Health and Safety My Arse - Sleep is for the Weak

Despite my toga-wrenching pleas to the universe to have a  'Summer Holidays'  lull  -  we are every bit as headless-chickeny-runny-aroundy as ever.    I keep convincing myself that despite my Wednesday's  'free spot'  on the calendar,   (my desert island 'symbol' notwithstanding),  it will be perfectly OK if we just drive for an hour up there,   pick up that one,   turn back and scoot back down for half an hour,   drop two over there,   run around town with the remaining two,   chug BACK up that way for a further hour for THAT and then cruise on back down again at bedtime for the hour and a half it takes to zzzzzzzzzzzzz ..... drop another one off there and THEN head for home for the final hour's stretch with my banjo on my knee...... i t    w i l l    b e    f  i  n  e.    Before getting up at dawn again to zzzzzzzzzzz.........  mmmmmmmmmmmm..........

You get the drift.

But it  WILL  be OK because I have made a deal with the diesel gods that I can have Friday off instead.

So far.    Plenty of time then to prepare for next week's set of FIVE family birthdays.


Anyway  -  just when I'm recovering from Sunday's sis-in-law's rugby club's hysterical sports day,   a day designed especially for my Cheetah Boy  -  oops hang on I'll get back to this sentence in a minute  -   my sis-in-law runs the bar at their local rugby club and every year they do a fun (ie mental)  Turn up,   Put your name down on the appropriate team  (ie Rugby,  Football,  Lacrosse  or  Bar)   and Play It until we say Stop and Give you a Sausage.    Well,  only one rugby bod turned up  (it WAS Sunday and I do believe rugby types enjoy a small sherry of a Saturday night)  and so everybody else who'd turned up 'cos their boyfriend,  brother,  son was there decided to get up and BE the Rugby team.    This proved to be extremely entertaining.    And Cheetah Boy was drafted into this cackling,  tottering,  squealing,  blundering  savage band of manicured outlaws.    'What's that thing you're waving like a big fly thing lady?'    'A lacrosse stick thing Big Bird'    'WTF's lacrosse for fake tan's sake?'    'I don't bloody know just pick one up and run tuck yer tits in'   'Bring It On!!!'    'Oh I've got grass in my shoes now!'    Cheetah Boy looks puzzled.    He's just signed up for the Rugby Team.    'Ooh  -  you're on our team babe?'    'What's that thing?'    'A lacrosse stick!'    'What's lacrosse?'    'Have it!  Shut it!  Run!'      'Cool!'  

So he did.    What a star.    All this amid not-so supportive shouts of  'I've never seen her move so fast without farting.'    And   'Why is everybody shouting at me?'    'Cos you're supposed to be the goalkeeper!'    'Shut up!    I'm not even doing this deliberately!'  he dashes about looking like he's been doing this since he was born.    And then he 'skilled up the teenagers'  as he puts it at football  (with a couple of added cousins the team was by now looking a bit more athletic).    And jumped about alot on the volleyball patch with lots of very tall boy/men in very big shorts  (as the chicks had kind of retired by then -  I don't know if this was the only team to morph so much)  and he had the best time a ball-crazy boy could have.    And archery thrown in for good measure.    Double yay.    And a bar!    That means fizzy stuff in bottles.    Triple yay!!!    And big cousin's birthday cake  -  yeah yeah enough.....    ANYWAY  -   just when I'm recovering from all that (remember this sentence now?)  and the fringe episode,   I have a date for  Pond Dipping and Willow Weaving on Monday morning,  and.......... Oh I don't really feel like it.


But,   like we do,   we went and,   like we do,   had one of the funniest and funnest days.


We had a very lovely  'guide'  -  'team leader'  -  'person in a collared T-shirt'  (what do you call these people?)  who gathered all the kids on the nice wooden platform by the opaque chartreuse pond and stiltedly did her self-confessed  'boring'  Health and Safety talky bit:  can we stay behind the raised sill on the platform,   not skewer each other with the fishing nets,   fall in and drown unnecessarily,    get incurable diseases in open wounds from the murky gunk  etc etc.    Yeah yeah no problem dudess.    Home Ed people are totally dependable.    I think it took about 45 seconds for them to get tired of blinding each other with dripping pond-skank at close range and scattered to the grassy tufts around the sludgey slopes.    It probably then took about another 45 seconds before the first one was in.    Up to the knees.    Mmmn  -  home at last.

Bless her,   our official gal actually thought this was all very cool and I think even had a good time too.    And despite the willow being a bit too old and dry for groovy bending,  leaving her all apologetic.    'Ah don't worry -  we'll do it at home with pipe cleaners.'    We are flexible even if the willow is not.    The kids deftly made good use of the nice long snappy sticks  -   ie  nice long spears,   lances  and  harpoons.

Back to the pond then.    Home Ed does Nature.

Our lovely guide lady said they  (the Kent High Weald Project?/People/whatev)  love doing tree faces with groups where the kids splat wet mud on trees and get all creative-like but said how the schools have a really hard time with this  -  children touching real mud!    No No No!!!    Us stinking sopping splattered lot must be such a delight then!      Oh yeah.      (Well,   that'll make a change then.)      

'So,   thank you all for coming.    Hands up -  what was your favourite thing you found in the pond today?'    '....a tiny fish,   a spider,   a snail.....'    'Lovely.    Bye bye and don't forget to enter the Nature Art Competition'.    'Bye!    Thank you nice lady.    Bye!!'

It took about another 45 seconds before the next sub-slubby discovery.

A bike.  

More kids in there now.

Then someone found the missing KHWP fishing net that Thuglet had launched earlier.    Fab.    A headlamp.....    Another bike .......

This is what you CALL pond dipping!

Final tally:    3 bikes,   1 scooter,   a headlamp,   a fishing net,   an umbrella,   a jacket,   a bottle and a can.


R e s u l t!




And back home,   the scooter scrubbed up a treat.


Ahh  -  back on the ol' treadmill again tomorrow then.......    A  'Bye-Bye New York-bound chum'  Bowling and Karate Kid gig for the  'big'  boys,   secret boy birthday shopping and more ice skating for the girl,   being dragged along and a lollipop for the small thing  and another set of matches in the eyelids for me.

All in a day's work.

Good preparation for the football tournament next morning down in Hastings.     Somewhere.    And the thinking up very good get-out clauses for the park meet-up  (2 hours in the opposite direction),   and  -  oh -  just forget it.....     Faking one's own demise is an effective one I hear.    There may be a clear stretch of sea to run into leaving my clothes neatly folded on the beach.    Hmmmm  -  it's the Summer Holidays remember?    Summer Holidays?    And I'm going to Hastings?    Who organises these things for Chrissakes?    And what doughnut says  'Oh yes we'd LOVE to?'    ....ooooooOOOOOHHHH!!!!!


And then  -   it's Friday.



Friday      Friday      Friday......





*   *   Ring  Ring   *   *



**** Madamesmokingun cannot come to the phone right now as she is currently planning your death.    Please leave a message and date and time when you will be available for your last rites.    Thank you for calling.    Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm......... ***



Oh we 'ave a laugh!!!





Do headless chickens really run about?    I've only had experience of headless rabbits.   And they definitely don't.












    

But I thought Daddy loved me!!???

Mr GPants has just cut Rock Godling's fringe.

I repeat:    Mr GPants has just cut Rock Godling's fringe.

This  is   A   BAD   THING.  

This is now truly the Scene of the Crime.

(I really need to learn how to do pictures on blogs just to share the full horror  -  but that would simply be sensationalising child abuse.)

The poor half-pint soul man will be traumatised for ever more.    It really is THAT bad.    I walked into the kitchen/crimescene as the atrocity was taking place to be met with a panicky look on Mr GPants face scooting into a silent  'SSSSHHHHH!!!!!'  shape.    My eyes popped and brows flew as I turned tail and RAN!    Was found shaking in the cupboard under the stairs a full 5 minutes later.

The victim was ushered into the shower  (which would normally be much heralded)  where the mirror was thankfully still steamed up after Thuglet's hysterical willy-splattering session.    I think Father From Hell has got away with it for now  -  and I expect him to be long gone by the time any of us get up tomorrow.    So this leaves ME with the clean up operation.    I can tell he feels guilty as he offered RG The Big Bed for the night  -  which means cuddles and happy boy basking in the bliss of ignorance.    It also means I'm down here reading blogs when I should be in bed  -   now to be Thuglet's bottom bunk  -  which I pretend is a sumptuous 4-poster.       (No I really don't.    I really couldn't.    Not staring at my sheet tucking from below.    Bottom bunks are so unaesthetic.)        I     c o u l d     have a whole bed to myself if I chose RG's top bunk but that is tantamount to lunacy in this hobbit cave.  

The Incident also sparked another stupid argument about cleaning.    All arguments about cleaning are stupid.    Cleaning is stupid.    Especially  THIS  house.    But Mr GP brushed the hair off the kitchen counters with the dustpan and brush.    The one I use for  THE FLOOR.    Did I really need to explain that to anyone?    I spluttered  'That's not hygienic!'    Which is what opened the firing.    A whole battery of spitting outrage listing all the disgusting features of our house due to our  -  no  MY  slovenliness  etc  etc.    Well  -  I believe it was.    I was already fluttering around the emerging mini monk from the shower and  NOT LISTENING!!!!!........

I already have a million and one things to do in the morning before having to be somewhere I don't know quite early with implements which I'm not sure I'll be able to find,   and I really don't need to be comforting/restyling  (like HOWthefuck???)  a small sobbing little dudelet robbed of his dudelet locks.

Can you still be a cool rock star with a pudding bowl hairdo?      Yes you can!

Can you still be a cool rock star with a random turretted brow frightener?      No.    No you can't.  

I could remove all the mirrors in the house.    (What was that Joan Crawford film?   -  Just had to google it  -  A Woman's Face  -  sorry).    I would also have to remove all the mirrors on the car.    And swear extreme violence to all our friends we're meeting up with if they say anything.    And hope the pond we're dipping in tomorrow is murky and non-reflective.    And swear extreme violence to all the frogs.    But who am I kidding?    The tragic shorn one has siblings.    And that,   as everyone knows,  is that.

There is noone on earth so cruel as a sibling.    They have been quiet up til now but it's just sinister.    Mr GP must have stuck their lips together with something.    Goop off the dustpan and brush possibly.    But it is merely a stomach-coiling pre-emptive torture.   They can't possibly hold out beyond reaching the bottom stair in the morning.    And then the screaming shall begin.    My alarm tone.




I might just get in the car now and  D R I V E ...................  









  

    

Home on the Mange

We live in a mad old Eighteenth Century farmhouse with ivy smothering half it's features like a Green Mannish Veronica Lake,   flowers round the door  (triffids I think),   and an amazing array of native British wildlife at every turn.    My children being the wildest.     Naturally.

It has its charms and quirks.    As do we.    And its darker side.    As do we.    And bulls for neighbours.    As do they.

It's not all chocolate box.    There are a few orange creams in the ointment.    But there's always a way of finding one's hazelnut cluster.
      
We really can't open our front door now.    I've finally given up with the grunting and heaving and  'Be there uh in just a  uhh minute...can you push from your uhh....?  and now have to run round the back singing   'Coming Round the Mountain....'  at the sound of the Postie,   leaving them to face the sight of gurning naked paint-streaked demons pressed up against the windows.    But not feeling very Maria Von Trapp-like yesterday I decided to just open the blinkin' window.    It fell out.    Mostly.    Hanging on by one rusty hinge.    Had to bomb round the front anyway to wiggle and shove it back in with Minx on the inside hanging on to the dangly bits.

'OK.    Let's not open that again.'

Gurning  naked paint-streaked demons back on the bill.

We're also missing several kitchen cabinet doors.    Which is really much more colourful.

There are more broken window panes than complete ones.    Nice patterns through which to peer at erupting mole hills.    Kind of trippy.

The brown-ness under the kitchen lino,  and around the toilet and... well  -  the downstairs -  is growing and growing and growing.........    Brown  IS  the new black.    Well soon.... black will be the new black.   We stay on top of interior trends.    And always growing........

As is the mould on  -  yeah everything.    It has faces.    It's company when everyone's asleep.

The back gates are beyond worrying about.    I like to think of them more as a welcoming embrace  -  throwing their arms around the car as we scrape through into Larkin Land.

The walls keep.... sort of falling off.    No point hoovering really.    There's a comfort.

And the toilet has started refusing to dispose of poo again.    Probably something to do with the ancient drains that have had many a chin scratched about.    Entertainment with every visit.

But the slugs and the bugs and the kids seem happy.

  

The nice lady at the bank offered to try for a better Homes Insurance quote for me.    I pay about £8 or £9 a month roughly.    She rang me back later with a quote for about £33 a month.

'Is your house listed?'  she asked sweetly.






Yes it's in the Top 10 Most Fucked Houses of East Sussex.






'Let's go out.'




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The demolition appears to be catching.    Now even the car is joining in.    Down to me last hubcap.

Better hang on to my knickers.    Lord knows what else will collapse.

Never-At-Home Education - Part 2

We recently had to change halls.    The last one's little garden was deemed  UNSAFE.    So no more outside space.    This cannot be!  

We found a 'new' hall.    With outside space and free parking and a little cafe and somewhere to make tea....    Took weeks of hall-inspecting and full-teeth smiling to get to this stage.    Voted.    Sigh.    We have a new hall.

We have lost our new hall.    We have apparently behaved in an unacceptable manner.    Our crimes?    Well........

*    The first week  She-Who-Says-So  saw 3 girls in the toilet  AT THE SAME TIME  washing their hands.    And one of them was  YOUNGER  than the other 2.    (Well  -  She-W-S-S may have been spared this atrocity if She'd unlocked the kitchen we were paying for.    But maybe She wanted us to get our teas from Her Community Cafe.....   Aaaah!    Maybe She's clever?)

*    We drift into the Community Cafe in 1s and 2s  -  so inconsiderate.    And it's 1 0'clock and the She-W-S-S had already washed the grill so was NOT about to dirty it again for cheese on toast even tho'  She doesn't shut til 2 o'clock so there.    (Uh  -  OK  hold the  'Clever'  idea then...  )

*    They kick balls in the area She-W-S-S said was OK to kick balls in.    (Tut Tut Tut........)

*    Somebody deliberately held the gate to the playground open.    (OMG!    There must have been another one of them coming through!)

*    Those children are UNSUPERVISED!    That's right.    All those grown-ups loitering about in the background are deliberately not looking.    They're not even really there.    No I can't see them at all when I squint my eyes like I'm in Eastenders.    In fact,   all the children are abandoned godless bastards and should by rights be in the workhouse.  

*    Taking an hour and a half to clean up so we can see our faces in the floor tiles?     Nonsense!    We repeatedly  'leave the place a disgusting MESS'.    And repositioning the library bookshelves on wheels back to their marked places and double checking this against the floor plan  -  (usually hidden)?    Uh-uh!    We 'move the furniture about'!

*    And the children are RUDE!    How DARE they answer back when they are being insulted by She-W-S-S!    And not only that but have the audacity to comment on Her smoking right by the tightly coralled fluorescent-jacketed terrified little pre-schoolers  She is defending against these heathen hordes.    And this upstart's mother asking Her what the problem is?    'STUCK UP THAT'S WHAT YOU ALL ARE!'    She retorts.

                Oh  -   but the best is yet to come!



*    We are NOT CRB CHECKED!!!!!!!!


I'm even outraged at this myself.    The very idea.    What were we thinking?    Not CRB checked to look after our ....um.... own children....     ?


Initial reaction from one of our criminal sisters:    'Thank you for reminding us why we stepped out of your world.'




These dirty savage anarchists can now be spotted grouping around the shade of large trees in local parks,   spending their dirty money in those cafes instead,   apologising to a very cross lady at the bottom of the hill for the dirty great skateboard that just crashed into her back........

'There are By-Laws you know!    You're not allowed skateboards in parks!    Or scooters!'

(Or footballs....   Or ice-creams....    Or buggies....   Or children who should be in school! ...?)    

Honestly!     Haven't they got homes to go to?




We really are being run out of town.       Nobody likes us and we don't care.    


Next stop Tonbridge.





Be afraid Tonbridge.    


Be very afraid.



 


          

The Bitch Is Back! - Again...

Back from Seeking Answers from the Great Beyond.

Back from the Bacton Gas Terminals resort.  

Where the tide doesn't go out til about 2.00 in the afternoon,  so you have ....... concrete and sea.    And with 5 children  (yep  -  I sold 1 for the week but gained 2 more)  to entertain we had to rely on the shelf-ful of unheard-of indecipherable board games and the typical library of holiday house books.    Tarby On Showbiz was a belter.

But then..... I wasn't looking for excitement.    Merely enlightenment.    And some stones with holes in.

Stepping outside the slightly damp symphony of beige patterned chalet,   hanging on to one's hair for fear of it being ripped from one's skull by the fresh summer East Anglian breeze,   and finding the perfect spot from which to launch one's precious family down onto the finally revealed sand several hundred feet below the  'promenade',   one frees one's mind of all daily clutter and contemplates the infinite.

Such as  -  'Who the bloody hell organized this bloody holiday?'

But funnily enough  -  I kind of enjoyed it.

And I even  'started'  (again)     *  *     M y       B o o k    *  *      -  oh yes!         Oh yes I  DID!  



I'm   Breakin'   Through!!!            I'm   Bendin'   Spoons!!!



Albeit in a tiny A6 notebook with a scratchy biro  -  but I have started something.    Worked out some squiggly illustrations.    Scribbled out a couple of babbling sentences.    I'm well on my way.    But should I really sweat about my art work?  Spend another couple of years worrying about my lapsed life drawing skills?    Stall some more because I'm  NOT GOOD ENOUGH?    (Here we go again.....)


So.......

             .......... I asked the sea.







It told me to piss off and take responsibility for my own decisions.




Bastard North Sea.    I bet the Atlantic would be more helpful.  

Well  -  whatever.    Decided to live with being a bit crap and do it anyway.



I'm Keepin' Flowers in Full Bloom!!!!



And as you may be able to tell I have reconnected with REM  -  everyone has to have a holiday CD to drive the kids bonkers.    Played it loud and pretended to be a muppet   ALL  the way home.      Even during the unscheduled 3-hour  appreciation of the Dartford Crossing stop.

Then finally reached my dear old welcoming family shack.    It smelled of wee.



I'm Pushin' an Elephant up the Stairs.................

Basket Case for a Suitcase?

At least hanging out by the washing line is a place to think.    Thinking of things I could really do.    I don't mean when I get back inside and see the devastation.    Not those sort of  'things to do'.    I really don't waste precious brainwaves thinking about picking up half sucked Frubes.  

No,   I mean when I walk back into the house and it is clean and welcoming and there's a clear table and all my scrapbooks and materials are in order and all I have to do is breeze into the fragrant living room with my elderflower presse and  CREATE.    You know  -  when.....

Maybe tomorrow?       Ha  ha  ha  ha  ha  ha  ha  ..................   huuuuuuuuuuuughhhhhh........

Maybe in about 12 years time then.    Thuglet will be 16 and might be capable of entering without breaking.    Oh  -  he'll be a large teenage male tho'.    Hmmmmm  -  make it 20 years.    They may have all left home by then.    Or I will have.

Back to my place on this earth and the reason for so being.   It's been a sticky subject for some time.    About 43 years.   I know I definitely don't do blouses and numbers and smiling at people and telephones.    That much I have worked out.    And I keep harping on about being creative.    But really....?    I have recently peered through old notebooks.    Set me back several pounds and hours in The Chair.  

But I have worked out something.    It does need to be creative-y  -  BUT  -   I don't have a novel in me.    And despite sheets of scribblings in the flickering dark in the old days,   I am not going to direct a feature film.    And I may have towers of magazine scraps but I am not going to design shoes,   or jewellery,   or theatre sets,   or  redesign The South Bank.    I won't be unveiling a majestic bronze tribute to the nation's heroic fallen.    Or render Zara Phillips' fizzog on canvas with cow dung and molten Biba macs.    I am not going to emerge from a cellar with the next Wallace and Gromit.    I cannot speak sewing machine and won't be producing the costumes for Holiday On Ice.    I'm never going to hit top C.    Or hold down  'F'  properly.    Or write the next  'White Christmas'.    Or join  'Diversity'.    Or even get both eyebrows to match.

But....

  ....if I try really really hard........

    ....I might remember to scrawl Thuglet's latest funny on a scrap of paper and stick it to the fridge.                      


In my late 20s' phase of madness,   the thunderous clouds parted and left me with the Great Truth that the only things of worth are  Space  and  Passion.    And I still hold with that.    Pretty much anything I value falls into one or the other category.

But there's another:    Funny!

It has taken me  FOREVER  to accept that  FUNNY  is a driving force and is not a joke.

Willliam Morris has his  'beautiful  or useful'  boxes to tick.    I would have it as  'beautiful or funny'.    If it ain't either of those.................ZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzz....

I have strived over the years to make things that are beautiful.    Really strived.    But they always come out funny.    And I pretend that I meant it that way all along.    So  -  thinking about it,   whilst pegging out my lovely washing,   maybe I did always mean it all along.    I've been knotting myself into rigging for years trying to think of the things  I COULD REALLY DO.    Reached Cracking Point.    I'm just not fabulous enough at anything to do it beautifully.    So........clouds parting again........maybe I could make funny things.   Or maybe make things funny.    

 (  I     have     a     dream     !!!!!  )    

Shame though that I want it to be funny ha ha  -  but my speciality is funny peculiar.     Knew there was a catch.      Cracking up is hard to do.......

I'm at Cracking Up Point with about everything at the moment.    I have never looked more forward to a holiday than I am this week.    And my  'holiday project'  (ha ha),   this year will be to sit  (ha ha ha)  and scribble and think and think and scribble and come up with a fool-proof plan for foolery itself.

And I'm going to Norfolk!    I'm looking forward to going to Norfolk!!!!



Now that's funny!


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(OK  -   I know we have already off to Dubai earlier so I'm not expecting an over-dose of sympathy  -  but that was a sudden opportunity  -  a treat  -  and didn't seem real somehow.    A lovely dream.    And I wasn't in such a state of lunacy.    So shut it!)


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 * *  Sobs.   Clutches the door-frame.   Bottom lip quivers.    Go!  *  *   -   I have been running on the diesel fumes for the last couple of weeks now.    Total basket case.    Hurtling from one box of frogs to another.     I really really need to  STOP.      And  GO AWAY!      Away from my endless doings.    Unfurrow my unbeautiful brow.    And unthink my unfunny undertakings.      *  *  Sweeps back of hand away from beading forehead and turns sharply to camera  *  *  

Sounding all negative you guffaw.    But too much positive comes back round to negative if you're not a bit more less-y.    You see  -  lately it would appear I'm just a girl who cain't say  'No!'  -  an'  I'm in a terrible fix.      ...Oh yes.....    

'Yes!',   in discord with the Positive Thought Brigade,   merely causes piles of  THINGS  on my kitchen counter and a very muscley clutch control thigh.    'Yes!'   results in me looking in the fridge for a pen,   the washing machine for the tea bags  and the oven for the phone.    'Yes!'  has brought me closer to becoming my mother  -  herself famous for putting milk bottles in the airing cupboard,   stroking her handbag  and leaving that very item on top of the car and driving off.     'Yes!'  has torn apart the organizing part of my brain with the doing part of my body.    'Yes!'  decrees that no thought can pass through my mind until at least 5 biscuits have passed through my lips.    'Yes!'  makes every mundane decision feel like a World Cup Final penalty shoot out.    'Yes!'  has driven me to the brink.....      It's definitely time for some  'No!'


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Hmmmmmmn  -  'No!'  you don't fit into your wetsuit anymore due to extreme biscuit abuse.    

                                                                     'NO!!!!'


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Aaah -   but the British holiday........    Happy smiley slightly neglected kids  and  dappy shiny slightly forgetful grown-ups .    Sand in your ice-cream  and  love in your heart.      Seagulls on your case,   plasters on your toes  and the wind up your jacksie.    

Games.      Conversation.      Makin' memories.

Oh god.

That means   (a)   Cards   (No!   No!!   No!!!)      (b)   'Why can't we have nuggets and chips for dinner?'    'Because you had it for breakfast and lunch.    For the last 5 days!'      (c)   Scrubbing off crayon murals from freshly renovated holiday walls with tiny bendy dinosaur rubbers before Daddy comes back from the paper shop.


That's not so funny.


Maybe I should send them off on holiday and I stay here.    Just me and my washing line.    No no no....


I want to go and stare at the sea.    Ask it some big questions.    Throw stones in it if I don't like the answers.    Or throw stones at wasps like my Dad.    Wonder what he was thinking about?








Wasps probably.








    
        




  

Never-At-Home Education Part One - Breaking up

I really really need to write a nice new post but I haven't had a moment for aeons.    Here's a skanky lame excuse.....  

My house is a freak show.   My kids are feral and about to be offered on e-bay.    Nobody's got any clean clothes.    Tinned soup for lunch whether you like it or not.    And I'm beyond exhausted.  

Despite not doing a  'school run'  everyday  -  2 or 4 or 6 times a day  (I still have the memories)  I am still constantly on the run every bleedin' day the Sun/Rain/Wind sends.    My car is so full of food I really ought to stick it in an envelope and send it to the poor starving children in Africa  -  as I'm sure we have all called our bluff on our parents' not-so-empty plates threat of old   (as discussed lately on poor lamenting Mr Shev's blog).     Sorry I'm not making any sense...... I'm breaking up.....

Breaking up.    That sounds good actually.    Do Home Educators  'break up'  for the summer?  

I'm not sure what that would entail.    If we carried on doing our thing  -  we might be in danger of coming into contact with  'school children'.    Everybody knows this is not a good idea.    For a start we are all religious nutters and might start talking in tongues.    Secondly we don't know how to socialize and we might eat other people's smaller children  -  probably surreptitiously in an area marked  'Only food purchased from this establishment to be eaten here'.    Home Edders can't read.    Obviously.    And another thing  - we'd find ourselves having to pay  FULL PRICE  for something.    The fall out from this would not be pretty.    We might shout.    Cause a scene.    Bring unwanted attention to ourselves.    That wouldn't do anything for our image..........    (We can add and subtract when it suits us.)      

But for now we're still fitting in  gymnastics,   football,   ice skating,   street dancing,   karate,   art workshops,   park frolics,   swimming,   museum visits,   nature walks,   bug frightening,   pond dipping/dripping,   rock clambering  (not rock climbing  -  rock clambering)   and our usual hall sessions with its associated explosions,   together with the family stuff  and the hell-known-as-shopping  -  (ooh  -  we've dropped drama  -  well,  as in between  4.30 and 6.00pm on a Monday evening within an agreed allocated space  -  not as in our everyday over-the-top bloody dramas involving bedroom territorial wars and attempted sibling poisonings etc).    Everybody has to kind of    W A S H    of an evening too  (for why Madame for WHY???)   'Cos of the damned POLLEN!    My ears are retracting ever more with every bloody  sniff   snifff    ssnnniiiifffffff .......    aaaaaAAAAARRGGH H H H  H   H    H ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Change the bloody beds?   But I just did that at Easter didn't I?

And when I do manage to turn the spray onto the contaminated stinking sneezing urchins  -   they go out in the bloody garden again.    'It's still light!    Wheeeeeee!......'  

I don't stand a bloody chance.  

And what with this ridiculous notion of how it's so nice in the summer to properly peg out the clothes?    Yeah.......    It's a notion.    It used to be a chore and then they invented the lovely tumble dryer.    And then people got notions about the good old days when you'd hang out the washing in the lovely sunshine.    And then it became a duty to not use the lovely lovely tumble dryer in the lovely summer.    And then husbands get all complainy about the house being all hot and how much money it costs blah blah blah.....  and it's such a joy to be able to peg out the washing in the lovely sunshine.....    But who is pegging out the bloody washing in the lovely bloody sunshine?    Hmmmmmn?     Yes  -  bloody ME!    No you haven't got any bloody dinner because I'M PEGGING OUT THE BLOODY WASHING IN THE LOVELY BLOODY SUNSHINE!!!!!    I really don't need to be reminded that it's 9.30pm and they haven't had their pollen-shifting showers yet.    I've got 3 more festering loads of bed sheets here that I washed yesterday waiting to go on the line and I'm busy rescuing this mummy spider and her 75 babies from the knickers that I hung out 4 nights ago and didn't have time to get off  and ..... and.........      

...........AND I NEED A BREAK!!!!!!!

    
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I'm not complaining about the lovely sunshine.    I love the lovely sunshine.    It would just be nice to appreciate it face on,   relaxed like.    As opposed to back-of-neck-on with arms in the air like.

And I'm not complaining about our lovely busy life and all the lovely things we do.    It's fab.    It's mental,   but fab.

I just need to calm it all down  -  a bit.    And maybe have a  'summer holidays'  sort of gig ourselves.    It's called 'breaking up'  I believe.    Never been so apt a phrase.  

In a couple of weeks I can reclaim Fridays.    Fridays can be our new Sabbath.    I shall worship the God of Pissing About Aimlessly in Our Own Filth most devoutly.    A-men.
    

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And then everybody else will  'break up'  from school and ring us up and say  'let's get together!    What days have you got free?'  

Ohgodohgodohgod....think woman think! .............    Sob  sob  sob   '.....um.....h-h-h-h-h.........Friday?'

'Perfect!    Let's go swimming!'

'W-W-W-W-Wha-Wha-Wha-Wha-Wha-t?    Bu-Bu-Bu-Bu-Bu-Bu-Bu.........     Nnnn-nnnnn-nnnnnn-nnnnnn..........    Hu-hu-hu-hu-hu-hu-hu-hu.........  eeeee!    eeeee!    eeee!      eeeee! ohmyohmyohmyohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod
 OHMYGODOHMYGOD OH MY GOD   O H    MY   GOD      O  H   M  Y    G    O    D  !!!!!!!!

            IN THE SCHOOL HOLIDAYS?  


                                JESUS,   MARY   AND   JOSEPH!!!  



                                                       ARE YOU  I N S A N E?

       


                                                                        F UC K    O F F !!!'




                                                                                   !!!!!!!!!