Not quite a beating heart, yet!

We have been a tad tied up over the past few days. We are fitting a new kitchen for her Ladyship, (our daughter), and her partner.

You might be forgiven for thinking that we are somewhat off the scale of sanity attempting such a thing with Christmas looming on the horizon. Don't fret, His Lordship and I are old hands at this type of thing.  In fact our current abode is the first that has had a fully functioning kitchen in when we have moved into it. Our first house had a beautiful new kitchen when we signed the contracts, but the day we moved in the said beautiful kitchen had moved out with it's previous owner.  Along with the light fightings, including lightbulbs, light switches, plug sockets. Yes just bare wires protruding from the walls and ceilings. They had gutted the place. So that was our first kitchen fitting experience.

Our second house had a kitchen in a cupboard and it was very cosy when the two of us were in there. So within six months we had extended the house and again fitted another kitchen. When we headed south for Kent we bought a house that needed a lot of work. This was mainly due to the previous occupants of the house, who were somewhat eccentric and decidedly ecclectic in their furnishing and decorating of the house. Everything, including the windows, doors and the kitchen came from car boot sales. The patio doors had been fitted upside down and inside out. Every window in the property was broken as they had been forced to fit. The kitchen, well that consisted of a number of mismatched units balanced precariously about the floor with a tap in the wall and a bowl on a stool for the sink. Lovely! So once again we donned our kitchen fitters garb and set about providing our home with a heart.

So today we shall be working our derrieres off, making sure that their Ladyships' have a working heart to their home ready for Christmas. Ah the joys of being a parent... oh and who is paying for this little lot?   This is one present that won't fit under the tree.

It doesn't matter how old your children are, there are still times when they want their mum and no one else will do.  Yes I can offer motherly advice down the phone, but I can't hug her when I can hear her trying to talk back to me through the sobs.  I can tell her that I love her, but I can't show her by kissing her tears away. I can hold her attention but not her hand.  I know that she will be alright, why, because I'm twice her age and I've seen it all before. Relationships, trust me your children's are always more difficult than your own. If you can't go over it, under it or around it you just have to go through it and hope that you come out the other side better for it!

Have a lovely weekend everyone... I can feel some retail therapy coming on ;0}

Porks Off!!

Mrs Beeton came over for dinner yesterday. I did the whole roast thing including Yorkshire pudds. It is always something of a trial when Mrs Beeton comes to dinner. She has very particular likes and dislikes. Unfortunately they tend to based on whatever is happening in the news. For example she is currently 'off' poultry, chicken and in particular turkey. My friends here in the UK will understand why, but for those of you who are not aware, it is down to the whole bird flu furor. Several years ago she gave up on beef, CJD was the culprit, just prior to that it was eggs because of salmonella, and then shellfish because someone told her that they 'store heavy metals', (she has no idea what heavy metal means or indeed where the shellfish keep their store). She spends her entire day glued to the news channel. The BBC of course, because no one else tells the truth!!!

So Back to the meal, I decided as beef, chicken, turkey, fish and eggs were off, I would serve Pork. So there I am serving up when I notice that Mrs Beeton doesn't have any pork on her plate. "You've forgotten to get some pork," I point out helpfully to her,

"Oh I don't eat pork," she replies munching on her carrots,

"what do you mean you don't eat pork, you've always eaten pork,"

"no, I don't eat it anymore, did you know that you get worms from pork!"

I was speechless, but I know better than to enter into an argument with her when she is in this mood. Then suddenly his Lordship came to the rescue, "we could rustle up some sausages... you like sausages don't you." She nodded enthusiastically.

A short time later Mrs Beeton was tucking into sausages, apparently they are not pork, they are sausages. It's a good job her Ladyship didn't decide to recount the story of when she discovered that sausages came from pigs, she was mid mouthful when Daddy, told her that they were pork, unfortunately she put two and two together and made.. well pigs willies. (She was only six at the time.)

My Daughter, the 'Treehugger'.

One day a couple of weeks ago her Ladyship had to take an exam for one of her college courses. She studied hard in the days leading up to the exam and burnt the midnight oil making every effort to ensure that she was ready. The night before I tested her and 'teased' the answers from her tiring brain. Now at this point I should say that it does help if you have a smidgen of understanding of the subject that you are testing on. Psychology was never one of my preferred subjects and sadly I have to say that more of it probably remained in the text books than in my brain. However I did my best, and when all else failed I valiantly filled in the 'blanks' with my own theories!

The morning of the exam arrived and her Ladyship seemed remarkably relaxed and calm. Confident in her abilities I headed off to work. At 11.30 she called to say that she had finished her exam and although not altogether happy about how it had gone she did remember some of the theories that I had filled in for her, and she was most grateful, eek! In particular she favoured my theory that Pavlov's' experiments were by their nature flawed and that he did not in actual fact create a trigger to make the dogs salivate on command, dogs drool constantly and his time and effort would have been far better utilised in trying to find a trigger to stop them drooling, especially on furniture and work clothes.

This said she informed me that a bunch of her college friends were heading to the pub to get a bite to eat and a drink to celebrate and that she would see me at home in a couple of hours. I gave her the usual 'Motherly' advice, make sure you eat something, don't drink too much at lunchtime, check your rear view before leaving the Ladies, etc. So I went back to my work. When it was time to leave I called her to see if she would like to meet up and we would go home together. A slightly tipsy daughter answered,

"Hello Mum," she answered.

"Hello Sweetie, I've finished work and I just wondered if you wanted to travel home together?"

"Oh Mum, I'm having a great time, everyone is such a laugh. I'll be home in a little while."

Hmm, "Ok Sweetie, just don't drink too much will you," Famous last words spring to mind.

During the course of a very long and somewhat fraught afternoon awaiting the homecoming of her Ladyship and several increasingly drunken phone calls ranging from "Hi, Mum, we're heading to another pub I'll call you in a bit" to "Hello mummy, you're the besht, you reeally, reeally are, aren't you,"

"Hello Sweetie, yes I know I'm the bees knees, now do you think I should come and pick you up?"

"Ok, what time?"

"NOW, would be good for me dear,"

"Hic, urrm, achewally, I'm not entirely shure, hic, where we are, hic!"

"Try asking somebody Sweetie," I could feel my halo tightening.

Eventually I managed to establish where she was and I headed off to pick her up. After twenty minutes I was at our meeting point and as I pulled the car up I was relieved to see that she was on her way out of the pub. On seeing the car she broke into a jog, unfortunately at that very same moment a nearby tree also decided to go jogging and ran directly into her path. Whallop!! She hit it 'head on', I watched helplessly as she staggered backwards arms clawing at the air, then just in the nick of time she managed to regain her composure. She is her mother's daughter. Courteously she turned to her 'fellow jogger' and apologised for not seeing him, then she happily skipped over to the car and 'slipped' into the passenger seat beside me grinning like a Cheshire cat.

"Hello dear, how's your head?" I asked trying to mask the impending fit of giggles.

"Whow! You musht, hic, musht be p-shy, p-shck, p-shy, hic, a mind reader," she said turning to me in awe, "how did you know my head hurt?"

"I'm you're Mother Sweetie, I know everything,"

As we drove home a large bruise began to develop on the side of her face, several times she queried it's creation and several times I recounted her 'treehugging' encounter. Finally we were home and being the kind Mother that I am I tucked her into bed. At 2.15am I was woken by a rather pathetic little voice issuing from the door,

"Mum, I don't feel well, I don't feel well at all, I think I have concussion,"

"Really darling. So what are the symptoms?"

"I've got a banging headache and I've been sick," she pleaded woefully,

Hmm, nothing to do with the copious amount of alcohol then! So once again I tucked her back into bed, cold flannels pressed to her aching head and bruised face... and of course the obligatory bucket. Then I headed back to my own bed, I'm a saint I know, but there are limits.

I left her the following morning tucked up on the sofa with a bruised face, fractured dignity and a hangover, sorry concussion. As I walked out of the door she was deep in conversation with her cousin, who it appears she had called the night before telling her that she had been attacked by a mad duck named George!! The duck in question resides next to our telephone, he's never shown any signs of aggression before.

He, He, He...

As I have been working today, her ladyship was appointed honorary shopping chaperone to Mrs Beeton in my absence. I have received three phone calls so far.

Call number one;
"Mum, where's the pomegranate juice kept?"

"Urm, aisle two I think sweetie, who's that for, it's not on my list, and Grandma doesn't drink it does she?"

"No, an old guy just asked me where it was. Thanks. Bye."

Call number two;

"Mum, mum she's got the trolley, I'm sorry she just took it while I wasn't looking. Gran, GRAN, don't..!" Click.

Call number three;

"Ok, if you ever offer my services again, I'll put myself up for adoption or I'll call childline."

"Oh come on sweetie, just remember you are your mother's daughter, and by the way, nobody wants to adopt 22 year olds they're too expensive, and I don't think childline will be interested either."

"It's no joke mum, do you know what she did to me?"

Stiffling the urge to giggle, "No, what?"

"Are you laughing at me?"

"No, no darling I would never,"

"She made me hold her hand when we were crossing the road,"

Excuse me while I go and pour myself another tall cool drink... it's a dirty job but someone has to do it. ;0)

Senior Shopping.

Yesterday I had to do the shopping thing with Mrs Beeton. She enjoys shopping, grocery shopping that is. For years it has been the highlight of her day, and she and the Fat Controller would take off to their various haunts stalking the bargains, 50% extra free, buy one get one free, three for two, they were skilled hunters. The fact that a lot of what they purchased is still languishing in the garden shed is beside the point. For them it was the thrill of the chase and the occasional fight with the other hunters to get there first and snaffle the last three cans of aerosol dairy cream, that stuff wouldn't know a dairy if it jumped up and bit it on the bum. However since the demise of the Fat Controller this little task has fallen to me.

So yesterday after yet another day sitting in a training room, I steeled myself for the role of supervising pensioner shopping. On arrival at her house we had to do the 'pre-flight' checks, reading glasses, check, shopping list, check, purse, check, toilet... several minutes later, check, cardigan, check, oh come on it was only 25 degrees outside. So after much manouvering she was safely belted into the car and we were on our way.

"Are you sure you don't mind taking me, you've been at work all day?" Mrs Beeton ventured as we backed out of the drive.

"No, no it's fine," I reassured her.

"I don't mind if you want to go another time, I don't want to put you out,"

"No it's ok honestly,"

"Are you sure?"

"Yes,"

There was a silence for a few moments.

"We always liked to go mid afternoon, that's when you get the best bargains. Everyone will have gone from work now and they'll have got there first," she announced. Have I mentioned that Mrs Beeton likes to get her own way!

"Well unfortunately I can't take you during the afternoon. I'm sure they won't have run out of milk or bread, or anything else on your list." I reassured her.

"I need dog food,"

"You don't have a dog!"

"No but I like to have some in. Just in case."

At this point I decided that my mind would be better utilised concentrating on the rush hour traffic. Pulling into the supermarket car park my heart sank. There were obviously a lot of people doing their shopping. This meant that we would have to park some distance from the door. We would have a bit of walk. Mrs Beeton has two speeds when walking, doddery old lady, and infuriatingly slow old lady. Today she chose the later. By the time we reached the trolley pick up there was a traffic jam as far as the main road.

Mrs Beeton stood to one side waiting for me to bring her a trolley. Having taken care to select one that had all four wheels in tact and pointing in the same direction I handed it over to her. Now I don't know about anyone else, but I remember when certain supermarkets used to provide miniature trolleys that had huge poles with brightly coloured flags on them, for children. The flags warned other shoppers to watch out for them. Well I suggest the same rule be applied to pensioners when given charge of trolleys, in particular Mrs Beeton. So several deep breathing exercises later we entered the affray.

By the end of the first aisle, she had managed to cripple two people and left them hopping for cover, and place half of the items she had selected into several 'unattended' trolleys, none of which were hers, with me in stealth mode attempting to retrieve the items before the trolley owners were any the wiser. I did unfortunately get rumbled on the last occasion much to the chagrin of the aforementioned owner, who happened to be a burly six foot chap with tattoos covering most of his exposed arms. After withering under his glare, I hot footed it to the bakery section. Too late, Mrs Beeton was up to her waist in Warburtons finest. Loaves littered the floor, other shoppers could only stare in disbelief as the store assistants frantically tried to clear a path for the sweet little old dear now ploughing her way through them in the direction of the cake section, oblivious it would seem to the carnage she had just caused.

After several attempts to wrestle the trolley from her grasp, without success, I decided I had, had enough and so I headed to the book section for some respite. I had barely had time to read the blurb on a couple of jackets before a tannoy announcement tore my thoughts back into focus.

"Clean up required in aisle's 3, 5, and 8... just a minute, make that 10 as well."

Hesitantly I emmerged from my refuge and went in search of Mrs Beeton. I didn't have to look far as another casualty hopped into view from the direction of the freezer aisle. As I passed aisle 10 the clean up party was in full swing, an entire centre display of cream cakes now lay battered under an upturned table. I finally caught up with Mrs Beeton as she was being escorted to the checkout by the store manager and a security guard. For one moment I thought about escaping and running for the car, unfortunately the sight of her looking rather flustered and not a bit peeked at the indignity of being 'helped' out made me change my mind. Several more 'sorrys' and a promise not to leave her unattended or to let her push the trolley in future secured our re-admission for our next senior shopping trip. Oh goody I can't wait.

Little Pearls of Wisdom

When you are a parent you start to develop certain skills. Some of them are really useful, like how make a space shuttle out of a washing up bottle, toilet rolls, and milk bottle tops, or how to make a bunny out of a handkerchief then make it run up your arm. How to speak fluent teletubbie, even at work!

There are also the pearls of wisdom we impart to them as they're growing up.

a) Don't stick your fingers in plug sockets, it makes your hair frizzy and then it's a bugger to style.
b) Always make sure you're wearing clean underwear when you go out. You may get hit by a bus. (Mm that's ok if you don't see it coming. I have to be honest if I saw a bus heading towards me, well I don't think I'm alone on that one..)
c) Girls, only shave the bottom half of your legs on a first date. It's better than a chastity belt!
d) Boys, a quick tickle with a damp flannel doesn't cut it. Pheromones are not the same as B.O.
e) It's never a good idea to boost the contents of your bra with socks, especially if your dad was wearing them the day before.
f) The first time you sneak off to get drunk don't drink Creme de Menthe or the antifreeze lookilike alchopop. The vomit stains are virtually impossible to get off the carpet.
g) And finally, when you're 19 years old and about to tell your mother she's going to be a grandma, don't start the conversation off with, "Mum, you'll look back on this one day and laugh."

(Ok so maybe my son was right on the last one).