1. It’s cold and the rain is flying horizontally. What are you going to wear as you walk round the city walls?
a) A T-shirt. I’m on holiday.
b) A nasty waterproof I bought in the Railway Museum shop this morning.
c) I’m going to dress up like Scott of the Antarctic with a camcorder.
2. You are in the city with the highest concentration of cultural attractions outside of a European capital. What are you going to do?
a) Visit the Disney Shop and check out the sale at Debenhams.
b) Look at the Medieval buildings and then overindulge myself in a tea shop or a pub. Or both.
c) I’ve already checked the guidebooks and planned my visit down to the minute.
3. What are you going to spend your money on?
a) The same thing I always spend my money on. Clothes.
b) Ooh. Things.
c) Museum admission and anything unusual.
4. How did you get here?
a) I drove and paid £1.80 an hour for parking.
b) I left the car in a free park & ride and paid £1 for an overcrowded bus that is now 90 minutes late…
c) There’s free parking at the B&B/hotel/my friend’s house.
5. What do you think of the city’s traffic problem?
a) I didn’t notice when I drove here. When I’d worked out what I was doing the road in front of me was clear.
b) The council should flatten some buildings and put a motorway through the city centre.
c) It must be a nightmare to live with, but I’m only a tourist.
6. What are you doing tonight?
a) Going to the theatre/opera house/concert.
b) Doing the Ghost Walk.
c) Getting wasted on Mickelgate.
It was bad enough last time.
This time, though, things are far worse. Three attempts to get to work failed. First time I puked all over someone (and that just isn’t tolerated in good schools.) Second time I was rescued just as I was about to lose consciousness. Third time I haven’t a clue what happened, but the ambulance crossed York faster than I thought was possible during rush hour.
Since this happened I have found it very difficult to leave the house and impossible even to think about certain things. My body, my willpower and my mind have all ganged up on me and delivered an ultimatum. They aren’t playing by my rules any more, and I have to get used to being a back seat passenger for a while.
Darling Wifey is being my guardian angel, and has provided me with lots of safe things to keep me in my ‘comfort zone.’ This week I have to paint the kitchen. Trust me - it is infinitely better than watching daytime television…
The gauntlet has been thrown (but not before Darling Wifey used it to slap me across the chops a couple of times.) Our desperate need to shift a load of junk from the house has turned into a contest - and this time it’s personal.
The rules:
1. Each player has a £50 ‘float’ to buy junk to sell on Ebay
2. No new items can be bought before Sunday 24th July (players are advised to keep receipts in case of suspicion of dodgy dealing…)
3. Any personal items or junk that can be legitimately blagged from friends and family are fair game and do not count in the £50 ‘float’
4. No item can be listed before Sunday 31st July 2005
5. All items must be sold by midnight on Wednesday 31st August 2005
6. Unsold items are valueless, although there is no limit to the number of times they can be listed
7. Profits from sales may be re-invested
8. Sales to friends and family will disqualify the player
There will be a suitably embarrassing forfeit for the loser, and a nice prize for the winner. And Darling Wifey thinks it will be more interesting if we throw the game open to all comers.
Anyone up for a challenge?
This afternoon, Little Nutter was playing with his favourite toy (with which, incidentally, he recently humiliated the maths graduate boyfriend of one of Darling Wifey’s staff - who’d have thought that a mentally disabled 4-year-old would wipe the floor with a 1st-Class Honours Graduate from Cambridge in a maths game…?) when he decided that he wanted to do something else.
He collected his coat and his school rucksack from the front porch, and put them on. He found his shoes and put them on. He looked thoughtfully at his communication book and decided on a more direct method.
He walked up to me and actually said, “I want play outside.”
Champagne all round.
Not that kind of stoned. I’m not that lucky.
I do, however, have to pay for a new stone floor in the kitchen and a new stone fireplace in the front room.
Then I have to get rid of the stone which may (or may not) be residing in my kidney.
Which would explain the pain.
There aren’t many occasions when Little Nutter can draw a connection between what he does and what happens afterwards. But tonight it happened.
After being a very helpful commis chef (counting the slices of carrot and pieces of brocolli into the steamer, and counting down the timer for the minute steaks) he then decided that he didn’t want to eat his dinner from a purple plate. He wanted a blue one.
So the whole lot was thrown onto the floor. And Holly pounced. And yes, spaniels do eat fresh steamed vegetables - but only if they’re scavenged and they have to be eaten quickly before they’re rescued by their rightful owner.
Little Nutter was horrified. “No! Oh No! Oh No! Dinner! Oh No!”
He was only fast enough to rescue an empty plate - with which he did the full, tearful impersonation of Oliver Twist. (Except instead of speaking his line, he used his PECS book…)
In my first year at university I was given an assignment that involved looking at various statistics relating to geographical areas of Britain. One of the snippets of information I discovered was that the city I went to school in had the highest rate of incestuous pregnancies in Europe.
On the radio this week was a new statistic relating to the city I now live in: the largest producer of pornographic home videos in Britain.
Now we know what all those net curtains are about.
