so far so so-so

"But I don't want to go among mad people," said Alice. "Oh, you can't help that," said the cat. "We're all mad here."

You meant well ...

Everyone's got it/ you ...

Along with their more pressing roman-candlesque economic and political problems ...

If only we had been a size 10 within spitting distance of a Primark, we might not have had to wander around looking like such sacks-of-shite when we were nobbut needy lasses ...

Where where you ...

But there you go ...

PS : I love you

Something beginning with M ...

I try to stay in touch with friends, even if it is only every 12 years or so ...

So yesterday I drove white-knuckled to Sale with Sinister and her mate listening to Fearne at mega-volume in the back (Boo-Yah !) ... to meet a mate who I haven't seen for 11 years. I don't know why, because it's only up the road and I used to do the trip easily (see a jazz band at The Malt Shovel in Altringham and drive home, pissed, every weekend no problem)...

So we went on the Manchester Eye, which is a bit like the London Eye except the carriages are smaller and they sway around a lot, and you get a view of Manchester instead of London ...

Then the grown-ups peeled off and had lunch at The Urbis, and a quick tour of the current hip-hop exhibition therein, before having a look around the medieval centre (some of it relocated because of the dreadful IRA bombing) and diving into the Cathedral ...

Tell you what though ...

I think Liverpool is the more graceful city (and considerably less mucky, which is saying something !).

And as always with very good friends, the years between just melted away.

Sometimes when you stop picking at it, it gets a bit better...

Firstborn has been provided with two pieces of kit (and considering they sent the list to the Blind Society, I'm frankly surprised they didn't turn up with a white stick)...

One is a door-beacon... you knock on the door and a light flashes. And flashes and flashes and flashes. In fact it strobes like the opening sequence in Joe-90 every time someone does a jobby let alone flushes the loo two doors away, so is probably best left to a research team studying epilepsy...

The vibrating alarm clock is guaranteed to trip off that lump of rock in Gran Canaria and start a tsunami. We just 'pop' it under his mattress and watch it sail out of the window on day-one. Well, rather it than me, and I think this might well work if we gaffer-tape it to Firstborn's head ...

And the fire-service rang again. I don't know why they changed their minds because they seemed so adamant that nothing would come of our applications for life-saving kit for Firstborn and we have a bad history of time-wasting assessments, but they assure me that this time they will wire us up so that when the smoke-alarm goes off (which is quite a lot in our house) they will scramble forthwith. Imagine ! Firemen at the door every time you burn a slice of toast... I'm living the dream.

And a prospective PA/buddy is coming round on Saturday for an interview.

If luck is after all like buses, then three don't just come at once ...

We've hit the depot !

Apparently you can preserve pumpkins for a few extra days by soaking them for 8 hours in a bleach solution before you carve them (obviously not before you eat them )...

I'd love to see some pumpkin or turnip-heads on BCUK over the next week, both before and after Halloween (well, not months after obviously)...

I tried to prepare a turnip once by microwaving it, thinking that only the insides would soften ...

One electrical fire, totally knackered microwave and burning turnip later I realised that it was mostly other people who had the heads-up on the whole living&learning thing

And once we could only find a one solitary deformed melon, so had to make do with 'the scary deformed melon-man' ...

The point is to scare the scariest things you can think of away without recourse to a Kalashnikov ...

Anyway, talk and turnips are cheap(ish) so get on with it ...

Chop-chop !

Dear oh dear oh dear ...

Beloved got his totally drilled company computer back from the vets a couple of days ago and chose to try and use it tonight while I was busy in another room watching telly (Monday's a busy night)...

So after coming in several times wide-eyed and panto-waving it's not working and getting shhhushed and short-shrifted, he calls in the cavalry, who arrive post-haste and point out that plugging it in helps ...

Juzz is a star like that ...

After Crank (good film, really enjoyed it) I find them huddled around said inert computer all dewy-eyed and shouty ...

And where's the brandy gone ?

'Dunno' they chorus (as if they could hope to fool a woman who has lost her teapot and Christmas cake that very same morning to the same dark forces)...

All I can say is ...

Have a good day at work guys !

*Mwahahahahaaa!'

My knee-jerk response to the initiative of giving primary school children careers advice was negative, but it's an idea I'm fast warming to ...

On the downside there is the danger of children being vocationally sidelined at an early age and that teaching could become close-ended, because there's nothing the education system likes better than a neat ending with a full-stop at the end of it ...

But there is a glorious possibility that children's natural strengths and enthusiasms could be stirred up in a frenzy of aspiration to live a happy and productive life doing something they enjoy and are good at.

This is after all the point and purpose of education, to nurture the whole child and help them to become fully-functioning autonomous human-beings.

It would be a balancing act, but we're already teaching Wordsworth, quadratic equations and the Napoleonic wars to kids who have fixed ideas about their futures as astronauts or burger-flippers.

The playground in school as in life, exists for the precious time in between the slog of trying to make that life turn out for the best...

We should tread carefully and hope for full employment, 'lest we step on their dreams.

I put up a post a few days back describing an incident with Firstborn, but deleted it without replying to any of your kind comments, for which I'd like to thank you now ...

I made a decision to use open Deafstar titled posts to chart our feelings and progress through the whole sorry caboodle since he lost his hearing, but his headspace and meltdowns of that magnitude should remain his own business no matter how deeply they affect us, and I felt that I'd overexposed him and overstepped a mark ...

So, thank you for listening anyway ...

It curdles on the tongue and sticks to the roof of your mouth if you're lucky ...

It tastes of fermented nappies ...

It's the anarchist and anti-christ of the food world ....

Cheeeeeeze !

The more you wince, the better it is !

See that stinky Stilton ?

That's me that is ...

The Beeb did the right thing in inviting Nick Griffin to join the Question Time panel last night ...

Sadly, the program was then devoted to the only topic the one-trick-pony was qualified to discourse on and defend (no matter how odiously) - the BN-bloody-P..

If the questions had been broader and the discussions deeper, then Griffin would have been exposed as the political charlatan he is.

The arena was patently a middle-class bear-trap and the weapons of choice were wagging fingers, pained expressions and a general sense of grievance that wrong-minded voters had set this particular bear among the cooing pigeons ...

All Griffin had to do was sit there while the program effectively did the job of alienating economically insecure jingoists from the main party-lines for him.

Just sit there for half an hour and say nothing

You know that you've made everyone else thoroughly miserable don't you...?

Well done !

*shhh*

Only two more tests to go ...

MS has been pretty much ruled out, so it's one test on his eyes to confirm the possibility of CMV (scarring on the retinas)and a bloodtest to rule out underlying metabolic disorders ...

As the Doctor said as I sat boohooing - we do need to draw a line under this.

The problem with the eye-test is that this virus attacks neurons in the ear and eyes, and all we can hope for is that is that it's already done it's worst ...

As Firstborn said when we left the hospital 'I want a word with god when I die'...

And I thought ... 'God.. hopefully He and I'll be well dead by then son, if I can't sort it here I'll bloody well sort it there'

And I thought about him losing his sight too ...

But what I said was 'move on'

*shhhh, don't tell anyone*

I know where the 'delete' key is and how to block, edit or report someone who gets on my tits ...

OMG! Whaddya mean ...

It's not a secret ?

Fortunately, mine happily fall into both categories as ace ...

The last was 'The Orphanage'

The best was the original 'Haunting of Hill House' ...

Those breathing walls and the ghost hand will haunt me ...

Forever ...

'And we who walk here walk alone'

*hides under the bed and squeaks like a mouse*

Men In Black Round Ours ...

Sinister and her mate had some *cough* information ...

Not convinced they were going to get due remunerative thanks from Crimestoppers, they wended their way merrily to the local police-station and sang like sparrers ...

Hence them just being brought home by two men in very sharp suits, and not long leather coats as one might have supposed (and hoped) ...

Beloved perched himself sartorially on the arm of the sofa in order to speak mano e mano to these uber law enforcers (yes,for it was they ) and then rather unsartorically fell off ...

I'm living the dreeeeem ...

(If the dream is a cop soap-opera reconstructed by a confuddled Follyoaks/Shameless script-writer) ...

I have been overcome with an inexplicable desire to trade Beloved in for a cheeful elderly gent, fully accesorized with matching beige bowls hat and moustache ...

Va-va-Vroooom !

Jeez ...

I gave up my God (well, not strictly mine), my firstborn child, my mother (pending) and my bunions ...

What do they want... exceedingly good jam on it ?

I also make very, very good chutney...

*scratchnsniff*

Good innit ?

Well, mum has been diagnosed with cancer of a slow order in the lung...
She has opted for no treatment and not to tell anyone other than immediate family (and I have chosen to tell it to the blog - how unethical is that ?)...

Highly (but hey-ho) ...

It wasn't a surprise, and I think she's taking a sensible approach, because if Abbeyfield knew they would get in a flap and try to move her into nursing care way before she needs to go, and she is happy where she is...

The district nurses and myself will keep an eye on her in case she needs or wants further intervention, and the consultant will review her every 2 months...

She's 88 and ready to go ...

But will she ?

Hell...

Nooooooo !

As a young philosophy student at Liverpool, Carol Ann Duffy used to blow the cobwebs away by riding the ferries with Adrian Henri , visiting Port Sunlight, the Williamson art gallery and Sydney Buildings in Birkenhead where Henri had spent his early years.

On Monday Carol Ann Duffy returned to Wirral as poet laureate to meet year 11 pupils from several schools at Weatherhead High School Media Arts College, who hosted the event as part of ‘Bookfest’. As the first woman to hold the most prominent literary title she says ‘It’s fabulous, and there are so many great woman poets that it’s about time’

She peppered readings from her anthology ‘The World’s Wife’ and other poems with gentle anecdotes, taking questions on her influences and technique from the enthralled young audience , before being interviewed by Weatherhead pupils on their own ‘Ice Radio.

Her references are scholarly and classical. She taps a rich vein of stories to subvert and retell, using the voices of people pushed to the margins of events and sometimes sanity. Her point is that poems add to the world and have a ‘living relationship’ with the reader, they do not have an agenda.

Her advice for aspiring young poets is ‘Read as much as you can, and read backwards through time, starting with the contemporary.’. She herself was an avid reader and writer from an early age, filling notebooks with homages to her favourite poets : Yeats, Tennyson and Shakespeare, (who she says she would have ‘followed home’). Sadly, her mum threw away those notebooks (as mums do) . As Duffy says ‘she’ll be kicking herself now !’

Fortunately the poet laureate is no longer obliged to write for state occasions . She could no more write on demand than fly to her beloved and often featured moon, which NASA experimentally bombed for water last week . ‘Imagine if you’d looked up and they’d broken it. I’d have refused to pay taxes !’.

However, as the Nation’s primary poet in interesting times, she will undoubtedly respond to events in her deeply personal and intuitive style.

The annual honorarium she receives from HM The Queen is being used to fund a new Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry..

And the butt of sack ? These days the 600 bottles of sherry are gifted from Spainish sherry makers, not the British monarchy … perhaps predictably, Carol Ann Duffy prefers hers dry ...

I met Carol Ann Duffy ...

The poet laureate with extra laurels !

It transpired to be 4 hours I could ill afford, but it was worth it ...

I was waiting in the foyer of the school. The Head rushed in a couple of times to ask if his distinguished guest had arrived, and when she did he rushed in again and there was much handshaking and offers of coffee. The Head kindly invited me to remain in the foyer to wait for Dave the photographer, and it was Carol Ann who asked... why couldn't I have a cup of coffee too ?...

I jibbered about it being an honour and how I'd blogged about her getting the laureatship and how I was going to follow her around all afternoon like a puppy (which I think put her totally at ease )...
So off we trundled to the office ...

The Head was saying something about the division of language and literature in the classroom and league tables, whilst we bemoaned the loss of geography and history as core subjects and what the world would be like now if our grans and mums hadn't left school at 14, as our coffees went cold ...

At the reading I wrote reams. I don't know shorthand ... I was describing myself as a 'resting' teacher not a journalist just to get everyone with a problem or a panto out of my face ...

Carol Ann invited me to have a glass of wine and a chat before the evening bash. Unfortunately when I got home I found my kids had spent the afternoon chucking dinner-plates, talcum-powder and gallons of water at each other in a bit of a domestic WW3, so I spent the night harumphing and pointing at random corners shouting ...

'And you can clean that up too, you little shits!'

(I wrote a short article about the good bits)

An impassioned commander with more respect for individuals than for authority, you have a no-holds-barred approach to life and its obstacles.

You don't believe in the no-win scenario.

Beam me up Scotty, there's no intelligent life down here !

I get talk...

Carol-Anne Duffy...

Monday ....

Me find werds ...

*Lost in admiration*

Having just got over the BBC's interpretation of God is dead so smile for the cameras (I'm the harassed one who doesn't know the words or harmonies bowing down before the organ singing 'Rhubarb rhubarb allelujah')

Story of my life !

The first call was from the mother to Sinister to get to the hospital as fast as she could ...

Sinister is in hozzie now with her bezzie overdosed mate. while`I hug her bezzie mate's mum and read her surplus kids stories while she fucks off to have a fag ...

Who I hate because she was married to one of the twats who robbed us blind ...

And then a call ... can I pack an overnight bag for both of them ?

Yes I can ...

Clean knickers, PJ', antiperspirant,

socks and a lorryload of makeup for two to go ...

And my mum and my son have just got a stay of execution by us (not a proud moment) throwing ourselves under the speeding trains hurtling towards them shouting 'nooooooooooooo'

Tired now...

*phew*

I baked our Christmas cake on Sunday (is that allowed ?) ...

And I'm lerning da werds for Songs of Praise ...

Now, out of of all the hymns in all the world, one line is god-bothering me ...

'Uncreated light shines through infant eyes' (Graham Kendrick)...

uncreated ...

The idea of a baby-god was genius ...

Unassailable ...

Jeez ...

I don't have issues with whether God is with us or NOT ...

Singing will just have to do ...

Allelluia ...

Who said we all get 15 minutes of fame ? ...

I forget ...

Squirt lemon-juice in the slag's eyes ...

My hell is bent, my awe is over and my loins are girded (and not with tenna lady pads)...

Wait a minute, I have to get in the right frame of mind for this ...

*bares teeth and knuckles* (Do I look convincing ? Do I get the part ?)

And what's my motivation again ? ...

Oh yes ...

Loved ones being screwed over blah, blah ... gottit

*Accepts prop-lance and charges with abandon at mum's caring serviceswindmills shouting 'Have at thee wankers, do your job'! *

And I'd better stay in part for Thursday's appearance in Firstborn's High School Musical Chairs

Mum is going to get chucked out of her new Abbeyfield home because she's a badass at 87 ...

It's that awkward age, innit ?

Just a phase ... which I've got over the weekend to sort, as well as taking her for another lung scan on Monday evening because she's really fucking ill ...

If you have an inkling of farming practice then you will know that in order to get yummy dairy products like milk, butter, cream and cheese from cows you have to kill their calves ...

I eat dairy and I'm not proud of it ...

Having stayed on a farm on the day the calves were separated from their mothers and heard their mutual distressed crying for 48 paid-for B&B hours...

The cows wept, the calves wept... their brutish grief seeped through the walls of the converted barn while we hid under the duvet.

It was an agonizing white-knuckle-on-the-edge-of-mattress experience (and not in a good way )...

I have to get a grip on proper vegetarianism again ...

I don't give a flying toss whether you eat meat or milk or not ...

I feel like seven shades of donkey-shit because I do ...

Funerals are life-affirming.

I was nearly late for Jon's due to the steady stream of hundreds of miles of moshers from miles around crossing to the cemetary with scant regard for the little green man ...

I didn't wind the car-window down and shout... 'OI! Do you want to get runover or what ?' out of respec'...

Priests always do their best at funerals, but they still sound like primary-school teachers caught in the headlights of a spotcheck OFSTED inspection ...

There were lots of ex-pupils, most of them a good two feet taller and more colourfuly black than I remember. I was going to give them their own space (thinking they would rather eat their own toes than let-on to their SNeedy school days) but there were hugs and kisses galore...

The hearse was a horse-drawn carriage, the coffin was black ...

There wasn't room in the church, so a couple of hundred of us listened to the service outside. The Salvation Army tribute and 'Highway to Hell' went down well before we buggered off to The Cal, where we bought the lads a drink and re-toasted Jon and retired to the very covered smoking area

I found Jon's mum, paid my respects and left ...

As a cousin of mine said at my dad's funeral many years ago...

We really should do this more often !!

This evening I've mostly been listening to Mahler and Grieg ...