty, tight headache that comes and goes,  but it has been one of those days where you have to keep going no matter what.  It’s what I think of as a conveyor belt day.  Once you get on, you cannot really get off and you just have to ride it until you are spat out at the other end.

Oscar had a big day. It was the first time he had a play date with one of his own friends, rather than as an add on to one of the girls’ friends.  His friend’s mother didn’t know where I lived, so we collected her and her son from school this morning and brought them back with us for the morning. It meant that instead of lounging around in my pyjamas with Oscar while we snuggle on the sofa, him with Spongebob on and me reading my book, we actually had to get dressed and go out in the cold.  Yikes. 

It was one of those play dates where you could not really slope off to the kitchen to enjoy coffee while they amused themselves.  Well you could, but the way they amused themselves was such that one or the other or both of you were required to leap into the air like a startled gazelle every five minutes to go and arbitrate over something, or be fierce or suggest something less dangerous.  In the end it became a ‘let’s trail two small boys round the house while they wreak havoc, and we fail to have a single conversation which isn’t punctuated by screams or fights or both.’  I had forgotten how wearing this kind of high maintenance child rearing can be.  My children are relatively self-sufficient in the main, and the girls haven’t needed this kind of chaperonage for several years.  It was one of those mornings that put off any faint flickerings of broodiness that might be residually swirling around. 

Don’t get me wrong.  They were not naughty.  They were just small boys. Together.  Which is more than enough to keep you on your toes.  I had three cups of coffee.  All of them were cold.

After this, we had jobs to do which necessitated me driving to town or using the bus.  I decided to drive and see if I could handle it.  The route in to town involves several large areas of complicated roads with multiple lanes, a huge roundabout whose middle is actually a massive hotel, so you cannot see over it, and just have to know where you are going and what you are doing, and then of course, a multi-storey car park.  I am rather frightened of multi-storey car parks.

Anyway.  I promised Oscar we would go for a nice lunch, should we make it there without me chickening out, and we set off.  We did it really well, much to my surprise.  Although by the time I had parked in the multi-storey, the adrenaline had left me shaking and we had to sit and listen to the radio for five minutes until my legs stopped going wibble.

I was pretty proud of myself, and the fact that we got back in time to get the girls.  I worry much more about timings now it is me driving.  I am aware that I am a bit of an old lady driver and I need to leave myself more time than say, Jason would.  My terror, apart from crashing us all into a ditch in a welter of twisted metal and gore, is being late to pick the children up from school.  It is a big shameful thing to be late to pick up your children.  Well, it is for me anyway.  I once fell asleep when I was supposed to pick Tallulah up from nursery and was nearly half an hour late.  I was mortified, absolutely mortified.

Just as we were about to step out the door to pick up the girls from school it started blizzarding.  The weather has been really peculiar over the last few days.  Yesterday we had sleet, rain, snow and glorious sunshine in rapid succession, followed by buckets of rain. Today it was clear but cold all day until ten to three when the snow was so sudden and so severe that you could barely see your hand in front of your face, and about a centimetre of snow fell and settled in fifteen minutes.  I had to go back inside and raid the coat cupboard for hats, scarves and gloves for the girls.  I was so annoyed.  We were going to a friend’s house for tea, and her house is a ten minute walk away.  The way it was blizzarding we could have been ploughing through drifts by the time we got there.  But it stopped fifteen minutes after it started and we haven’t had any since then.  It’s most peculiar.

Jason picked us up from our friend’s house, because the kids had a dental appointment at six.  He drove because we were running late and it was rush hour.  The dentists we use is by my mum’s house and it takes me twenty five minutes when I drive it.  When he drives it, it takes fifteen.  We needed every spare minute, and made it on the dot.  The kids did great and were calm and dare I say it, even enjoyed themselves.  They all came out with a glowing bill of health.   The dentist we see is also Tilly’s orthodontist.  We are waiting for a couple more of her baby teeth to fall out before she has to have braces.  He reckons she will probably be fitted for her first braces in October.  She is a bit nervous, but he was very good with her and included her in his discussions which helped to reassure her.

One thing that came out of the visit is the fact that it is time for Oscar’s night time dummy to go for good.  We had discussed it between us and reckoned that February was a good time, as he would have had a few weeks to get used to sleeping in his own, big boy bed.  The dentist confirmed it when he said that if we left it any longer then there would be permanent damage to the jaw line and he would end up with buck teeth.  Not good.  So, the dummy fairy is coming on Saturday night.  I think it is a good thing, but I am aware that it is his last vestige of babyhood, and he has been very needy of it in the weeks since his bed arrived.  More needy than before.  He has started asking for it in the day, and a few times when I have left it on a low shelf in his room, he has climbed up and stolen it.  Somehow I think the dummy will not go gently into this good night, even if he does get a present in return.  Still, we have had it easy with him in every other area of development, so I suppose I should be grateful for the smooth run up to now.

After the dentist we had to drop in on mum and dad.  We hadn’t had tea, so we stopped off at the fish and chip shop at the end of their road and ate it at their house.

We got home twenty minutes ago.

I do not intend to study tonight.  I have been really, really good.  I finished and submitted the essay I was worried about previously. It is not due in until the 18th February, so I am ahead of myself.  And I have been studying every night since I submitted it.  I am a good way through the material already, so I feel that one night off to gaze, slack jawed at the television and then fall asleep will not harm me too much.  As long as I don’t take it as licence to wiggle out of further days, obviously.  Fingers crossed that my stern, moral policeman is in charge, rather than my lazy, straw chewing yokel.  Only time will tell.

Covetous Tuesday

I have not had a chance to take pictures of the lovely things that I have accrued over the last few weeks like some deranged, capitalist pig dog magpie (we crave shiny things).  But I did manage two items for your delectation.

Firstly I desperately need to show you the newest lovely thing which I only swiped for my nest today.  I went to my favourite flea market with my dad.  I drove, and as a reward for not killing us all, I was pointed towards an amazing Victorian pin cushion.  It’s a decorative one that was meant to be given as a gesture of friendship, rather than actually used to put pins in.  You will gather this when you see that it has been decorated rather enthusiastically and with little regard for minimalism.  I think that’s why it appealed to me.  It’s quite large, about the size of my hand.  God knows what I will do with it.  I expect I shall just put it on a shelf and look at it with enthusiasm while Jason sighs and rolls his eyes.

The other thing is a picture of me looking suitably hatchet faced with insane hair, but sporting a gorgeous Gharani Strok blouse I mentioned a few weeks ago.  Ignore me and just look at the blouse in wonder and awe.  I look more like my maternal grandmother with every year that passes, and as she was the first to acknowledge, she was strong on personality.  I remember one particularly fateful day when she commented that her eyelashes resembled pig bristles and her bosom could best be described as ‘two fried eggs on a plate’.

I will undoubtedly regret posting this picture later. I hate my face. Nevertheless it’s not going to change, and I’m nearly forty, so it’s time I sucked it up and got used to it.

Behold:  Not Kate Moss modelling shiny clothing.

A Culinary Warning

My culinary inspiration has been somewhere near to zero over the last week or so.  Probably due to the whole panicking my tits off about driving thing. It did keep me very, very busy for a while.  While this has been happening I have been craving a) sugar and b) curry, for some reason.  I don’t usually crave spicy things.  I like them.  I like them a lot, but I don’t usually crave them.  I always crave sugar, so no suprises there.

This culinary flatline, which mainly involves me spending the household budget on fudge and gingernuts, has meant that our meals have been on the desperation stakes side of interesting.  My shopping skills have also been incredibly poor as I desultorily click my way through some well remembered favourites on the Ocado website with no plan or forethought in mind.  This usually leads me to a despairing moment once a week where I stare into the depths of the cupboard thinking about what I can create with unsoaked quinoa and gingernuts.  On the odd occasions where I have bought real ingredients with which to make real food, the inspiration has dried up once the fridge door has snapped shut, only to reawaken in time for me to realise that half the ingredients I need are now out of date, and the other half are galloping around the bottom of the fridge waiting for me to wrestle them to the ground.

We have eaten out a lot more than usual.

I put an order in for groceries at the weekend and had a stern talk to myself.  I ordered fresh fruit, and vegetables and real pieces of meat, with which I promise I will create real meals that have a nutritional value and no gingernuts.  As a reward I treated myself to two, shiny new foods that were advertised as being scrummy and just up my street.  I spent three quid, three whole quid, on a hand made, rustic, organic, beaming with health and chock full of vitamins, apple sour dough loaf from a bakery called Gail’s.  I love sourdough bread and it’s quite hard to get here. I always mean to make my own but it’s one of those weird loaves that needs a starter which you have to feed, rather like Audrey II in Little Shop of Horrors.  I am never organised enough to do this, and I also secretly worry that it will blockade itself into the kitchen one night while we are sleeping, and throw knives at our heads when we go down  for breakfast.

I also spent another three quid, three etc, on what claimed to be manna from heaven, floated down on angel wings, or delicious, all butter Madeira cake.  Yum.  I love Madeira cake.  If I am lazy I usually buy the cheapass version from the Co-op.  If I am being good, I make my own.  The cheapass version from the Co-op is alright, but I wanted to taste a home made one without making it at home, so I bought the one Ocado proffered me, in the manner of a pimp, selling his finest laydee to a dishevelled man with a bri-nylon shirt, driving a shit brown Ford Fiesta with a twisted coat hanger instead of an aerial.

That will learn me won’t it?  Crime just doesn’t pay people.  And nor does spending six pounds on two artisanal items made with twigs and jam by the pixies in the woods.  What a load of hokum.

Gah!

The sourdough bread was so utterly vile that none of us, not a single member of the family could eat it.  I was the only one who didn’t spit my slice out after the first bite, and I only ate mine because I was the only one who knew how much each slice cost.  It was truly appalling.  It smelled as Tallulah said: ‘like nasty medicine’.  It tasted wet, gluey, and remarkably unlike any apples or indeed sourdough bread that I have ever eaten.  It was leaden, misshapen and unpleasant in every way.  If forced to describe it, I would say it resembled a fossilised dinosaur turd, only more unappealing.

The Madeira cake was also leaden, slightly undercooked in places, also leading to a kind of gluey consistency.  This gluey quality combined neatly with the choking, crumb-like texture of the rest of the cake, and was the only thing stopping the entire mass becoming some kind of hideous cake rubble.  It was anaemic looking and even the cake I made two weeks ago where I forgot to put the baking powder in, was more appealing.  Jason is also a great fan of Madeira cake.  We tried a slice each. He ended up rolling his into grainy pellets and trying to flick it into Matilda’s tea cup.  It was probably a better option than eating it.

This is a sign from the gods that I need to get my act together and cook proper food myself instead of relying on Gail, and the unnamed miscreant of Madeira cakes.  It can’t be any worse, even if I do forget the baking powder.