Holidays

Everyone loves holidays, don't they?  What's not to love?  It's rest,relaxation, a change and a rest.

You get some sun, do some walking, eat loads of food, drink until the world blurs.  You get home and post your photos on Facebook and even though you know that 208 photos of you on your balcony or the view from your sunbed isn't exactly thrilling, you wait for everyone to comment on how it all 'looks lovely.'

Great.  We love holidays.

If only.......

They didn't come with

1. So much washing and ironing you feel as though you've started your own laundry service.

2. Packing.

3. Cleaning out the fridge

4. Finding interesting food to make with courgettes, coleslaw and cheese for days before you go.

5. Flying - stupid baggage allowance, queues for everything, those stupid metal trollies that are slightly too wide for the aisles.  

6. Finding someone to look after the animals

7.  Arguing about what time you need to leave to catch your flight.

Clear the Clutter.

There is nothing more therapeutic than doing a great big tip run.  Getting rid of all the stuff you don't need any more, making room for new things.

The TV shows where people have so much stuff they can't get into bed fascinate me.  A lot of my hoarding comes from laziness.  I genuinely can't be bothered to throw stuff away.  The Long Suffering Husband keeps bits of wood and rusty screws because, "you never know when they might come in useful."  He would only reluctantly throw away something that was broken because, "I could fix that!"  He also keeps the cardboard boxes from when we've bought large expensive items, "just in case they need to go back."  We can't be the only couple in the world to have a box for a Commodore 64 computer in the loft.

When throwing stuff away there is always a frisson of fear, a  thought that nags away, "What if I need it?" I think this is worse for people from poorer backgrounds.  Could it be an inherited genetic survival instinct?  If you don't know where your next jam sandwich is coming from you don't throw away the crusts just in case you are hungry tomorrow.

To cure myself of my hoarding habit I bought a simple little book by Karen Kingston called Clear Your Clutter (although some would argue that as I hoard books more than anything else it's not really a great purchase in the attempt to clear the rubbish) .  Her advice really helps me to clear my wardrobe out regularly.  She says that if you haven't worn it in a year you are not likely to and that you should give it a 3 month warning.  If you still haven't worn it then it needs to go.  I don't suppose this would work if you collect clothes, or shoes or handbags because then you are keeping them because you love them and not because you are too lazy to throw them away.

A Level Notes

When my daughter finished her A levels I suggested that she throw her notes away and make a bit more space in her room.  "But what if I fail?" she said.  "Then your notes were rubbish and you need to make more."  My Dad said, "Oh no, don't get rid of them, you never know when you might need them.  I've still got all my notes on how to work a telephone exchange in the loft.  If I ever need them I know where to find them."  As he hasn't used them in 40 years she agreed that maybe there was no point in keeping them but would wait until after she had her results.

"Why don't you have a burning party?" I stupidly suggested.  "You can BBQ and all burn your notes.  It will be therapeutic!"

That is what is happening right now, outside my patio doors.  As I sit and type this, the Long Suffering Husband is enjoying what he says is like Big Brother on a huge screen.  It looks fun.  The whole garden and house is filled with smoke, the box of notes is slowly emptying, food is being eaten and Prosecco being drunk.

There are people bouncing on the trampoline, swigging from bottles of WKD and toasting flumps over the incinerator. It makes me wish I was young again.

There is only one thing that worries me.

Who would store a toddler in a plastic box?

Don't Panic Mother!

It is a mother's job to worry.

I know I shouldn't.  I know that everything will be fine - even if it's not.  I did A levels and went off to college and I didn't worry.  To be honest, I didn't know I should worry.  No one in my family had been to college before.  When my A level results came out (by post!) I was a temporary cleaner in a big Solicitor's Office next to St Paul's Cathedral.  It was probably the best job I've ever had.  We were paid loads of money for flicking a duster over the highly polished tables 3 times a day and cleaning the sinks in the ladies toilets 4 times a day.  There were two long tea breaks, with homemade cakes (left over from the Solicitors tea with a group of fascinating ladies, who I thought were ancient but were probably fairly close to the age I am now.  One of the younger Solicitors, in a pink striped shirt and wide silk tie, with red braces holding up his pin-striped trousers said, "Crikey, I didn't think you'd be in today, aren't you collecting your results?"  "They come by post," I replied.  "Fuck me, you're a cool one," he said.  I blushed and ran off for tea break.  The old ladies all wanted to know what I'd got.  "I don't know, they come by post," I said again.  "Ring home and get your mum to open them, find out what you've got. Use the Partner's phone, he won't mind."  I was confused.  The results would be there when I got home.  They were even more confused, "Aren't you going to University?" It never even crossed my mind that I wouldn't get the results I needed.  This is probably because I only needed to pass 2 of my A levels, no particular grades required.  I had already wasted my UCAS application on totally unsuitable courses, requiring grades I knew were impossible and so I was going to a Poly, which I had applied to directly.

Tomorrow, the A level results come out.  I'm sure my daughter will be fine.  She worked hard.  Her offers are realistic (although the grades I got at A level wouldn't have got me in) but over the last few days I've been waking several times a night, hot and sweaty having dreamt about something that I had to do again.  I need to get a grip.  So my default anti-stress position is to bake.

A while ago I bought some really cute silicone muffin cases that look like flower pots from Lakeland, so what a perfect opportunity to try them out.  I made some elderflower sponges,  iced the cakes with green butter cream and placed some sugar paste flowers on the top.

Then I went to see Ted (remembering to remove the courgette from my handbag before I went) laughed a lot, had a curry and now I feel much better ......until 3am when no doubt I will wake, sweating and worrying.

Such a Shallow Feminist

Contrary to my recent deep and political blogs, today I am going to share what has been on my mind for the last few hours.

MY LEGS HAVE FINALLY CHANGED COLOUR!

In 45 years I have never managed to tan my legs below the knees.  It is, I assumed, because I have the hugest, most knobbly knees in the entire history of the world and so the sun can't get down there.
I don't know how it happened but after a day of dog walking, pulling up weeds, fixing fence posts and reading books in my shorts (I was wearing the shorts, the books weren't) my lower legs appear to be a different colour.

I began to panic.  What has changed?  Is this the beginning of hot flushes, losing my keys more often and weeping at school assemblies?

I sat in the bath, examining them carefully.  "Yes, they are a different colour but quite hairy," I thought.  So I soaped them down.  "Oh dear, there's a lot of dirt!"  And I scraped the hairs off noticing how bruised my legs are.

Now that they are clean and hairless I can confirm a colour change, unfortunately that colour is PURPLE!

Inspiring a Generation

The official slogan of the Olympics had me worried for quite a while.  Inspire a Generation.  Inspire them to do what?  Sit on the sofa and shout at the TV? Complain about how the British aren't as good as the Jamaicans, "Is it because they're black?" (was actually discussed on the BBC last night)  Run down our schools and teachers? Complain about the price of a Coke in the Olympic park?

Then team GB turned out to be really quite good.  We won medals.  I believe we are 3rd in the Medals Table, despite being a country with 1,281,498,000 less people than China and 248,950,197 people than the USA to draw our winning athletes from.  And they are beginning to inspire a generation, although I think the re-appearance of the sun is also helping.

Yesterday, we went to Hyde Park to watch the women's Marathon Swim.  Four laps of the freezing cold Serpentine, that's about 6 miles or about 400 lengths or my local swimming pool.  They finished it in just under 2 hours.  Based on my usual swimming rate (not that I've ever swum more than 70 lengths in one go) that would have taken me nearly 7 hours.  I thought it was really exciting, although I was disappointed not to see anyone swimming breaststroke with their sticking above the surface so that their contact lenses don't wash out.  There was some confusion about who was winning as the Hungary flag and Italian flag look very similar if you are not sure which way is up.

The top 5 swimmers, were miles ahead of everyone else and they included a British Woman, Kerrie-Anne Payne who delighted everyone on the banks of the Serpentine by coming 4th.  I'm sure she'd have loved to get a medal but we were happy with such a strong placing.

Hyde Park was then filled with a generation or three who were inspired.  As we walked around the park we saw children practising long jumps in the sand bridleway, blissfully unaware that there was horse poo in there somewhere.  There were toddlers swimming in the the ponds and fountains.  We saw little boys wrestling, being refereed and coached by their dad.  People all over the park were discussing whether they would or even could swim the course they had just seen, even my son who is convinced that if we keep practising we could get to 400 lengths in one go quite soon.

We were home in time to see Bolt stroll to victory and two GB women get gold medals in sports I find very difficult to watch.  I have a personal aversion to watching people get hurt.  I can't quite see the sport in trying to kick someone in the head.  I said to my daughter, "GB have another 2 gold medals, there's some scary women out there."  Having brought her up as a proper feminist she immediately said, "Why is it scary because they're women?"  Confusion hit me for a while and then I realised how it might have sounded.  "No, they're scary because they're good - they win gold medals and the British men haven't managed to do that yet."

First it was Nicola Adams, who was then interviewed by Gary Lineker, in patronising tones.  He spoke to her like he was trying to encourage a schoolgirl who told him she liked to eat newts. He told her that she had a "beautiful smile" and virtually patted her on the head.  There was an unspoken, "strange choice of sport for a girl, you'll never find a husband if you don't give up this silly idea that you can hit people.  You'll frighten them all away but never mind you have a nice smile."  The Long Suffering Husband thought he was patronising, I thought he is patronising to everyone and my daughter thought anyone would patronise her because she spoke like a little girl.  But, whilst Gary Lineker does patronise everyone he wouldn't say that to a man, no matter how young he seemed.

Then it was Jade Jones, the Welsh Taekwondo gold medal winner.  She was really bouncy and very good at kicking people in the head, a skill she couldn't learn in Wales and so had to be driven to Manchester by her Grandad.  An article in the Independent about yesterday's Women's Marathon mentioned how Kerrie-Anne Payne had been driven to early morning training by Steve Parry.  Would an article about a male athlete describe how they got to training?  It is assumed that they are men and men can drive themselves but these poor little girls...well, they need someone to take them.  What about all the mothers who take their sons and daughters to training, do they get mentioned in articles?
Then after Jade won the medal, she called her coach over, saying that he was a true inspiration and she couldn't have done it without him.  I wish she had been able to.  What a sexist pig.  He was praising her strength and determination in training and he said something like, "She's brilliant, she trains so hard, she's just like a male athlete"  Whoosh.  It was like tumbleweed blew through our living room, we stood, slack-jawed incredulous and then the coach added, "There's still more she can do," and the Long Suffering Husband sarcastically said, "Yeah, like grow a penis!"  I know that the men who live in this house have to be feminists to survive but it was brilliant to hear.

This morning there was a picture being shared on Facebook.  It showed two men holding the Irish flag with these words written on them, "Katie Taylor, Olympic Champion, The only woman Irish men fear more than their Mammy"  This is funny but is it also just a little bit sexist?  Would the same be said of a male boxer?

This year's Olympics has featured women's boxing for the first time, had a woman competitor from Iran and seen the GB women's football team playing matches of staggeringly better quality than the men.  This should be something to celebrate. If it important to discuss Jessica Ennis' stomach then the newspapers should be running pages about the nicely toned asses of the male gymnasts (I'd buy it!) If  If we inspire a generation to do anything it should be to celebrate everyone's success equally.

The Great National Sport of Teacher Bashing

Last Thursday, Rupert Murdoch tweeted, "No wonder China leading in medals while US and UK mainly teach competitive sport a bad thing. How many champions state school background?1" (sic)
Soon, this tweet had been picked up by the press, the lack of medals was entirely the fault of teachers in the state sector.  As I drove back from the Supermarket I was shouting angrily at the Jeremy Vine show, as people rang in with stories of how teachers had made their lives a misery in sports lessons. Agreeing that it was all the fault of teachers that we didn't have as many medals as China. Today, David Cameron has said, "The problem has been too many schools wanting to have competitive sport, some teachers not wanting to join in and play their part." (Not that this makes much grammatical sense but his meaning is clear - it's the fault of the teachers not the government!)

Teacher Bashing Olympic Sport - No medals for my drawing

Now, if we were to make teacher-bashing an Olympic sport we'd surely clean up.  No other country runs down teachers in quite the way we do.  The thing is the British are brilliant at running things down and everyone has experience of at least one teacher.  Most people have spent the majority of their lives interacting with teachers, either as a pupil or parent or grandparent and teachers come in all shapes and sizes.  I had a couple of maths teachers, who made me love watching Rugby because they taught me rude songs in choir and I also had a PE teacher who used to make me be her partner in hockey and would hit me round the shins with her stick.  I was never going to win an Olympic medal in sport, though.  I was quite good at music and never came across a single teacher in my whole time at school who didn't support and encourage me. Personally, I would be completely useless at providing extra sport in school as I have absolutely no skill I can share but I would encourage anyone who loved it.  I expect if you asked the Olympic medallists about their experience of teachers there would be a variety of answers but most would have been encouraged in their sport by their teachers on an individual human level.

Obviously, the winning of medals is far more complicated than the statistics can tell us.  It takes a talent, an interest, hard work, dedication, time, money and support of everyone around them.   Yes, teachers play a part but they are not wholly responsible for the success or failure of an individual.  Parents, grandparents, coaches, friends may have a greater influence.  

In schools, there is a great difference between inclusive and competitive sport.  PE lessons have to include everyone and yes I do think everyone should be made to do some sport each week. Keeping fit and healthy should be for everyone and it should be fun but those children that show particular skill should be encouraged to do more after school, or attend a club or compete in district sports. 

Thinking about Murdoch's original tweet the obvious difference between public and private school to me seems to be money.  The parents who can afford to pay for education can pay for private coaches and equipment (including the best horses!)   This is a sweeping generalisation but parents who send their children to private school are probably a bit more pushy and expect a lot from life and their children.  Also, boarding school pupils have evenings and weekends to fill at school and so are more likely to take part in sport after school hours, provided by highly qualified sports coaches (at extra cost).

Last Thursday the athletics started and the statistics have shifted, as all the athletics medalists are from state schools.  Loads of medalists are from Yorkshire, most are in their 20s, quite tall and have brown hair.  I blame the teachers, they are obviously favouring the brown haired students when suggesting who goes to after school athletics club.  As for the Yorkshire thing, well I can only guess they don't get a good TV reception up there (I am being sarcastic before anyone gets stroppy) and they probably have more children as well, as there's nothing else to do.

One of my colleagues wrote on facebook today, "It just drives me made that they constantly bad mouth teachers and then expect the pupils and parents to respect the very same people."  How right he is.  Maybe we shouldn't add teacher bashing to the Olympics, no matter how good we would be at it.

Loving the Limpics

Like the rest of the country, I've turned into a Limpic Couch Potato.  I haven't been for a swim all week, the dog has had shorter than normal walks and I'm even struggling to tear myself away from the TV for long enough to get a cup of tea.  I worry about what will happen when it's all over.  Will there be mass depression, the whole Country so lethargic they need to be surgically removed from their couches?  The organisers of the Olympics think that it will inspire everyone to go out and train.  They think we will be inspired to go and sculpt ourselves a stomach like Jessica Ennis.

The last time I was this interested in the Olympics was when Nadia Comaneci was getting perfect tens in the gymnastics.  That was the Summer of 1976, it was hot, you could only have a bath once a week and then you were limited to the amount of water you could have in it.  My Dad was looking after a small Telephone Exchange in a village about 7 miles from where we lived and we would cycle to see him, stopping on the way at the Ford to fish for Sticklebacks and paddle and to talk to the Tramp that lived under the bridge in the next village. The Telephone Exchange had a huge kitchen with a television in  and I remember spending hours there watching this brilliant gymnast.  This was the age when I spent most of my life upside down.

This passion for watching is how my son is with the Weightlifting.  It's so much easier for him, though.  We had one channel and could only watch what Aunty Beeb thought we'd be interested in.  Luckily, with the perfect tens flying around there was no question of not showing the gymnastics.

By the time the next Olympics arrived, I was a moody teenager who couldn't care less about sport.  Even the Steve Ovett and Seb Coe 'Clash of the Titans' barely caused me to raise an eyebrow.  I do remember it but for some reason, in my mind, it is linked with the Christmas when my Grandad drank too much, tried to walk along the kerb to prove he was sober, fell off and broke his arm.  

This year has been so exciting.  Bradley Wiggins and his sideburns, the gymnasts including the sweet little Nerdfighter gymnast, who nearly spliced herself in two on the beam, Tom Daley and his brilliant diving, rowing, sailing, horsey stuff.  I've watched it all.

But it is the names that really make me smile.  The Chinese athletes are wonderful for a laugh.  There are Yus, Haos, Dings, Pings Dongs and Wangs.  Dong Dong made me chuckle in the trampolining today.  If only he was Ding Dong and competed in the Ping Pong.

The long distance runner from the Seychelles must find it hard to be taken seriously in this country, no matter how well he does.

Gaylord Silly

But my absolutely favourite competed today.  A German diver called Katja Deickow (pronounced Kat Ya Dik Ov)

Sew out of my comfort zone

"Are you OK?" someone asked me.  They didn't look as though they believed me when I said I was.  "It's just that you haven't written a blog for a few days."  I've become like Big Ben, constantly chiming away so that when I stop someone thinks I'm broken.

Maybe I have been a bit broken.   I could be pretentious and say it writer's block or say that I had nothing to say but the truth is I never have anything to say when I sit down to start a blog.  I don't walk around with all these ideas buzzing in my head I just sit and write. Mostly it's rubbish and I don't care.  The act of writing this rubbish makes me more creative, it leads to other writing or making something or baking and it just sorts my head out and makes me a better person.  The problem is that someone I didn't know told me they read what I write here.  That shouldn't be a surprise after all this is public.  I know people read it.  Colleagues tell me that a particular post made them laugh, a stranger even followed me on Twitter and linked 'The Glamorous Life of a Musician' to one of her tweets.  That freaked me out for a bit but it was anonymous, like when Pedigree Chum got in touch after my 'Biscuits' post asking me if my dog would like to be their poster boy.  If I ignore these I can pretend they aren't happening.  These people can't track me down, sit on my doorstep and demand I speak to them in person.  When a stranger tells you face to face that they like your writing the pressure suddenly becomes huge.  I become Mrs Insecure, "I can't write about driving instructors, it won't be good enough," or "What if I've made a spelling mistake, the whole world will know I'm stupid!" or "What if I give the wrong information about something?"

It's not the whole truth either.  I have also been preoccupied with a carnival float.  I'm not sure whose stupid idea it was to enter a float but I think it might have been mine and I think I might be regretting it.  "It's no problem, I can make some banners to go down the side.  I've got and old sheet and some material."  Between pushing the dog off (he thought I was making him a new blanket) and cutting pinning and tacking letters on, it has taken over my life.

Today, I moved to trying to machine the letters on.  The phrase A BAD WORKMAN BLAMES HIS TOOLS is rushing around in my head and I'm determined not to throw the sewing machine out of the window but it is making great bit loopy stitches on the back.  The tension keeps changing as I sew and the thread breaks.  I checked online for a solution and found this wonderful quote, "A sewing machine never plays up when it's in the cupboard, only when you have something that you have  to sew!"  I watched Youtube videos and they all agreed.  I had threaded the machine with the foot down. So I tried again.  That wasn't the problem.  Still loopy.

Still loopy.  A metaphor for my life.  When we were discussing the theme of our carnival float we kept coming back to, "going round in circles."  Another metaphor.  The banners I have been making say, "MYO, Having Fun, Making Music," although in my head I've changed them to, "making fun of music."  Another metaphor for my life.   Julia of All Trades - Going round in circles making fun of music and still loopy.