A Mummy Blog and Random Acts of Kindness

I have had a bit of  day, you know...one of those days where you have to do lots of responsible things. I had to take Josh to the Optician and the Doctor. My little Puddle Jumper (Car) has been consigned to that great cube in the sky and I am trying to get another on the road so, hideous amounts of responsible things are hard to deal with. Logistical nightmare or not, I still had to fulfil my parental responsibilities. God , she sighs, I hate all the miasma that clings to you when you are a parent.

Anyway our first stop was the Optician, where Josh had to have his eyes tested. He has been complaining for some time about things being fuzzy but I ignored this as all sensible parents do. I put it down to teenage hormones and an aversion to school work  - oops! Turns out that number two son needs glasses fast and I am a bad mother. Just as well I knew this already or I may have taken it personally. We decided (Josh and I) that we were not to blame, Grampy was...how dare he breed when he has the 'short sightedness gene'! Josh was a little star and chose some rather Nerdy Joe 90 glasses and looks Fab. He is only 14 and does not realise that this is a life long thing. I wore my first glasses at 16, switched to contacts in my early twenties, wore them for 10 years and ended up with such a bad eye infection in my 30's that I was advised never to wear them again. This of course was as a result of far too much partying and far too little lens cleaning on Ascension Island. The upshot of this is my glasses have become part of me and you have to take me as I am or not at all.

In fact, I feel a little vulnerable without them. As we were waiting a nice lady reminded me that I had had an eye test in November but had not chosen any glasses. I did, but had to go and pick Josh up so had forgotten about it. So here I am, trying to deal with the fact that Josh has to wear glasses for the rest of his life and trying to pick out a pair of readers and distance for myself. The readers were easy. Big strong black framed bottles that you could sit on, on a regular basis, cover with ketchup, run over with your car and give them to the cat to wear. The distance glasses had to be some that I could wear everyday. I was so flustered that I came out with a bit of a 'Jenny Eclair' pair. All thick frames in bright green that were far too big for my small head.

I clutched my miserable selection in my hot hand (why do I always feel a bit hot, sweaty and unattractive among those 'Optician Assistant Girls', in their air conditioned heaven?) and watched as Jo measured and fitted him with his new glasses. She asked me to try on my choice and when I nervously said "what do you think of these" she gently asked me to look in the mirror. Turns out that our Jo of Specsavers in Bodmin was not going to let me go out of the place looking like Jenny. I might be reasonably funny at times but realised what she was getting at. My problem was that I had NO budget....nada. My car is off the road and all pennies must be saved. Also Joshy has just started playing hockey ( he is rather good) and that's an expensive hobby! Jo took me through a lot of frames and made me stand in front of the camera and have my picture taken with four different frames on. Ewwww....hate having my pic taken as I am old and wrinkly now. Jo realised I had no budget and discounted  a pair of glasses for me as she was not going to be responsible for me walking out of Specsavers looking like a bad impression of Jenny. So this is a thank you to Jo, who was so very kind, attentive and realised that doing the parent thing had made me neglect myself. Thank you Jo. Even a Big Brand name such as Specsavers has a heart. I am impressed as it is usually me that does a RAK or two.

My day was not finished yet though. I had to take Josh for a check up with his Doctor. The Doc in question has been on sabbatical and we have really missed him. He realised how ill Josh has been and it turns out that he thinks Josh has had Glandular Fever and actually managed to get some blood out of Josh. Josh is very tight with his red stuff and always ensures that no decent medic can find a vein. He also realised that Josh was not using his steroid inhaler as he should and has prescribed another. The upshot of this Blog is that I am a bad parent and should believe my son when he says he is ill. The other bit is to say thank you for all the support from Mrs Phipps at Bodmin College, Dr Stead at The Carnewater Practice and of course Jo. Thank God, Allah, Buddah, Ganesh, I have some support! x

Boobs, Breasts and Botox.

I woke the other day, hair looking as tho' I had fought off half of the world with lots of sleep lines on my skin. I am not a vain woman, I accept that my skin does not bounce back like it once did.  My problem on waking and looking like a Spitting Image Puppet was that I had done nothing to deserve it. No booze, no fags, no mucking about with unsuitable men. Shame! I had been positively angelic for at least a week. Yet I looked like I had taken part in Woodstock.

I have something to tell  you Ladies 'of a certain age'. Unless you can afford Botox and fillers on a monthly basis, everything is gonna drop. If, like me, you are blessed with good genes (although I am a little thick of the neck) you can probably carry this off until you are 45. I am 48 now and my time has been HAD, ENJOYED and  BLOODY APPRECIATED! Read this as 'I am over the Hill' now! Yup, I could pull a 29 year old at the age of 45. Do I want to pull a 29 yr old now? No! (I was going through my Mid Life Crises at the time). Do I want to fill myself full of unnecessary things - nope! Do I want to fill my breasts with Silicone, Nah! they are quite nice as they are. Lovely soft fun bags that have fed babies.

So here I am. I have climbed that hill, been utterly gorgeous, and completely fabulous to the men in my life. You know ladies.....the men that you twirl around your little finger and wind them into your life. The fact is that you might be one of those women that lives her life on her own terms or perhaps fills her soul with fake tan and eyelashes. Whoever you are, just remember you are beautiful and if your heart and mind is in tune with your body, then you will be happy x

Fleas, Flu and Flagellation!

I am aware that I am supposed to be blogging about all things amusing such as handbags, contents thereof; and of course funny foibles on Facebook. Not in the mood, so not in the mood. We have flu in the House of Muse, also Cat Fleas (little evasive bastards) and a broken Kindle. Grumpy does not even go near how I'm feeling at the moment. Have a word with yourself girl and get on with it.

I watched a documentary tonight called 'No Impact Man'. Bit of a stupid title but respect to the guy, (and his long suffering spoiled brat wife) as he stuck out a year of sustainable living in the middle of New York.  Worth a watch.  I think he was probably naive at best and a bit daft at worst.

I've been thinking about Lent over the last couple of days. Twitter was awash with it. Stupid ignorant people twatting on about what they were going to give up. Now, am I a bit simple in the grey matter department (told you I was grumpy) or is this the endish of February? Have we all had Christmas, gone on diets/ given up alcohol, fags/ tortured ourselves at the gym or am I delusional? So WHY do we need to do it all over again? I have no problem with the 'God Squad' getting out a bit of rose bush and flagellating themselves with it. On a kinder note, if you have FAITH in yourself, others, God or someone else's God then good luck to you. I was brought up as a Catholic and how I hated it. All that guilt, I must have been 35 before I managed to get rid of it all. I digress, what I'm trying to say is Lent is a religious festival so why are you trying to give up chocolate etc... ad nauseum for forty days. Will we see 'Happy Lent Day' cards next? I am completely bewildered....

Oh dear....just a click and I found one. Deep breath. So we have two extremes here. Giving up your G & T for forty days and nights (that sounds much more challenging) or giving up your entire lifestyle for a year. The Muse household needs a bit more self control, a little less judgement and a tad more love. In the immortal words of Twitter #justsayin....

Those that can DO and those that can't TWEET!

I have a question. If your married or living together what do you do about Social Networking? I don't know anything about this because I live alone (well not alone, but with child) and have noticed that living together has changed rather a lot since my days of being tolerant of another. I know several married couples who are keen about social networking. There's nothing wrong with that is there? Actually there is. It's been troubling me for a while and a couple of conversations I've seen on Twitter recently have just underlined what I have been thinking all along.

I know a couple who have been happily married for 30 odd years. They both work full time and in the evenings they like to play games with each other on Facebook. Quite normal behaviour, you would think. Except its not because she sits in the living room, feet up with her laptop and he sits in the attic surrounded by PC paraphernalia. They constantly comment on their scores and on other friends pages, but separately. Great fun for the odd evening but they do this night after night. Can they be happy living together in cyber space? Maybe that's how they preserve their marriage. I'm not judging, merely pointing out that the dynamic of marriage or partnership in this Cyber age is changing rapidly.

The conversation on Twitter that got my attention was one about passwords, computer passwords. Two couples argued that it was perfectly fine to be on Twitter because they both knew each others passwords and god forbid that they would ever go to that dangerous place called Facebook. It just made me realise that both of these couples were on Twitter pretty much all evening and talking to various people on their phones and not each other. This also begs the question, do you do or do you Twitter? Or the old adage. Those that can do and those that can't Twitter. How much of the moment do you experience  and enjoy before spoiling it and whipping out your phone to Tweet thereby missing half the experience.

I think a few people will probably unfollow me on Twitter when they read this but I'm not trying to be critical, just trying to point out that's its easy to get too involved in social networking without realising it. Many Tweeters have decided that Facebook is the Devils work and Twitter is safe 'coz my missus is on there' Facebook and Twitter are just the same. Twitter just moves faster. Facebook is not going to twist your arm behind your back and make you have an affair - that's up to you.

Time for me to get off my soapbox. All I'm saying is think about how much time you spend in the moment and how much time you spend talking about it. I can't tell you how to run your relationship but ask yourself am I married or am Borg like and part of the collective? On a lighter note there is one couple on Twitter that make me smile. Andy and Niamh tweet to their friends AND argue in a tongue in cheek way as to who is going to make the tea. Now that's what I call a positive cyber marriage!

Bollock Drizzle and Snot.

Here I am at last. Honestly, the minute I get going on the Blog again the common cold has felled me like an Elm tree in Holland. I have very sneakily avoided a cold for the last four years. I have done this by having B12 injections every three weeks, doctors orders, and behaving in a belligerent and stroppy manner toward my fellow man. This involves interrogating anyone suspected of harbouring germs or shooting daggers of molten lava at anyone who dares sneeze in my direction.

I spent years being poleaxed by Other Peoples Germs (OPG's) and decided to fight back by making a conscious decision to avoid OPG's and keep myself well. The bad behaviour started with the purchase of many pashminas AKA scarves that you can use to open doors, clutch shopping trolleys and provide a barrier between you and the germs. I didn't care if someone sneezed near me and saw me cover my face , ninja like with my pashmina. Don't look at me like that I'm making sure you don't infect me! In fact don't even glance in my direction you snot filled disgusting plague carrier! Another handy tool I discovered was anti bac hand gel. I found this very useful when using those yukky, shit smeared, Ebola pools that we know as Cashpoints. Germpoints more like. I mean, am I the only one who sees a bloke in the queue in front of me adjust his nads and then proceed to use the cashpoint!!!!! How dare you leave your Bollock Drizzle all over the buttons.  So if you are behind me in the queue please be patient whilst I  scrabble in my handbag, produce gel, and smear it all over the cashpoint, buffing to a gentle shine with a clean hanky. Only then can I bear to use them.

I can actually be even more badly behaved than that. I went to the health food shop to buy some glucosamine the other day. The shop assistant looked like something out of Survivors. Her red nose dripped menacingly, her eyes pools of broken veins, a snotty tissue hung limply from her sleeve. 'Can I help you' she rasped. Quick as a flash I whipped my pashmina over my face and made like a ninja. She gave me a really dirty look. It was all I could do not to yell at her 'Unclean' and make a cross sign with my arms. I apologised saying that I would die if she gave me her cold. I was lying through my teeth of course, but how dare she turn up for work infested with germs and expect me to touch her goods. Blimey that sounds a bit rude but you know what I mean. She got the pills and tried to give them to me. Forgive me, but I couldn't do it, I couldn't take it off her. At that point I nearly bolted and ran screaming from the shop. 'Oh for goodness sake' she muttered. She opened her drawer pulled out some anti bac gel and smeared it all over the pill bottle and banged it down on the counter. I threw a fiver at her and without waiting for my change picked up the offending bottle (with my pashmina) and ran out of the shop to the nearest bin where I chucked it!  Erm...don't think I'll be shopping there anytime soon.

There is a flip side to this. I am not a hypocrite. Having my first cold in four years has made me realise that I am contaminated and I will do my utmost to ensure I do not infect you with my feculent fever. I will not shake your hand or kiss you or breathe in your general direction. I promise to avoid you and become hermit like until all bacteria has left my system. Now please do the same for me!

Donut Child finally grows up !

I spent the other night doing something very painful but horribly necessary. I had to switch to the new Blogger interface. Well I say 'new' but I've been avoiding it for a year. In order to make the new template work properly, I had to delete the side bar on Donut Child. There was no simple way to do this and I had to delete each post separately. It was like having two years of my life flash before my eyes! Deleting each picture, quote or words of wisdom caused me physical pain. I was so sad to see it all consigned to the great cyber space in the sky. But it's done now and I feel light and free, able to Blog about the important stuff and not spend an hour on the sidebar, stressing as to whether the bar aligned with the Blog okay. I know a lot of you loved the side bar but it just wasn't sustainable and if I 'm going to grow up as a Blogger I need to move on. I'll still Blog about lighthearted stuff (I need to finish up the A to Z of Facebook for instance) and I'm still mucking about with colour schemes etc... but with nearly 1,000 people a month reading this I'm trying to make it more user friendly and easier to read on a mobile. I want to include this old photo from the sidebar though as it was my favourite and I'm sure you will agree...

 Its a 10 year old Joshy with Amos on Folk on The Water learning to play a Dulcimer. Awww! I have also become a member of BlogHer and a very nice Graphic Designer has offered to design a Donut Child logo for me. Phew, its all happening!

I need to ask for  something from you dear reader. My old Blog interface made it very hard for readers to follow this Blog but the new version should be easier. So if you read this on a regular basis then please help me by becoming a follower. You can do this by entering your email in the box at the top right of this Blog. I'd be really grateful. I'm very proud to have been Blogging for two and a half years now, so thanks for reading and keep up the good work! x

The Chronicles of Ma and Pa.

I promise that I will finish the A to Z of Facebook soon, in fact I have already scribbled most of it into my lovely suede bound cream journal but I want to tell you about my day.

Mum and Dad have been away for the last 3 months, they have been visiting the Australian Rellies. These include my brother Greg and my sister Jax. Thanks to you both for giving them such a good time x.... Anyway they flew in from Singapore yesterday, where Greg now lives. They boarded a coach at Heathrow after a good flight (there were 200 spare seats on their Quantas flight home), rang me to say they were on the coach but going straight through to Camborne which is about 35 miles from where I live in Bodmin. They usually stop off at Bodmin but they were shattered and wanted to fall over gracefully when they got home. I knew the coach was coming through Bodmin and hurriedly put together a food parcel of Bacon, Eggs, Milk, Bread etc..., filled a flask with hot tea and wrapped a bright orange pashmina around myself. I went to meet the coach, hoping that it would stop at Bodmin and stood in the icy wind, my carefully styled hair blown to bits. The lovely driver did spot me and stopped, asking if I had a Cornish Pasty about my person. I gave them a big hug and a kiss and sent them on their way. They looked tanned and exhausted but promised to see Joshy the next day.

I had a phone call from Pa at 9.30am this morning. They got home to utter chaos. The car wouldn't start, slurry was backing up into the washing machine (they live in a Barn Conversion in the wilds of Cornwall) and the house was stinking of damp with mould up the walls. I said no probs, I'll drive down and we'll get the car started and everything else will follow. I duly drove down to find that Pa had managed to start the car with a neighbour, who (thank you Elizabeth) had also cooked them a hot meal the previous evening and brought a dehumidfier for them to use.

I followed Pa to Truro to buy a new battery and to make sure that he could restart the car whilst filling up with petrol. Job done, or so I thought. We drove to my daughters in Truro and I went to park the car. Oops, small problem as my passenger side electric window refused to close. I rattled it a bit and with a huge 'thunk' it dropped neatly into the door frame. Oh Bugger! I drove back to Siany's and summoned my father. Now lets just pause for a minute and consider the fact that my 70 year old dad has flown from Oz to Singapore, spent 5 days in Singapore with my brother, experiencing a very fast five days of fun and frolics, boarded a flight to Blighty, stepped onto a coach for 7 hours, come back to domestic chaos and is now blearily considering my broken window - WIBBLE!

I drove to Staples, in the hope they may stock some clear plastic to temporarily shut the window as it was raining quite hard. Dad sat shivering in the passenger seat as I ran into the store. I found a load of Muppets discussing their love lives at Customer Services. 'Clear Plastic, nah, the computer says no'! Arrgghhhh..... I resisted the urge to throttle them and ran back to the car. Next stop was Homebase. I fully expected to find more persons similar to Kermit but found a brilliant bloke called Robin and explained my predicament. We hummed and haaa'd over a few options and then I saw a big light bulb go off above his head - PING! He dashed through the 'Staff Only' door and returned with a huge roll of cling film 'pallet wrap'. It was the cling film equivalent of the stuff you use to wrap someone up if you are an East End Gangster! He proceeded to turf a stunned Dad out of the car and between them they "clinged up" my door until it resembled a well wrapped sandwich!

I have to say here that it is not often that I come across the 'Robins' of this world. I am one of the 'Robins' and was delighted to discover another. It doesn't take a moment to help someone and have discussed this before under the heading 'Random Acts of Kindness'. Thank you Robin for your RAK, it was so appreciated when I needed a little TLC during a long day.

Back at the daughters it was decided that Dad would drive me home in his car and Mum would drive my clingy motor back to Camborne, where Dad would spend the weekend mending my window. My heroic dad then drove me back to Bodmin and set off on a dark rainy night back to Camborne. So here I am explaining it all to you but it needed a mention because how many Dads would do that? Here I am riding in to help on my little Micra White Charger and my dad, despite his exhaustion and fuddled brain has dipped deep into his reserves and become (once again) my Hero.

I am such a Lucky Girl.

My A to Z of Facebook - Part One

This Blog has been a long time coming and recent changes to Facebook mean that I have to get it out of my system so here goes.... WARNING! Some of this is funny but some of it may make you squirm!

A is for Affairs of The Heart and all the angst and fall out they cause. There is actually a website called Facebook Cheating.com . According to The Telegraph, 1 in 5 affairs are conducted through Facebook. Now, I'm not going to preach to you because I was one of those statistics. I am single and he was very married. An old school friend, yeah, I know, but this was a few years back. I really thought he was a decent person. But Keith (and you are very lucky I don't mention your full name on here) was a pathological liar, shoplifter and collector of sexual diseases. He was sleeping with several women and was obviously too stupid to understand the term 'safe sex' because he managed to give his long suffering wife genital warts. Luckily I managed to extricate myself from the situation before I was exposed to any nasties. His wife likes to comment on my Blog from time to time, putting the blame firmly at my door. Blame? and you still want him love? My only regret is losing a lovely girlfriend because of his lies. If you're going to do it, then don't! It really isn't worth the fall out.

B is for Bejewelled Blitz .This is one of the most addictive games known to man and has ruined my life, it is more addictive than crack. I can give it up (she says sniffing into her sleeve), I can beat it and I CAN remain top of the leaderboard no matter what it takes! Bejewelled is something you play with your friends. In fact, I am so friendly on it that I never share points and tie my son to the bed until he gives in and sends me at least 10 lots of points via his FB account. I have also been known to withold food until he agrees!

C is for CIA or Intelligence Agencies thereof; Yes it IS true. The CIA/FBI/GCHQ/POLIS.... are all reading your posts, in fact they think it's their birthday. They love Social Networking Sites and cannot believe their luck that all this information just dropped into their laps. I have a guy on my timeline who works in Afghanistan and regularly posts his flight details and locations. Hilarious! Bet he isn't going to get promoted anytime soon. Yes! Big Brother is watching you. Now behave :)

D is for Drunk When I was a few years younger I used to phone girlfriends/exes/whoever when I had, had far to much of the Pink stuff. Then I progressed to texting, that was terrific fun and now.... Hmmm, well I think we have left the one dimensional phone/text scenario behind in favour of Social Networking.

Step One - Have far too much of the wet stuff, get bored with the crap on Telly and Log on.
Step Two - Look at all your friends profiles in a Stalkerish manner and leave inappropriate comments on their photos.
Step Three - Enter Facebook Chat at 3 a.m and talk a large load of rubbish to people you hardly know.
Step Four - Pass out and wonder, upon waking, why you are nose down on your keyboard and have 57 notifications and 18 messages in your inbox!

If you are planning a heavy night then I strongly suggest that you unplug the 'pute and disable the router!

E is for Editing Always ensure that you understand a Facebook post/comment cannot be removed. Perhaps you have just commented and made a really bad typo such as "I thought your brother was a Wanker" (replace the W with a B). Lawksamighty, you are understandedly mortified. So, it's been 20 seconds since you posted and luck has it that you have spotted your horrendous typo. 'Phew, I'll just delete it and repost' you mutter to yourself. WRONG! Every single person with a smartphone has just read your comment, in all its glory and it's only the poor saps on a PC that are wondering what the joke is about! Think! before you press that magic Enter button!

F is for Facebook The Great God Facebook has become our new religion. Some statistics for you. Facebook has over 800 million users and apparently the average user has roughly 130 friends. It's that six degrees of separation thing that fascinates me. Imagine my feelings when I managed to track down some 30 odd school friends. For those that have lived in the same town all their lives, this may be no big deal. But for me, a Donut Child (forces brat) and then an Army wife, constantly on the move, it brought a whole new dimension to my life. We all attended so many schools that I never thought I would ever see any of my friends again. Facebook has given me an enormous amount of pleasure, a smidge of grief and I think I would cry if they closed down my FB account. My father, being ex-GCHQ, shudders at the mention of FB and refuses to pose for photos if he knows I am going to post them. He is, of course, right to be wary. Social Networking is in it's infancy and only time will tell whether the information we post on our walls/timelines will be available to prospective employers/insurance companies. Note to self - Think about what you post.

G is for Girlfriends Or for that matter Friends as I already did F above! You may think that you should count all those on your wall as friends but you (and I) are sadly wrong. Many of us have subdivisions of our friends which are as follows.

a) Stalker - a person who is always on FB, has their laptop constantly by their side and comments on everything. They love to 'copy and paste' irritating messages and threaten to break your legs if you do not follow suit! This person also likes to share their entire back catalogue of fave You Tube Videos with you. You are one click away from deleting them but a perverse fascination makes you continue.
b) Friends that share nothing, only pop up once in a blue mooon and you find yourself grinding your teeth and willing them to share a bit more so you can be nosy.
c) Family members, such as older children. Only kept for their ability to curb your wild side and ensure you keep in touch with Great Aunt Batty.
d) Interesting and semi famous people who you love to have on your wall as you need the street cred they provide.
e) And finally, those that make you smile, post interesting and thoughtful comments or you fancy the pants off them and.....FB comes full circle!

Just remember if you have more 'friends' than you can count on the fingers of one hand, you are horribly deluded!

Thats it for tonight. More to follow soon.

Surviving.

I am sticking on the book theme for tonight and deliberately avoiding the man subject. No doubt, I will explain in a later Blog. I have been reading the sequel to The Legend of Heorot. I have Blogged about this before. The sequel is called Beowulfs Children. I read the original book 20 years ago and last month read it again.

The original book is about colonising an Earth like planet that seems friendly but as the colonists discover more about the planet, it becomes apparent that they have misjudged the Ecology and have to fight for their lives when they discover a terrible monster called a Grendel, hence the Beowulf theme.

I think what entranced me about the original book was the question... If you were going to a Planet that would take you 100 years to reach, what would you take with you? What would you need to survive? Imagine a sort of Noah's Ark of the future. Every sort of plant seed, human/animal embryo, mining equipment, ad infinitum. The list went on. How would we survive if we had to start from scratch?

In our modern western world it would not take much to kill off most of us. As a bone fide Donut Child my father and I discussed this one night about 10 years ago. 'Just take out the power and most of us would be dead' said my father gleefully. I disagreed with him and said 'Nah, I know exactly what to do to survive.' He concurred that I probably could but how would I cope if I was older. So here I am, 10 years older and much wiser, about the art of survival but also much weaker, more unfit and finally realising that if the power went off I could probably survive longer than some, but not much....

Why am I fixated on this question, you ask? Well, first of all because I am a Donut Child and second because of what is happening in our lives today. The recession bites ever deeper, The Daily Mail adores scaring the pants off us with scaremonger articles and I have to admit, even that scurrilous little rag does have a point.

There is a new survivalist Middle England emerging through the financial crises. Many people are buying food and household items in bulk because they do not have any idea as to what will happen next. Garages that once housed Porches and Lamborginis are full of bottled water, baked beans and pasta. American companies who supply longlife food packs are cashing in - the cost of their foods are astronomical. One British man has sensibly decided to ignore their marketing ploys and adds two bottles of water and four cans of baked beans to his weekly shop. His attitude is that if the shit hits the fan, he will at least have something to eat. Frankly, if I had that much tinned food in my garage, I may just decide to buy a gun and seal the deal! Those of you who know me understand that I do have cupboards bursting with long life food because I have obviously watched far to many disaster movies and I have been brought up to understand that YOU are the only one you can rely on. Erm...Ray Mears also features heavily.

I suppose the big question you should ask yourself is 'If the little Western bubble that we live in did break down what would I do?' For me the answer is simple. If it was a Nuclear War then I would try and get into the centre of London, get extremely drunk and welcome that big blinding light. If it was a nasty virus/contaminated water system then I'd probably find a chemist and make sure me and mine were blissfully asleep before anything painful happened to us. Anything else? I suppose I'd try my best to survive. I'm not sure how long I would manage it though.

We all have the will to survive, it is part of who we are. The challenges that daily life throws at us are ever changing and in some way we manage to wind our way through the maze of our individual worlds and persevere. For me, I think I'll carry on with the bottled water and the pasta but ultimately the day to day thing is a lot harder than the planning for Armaggedon. Ce La Vie - Thats Life!

Yin and Yang

Happy New Year to you all.

I've written this in longhand first, or scribbled should I say. I've got out of the habit of blogging and the computer silently mocks me from the corner of the room. I get so tired in the evenings so most of my important thoughts whirl around my head when I'm in my bed. Yes, yes...I know that my father thinks I am surgically attached to it, but honestly, for a variety of reasons, I have to have a few more 'Duvet Days' than most. So I thought why not go back a step? That way I can scribble away to my hearts content and snooze between sentences.

I also finally caught up with Eden Riley's Blog 'Edenland'. I hate the word AWESOME but thats what she is! I've been reading her Blog for just over a year and she is my inspiration for sticking with it. It wasn't always that way. Some of her posts were downright whiny or far too 'Mommy Blogger' for me. I think she's a bit like Adele, she writes her most impressive stuff when she's facing a challenge in her life. She really has blossomed this year and grown up as a writer, something I need to do! A'hem... What strikes me about Eden is whatever life throws her, she steadfastly Blogs through it, climbing mountains and looking down upon us mere mortals as we fail at the first fence. Eden suggested that we go back to basics, stop giving a shit about what people think and pick up a pen. That's what I did this morning. Thanks for taking the time to encourage me Eden. I wrote this entire Blog in about 20 minutes flat. Result!

From writing to another of my favourite things, reading. My children bought me Kindle for Christmas. Those that know me well understand my life long love affair with books. I could read at three, had my head in Du Maurier at nine and did the entire works of Tolkien at eleven. I love the smell, the feel of paper, the comfort of falling asleep with one upon my chest. I adore used books, scouring charity shops and happily hauling heavy loads home. Leaving books at a bus stop, in a phone box (usually with a peg upon my nose) fills me with pleasure. I linger in the Library and despite my best intentions, I buy half the books from their sale shelf and innocently wonder where I will put them all. Reading 'One Day' by David Nichols was memorable because the whole thing stank of weed - that was fun, a second hand high as well as the one provided by Mr Nicholls!

I lust after new and shiny Art and Travel books on a daily basis. So why on earth would I want a Kindle? Why? Beacause I soon realised that a Kindle would never kill my love for previously cherished books. A passion that deep would not be parted by a cold, hard, electronic box. I have to admit, even I did not realise how big that Brave New World was. Wow! It is stunning. The Kindle is super easy to use, light, warm and smooth. A Kindle does not object to me falling asleep on it or complain when I snore. It switches itself off quietly and never blinks at me with a smug 'low battery light'. I can lay in my bed and scroll happily through hundreds of delicious titles. Even the scrolling is fun. After making my choice, I press a button and Ping, there it is. Actually Kindles are quiet thoughtful souls and have never been heard to speak in public. A slight problem is that during the first week I read SIX book. For some reason I can read stuff on it faster than on paper. I have no idea why.

So there you are, high praise indeed from a technophobic luddite. There is one issue for me but I am sure they will work it out in time. I think that whoever transcribes the books does so using 'voice recognition' technology. A word of caution here Book Editors. If you are determined to Bastardise the entire English language into a 'Mid Western American Twang' then I think you will lose more readers than you gain. Please sort it out. My only other niggle is that I now sleep with far too many electronic devices to be healthy! Yin and Yang, its a weird old world as I revisit my shaky handwriting and embrace a shiny new technology.

Moor Harmony and a Vocal Sex Change!

After a long spell of ennuii I really had to get off my bottom and do something. Some new pills have made me feel a bit better of late so I spent a few weeks thinking about what I wanted to do. The answer came to me in the form of a programme called The Choir. Gareth Malone, he of the serious glasses, terrific musical talent and the looks of a 12 year old got me all fired up when he formed a Choir at RMB Chivenor in Devon. The Choir was the story of a group of military wives who find solace and cheer in music whilst their husbands are away on a tour of Afghanistan. The programme held me rapt. I cried, laughed and cheered along with them. Our Gareth triumphed and all was well in Forces Land. The men came home safe and as I write this The Military Wives Choir are are tipped for a Christmas number one slot with their single 'Wherever You Are'.

In my experience, almost all of us can sing in one form or another but most of us left singing behind along with our O levels. I certainly did. Apart from the odd wedding/funeral it has been 30 years since I sang a song. I have tried in the car but The Git (who has of course been blessed with perfect pitch) shouts at me to shut up so I honestly thought I was a bit crap!

I rang a choir called Moor Harmony, at least I thought they were a choir but I was quickly corrected. They are a Ladies Barbershop Chorus. 'Really' said I 'Blimey, I thought that stuff was for blokes and extremely hard to sing'. I was encouraged by Mel to come and have a go so it was with trepidation that I arrived in Wadebridge to do just that. I was shaking like a leaf and after saying a quick hello I spent the next 15 mins on the loo!

Sian, the Musical Director took me into another room to see what my range was. I always sang Soprano back in the 'olden days' but as I opened my mouth to follow her notes a deep rumbling Bass wandered out. I clapped my hand over my mouth in complete shock. Bugger, was that actually me? Sian laughed at my confusion and placed me firmly in the Bass section. Oh the shame....I was going to sound like a Bloke, or so I thought...

Okay, so just consider this, I haven't sung for 30 years, I have just been told I have had a vocal sex change and now they are asking me to do warm up exercises. This involved jigging about the hall like a disjointed giraffe. I was the giraffe the others were all swans to my stumbles. Actually I had to sit some of that out after nearly falling over a few times. I thought it might be best to try and get to the singing part in one piece.

Now came the hard bit. After warming up our vocal chords with me rumbling along in entirely the wrong places, I was given a piece of sheet music and asked to join in. Now I may not be a soloist but I have a good ear and am a natural mimic. These dubious talents ensured that I could Blag it for the first half of proceedings. This involved identifying the clearest singer among the Basses and attatching myself firmly to her side.

All I can say is what a blast this evening has been. Once I had found a smidgen of confidence, I lost myself in the music and started to learn how to sing in parts. At one point I carried on singing when all had stopped, swiftly clapped my hand over my mouth and blushed a deep shade of crimson which was tempered with a slight amazement at the sound coming out of my mouth. So I am renewed and feeling happy and exhausted. It's not easy, it's hard work. You constantly have to rehydrate and I have to admit I got extremely tired. A lot of laughter was shared among us and I can't wait for next week. Thanks to all the girls in Moor Harmony for making me feel so welcome.

I just want to end this Blog by saying that most of us left singing behind with religion as the 'Great God Supermarket' seems to be our only form of religion today. Some of us will sing at the Carol Service in the next couple of weeks or hum along at the Nativity Play but that will be it for another year. I would encourage anyone to join a Choir/Barbershop Group because the rush you experience whilst revisiting your vocal chords is better than any Dirty Martini you could ever mix!

The Ladies of 'Moor Harmony' are performing live at The Callywith Pub tonight. So if you live in Bodmin then go along and support them. I shall be there to provide a bit of moral support but I have a long way to go before I get up there with them.

In The Shadow of Donut Child.

Here I am again. I have to admit that I have failed miserably to create a new Blog. I cannot shake Donut Child off however hard I try. I wanted to create something that was a bit less personal. I yearned to be more professional, casting a cool arched eyebrow over the various news stories of the day. I aspired to the likes of Suzanne Moore, Caitlin Moran and Deborah Orr. All of whom I follow avidly on Twitter.

I also had a number of emails asking me why I had tried to kill off Donut Child and a lot friends told me they missed it, particularly the very busy side bar. Thanks to all of you for your generous comments. Then a famous publisher sent me a book to review and the writer of this book also encouraged me (review coming soon!) I had to admit deafeat. I just needed to realise that I wasn't Caitlin Moran, I was Donut Child with my own style of writing and should stick with that because despite not writing for three months 400 people read this Blog last month. Well I say 'read' they probably had a cursory glance and thought where the heck is she?

So to cut a long story short, I have had a 3 month break and am raring to go again. So be gentle with me won't you!

Ascension Island. - Bungalow 17. For Jane x

I have been very fortunate to visit Ascension Island three times. Not many people get to do that on HOLIDAY! My Dad was out there having fun on the Donuts expense account. A lovely girl called Jane Williams posted on the ASI Facebook page and was worried about serving a 3 year tour of ASI, accompanied by large centipedes and small children - aged 1 and 3 as I recall - the kids not the crawly things! I hope that I soothed her worries by asking if I could be her 'third child' I told her that the St Helenan's were wonderful, to check her bathroom carefully and to drink lots of shipwrecks! Perhaps not the greatest advice but honest I was sober there once, during my first visit....

I arrived on the great bird Tri Star, 16 weeks preggers with number one son. My Pa met me and I was shoved into a CSO nasty minibus, taken to English Bay (take note of this Jane) and introduced to a Moray Eel; a bit hot and stunned I was taken to The Exiles for lunch. Okay, Jane, that was the boring visit, where I spent a few weeks in hospital. I went into labour at 26 weeks and having no back up the Doc, Shubash sent me to sleep for about 4 days. My husband was somewhere in Norway for 4 months at the time and he could not speak to me because every time I woke up they fed me from The Galley, let me go for one 'wee' and sent me back to sleep. They realised that they had no 'back up' and decided that the only option was to send me to bed. My son James is now 23. Had I been in the UK at the time they would have left me alone and let me 'get on with it'. I was so lucky that I had a dedicated medical staff. By the way I got on the Tri Star at 16 weeks and got off it at 32 weeks. My hubby met me at Brize and nearly fainted at my size! Okay those were the 'Mummy Years. Time for the fun times! What follows is something published in THE ISLANDER on Friday 9th August 1996. Note to Jane...my parents were actually looking after my children at this time....

BACK TO ASCENSION - THE ISLANDER 1996

At last! Eight years on and I made it back to Ascension. Everyone on the plane thought I'd lost my marbles when, on final approach I jumped out of my seat and yelled 'Look its ASI...look, look its Ascension Island, we made it!' This is the person that needs four valium and a large vodka to even approach a plane! Ignoring strange looks and black mutterings from Falkland bound passengers, I scrambled over the poor soul who had endured my company for the last eight hours and was first off the plane.

I strode purposefully toward the Terminal, waving madly and making a complete spectacle of myself. I did however, resist the urge to kneel down and kiss the ground. 'Come on Chaps it's through here' I said , as I led all passengers into a 'no go' area. Running 'smack bang' into a very stern RAF chap, who said I should return quietly to the arrivals lounge or he would break out the emergency sraight jacket! Little did I know that the last time I had visited the island my dad had broken all the rules and met me at the gate..... I was soon surrounded by friends and family, dragged into Mrs Miggins for a cuppa, bundled into the 'I make you car sick machine' (read that as Lada Cossack) and driven at high speed..25 miles per hour to Two Boats.

I couldn't believe how green the Island had got since my last visit, but was soon to find out that the lovely green bits were in fact a secret military weapon the Mexicans had sent in place of Chili Con Carne. Ouch! That stuff hurts when you fall into it! I had forgotten about the friendly but dangerous habit of waving to everyone that you pass. I should point out that this is only dangerous when you drive a Lada Cossack! The scenery once again took my breath away and I kept pinching myself to make sure I was not dreaming! Lunch at The Exiles, a quick power nap and a wander round to explore. So many friendly and familiar faces (the Donkeys I mean). I was amazed to see how little had changed.

The next night I was introduced to The Senior Mess, where I found a lot of people whispering about Bar Chits. Bar chits are really rather wonderful, you put your name on a piece of paper and a nice man gives you a drink. Shipwreck is the alternative term I believe. Apparently my sister had visited the island before me and my dad's bar bills had broken all previously held records. I thought he was looking a bit ashen when he met me off the plane. So I showed him my wad of cash and also promised faithfully that I would put petrol in the car. John Fail shall be named as the man who poured my first shipwreck so you can all blame him!

The day of the Dew Pond Run arrived and feeling guilty I sat on the patio in my nightie, clutching my Lucozade and crunching on my Nurofen as I watched all these completely mad people running past. In fact I felt so guilty that I was compelled to do my own Dew Pond Run and asked Dad to drive me up the mountain. I am not silly enough to run UP it! I hummed the 'Sound of Music' as I broke both knees coming down the ramps, cursing myself for forgetting my camera. Oh No! I had got the walking bug, next stop four miles to North East Bay. This walking downhill isn't so bad, I said as he picked me up at the Ariane site. It also helps if you have an obliging Dad who drives you back uphill! Another walk to North East Bay and OUCH! Medic, two medics, I'm hurt bad - the left ankle, only used to depressing left clutch pedal, has gone on strike. As I sat in my usual pew at the Senior Mess that night, a strange man approched, lifted my left foot into his lap and started to undo my shoe. "Help, should I be letting this man do this", I cried. Perhaps this was another strange custom peculiar to Ascension Island. USO (Unsweetened Orange Juice) Merrick assured me that it was in fact the PTI holding Open Surgery at the Senior Mess.

Unable to walk far due to the ankle and not the shipwrecks, I hit the beach and on getting rather hot I decided to go for a swim. I had forgotten about the blackfish and decided to paddle instead. "Relation to the Piranha you know" said my father conversationally. It was to be a day of finding out about the 'Fauna' of Ascension. After having an unwelcome guest in the car (locust) I was lucky enough to find a centipede under my suitcase. My father came running into the bedroom as I stood on a chair and screamed loudly. He apparently thought I was being murdered. "Don't be such a baby mum" sighed Sian, rolling her eyes. A mention of the 'beasties' on Ascension is incomplete without a mention of our friend the 'Mosquito'. Have you noticed that the word Mosquito is synonymous with the word Grenade? People jump around, slapping their legs and generally causing havoc with the nerve agent gas also knoiwn as MOD fly spray Mark One! It is guaranteed to kill a human at three paces but the mosquito must sit there breathing deeply, saying "hey man, give me another hit, you hear what I'm saying"!

Onto the Flora of Ascension Island. Falling into bed after discovering the delights of shipwrecks, I bent down to undo my shoelaces and howled in pain as 500 'Double G's' embedded themselves in my left hand. 'Double G's' is the polite term for them but I can think of at least 10 impolite ones. In fact I think the boys in blue call them 'ouchy twats'! Being an adult (who said that?) I know the colours red and yellow in nature spell danger. My son and his friend obviously did not as they were having a great time bursting 'yellow flower bombs' on each other foreheads. This had the same effect of 15 packets of smarties, 4 fizzy drinks and a line of cocaine. "No darling, please don't do that" I said as James' eyeballs disappeared into the back of his head!

Enough of my ramblings. This Whitey from Blighty is sadly homeward bound very soon but will be returning tanned relaxed and very, very happy - note this another term for shipwrecked! Thank You to all the new friends and old, the hospitality has been wonderful. You never know, you may see me back again. I'll pose for the WANTED posters now! Last but not least thanks to my long suffering parents Jim and Pat Anderson and thanks for paying my bar bill dad!

So there you have it Jane. The 'polite' version of my bar room brawling on ASI where I also fell in love with The Gits dad and managed to climb The Exiles balcony, wearing 4 inch heels, ignoring the fact that I was 30 feet up and could expire at any moment! We had no air conditionng, no TV, no mobile phones and no Internet. The St Helenans are wonderful and my 23 and 26 year old children can still do the accent. My 26 yr old daughter, Sian keeps in touch with her childhood friends that landed in the UK.

Have a wonderful time.

Muse x

Cold turkey and Survival

My broadband crashed a few days ago and I am only online because of The Gits laptop Dongle, which I stole from his bedroom a few minutes ago. I had to steal it because I am suffering with a sickness. This is commonly known as going cold turkey from the internet. Sweaty palms, an unquenchable thirst for information and bad dreams all feature heavily. In fact I even found myself searching for an old Dongle of mine the other night with the desperation of a 40 a day smoker looking for that last fag in a pack down the sofa!

I digress. I have been doing a lot of reading recently, I always read a lot but having no internet has meant a book every couple of days. I was musing through the shelves in Asda and came across a book called 'Outpost' by 'Adam Baker'. It's about a skeleton crew on an oil rig called The Kasker Rampart in the Arctic Ocean. They are waiting to restart the fuel pipeline and boredom features heavily in their daily lives. A deadly virus hits the planet and they lose all communication with the outside world. They are marooned and have to somehow survive the long Arctic Winter as the deadly virus is heads their way. That is all your getting of the plot!

I could not put this book down. I was still reading at 4am when I fell asleep clutching it. 'Outpost' fired my imagination and the characters were so well written that you actually thought you were part of the crew. I felt as though I was on Kasker Rampart. I knew my way around the rig and could visualise every scene. I could smell and touch my fellow crew members. As an avid reader I often get pulled into a book but I haven't been so enthralled since Huxleys 'Brave New World' and Niven, Pournelle and Barnes' 'Legacy of Heorot'. Adam Baker is a force to be reckoned with and I know a brilliant future beckons him. I read a lot of Sci Fi and the usual horror books as a young woman but haven't in recent years, so why did this book suck me in and leave me wanting more?

I guess it is because I am a Donut Child. My father was Forces then GCHQ and he taught me an important lesson about the survival of the fittest. Throughout my childhood I was completely convinced that 'The Bomb' would drop at any moment and I spent the long evenings of The Winter of Discontent planning how we would live under the stairs with a torch, a mattress and some baked beans until help came. My father encouraged this by keeping our house warm, well lit and even powering a portable TV whilst eveyone else shivered in darkness. Personally I think he must have lifted a few batteries from the comcen where he worked but who am I to judge!

My childhood fears morphed into a full blown interest in survival guides, Ray Mears and an unhealthy interest in all things Triffid and the series Survivors. I am an adult (as I remind myself on a daily basis) but I still carry this monster obsession with me. I have a well stocked larder full of tinned and dried goods, buy bottled water and worry that I don't have my own generator, fresh water well or an emergency battery supply big enough to power a nuclear sub. On top of all this I start to fret the minute there is unrest in the world. When trouble started in Tunisia, I was unable to sleep and told my 23 year old son not to go on holiday to Morrocco as I was convinced the trouble would spread....

So here we are with trouble on our own doorstep and the unease I felt all those years ago is right back with me. I cannot help it but here I am, desperately trying not to place that ebay bid on a deserted ex cold war bunker and empty supermarket shelves of anything remotely long life! Deep breath here. I am a Donut Child, and think I can survive anything because of my background but the reality is that once the power goes off and the water trickles to nothing we are all dust. Shiver! I guess I have answered that age old question: "What would you do if you won the lottery?"

Sleep safe in your beds

Muse x

One of Lifes Little Lessons!

I decided to paint my lounge, the reasoning, being that if I started to decorate, I would finally manage to move house, aka Murphy's Law! I was determined not to involve the parents or anyone else and do this myself. Note, I have NEVER decorated anything in my entire life. I have always decreed this is a blokes job and it is their responsibility. This is what happened.....

STEP 1. Move furniture away from wall with one arm and marvel at the amount of crap underneath sofa, bookcase etc... Also realise where The Git has been hiding his 97,000 sweet wrappers, 11 pairs of undies, Pokemon Cards and 75,000 comics all this time!

STEP 2. Fall over for two days and rest as exhausted (not kidding).

STEP 3. Find dead Hamster, last seen in 2008. Respectfully give it a full Military Funeral but forget (on purpose) to inform the Git. Take curtains down. Eye various cobwebs with trepidation and resolve to buy a feather duster.

STEP 4. Fall over again and sleep for 36 hours. This M.E business is a twat when you are trying to accomplish something.

STEP 5. Go to Trago Mills to buy supplies. Ask nice but condescending man for advice and travel home with boot full of painting things you had no idea existed. Buy large feather duster and systematically wreck Spiders 6 year old homes...I am such a slut!

STEP 6. Start as you mean to go on. Cover eveything with dust sheets. Carefully use masking tape as wiggly lines are not allowed in this house. Lay out all tools needed and ensure not one drop of paint shall be spilled. Wash one large wall, have a glass of wine and...fall over!

STEP 7. After another little nap, use a paint brush to paint around walls and then its 'roller time'. After three hours of careful concentration one wall has one coat on it. Sit and look at it in disgust. Have a glass of wine and a Tramadol as arm is fecked and fall over.

STEP 8. Answer door (in a dishevelled state) to parents. Pa takes one look and tuts a lot, muttering about it needing another coat and on noticing the state of me tells me to go to bed.

STEP 9. Wake after a few hours sleep to find that Pa has not only finished painting my 22 foot lounge but has moved most of the furniture back.

STEP 10. Resolve NEVER to decorate again and leave it to the Blokes!

Lesson learned!

Muse x

Questions...

I DO try to take people at face value but it becomes harder and harder as I get more and more sucked into the social networking sites that have become our new Religion. Ten years ago it was the Great God Supermarket. I remember coming off a night shift and so desperately hungry that I parked up outside a Supermarket to feed myself with hot coffee and toast in order that I could drive the 75 miles home safely. It was 9.30 am on a Sunday morning and I groaned at the amount of bored people sat in their cars, queuing to get in. Our Church today is of course Facebook and the acidic Twitter. More of that later.

Going back to face value. There are two points I need to make about 'Face value'. The first is, can we take anyone who is online at face value? Am I so naive that I still try to do so? Yeah, yeah, yeah...I got my fingers burned ONCE and ONCE only on a dating site. I lent a guy £100 and he buggered off. But I feel quite smug as I dated 17 guys in a year (for this Blog) and never once got 50K in debt. I am talking about a programme I watched last week where older women ...shall we just say jaded, lonely, messy looking older women...(sorry but frankly my Great Aunts keep themselves in better shape!!!!) plundered their life savings in order to finance someone they had never met. Oh and can I just say here (cattily) that the 22 year old girl that ran off with my ex got stung for 15K. Phew! nice to get that out of my system!

Anyway, I digress. I NEED to realise that I am actually naive and should not get sucked in to everyones life stories on FB/Twitter. Erm..FB is not too bad as you can usually weed out the nutters but as for Twitter...Feck knows. It seems that everyone has an alter ego/is pissed off with the world/does not understand the rules of life or is some loved up religious freak. So perhaps it is time for me to create an alter ego, to be a Dr Jekyll or Mr Hyde and to have stupid fun on Twitter. Hmmm...I'll have to think about it but honestly I am such a crap liar that my new Twitter account will have a huge red siren over it every time I tell a lie! Enough about our new Gods!

The other thing I wanted to say, quite gently, in case you think I am a man hating Amazon, is that HOW can I possibly understand men when one of my life long male friends has grabbed his testicles and dived into 'lurve' with a lady that has somehow managed to scoop his brains out? Well done babe...lets see you deal with the consequences! Why is a Higher Power up there laughing his/her bits off when they see us doing all these dances around each other?

Blimey toots...my brain has had enough for today. Answers on a Postcard Please!

Namaste

Muse x

Curses.....

I was talking to my lovely girlfriend Prenders about swearing the other day. I was complaining that the Brits were quite frankly CRAP at it. We only manage one word per insult and most of them begin with B, F ,C or W. How boring. I love how other nations swear.

The Irish are masters. They don't bother with our pale and uninteresting curses. let me give you some examples...

You feckin' self polluter..
Arse Picker.
Truffle Snuffler
Bollix
He was a great Ride...
Ask me arse...

and so on. However the Gods of the curse must be the Arabic nations. Stuff like 'your mother was a camel and your father was a donkey' or 'you are the dirt on my shoes' or 'may a million locusts descend upon your field'. Oh! and those are the ones I made up. From Bulgaria comes the phrase 'your mother sucks bears in the forest' or the wonderful 'you are as ugly as a salad'. See! We are all pants at swearing in the UK. Now for some of my own.

Flower Sniffer
Wine Spitter
Button Burster
Lamp Switcher
Computer Cacker
Heel Breaker...

The list is endless. Bit of a shame that I revert to the old Brit type behind the wheel. Even the 13 year old has stopped laughing at the C word.

Must try harder...

Muse x

Nightmare on Spaghetti Street...

Ma and Pa are moving, long boring story, they are moving to a bigger property and so I had to indulge and entertain the little darlings today, whilst they actually packed boxes - must just say this, I have packed for them since I was 6 years old so it is about time they learned to do it for themselves. I have had nightmares about inventories since the age of 10. Control freak me...NAH!

Angelina, my grandaughter, The Git and I set off for a place called 'Raze The Roof' in Falmouth. I knew, of course, that this was always going to end up in the 'Minor Injuries Unit' but being a little tired at the moment, the left brain did not connect with the right and I went along with my mothers suggestion. First stop was Macdonalds and I tried not to think about what I was feeding them whilst I scrubbed the table carefully with my hand sanitiser. I bit into my cheeseburger and attempted to enjoy it....I bit into it again and decided that it may have seemed a good idea at the time but quite honestly, biting into it was like biting a bad 'smell' and I really could not carry on! I then freaked the kids out by scrubbing their hands and refusing to let them take said 'toys, odd chips, half bitten chicken nuggets' into my car.

Raze The Roof was my worst nightmare come true. It was based in an industrial unit full of soft play areas, ball pits and large slides that scared the Feck out of me but did not seem to faze Angelina - mind you, I am still scared of Dr Who and she loves it so WTF!

I decided that I could do this two ways. I could follow the kids around, desperate for a vodka and get very upset or I could take a couple of valium, buy the Mail and do the crossword and let 'em get on with it. I chose the latter. In my defence, The Git followed Angel around and really looked after her. Bless his heart.

I have to describe this place to you before I carry on. The height of the ceiling meant that every scream/yell/shriek was multiplied by 10. Each time a child opened its mouth all the parents would glance/run/skitter to the source of the terrible ear splitting yell... Utter torture. I was so determined not to do this but as we were admitted I nervously pulled The Git to one side.

'Erm, erm, erm the thing is Josh, I don't know what Angelina sounds like if she's, erm...you know, erm..in pain'. He was pretty quick off the mark. 'Don't worry about that mum, I know 'eggsactly what she sounds like'. Hmm... Its fine I said to myself, I'll just try and ignore it....NOT! The first hour passed by. I did not manage to solve one clue and despite wishing that valium or vodka was available I knew that I was in CHARGE and I must be a good mother/nanny. (Which I am not by the way as I am bloody scared of small children...).

S'fine. s'fine...I kept telling myself as I watched one horrid little 2 and a half foot thing, try and tear his sisters hair out and observing whilst the parents waded in and broke up the scrap. Shudder. I was half expecting an injury of some sort as I glanced around the 'restaurant facilities' where I was perched nervously on a 'primary school chair'. The 'restaurant' in question was a large depressing grey area full of uncleared dishes, nasty fingerprints and a mash of beans and spaghetti hoops that you had to wade through in order to reach your seat.

Just as I thought about dragging said children out of the place and bribing them with a visit to the nearest Toy Shop...my poor little Angelina calmly tapped me on the shoulder. Some nasty two foot tall person had thrown a ball at her face so hard she was sporting a large shiner... 'Oh Feck', I thought 'I'm in trouble now'. A nice but indifferent girl came over with an ice pack and asked me to fill in an accident form. She was so indifferent, her pen did not work, she nicked mine and forgot to ask me to sign the accident form. Just as well I'm not in the mood to sue isn't it! Indifferent girl gave me a voucher so that I may return and 'enjoy my next experience'....

We made our exit and I was mightily relieved to be out of the place. Angel was so bloody brave, none of this yelling and screaming thing for her, just a bit of a miserable face. I took her home with my tail between my legs, clutching some childrens painkillers in case she needed them later. See...I keep telling people, I should never ever be left in charge of small children!

I was telling my friend Sharon all about it on the phone tonight. We agreed on a few things.

1. Never ever visit those places unless your mother insists. It is far safer to wrap up your kids and let them abseil off the Welsh mountains in a Force 9!

2. We were both desperate for a 'shiner' at the age of 9 and Angelina is very cool for getting one at the age of 5! (We are very jealous).

3. We were also rather desparate to 'break something' and get lots of attention and a cool plaster. Alas both of us broke something when we were old and grumpy and had to do without the plaster and deal with the pain!

Be careful what you wish for...

Namaste

Muse x

Think About this Please....

A lovely, caring friend of mine has recently been diagnosed with M.E. Also known as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. She talked to me about how this had affected her. At first she was unsure and hesitant, cancelling two appointments with a Consultant because she was scared and fighting for her life and desperately clinging to her sanity. She did not believe that M.E. existed. Eventually she gave in and attended the appointment with said Consultant.

He was a very clever man and managed to pull her down from her 'expectations' of life, cleaned her glasses, held her hand and told her she was a bright, beautiful person and needed to understand her condition. He read her Blog and encouraged her.

The first few weeks after their meeting were really good. She managed her time and recognized how to deal with her condition. Still, she hated the diagnosis and fought against it. The Big Fight versus Life was on! She refused any counselling and decided that she would ignore all advice, push on and look after others.

She went on a holiday and despite her determination, collapsed. A friend said he understood but she soon realised that no one could understand. A girlfriend did and looked after her. She was so grateful for that.

She soon realised that the term M.E. was a stigma, despite being a proven illness. How could she live with this terrible Stigma? How could anyone understand? Her parents tried but really had no idea and many more said they did but were totally ignorant.

I understand and I hope that you can too. No matter what advice you give her, she will strive for perfection. It's just the way she is made.

Namaste

Muse x

Stepping from Narnia to Hell!

I have been away for the last week in Warwickshire having a large lot of fun on Folk on The Water. I am just digesting all that went on and am feeling pretty exhausted but will start to write my FOTW Blog next week. For now, you guys are going to have to put up with a rant. For those of a nervous disposition, please look away now.

The Git and I had a great journey up to Leamington Spa and thought that going back would be a breeze. After all we were taken to the station by Barge. I kid you not. We moored at the bank and Dutch took us up about 10 steps and there was the station. How cool is that. It was like walking from Narnia to Hell! Actually I cannot take credit for that comment it was one of Dutch's!

We got on a small train to Reading. We were on there for an hour and unfortunatley had to sit by a big growlie guy who had three kids with him. The kids were pretty well behaved but I think he had tourettes. An hour of screaming, swearing and random bouts of bad singing followed. There were also two very fretful newborns jostling for attention above the din. Ah well thought I, we shall soon be aboard a nice swish train with food and coffee and films for The Git. It can only get better. Oops....

The aforementioned 'big swish train' looked like the Calcutta Express it had people hanging out of the windows, Tiffin Wallahs and all! The Git and I could only board in carriage D but our seats were in carriage A. Every single seat was taken. We had no option but to find our seats. We had two over stuffed bags and The Git did a magnificent job of politely hauling them through the carriages. Chivalry is indeed dead, as not one guy offered to help. Failing that, I looked so hideous after a week on the water, I was given a wide berth!

Carriage A was in sight, thank god, I could relax. Tap on right shoulder from 60 ish woman, carrying a coffee and fed up we were holding her up. 'You could sit on that seat there' she said. I was too tired to explain as by this stage we had mountaineered over several suitcases the size of a semi detatched house (I am not bloody joking) and had said excuse me (sub text - move your fucking foot you ignorant bloke) so many times we had lost the will to live. I nearly broke out the crampons at one point. Even The Git was trundling over peoples feet by this stage. Be polite, I said to myself...and just told her that I needed to find our reserved seats when left brain was telling me to punch her, HARD! Exhale...

Got to carriage A. Asked a nice guy to move out of our seats, which he did, ta chap. Obviously by then there was not a cat in hells chance of getting said bags into luggage rack. Managed to stow The Git with bags in my seat. He was such a fanatastic help and support to me, I couldn't have done it without him, thanks Joshy x. Then wandered off to find coffee and food. The buffet car was hilarious, long queue and lots of drunk and disorderly 'I can't find my seat but who gives a Feck' people. Found food and coffee, lurched back to seat, fed the git and spied an empty double seat. As I sank into it a pretty blonde girl sidled in beside me. I moved to get out and she said don't worry, just stay there. I was soooo.... bloody grateful for that little bit of TLC, thank you Sophie! As we settled down my phone rang, I said one word... 'Hello' and the lady that had tapped me on the shoulder previously stood up from her seat in front of me (groan) and hissed loudly 'this is the QUIET carriage'. My lovely Dad was on the other end, telling me that he would pick me up up. I mumbled thanks and he said ' tell that woman to shut up by the way'. Hilarious!!!

I was so stressed and damaged by this point that I really was ready to stick a pair of underpants on my head and put two pencils up my nose (note, I am not mad just a fan of Blackadder). The lovely Sophie listened to my ramblings and managed to calm me down. Thank you Sophie, I really hope I wasn't 'the nutter' on the train for you. Its a big wide world out there and despite being well travelled I quite like my little life as a Cornish Muse in our sleepy, beautiful bubble.

Musing about public transport. After that journey I have decided it should be known as Pubic transport from now on ie: not everyone wants to feel it, deal with it or look at it!

Be Careful out there

Muse x