Showing posts with label age. Show all posts
Showing posts with label age. Show all posts

Wednesday 25 February 2009

Beholder's Eye

In snooping round Facebook photos worry I am alone on the ageing front. Or does everyone else post old pictures? Or use software? I see my young fave nieces on there. Being young they get away murder. Jealous? Ha!


When we were young He-who-must-be-adored and I agreed. I would give birth to dustbin lids more beautiful than ourselves. Even in our young and beautiful days. Those days before the growth of extra chins and bellies. Before gravity took its toll. Before the ability to shake off pillow creases from our faces was lost. In return, He agreed to do the duty of bin night. And re-fueling the car. Today, with the poor excuse of a ridiculously long shift saving London, He broke the rules. I am owed.


Yesterday the little-un thought she was owed. But even I, with my low resistance to her pestering, draw the line at ice-cream on breakfast pancakes. I was kind about it and offered to dial child-line for her.


Is this cruel? During the dog’s usual post-supper sniffing round the kitchen she became still. And focussed. She stalked the fridge. I thought of mices. Then her tail wagged. She tried and tried before realising her tongue wasn't quite long enough to retrieve that which was under the fridge. I laughed as she tried different positions. And there’s only so much paw digging to be done on a hard floor. She switched between digging and stretching her tongue. And back again (whoah there Mrs is this an adults only blog now?) He-who-must-be-adored retrieved the discarded nectar and gave it to her. Killjoy.


To my book group last night. Was it my poor choice of book that led to such little bookish discussion? Or is the book just another excuse to sit about with other wimin smoothly sipping the bubbly stuff? A problem? Moi?

Tuesday 10 February 2009

Art of noise

Growing up with six brothers I’ve pretty much seen and heard every fart trick there is. So Gorgeous boy cannot surprise me with the shooting gun thang nor pull my finger, nor creak floorboards and get a rise out of me. Yet, somehow, he manages to take me to a new blow-off low. He tenderly leans in to kiss me goodbye. ‘Ah, my boy is still gorgeous’ I think. My heart is sunk: he managed to perfectly time his puckered lips with a trumping bottom. With disappointment I find myself stooping to his level: the only way to stop his fart-fest giggles is by name calling: ‘smelly fart boy’ is neither original nor clever, but it does the trick.

Did bottom burps used to be funnier? Or is it my age and part of the wider problem of oversensitivity in the ear department? As if the boy’s bottom doesn’t make enough noise the kitchen boiler has started to do impressions of the Tardis with a weird whirling wah wah noise. I find switching the thermostat right down puts a stop to all that. If only the boy was that easy to control! Temp zero is fine when I’m cooking and on the move but when you sit to eat supper and your fingers and toes threaten to fall off through cold it is somewhat less than fine. Add to that the fact that we have to remember to shut firmly the Nativity Room door before we sit to eat. Not to keep in the floods, but to keep out the superfastspinthing noise of the new washing machine. With the new space age kit the entire Nativity Room sounds as if it is preparing for take-off. Twice daily. Have made note to self to try to remember to turn down the spin dial before pressing go on the 53 different controls.

So, wouldn’t it be nice to think that when the day is done and you can finally slink off to bed, in the privacy of your own sleep space you might be spared the discomfort of any more noise pollution? For complicated reasons nothing ever gets finished properly in this house, thus our en-suite bathroom doesn’t actually have a door. Consequently at about 5am every morning I hear the upstairs boiler kick in as He-who-must-be-adored starts to run the shower.
This morning I was spared that torture as He-who-must-be-adored was having a lie-in. Instead of the usual morning water torture treatment I had my ears assaulted by his phone. Nothing as obtrusive as it ringing. Of course he wouldn’t dare be that insensitive. Just the usual 5am alarm. Plus snooze. Two or three times. Then texting to and fro between He and He’s team. I really had no idea just how loud each letter of a text being inputted sounds when close to your head in the comfort of your bed in the wee small hours. It was a relief when my alarm finally went.

On re-reading this am worried I sound like a grumpy old woman! Because in truth I’m neither grumpy nor old (not much anyways). At least I can draw comfort from the fact that I’m nowhere near as bad as Supersis on her worst days!