The Agony of the Abandoned Wife and the Ecstasy of Neglected Children

I need to sort out so many of things in the house this evening. I cannot see or feel floor. Obviously the first job was to switch on the computer. The next was to scoop a handful of Thuglet's popcorn. Can't possibly read all those blogs on an empty(ish) stomach. I mean dinner was easily 20 minutes ago. Much shouting needed too. Multitasking again. Then I'll need to eat some mint chocolate creams from my secret tin. Well, my baking ingredients tin. So innocent-looking. I'll be needing the energy. It requires at least 3 chocolates to erase all my recent texts in my inbox and sentbox. And after all that I'll need a little sit down. And another couple of chocolates obviously.

Trouble is THEY just won't let me get on. So much to do. But there's always something they think is more urgent - like a purple flattened finger in the bathroom door. Those sobs of agony are so distracting. As is the Diahorrea Song that flings in at top speed from the garden every now and again attached to a puffing 3 foot scarecrow with blue ink all over his face. Apparently he HAD to yank his brother backwards off his feet by the hood because ....oh I'm not actually listening. Crying won't get you any more attention. Can't you see I'm snowed under? Go back outside it's nearly bedtime. Go on.

Daddy's away for 6 more days. That's 6 more days of this interminable slog. Noone's helping me eat this popcorn you know. And I've got a packet of red highlights and a facepack with my name on it too. It never ends. It better not stain my newly painted fingernails. I just won't cope. There's still a whole weekend to get through without the aid of the golf on the telly. That's hours and hours of having to choose my own damn entertainment right there. I tell you - this lone parenting thing is hell. It's not all doughnuts and oven chips you know. There's bloody biscuits too.

I must remember to check his flight arrival time next week. Don't want him coming home to me looking all purdy now. Must kick off the sunglasses, apply chicken grease to those special places, spray liberally with Dettol (my signature fragrance), count to 10 and frown.

'Hi honey. How's it been?'

'Oh you wouldn't believe!'

Ole to the Man on the Box

I have 4 minutes to produce my thoughts. It's MY turn on the 'poota after a week of inertia due to illnesses (mine, followed by Thuglet's, followed by oh he's up...) Never mind. But this will be a more than usually incoherent spew of tumbling brain-gush.

It's Saturday morning - football training has been avoided and it's MY BLOODY TURN alright? Get your own bleedin' apple juice.

Yesterday was an A - Z of emotions due to the Super-Glued Settee of Hot Boy (not as fun as it may sound) finally bursting into a boiling mass of screaming-for-no-apparent-bloody-reason-child and lid-blown-off-mummy. Lid-blown-off-mummy then sat in the garden with chocolate biscuit and sobbed. Had slightly frightened visitors. 'What's the matter?' No imagination my family. Not even imagination that's required. Just eyes and ears. Surely that would be enough to work it out.

Now, just leaping across my mind contours for a second, I've been a long-time lover of flamenco. I even did classes for a year or so until I moved and couldn't find another place that did it - (was also pregnant by that time and ......... life as I knew it stopped there anyway). I never saw the annual shows at Sadler's Wells cos I was always too skint, never managed to frequent the Spanish bars round the West End where it all flourished (apparently) when I was living up in London as noone else ever wanted to go (and I just never did wander in by myself - being permanently skint), and last year I noticed a flamenco show at the Trinity Theatre in good old Tunbridge Wells but Friday night's are awkward what with football and .....being skint. But this year I see the flyer again and - football or no...... skint or not........ I just went and booked it. And organised Mr GPants' mum and dad to babysit all by myself. Historic.

Been looking forward to it for weeks. Even on holiday I was brewing up as I was reading Victoria Hislop's 'The Return' (which by the way damn near ruined my holiday as parts of it were so harrowing but I had to keep reading). And despite Mr GPants' obvious disinterest I was counting the days. But then I had Hot Boy. The longest temperature in our family's history. All the week's plans daily knocked down like dominoes. Repeat text 'sorry cant make it today.....' And it's Friday and he's STILL BLOODY HOT!!!!! Mr GPants will most likely not get back from a job in Wimbledon in time anyway.

He tries to sound helpful. 'Why don't you take Minx?'

She's not interested.

'Or my mum? She'd love it'

Because it's supposed to be a night out for US! And you're always moaning I don't organise anything and even 2 days ago you said I should think up things we can do together and I have and you can't even be bothered to come and I've been looking forward to this and I've been sat on the bloody settee and the house is in ruins around me and he's screaming and I like it when YOU drive and I need to get out of this house and I you like guitars and I still don't know whether to throw the microwave away cos it smells and it's bad and I hate breakfast-lunch-and-dinner and your dad won't be happy having all the kids until you get back and anyway he's still hot and screaming and I didn't take the kids to their things this week so maybe I shouldn't go to my thing either and my coffee's cold and I've hidden my bank statement and I'm wearing tracksuit bottoms for the 6th day in a row and my ant bites are driving me mad and your mum might not like the funny singing and I haven't emptied the dishwasher and my hair is crap and you don't understand me.......

Actually I think I said 'Mmnn'.

Then Minx came out and said 'He's stopped screaming. I'm a genius. His apple juice was in the wrong cup. And he's taken his medicine.'

A new dawn rises.

And I sort of scrape the house back into a liveable pod. Cut myself a new fringe. Layer on extra smoky eye-liner above and below the eye and smother in green shimmery stuff AND feed the little bastards. Mr GPants makes it back in time and OFF WE GO.

He's still obviously uninspired by the whole thing but manages not to snore. I love it. I love the fact that the singer looks like a proper big ol gypsy wailer. I love the 2 guitarists - one sleek-haired, one long and wavy-haired. I love the little chap sitting on a box, batting out his rythmns. And I love the 2 women - not young and pretty and smiley but real and expressive and earthy. If one member of the gang isn't required for a number they get up and bugger off. At one point everyone had gone but the Man on the Box. But then one of the guitarists came back. Of course come the interval it is this moment that had captured Mr GPants' only shred of enthusiasm. 'I was hoping we would just get the Man on the Box' which led to a rambling giggle of ' "And what do you do?" "I sit on a box" "That must be very interesting" ' etc etc

And then we went back in for the 2nd half for more cool (for me) stuff. And at one point I reasise that the Man on the Box isn't there. Where's our Man on the Box? Suddenly we hear Snappety Snappety Snappety Snappety and on comes - The Man off his Box but he's taken off his shirt, put a dandy red bandana on his head and then.......... OMG - the Man with the Castanets is the most jaw-droppingly astounding dancer I have EVER seen. His solo performance went on for about 20 minutes of amazingly powerful beautiful passionate brilliance. At one point his feet were truly a blur. I think my gob was hanging open. He was certainly some secret weapon for the 2nd half. My head is still pulsating with the energy.

Mr GPants' verdict?

'He's gay.'

I googled 'Flamenco Express' this morning. His name is Titi (more guffawing from Mr G). Titi Flores. Look him up.

The brats are really circling now. Drooling. They want blood. My time is up. Actually I've taken the piss a bit I suppose. But I had to share my Titi experience with you.

Ole!

Life is big pants, telly is thong

After only 2 weeks of sunshine stuff - 2 w e e k s - not 2 years! - I feel like I have landed back on Planet Ice Age, only without the funny bits. Still going to bed in 15 layers. The slugs have joined in the salsa classes all over every floor. And I really can't be bothered to clean any of the mess up. I have already moved house in my head. The interesting-looking house with the annexe up for grabs nearer the ice-rink but still-in-reachable-distance-of-the-rest-of-our-lives has now got 'Let Agreed' slapped across its picture and I don't fancy anything else on the lists. But this hasn't stopped me from believing that our 'new' house is out there somewhere. My 'belief' may be there, but my enthusiasm for finding it has diminished. Still wondering if England as actually going to provide it. Pie in the sky. As if our brats would let us move anywhere other than... Even 'just for the winter' is sparking blasphemic fireworks. How could we possibly entertain the notion of having a nicer life in a nicer place with nicer weather? 'Our FRIENDS are HERE!'

I'm still confused.

I'm still fucking cold.

I really don't think I could stand another British winter. I really feel now that I've done my fair share. As with the alcohol 'book of tokens' idea - ie: we all get a book of tokens at the start...... some work their way through for the duration of their stable life, others use up all their tokens early on and don't get any more, some nick other people's books etc etc ..... I now believe I have used up all my British winter tokens.

But I'm forgetting - it's May. That's Spring isn't it? Time to unearth short-sleeved things, shove old tights into a bag for stuffing toys, pick the fluff off pretty light-weight cardigans for 'just in case' weather? Insignificant knickers? Bollocks. Where's me big pants. Feel like the ice-rink is a warm haven.

Ungrateful little bastard.

Maybe this miserable old hag needs some inspiration, or reminders of what is good about England? Is there anybody out there? I need a good talking to.

(At least the Labour educational 'reforms' have been swerved! I cannot be reformed. Can the whole political system be reformed? Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha .............. !!!!!!!!!!!!! Yeah - that's a good one Dave..........)

I think I just need a bit of something - my 'I'm so lacking - of skills, brain, ANYTHING!' thoughts keep swimming through my head just when I start to see light at the end of the baby-rearing tunnel (it's a pinprick but we're nearly at the Grand Ceremonial Potty Hurling stage). I thought by this marker that I would have all the answers - or at least a whittled down multiple-choice selection that I would ponder. That vague floaty 'what do I want to be when I grow up?' musings, which turned into the imaginative 'what do I want to be when the kids are all at school?' question, which turned into the desperate 'what could I possibly manage when the kids are old enough to wipe their own bottoms?' puzzle, is now a drier form of Chinese water torture. ie: you are a useless, talentless, lazy, unfocused, unemployable, old, unimaginative, lumpen heap of unsightly wrinkles slumped in nasty clothes that has no hope of ever finding your place in this world. That about sums it up.

Obviously I pretend to the children that this bonny old world is full of boundless opportunities and that I have merely sampled some of them but not settled on anything because I'm so full of life that I need to taste a little everything before I die blah blahh bleughh.... Is it easier to have 'been something' and then had children and forever look back all misty to the good old days? I've never 'been' anything. Not really. If I find myself 'looking back' it's not misty - it's just glossed over. I've covered the lens of my history in Vaseline to obscure the tedious details. I'm a bit of an Impressionist me. Photo-Real does not work here. I really would like to have something to be proud of - other than delightful offspring. God - OTHER than 'delightful offspring'! Mine are definitely 'other' than 'delightful offspring'.

I can only hope that my 'other than' delightful offspring will become delightful adults full of pride in their weird and wonderful achievements. Not miserable old Not Even 'Has Beens' 'cos I never 'Had Been'. Ohhhh stop now!

I know what I need! I need a dose of my new favourite film - Drew Barrymore's directorial debut: 'Whip It'. Yes yes yes.........

Saw a few films while I was away - most of which I couldn't finish because they were so goddamn boring. Such as 'Motherhood' - about a mother who blogs (ohgodohgodohgod-so awful I can't describe, just designed to make anyone who blogs feel like dog poo crumbs that even dogs don't sniff), 'Creation' - the Charles Darwin yawner, 'Nine' - really dire remake of 8 1/2 with shite songs, 'Everybody's Fine' - which I was looking forward to but..zzzzzz.... but amongst all this waste of celuloid Minx discovered 'Whip It' in the folders of DVDs left in the house for our plundering. It's all about Roller Derby - wild girls in fishnets and safety helmets bombing around a raised track on roller skates slamming the shit out of each other. With names like Eva Destruction, Bloody Holly, Princess Slayer etc. Our mission was to all have Roller Derby names by the end of the holiday. I'm still unsure about mine - needs a little tweak. Not obscene enough. Vexin' Vixen? Better than Mr GPants' suggestion tho'. he'd lamely suggested 'something like Foxy Lady' (sweet of him but phrghhhhhh). I'd answered that 'Badgery Woman' would be more apt. After which he came up with 'Battery Hen' and felt very pleased with himself. Minx is 'Dizzy heights' (mixture of her most-used moniker and hint of triple axles to come). Think I have blocked out Mr GPants' new name. Must be a sanity-saving reason........ But this film (and I must get the original book) is now my life's blood. Maybe it can replace the sun I now so crave. It's basically about 'being the real you' which I know sounds buckety - (in the film it's 'Get some skates on and be your own hero') but I'm the sort of saddo who NEEDS to be reminded. I just need to find MY 'Roller Derby' thang. Meanwhile I just need to keep watching other people being cool to make me feel like it might rub off.

I need to get onto Amazon right now.

There we are then. Happiness. It's not all about achieving things with one's life. It's watching telly after all.

I bloody knew it.

Somewhere Over the Rainbow....... skies are green....?

Hey The Bitch Is Back!!!!!!!

And I'm fucking cold.

And everything is small.

Including my mind.

Travel broadens the mind apparently. Boxes full of baclava broadened my arse. Why doesn't my miniscule fridge have a box full of baclava? I don't understand. Why can't I get into my jeans?

Why are these apples the size of peas? 'Is this our biggest saucepan?' asked Mr GPants yesterday. And when did the A22 shrink? Were our stairs always so bloody narrow? How do I get a shower in this midget house without the curtain sticking to me?

But......

..............a two-hand tall mug of coffee? More than three sips? I need to sit down for this.

And who painted the whole world green? It's so green. It's SO green!

But yes I'm back. I wanted to be back. Until it was nearly time to come back. I was just kind of getting used to it. And now I'm here. And I want to go away again. The grass was greener over there. No that doesn't work - well there was patches of green stuff which made me stare and made me think 'how much does that cost to keep?' and 'I miss green' and then we got back and it's unbelievably green. Beautiful. Like quenching a thirst. And now I'm thinking 'I miss beige'. I think I am what's known as a ungrateful little bastard. A much-used phrase in our house. I have 4 ungrateful little bastards that have sucked my soul to a sharp diminishing 'blip' like the end of telly in the old days. The 'blip' of oblivion.

The youngest 2 were OK - adapted to their new chimp compound with simian ease. There is floor - lots of it. There is garden - we know this. There is pool - ooohhhh - splashhhhh......plop......splutter......cool. We can do pool. There is sand - oh yes. There is sea - that does splashhhh too. We know this. We can do holiday. We is holiday. Holiday R Us.

The older 2 however..........

'I'm bored. I miss my friends. How many more days til we can go home? You haven't got any more credit on your phone and I want to text my friends. I'm already packed. When can we go to MacDonalds? .....................'

'You've got a 9 bathroomed marble-floored palace on the beach with a pool and a killer view across the sea of cartoon-crazy Metropolis and it's gloriously hot and all you can do is moan about going home! You ungrateful little bastards!'

'So?'

All of which proves that they don't have a bad life now do they if they couldn't wait to get back to it?

Mr GPants LOVED it big time. Keeps talking about the light, the sun, the skyscape, the space, the business loans.......... There's gold in them thar hills. There's WORK. Not just for the winters - we could try it for a year.....

I spent most of these conversations smiling like the groom's mother, staring out to a mythical saviour, quaking inside, thinking about ruined castles, shadowy museums, big old oak trees, rolling hills and Mr Whippy.

Saying 'mmmmm....'

Small minded you see?

But maybe travel broadens the imagination. If apples are bigger over there, they might be bigger over ....... there, or there, or even there.............

Ohhhhh! Im all confused see...... I like my green. But I like big apples. I like my bluebells. But I like the warmth. I like my hefty mugs. But I like the enthusiasm of 'not England'.

I like my tortoise shell. But I am just beginning to poke my head out. I don't know what to think: Adventure or ............ Green?

But the biggest factor is - the ungrateful little bastards. In this case the question is really: Money or Friends? Over there = most likely a better 'quality of life'. But......we have definitely chosen a Home Ed way of life. This doesn't always transfer. I know people who moved to warmer, more wonderful places - and found a barren social scene for non-schoolers which sent them back to grimy cold old England. How do you value educational wildness?

For me - pretty high.

SO - why did you bastards still vote for Ed fucking Balls??????

It is not me who is the ungrateful little bastard. Mr GPants is lamenting so many of his well-heeled friends still ranting about Labour's misfortune. OPEN YOUR FUCKING EYES PEOPLE!!!! We can't do much about England's shitty weather but you CAN change the fucking strangling government. We don't have to wear sleeves in the presence of men. We can kiss our beloveds in public. We are not being bombed every day. The doctor's might just see you before you die. The water will not kill you. We don't live under a volcano or on an especially dodgy fault line. You don't have to go to church. You can marry or divorce whoever you damn like. And, for as long as we can keep Ed Balls restrained, you can take responsibility for your own children.

But it is fucking cold.

It's not just the weather that is making me think of distant shores. I am tired of our supposedly creative and individual quirky country (yeah?) being so small-minded. If I can pin down somewhere with castles and ice-cream, art, decent music-makers, money I can understand, English speaking (sorry but...), bonkers experts on bonkers subjects happy to bend your ears for an afternoon, property we can afford, tax we can afford, drugs and guns free, football and ice-skating a spit away, second-hand shops, child-welcoming cafes, and gangs of wild children free from educational strait-jackets - and THE SUN - and GREEN!!!!!! - then I will skip off happily.

Any suggestions?

I'd send a postcard but .......... eugnmmmphprrrrhhhh

I have nothing to declare except my ........pathetic desperate need to be remembered while I am away. Just thought I'd announce that I am heading off (ash-willing) Middle Eastwards in a day or so and won't have internet access for 2 weeks. Well...... unless I sneak off to some cyber cafe thing but that seems a bit sad - imagining 4 little noses pressed up against the window, buckets and spades in hopeful little paws. Pah.

Anyway - I'm hoping a dose of intensive sun (or most likely intensive air conditioning with me in a cardie - just like old teenage days) may inspire a regrowth of brain cells. God I need some. My powers of recollection, recognition, speech, putting one foot in front of the other etc are at zero. I can barely blog. Gasp.

So I will perhaps relearn how to communicate with my family without turning everything they say/do into 'potential blog material' (which gets instantly forgotten anyway - hence my output is usually a spew of self-loathing and leaden adjectives - see?) I may also address my serious ' - ' addiction, and unimaginative reliance on '........' s

I need to go to bed. I need to go on holiday. I need to go on medication. Do I need to go on? Oh for gods' sake woman (btw - ' gods' ' is deliberate) I NEED to cut out all this skanky stagnant pond of consciousness pigflaps and learn how to communicate with humans full stop

I really can't stand my incessant moanings. I want to reconnect with my spiritual side. Find the rainbow within. Bollocks - I know exactly what's bloody wrong with me - it's this not swearing lark. It's driving me inbloodysane! I'm sure that's why I've been so fucking angry for so long! I NEED to let it all out! Shitfuckwanktitcuntbollocks..........

God that's better.

That's way cheaper than anti-wrinkle cream. I feel like I'm on holiday already. I genuinely feel lighter and happier and deeply fucking soulful. We should not deny our true selves the expression we crave. I am obviously mined from a foul seam and am happiest crawling in the dirt.

We are all of us in the gutter but some of us fucking love it.

Yippeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!......... I'm off little mouse!!!!!!!!!!

Who am I?

My rough old paws stink of Dettol and sun block. Meant to clear up the house today but ended up clearing out the barn thing instead. Mr GPants started it. He was supposed to be clearing up the garden. We have had a life-lightening experience tho' - even tho' now I also have more stuff IN the house to go through. But we do have a fine-looking bonfire pile. And a frightening-looking dump pile. How come we accumulate so much STUFF?

We found creative things we had done in a previous life - wonderful tools, such an array of art materials, portfolios of drawings, newspaper bundles of forgotten ceramics, scrapbooks chronicling a couple of years' worth of the history of the world, tapes of songs, notebooks, scripts, proposals, designs, paintings, photographs, old address books full of long-since drifted partners in crime, tickets to gigs and shows and half a dozen guitar cases. All disintegrating. Covered in bird poo, mouse poo ....'the countryside'...... Stuff.

Daunting stuff.

I remarked that we would be so much happier if we were totally unproductive and just sat and watched telly all night instead.

'We do'

'Oh yeah. We do now'

Panic on the Streets of Penshurst

I'm doing something highly illegal. I am sitting at the computer in the morning. I got down here first. I've got some washing on. I've got my coffee and I've got rights I 'ave. I've also now got 4 outraged monkeys demanding things that require movement of bottom. I've pinging well earned this moment. I found the living room floor yesterday. I bought a Kellogg's Variety Pack the day before and they know where the fridge is and the contents of the dishwasher. MY turn. Is this unreasonable? When I'm still unconscious under the duvet they manage perfectly well - it's just 'cos I'm here they've lost the ability to do things for themselves. Or maybe they realise that I might just SEE how they fend for themselves. Maybe this is the truth of it. Either way - slap off little mind-snatchers. Mummy wants some head-space.

Mummy and head-space in the same sentence...... Head case perhaps. Space in between the ears very likely. Why does child production melt your brains? What is the evolutionary purpose of this? Someone once told me she thought the reason for pregnancy and new motherhood forgetfulness was to ensure that all peripheral thought was diminished to ensure you concentrated on the truly important job of keeping that baby alive. I could get my head round that. But I want my brain back now. Such as it was. Maybe always slightly faulty but it got me from A to B , mostly. Now ............... I just want to see a thought through. Or think a thought through. I want to get to B. Actually I would like to find A.

Yesterday, for example, I was driving off to pick up Minx from her chum's house. On Automatic Pilot. Unfortunately Automatic pilot malfunctioned and took me somewhere else entirely. 'Real' head had to suddenly take over and the expected 35 minute journey became a magical mystery tour through the chocolate box rolling hills of Kent for almost an hour. Having said that, I kind of enjoyed it. Nice day, no clock to watch particularly. What's the big deal...... but I do things like that when I AM supposed to be somewhere specific. Alot.

My head was so full of ponderings. Tidal channels of consciousness - semi-consiouness - whatever. I was wondering why humans are so weird. Maybe it was the sun - finally the SUN! Maybe it was knowing I had found the living room floor, hoovered and bolted out the door so that it would still be there when we got home. Maybe it was wondering why Mr Golf pants has seemed to be in such a grump since last Wednesday. Maybe I was just glad to be out the house (despite having been glad it was supposed to be my day IN the house). Maybe I'm just as grumpy as Mr Golf Pants. Maybe I should have taken my vitamins. But they are just so high up, and in a box, and I just can't be bothered to reach. I think this is a sure sign I need to take my vitamins............

All this started with my persistent panic about the election. Ever rampaging circles of anger, doubt, nihilism, despondency, responsibility, rage, panic etc etc..... I just CANNOT vote Tory I really can't....... David Slimeball Cameron, leaving a trail of fetid skank behind him all the way. But I HAVE to get rid of Labour - single handed I feel. Every vote counts. I MUST make my Labour-vanquishing vote really count. Can't just vote for a smaller party - I HAVE to make my vote COUNT! And I am going mental. I spent all my younger years banging tables about the rancid Tories - naively thinking Labour would save us all. And they simply betrayed me. THEY MUST BE DESTROYED! As they have destroyed my faith in government in general. As they have destroyed human faith in humans in general. With their ridiculously controlling attitudes - they have not empowered people to take responsibilty for themselves and to bring up their children with confidence - passing on such an ability for THEM to take responsibility for themselves. They have bred a society of sneaks and box-tickers. No risks. Fear of individuality. Super litigious. Strait-jacketed. Curtain-twitching. Morally cannibalistic. Unable to think freely or to step on the cracks. And this vice-like squeezing of individuality has funnily enough produced many drop-outs - or pop-outs - such as us Home Educators. More and more of us daring to stick two fingers up at their suffocating hypocrisy. Those double-dealing money-grabbing grubby sociopathic runts in suits. They try to convince the rest of the ostriches that we are the enemy. That we are cheating, beating, eating our children. Denying them the opportunities to JOIN THEM. BE LIKE THEM. BE THEM. I don't want my children to have anything to do with this type of society. My children ARE ALREADY part of 'society' but not THEIR type. They are already people - already 'out there' daring to BE. They don't have to be channelled and moulded until they're 16 and then pushed off to higher education for another couple of years to polish them up, 'cos it looks good in the statistics, until they're 'ready' to fit in. They do not need to 'know their place'. They will take their place, make their place, live the life of their own making - taking responsibility for themselves.

Oh god.

Maybe if they can flap off and get their own breakfast they will.

So what's my choice here? Suffocation with Labour or Eton Mess with Tories?

The day before I had seen a hearse pull up outside someone's house. I was OK with that. Always a shame but that's the swings and roundabouts etc. And then I saw the family on their front doorstep and my eyes immediately prickled into hot little tears..... Silly old slapper. Still ridiculously emotional - another side-effect of blinking child popping. And then yesterday, in the middle of my election-paralysis, I saw a wedding car. Instant reactions are funny. I had been joking with a friend the day before about this when we'd been heading down to the fish and chip shop after our fossil hunting expedition, leaving small boys on the beach 'helping' to set up the fishing rods with her husband, and she squeaked with glee first at an open-top car and then at a cement mixer - as a natural reaction to usually being with children. I always have an urge to wave at fire engines myself with or without children. But when I saw the wedding car I just wanted to shout 'You idiots! You've spunked loads of money on this day. So have all your friends and family, half of whom will have black eyes by the end of this evening and you will never speak to them again and you'll be divorced within three years and all you'll have to show for it is some nasty photographs of people who have since died looking at their shiny worst.' It was at this point, as I was wondering if I had said this out loud, when I realised that I was barrelling along in the wrong direction.

And then I started wondering why humans get married. Why has it become such a huge money-making circus? Why do funerals cost so much? What's with all our rituals? What's with all this religion lark? Why do people still do all this stuff when they can read and watch telly and travel about and SEE and HEAR about alternatives. We're not bound by our superiors or strung up for not going to church. I ordered a book about world religions for the kids to get this stuff from ('cos they don't get it from me too much - just as well really), and I was flicking through it, what nice colours..... aren't the flowers pretty.... why do they do that then?...... oh what's the squelching point of any of it?! What a load of sewage!!! No wonder the world is totally screwed up. I put the book away and haven't suggested a perusal since. I just don't get it. And this may sound really weirdly sexist and wrong but I kind of 'get' girls in a nice dress, nice hair, nice flowers etc but what do the boys get out of getting married? And how come so many of us still do this? And why, if they want to do this, do they have such overblown mental 'stag' and 'hen' nights/weeks/exotic adventures these days? I'm just an old grump who needs her vitamins. But I don't understand humans at all. And with all these 'big' questions - why do politicians waste so much time on such stupid details? We don't need all this legal restriction - we can obviously mess up our lives perfectly well for ourselves and are much the better for it. We just have to accept responsibility for our own flap-ups. It's nobody's fault but our own.

Sorry 'bout all this. It just kind of came out. I'm going to go and clean up the monsters' breakfast puddles now. And find those vitamins.