Family sayings

While writing my book, I was racking my brains for an expression that my Godmother frequently used because I was determined to include it - then it came to me, "Ye Gods and little fishes".  She's been gone for a good few years now but I can still hear her saying it and it brings a smile to my face.
So this got me thinking about daft sayings or words that come from my family, in-laws and friends.
Sadly most of my dad's would be unprintable as he was known to be rather blue of tongue but his favourite, if somebody was a little gormless, was "She looked like two penneth of gawd 'elp us". Silly, but you certainly get the message.

Here come some more from my family:
Poor Uncle Wiggley - used when you hurt your finger and you're showing it pitifully.
Up the corner - a sour or sharp taste.
Worse than Lyons - when someone's clearing the dinner table if you haven't finished.  Lyons Tea House was famous for this.
Not today of all days - self explanatory!
Glomping - the huge, disabling, full bodied hug our son gives us in bed.
Fluffy McPluffy - the fluffing of pillows before sleeping.
Friday night relish - to truly enjoy your bed because you know you haven't got to get up early.
Thuman beans - human beings (my nephew at about 3).
Derp - to burp (nephew again!).

My husband's family:
Who let Fluffy out the bottle? - who passed wind?
You've had already a banana - my Dutch mother-in-law, to imply you can't possibly be hungry anymore.
Pog/ pog rag - to pog on the table is to make a mess which you clean up with the pog rag.
A sunbeam - a piece of cutlery that hasn't been used so doesn't need to be washed up.
Bella, Oo-hoo! - whenever the name Bella is heard it's always followed by Oo-hoo as that's how their Aussie friends used to call their cow in for milking! Recently reversed by inserting the Bella ahead of the Ohooo's when singing along with Beyonce's "Halo"
I taught you vell, my son - mother-in-law to husband whenever he achieves something, to take credit for turning out such a great son.
Hobbler - another word for horrible, "You hobbler creature!"
Een ounce kont in een pond broek - another Dutch pass-me-down,  a tiny ounce of bottom in a huge pound of pants (i.e. baggy trousers).

And friends:
Plockton toast - toast that has barely seen the grill (from a run-down Bed & Breakfast in a British holiday resort of the same name)
You're oiling me - you're annoying me (friends' son at 4)
Kenny Dalgleish - the standard answer to any football question in Trivial Pursuit when you haven't got a clue.
You look pretty - to be said in a really camp voice when the person is clearly not looking their best (e.g caught out at the door by gay neighbour when wearing manky dressing gown and no make-up).
Don't want a black egg, thanks - friend regularly to my husband after he ONCE achieved the impossible by charcoaling a fried egg.
Can't eat eggs with the window open - same friend as above, only applies to fried eggs as they taste "too eggy" with fresh air.

Feel free to add yours here!

Diary of a Mummy Misfit is on Amazon for Kindle or PC.

Now also available in paperback at Lulu.

My Love / Hate Relationship with Eggs

I love eggs, I truly do, and I could quite easily eat them every day - although I don’t because that would be bad for me, if not a little obsessive.

Eggs are so versatile and it’s not until you start thinking about them that you realise the extent of their culinary possibilities - fried, poached, scrambled, boiled, omelettes, quiches, frittatas, Benedict, cakes, sauces, biscuits, meringues, egg mayo and fresh mayonnaise if you’re brave enough.

You can also get pleasure from them when not eating them - painting them and rolling them down a hill at Easter, watching your hubbie clear them up when you accidentally drop one on the floor (same category as cat puke) and teaching your grandmother to suck them.

Then there’s the Fabergé egg - a thing of beauty if you like that sort of thing.

And, of course, the totally amazing egg that turns into the cranky teenage son who spends his life shooting zombies and eating.

There are nicknames for them too.  Living with an Aussie, I now know to call them bum nuts (a nut which comes from a chicken’s bottom?!) and cackleberries (the berry from the animal which cackles).

But as much as I love them, they can also drive me mad.  When I’m hungry, I take the advice of a very close friend, “You’ll be fine if you’ve got an egg inside you!”  Trouble is when I’m hungry, I want an egg inside me QUICKLY!  That’s where my problem with them starts.  And it’s the BOILED ones that cause all the problems.

OK, so it cooks nice and quickly with no real washing up to contend with but then comes … the peeling!  If you don’t manage to crack it in the right way and grab the first little bit of skinny membraney thing (technical term) you’ve had it!  The first grab of shell determines the outcome of the entire egg - often ending up with half a manky egg inside me.

I’ve tried everything - peeling hot, peeling cold, talking to the egg to make it my friend, positive affirmations.  But rarely do I end up with a good egg.

The boiled egg has even prompted two separate spats in our house - one with my husband and one with my mum.  Husband, whilst peeling some eggs I’d boiled and having the same struggle with them as me, asked, “How did you cook them?”  What’s a girl to answer?  Suffice it to say, my response is not printable.  Then my mum, in another egg-shell battle said, “Well, I never have this problem - what sort of eggs are they?”  Again, answer unprintable but I assured her they weren’t from a dinosaur.

So there you go, my fight with the evil bum nut continues and the day I get a perfect boiled cackleberry rolling around on my plate, I’ll be sure to blog about it.

But only after it’s inside me.

Why not check out my novel, Diary of a Mummy Misfit?  On Amazon for Kindle or PC.

Now also available in paperback at Lulu.

 

Thoughts on Marriage

I was talking to a couple of women at our Royal Wedding street party and they were delighting in the fact that their husbands would be away on business for a couple of days.  "Oh, bliss!" they said, "No dirty washing to pick up, watch what I want on TV, eat what I want."
I felt a bit of a wuss for not being able to agree - my husband and I have spent two nights apart in twenty years, once when I had our son and once when my husband had renal cholic (far more painful than pushing something the size of a melon out of something the size of a lemon, he reliably informs me!)
We don't spend nights apart because we don't want to.  Why would you marry someone to not be with them?  I married my best friend and every minute we spend together is precious - even when we (occasionally) bicker about petty things like not putting the teaspoon back in the teabag pot (me to him) or over-feeding the cats (him to me).  That's what makes a strong marriage.
We've had a pretty tough few years - redundancy, coping with a son with school refusal, caring for my elderly mum and we haven't had a proper holiday for eight years (no violins, please!),  but we get through it together by doing the things we do best.  Trusting and laughing.
I really believe that without those two things we would be nothing.  A marriage should be based on trust because without it you have nothing.  I trust my husband with my life and my heart and I truly believe he will always do right by me.  I think he believes the same of me.
And laughter, well, we never stop.  Luckily we both have the same daft sense of humour and are known to spend many a dull night making up ridiculous games.  And with the laughter comes talking.  We do it non stop and never seem to run dry.  Don't you hate it when you see couples in a restaurant who have nothing to say to one another?
With my husband by my side, I believe anything is possible.  He believed in me when I said I was going to write a book and he supported, and continues to support me, every step of the way.
So ladies, no I don't want my husband to piddle off on jaunts or business trips because I enjoy having him around.  I like him!

Libby and Ned have an excellent marriage in my novel Diary of a Mummy Misfit - on Amazon for Kindle.

Now also available in paperback at Lulu.

 

Poor Liz Jones

So Liz Jones (Daily Mail) has had a face lift which cost over thirteen grand and has shared the experience with the world (You Magazine).
This is the same Liz Jones who, not that many months ago, claimed to be bankrupt and struggling with mountainous debts.  Even pensioners took pity on her and sent her money!
I can't wait until I'm as broke as her.
But seriously Liz, every week I try to avoid reading your articles because I know you'll wind me up with your endless bleating about failed relationships and "woe is me" - but this time you've taken it to new levels, you've irritated me more than I ever thought possible.
Do something about the INSIDE of your head or you will truly never be happy.   Learn to love yourself because, judging by the comments on Twitter yesterday, you're the only person who's likely to.
In fact, take a break from your writing, go somewhere to contemplate your navel (if it's still where it used to be!) and move over so I can take your job on. Thanks!

There are plenty of annoying and self centred women in my novel, Diary of a Mummy Misfit - on Amazon for Kindle.

Now also available in paperback at Lulu.

 

HACKED OFF WITH GERMAINE!

I was a daddy's girl and my lovely dad taught me many, many things in the short eighteen years I had him in my life. One thing he DID NOT teach me to do was flirt ... I learnt that all by myself.

No wonder Germaine Greer found herself in hot water when, on Question Time, she claimed that girls could be sexualised by 'kissing their fathers goodnight' and that 'little girls learn to flirt with their fathers'.  Thankfully the sharp intake of breath from the audience made it clear that the sane world disagrees with her.

What a truly disgusting thing to say  - to almost make the wonderful father/daughter relationship a little bit mucky.

I used to kiss my dad goodnight, not once, but many, many times in quick succession - a silly little habit that we had.  I used to sit on his shoulders at the back of his arm chair and massage his head, tickle his ears with a rolled up cigarette paper and play hairdressers - what do you make of that, Germaine?  Because if you want to sully it and start psycho-bloody-analysing it, you've got me to answer to.  I had the best dad in the world, there was nothing smutty about it.  I grew up loved and loving.  What was your dad like?

My son, at 15, still kisses his dad good night and when he goes out.  They have joked since he was about 5 that at his 18th birthday they will have a slow dance together.  Does that make him gay?

I know Germaine has got flack from all sides about this but I still wanted to have my rant - I loved my dad and would give anything to give him another kiss goodnight - what's so wrong with that?

My novel, Diary of a Mummy Misfit is available on Amazon for Kindle.

Now also available in paperback at Lulu.

Long live (real) books!

I bet there must be loads of people out there with the same weird habits as me.  New book purchased, stroke, sniff that lovely cover and then a quick flick to the back to see how many yummy pages there are to keep me enthralled - always being careful not to discover the ending, of course.
With the birth of the Kindle and epublishing this isn't posssible.
I would like nothing more than to hold a copy of my "baby" in my hands, sniff it and think, "I wrote that!"
Sadly that's not the way my book went - it came very close with two near misses with top London publishers but the "real book" was never born. Ironically, given that the credit crunch is one of the themes of the book, they'd scaled back new writers by the time I submitted the changes they asked for (and my agent dropped the ball!).
An ebook seemed to be my last option and I'm glad that I've done it but, being old fashioned, it will never be the same.
Had I been a celebrity, I'd have been in print before you could say "royalties!"  And I wouldn't even have had to write it myself. Bitter, me?
I may be a published Kindle author but I still say, long live REAL books.  Sorry trees!

Diary of a Mummy Misfit is on Amazon for Kindle.

Now also available in paperback at Lulu.

 

School refusal

When people find out the majority of my first book was written in the confines of my car in a school car park, their first question is obviously, why?

I then have to explain how my son developed school refusal AKA school phobia at the age of eleven.  Inevitably the first response is generally something along the lines of, "Well, surely that was just naughtiness and he was trying it on?  Why couldn't you just make him get on with it?"

The answer is very simple.  School phobia is not petulance. It's crippling and very real, like only those who have had panic attacks can tell you.

As any parent who has ever dealt with this condition knows, when it first hits you have absolutely no idea what you're dealing with.  In fact, you think the very things that others have asked.  Is he playing up?  Am I being too lenient?  And in the beginning you try everything - punishment, bribes, coaxing, shouting, crying - you name it you give it a go. Then come the darker thoughts ... is he being bullied? Or even abused?

Once he was properly diagnosed, it was a question of baby steps - with me constantly in the background.  First step to enter the form room, next a full class, a half day, a full day etc.  This took the best part of three years and I was fortunate enough to be in a position where I could be there to support him.  My heart goes out to those kids who never conquer the fear and, indeed, never return to school.

There's not enough talk about school phobia and certainly not the sort of support students get in Japan, which has the highest incidence in the world. We had to pay for a child psychologist but were lucky enough to have a fantastic counsellor on site at his school.  Also the teaching staff were incredibly supportive and I could not fault the school's pastoral care.

As I write, my son has just returned from school having completed his penultimate GSCE and school phobia is a distant memory, almost as if it happened to another boy.  He's looking forward to returning in September to do his A levels at a school he now loves.

So, a happy ending all round really - a son who conquered his fears and the birth of a book!

UPDATE - 21st February 2013.  We have since featured in The Daily Mail  on ITV's This Morning (blog and link to feature here) And have met fellow tweeters and bloggers who have struggled with their children and this very real condition.  Donna Trinder and Ann Beck

The resulting novel is Diary of a Mummy Misfit - on Amazon for Kindle.

Now also available in paperback at Lulu.