Friday’s Flying Fickle Finger of Fate

There is a particular sound that I have come to know and dread.

That awful restrained calling of your name. Pitched precisely to let you know that although something dreadful has happened either the caller doesn’t want you to panic, as they are not screaming uncontrollably, or it means they are too shocked to shout with full gusto.

Either reason, naturally, makes me panic more – present fears and all that.

The caller in question was the Better Half. I heard his cries coming through the study window from the veg patch where he had taken No. 2 daughter and Gargantuan Puppy.

As I raced up the path to the expected scene of carnage, traitorous thoughts raced through the noggin. An injury to the dog would be preferred, one to the Better Half acceptable but one to No. 2 would have been unforgivable.

So it came as a relief, possibly to both of us as he knows my views on lacerations to the children, that I discovered the BH holding out a pair of garden shears for my inspection with the wonderful words, “I think I’ve done something to my finger.” On the end of the blades sat two centimetres of neatly severed finger pad. His powers of deduction are undiminished.

Right-ho… to A & E then.

Dog in house, towels round remnants of bleeding finger, No.2 in car, BH in car, BH dead white, BH out of car, BH returns with bowl to save upchucking on car mats, BH obviously not all there, house locked, severed finger pad washed and now nestled in pot of ice. Off we go.

20 minute drive to hospital. BH has lost all colour in lips and looking a tad glazed at continued gushing of the blood from his mangled digit. I pull over. Hmmm… need something to shove on wound to stop red Niagara. Fortunately have just the right shaped flap of skin on ice. Unfortunately, no longer right shape. Now frozen flap curled like a salted slug. Only one way of thawing it out… Mmm…a tasty treat.

Love is…sucking the ice off your beloved’s fat pad.

Note to self – do not chew or swallow.

Pad slapped back on, pressure applied, blood diminishing, car in gear.

With encouragement from No.2 in back, “Faster Mummy, Faster!” reach hospital. Drop off BH by door, park, grab kid, leg it for the waiting room.

Where the wait was surprisingly short. It’s hard to tell of course, our watches were at home and prudently there are no clocks in the waiting room for you to measure your irritation at the passing time, but in short order we were ushered into a treatment room. The injury to the finger was not their concern. The BH’s alarming pallor was. Still white as a sheet, it would have been rather bad form to have him slump in a heap and cosh his head.

With the BH now reclining, and blood flow resuming to his brain, Katie, the lovely nurse, peeled off the flap, washed and reattached as the BH related how he had managed to do it.

The blades of the shears were bent. He had been trying to straighten them. So, holding them apart by an open blade he had smacked the handle end down on the raised wooden board of the veg bed. The open halves had snapped shut, of course, and…

“I was only holding it lightly”, he said, “I didn’t curl my fingers round the blade, I could have lost one. That would be stupid.” No, no, of course not. THAT would be stupid.

By the time he’d finished so had Katie. The dressings and strapping meant that the BH was permanently ‘flicking the bird’. Oh how we laughed. We laughed again when I sadistically pointed out that it had been at least ten years since his last tetanus. Katie disappeared to get the dose.

With impressive bandage, arm aching from the injection and instructions to return on Monday we were released. I drove to MacDonald’s – just time for some much-needed sugar before we had to pick up No. 1 daughter from school. As I reflected on what might have been, one of the staff gave No. 2 a couple of balloons. So fingerprints lost – 1, Balloons gained – 2. We were up on the day.

No. 1 was annoyed at missing the action. On Monday we returned to the hospital with orders to photograph the gruesome bits for her. As our nurse was not to the lovely Katie but a woman emanating all the sympathy of a deranged Sergeant Major, I thought there would be plenty of photo ops.

Wrong, she removed the outer wrappings of the mummified finger but left the rest in place and retreated to fetch the doctor.

“So, you tried to separate dogs then?” the doctor said as he inspected the damage.

“Err, no, garden shears.”

“Ah, right. So after the shears you separated the dogs.”

“Err…”

Who the mystery dog-separating hero was we shall never know, as we were distracted by the doctor saying, “Well, as soon as the end falls off you’ll be fine.”

Words that, in any circumstances, win the award for ‘least likely to offer comfort.’

When it drops off, perhaps I’ll re-freeze it. Now that I have sampled the forbidden fruit you never know when the urge might strike again. Mwah ha ha ha.

White Out

MONDAY

One day left until school starts. Spend day sewing name labels into bigger uniform. Tomorrow, will finally be able to get back to work on book. Tomorrow, will no longer be Officer of Morale. Tomorrow, will not have phone call/ shower/ pee interrupted.

TUESDAY

School. Hooray. Switch on comp - power cut.

Local overhead line fault, will fix soon. Watched Electricity Company’s helicopter buzz low over house looking for ‘soon fixed’ local overhead line fault.

Used to power cuts out in sticks. Once off for three days over Christmas with all electric cooker and open fire that smoked. If wind in wrong direction, smoke so bad had to keep all doors and windows open, pointless really.

That Christmas cooked turkey in one neighbour’s oven and borrowed small generator from another. Elderly relatives had to choose between cup of tea or telly – Eastenders won.

Now have LPG cooker and wood burning stove. Feel very smug making cup of tea as helicopter buzzes off.

Phone goes – school’s got power cut too - come pick up sprog. After agreeing realise should have said out of county.

Get sprog. During lunch power comes back on.

Heavy snow is predicted so go to churchyard a day early to swap out Christmas wreaths and flowers.

WEDNESDAY

It has dumped in the night. School is closed. No. 1 daughter celebrates.

Build snowman, middle section of snowman too large – looks pregnant.

Pack away decorations. Missing some baubles. Know I will find them now boxes back in attic.

Had new cordless pc keyboard and mouse from better half for Christmas. He rigs them up. New keyboard has many, many new function buttons encased in plastic. Decide to leave plastic on till I know what they are. Mouse excessively fast with intermittent double click. I cannot control it. New mouse is possessed. Wonder if I should call Vatican for exorcist.

THURSDAY

Pregnant snowman starting to lean back and to the left. Have christened him Oliver Stone. Better half straightens Oliver then shows me how to reconfigure new possessed mouse – cancel call to Vatican having been assured new settings will only take moments to get used to. Plastic still on new function buttons. Should read manual.

No.1 demanding to go sledging, oblige. No. 2 non-committal. Gargantuan puppy and better half straining at leash. Better half stands on sled to surf downhill. Face plants and is attacked by gargantuan puppy.

Decide not to inform better half he overcompensated on Oliver, the pregnant snowman. Oliver now starting to lean forward dramatically. Looks like he has ignored Government pregnant safety warnings and has been at the gin.

FRIDAY

More snow.

School still closed. No.1 has had 2hrs education this week. No doubt too far behind now to ever catch up. Imagine her failing all future exams, no place at college, no university. Will only be able to get job over salting fries or with investment bank.

News says entire country shut. All schools closed – ha! She’s back in the game.

Better half takes clapped out old Land Rover to shops to get food for friends coming with their 2 girls for much anticipated but now doubtful sleepover.

News has also reported dairy farmers having to pour away milk – resulting in immediate ‘panic buying’. Shelves empty. Those with milk now ‘smug buying’ last of bread.

Go sledging again. Takes 25 minutes to get them wrapped up and 15 minutes to get to top of hill

No.2 has to be dragged up. We last 10 minutes. Gargantuan Puppy has to be dragged back.

Mouse still possessed. Plastic still on. Manual lost but find missing baubles.

SATURDAY

Friends not coming. Can’t get car out of road. During phone call can hear wailing from their disappointed girls in background, will soon be matched by No. 1. Get in clapped out old Land Rover and go to them. Roads whited out.

Keep wary eye on fat snow falling outside windows as now contented sprogs eye up friends Christmas toys, open a book on how long No. 1 will wait before asking for duplicates. No. 2 not concerned. Too busy throwing herself down their stairs.

During blizzard, go for walk round nearby park. Watch local youfs impressing each other by walking out on frozen pond. While not wishing to be extra in remake of ‘Omen II’, part of me wants to see them up to groin in icy water. Snow getting worse – decide to go home to guarantee of own toothbrush and clean pants.

Mouse still possessed. Better half puts back old mouse with minimal pouting.

Oliver the pregnant snowman is now kowtowing to setting sun.

SUNDAY

News informs 8 inches of snow expected.

School informs closed again tomorrow.

I am just going outside and may be sometime.

Advertland

Macbeth. Act V, Scene 1- Dunsinane, a room in the castle.

Enter Lady Macbeth and waiting gentle woman:-

Lady M: Out, damn'd spot! out, I say!

Gen: I’ll put a girdle round about thy spot in forty minutes with new Whizzo
stain remover…

In advertland this would happen. In advertland you only need the faintest lip tremble and disappointed sigh at the stubborn stain before a perky expert comes bouncing, uninvited, into your house, to show you how to shift dried in Duncan.

I tried it once - stood in front of the washing machine looking desperate and soiled and … nothing happened. No perky expert for me. Still, her failure to show meant I didn’t have to put up with her pointing out how suspiciously grey my whites were – as grey as if an underpaid prop person had spent half the night grubbing them up.

But now and again, when you are least prepared for it, you can find yourself in advertland.

It happened to me yesterday. Now that Gargantuan Puppy has had her final shots she is safe to take out for walks. So a walk she would have. The better half got himself and the kids togged up and all were braced for a hike. As the three of them got dragged up the path by the straining puppy they looked for all the world as if they had just stepped out of a picture on the back of a hearty cereal box.


It was a perfect image. One that I know will be imprinted on my brain for life. We all carry those brain pictures, the moments that stay with you.
Some are universal - the view from your childhood bed.
Some you can see coming a mile off and so rehearse – births, weddings, funerals etc. Some creep up on you unexpectedly – Yesterday’s was one of those. Another was seeing the finished genderless room that was waiting for the arrival of No. 1 daughter. I had insisted to the better half that IT MUST BE PERFECT, as I foolishly thought it would be the last time the room ever was. No. 2’s room, despite her being 2 years old, is still in mid transition from ‘spare’ room to ‘her’ room and is full to the gunwales with outgrown baby equipment and bags of No.1’s old clothes. – yet both rooms are perfect – when No. 1 and 2 are there.

No. 1 daughter has a season ticket to advertland. On the way to school the other day she pointed to a bug on the windscreen that looked suspiciously like a chip and informed the better half that he’d better contact Autoglass. If I could film the school syllabus and put it on during the advert break we could have a brain surgeon on our hands.

Talking of surgery. As I watched my perfect cereal box family disappearing down the path the phone went. A relative was to have an emergency operation. Minor, thankfully, and all is well… still….makes you think…

But not for very long.

A minute after I put the phone down the door banged. Cereal family were back – it had started to rain.

Right-o get the playdough out.

And then put it back again.

Playdough has now been banned for the foreseeable future. No. 2 daughter fed it to Gargantuan Puppy. GP then upchucked it all over the floor.

No 1 daughter paused from creating her entry to next years Turner Prize to inspect the puppy’s own artwork. Contemplating the multi hued steaming pile with a critical eye she announced that what it needed was Cillit Bang.

The Tate’s loss was the bin’s gain and while clearing it up one of those daft pre Christmas perfume adverts came on the telly.

Even with my imagination firing on all cylinders, I doubt I will ever find myself prancing down 5th Ave / Champs-Élysées, lolling about in the surf with dubious escort or pouting languidly at the camera while grainy black and white images, a snappy soundtrack and some whispered French phrases conveys how marvellous life is on planet pong.

There should be a more realistic statement odour available.

Hang on … I can see a gap in the market here.

BREAKING NEWS… I would like to announce the launch of my own designer perfume…


“Eau de Playdough” - un parfam de puppy gargantuan.

Oh …to be in England

We are back. Any doubts that we were on the right plane were banished by the sight of the rain beading down the windows as we shimmied in for landing.

Pausing to rearrange No.2 daughter on the long walk through Gatwick, I watched it sheeting down the glass panels and dancing on the runway. It was sorely tempting to go straight to the ticket desk and get on the turnaround flight. But no, there are many, many years of school ahead before being able to do a Shirley Valentine.

Besides, 30 minutes later I was too knackered from carrying No.2 to care. For those sans sprogs, on the way out you can trap the child in the buggy right up to the aircraft door. Your buggy is then whisked away to the bowels of the plane to magically reappear on the foreign gangway as you disembark. Champion. Strap in kid and off you go. Not so when returning to London Gatwick. It doesn’t magically reappear. You have to lug the kid a mile and a half to Baggage Reclaim before you get the buggy back. When we left the plane No. 2 was at eye level and I was 5’ 6”, when we got to the buggy I was 5’ 4” and wearing her as a bum bag.

Despite having stopped at every loo, again, - and waited long enough to visibly age while creeping through Passport Control - the crowd of hares from our Malaga plane were still waiting for the bags to appear by the time we tortoises trailed in. So I had a chance, in between changing No. 2’s nappy (who had chosen the very moment I was standing guard on the hand luggage to fill her pants), to eye up the passengers.

Most intriguing were the couple who had been in the row ahead. I was fishing something out of a bag when they had taken their seats so hadn’t seen their faces. Just after sitting down the man had said, loud enough for my benefit, “Well if it starts to kick the seat, complain to its mother. Do you want to swap with me?”
To which the woman had replied, “No – I want the window. Why do I always get the ****** kids?”… Ah, happy days.

I took care to make sure ‘it’ didn’t touch the woman’s seat back. Which was a bit of a challenge, as she had reclined it and then kept throwing herself back into it in rage at the incessant screams of another child in front of her.

This gave me an occasional glimpse of the woman I hope karma will one day bless with colicky triplets. She had the high maintenance look - all skin-tight leather jacket, jeans and knee boots - so beloved in Puerto Banus, Marbella and, of course, Soho. Tossing her long blondish hair she occasionally rummaged with perfectly painted nails into the depths of a Louis Vuitton bag. Definitely one, probably two were fake. I’m not well up on LV to known if it too was a fraud. (They’re just not my bag! – thank you – I’m here all week.)

But fake is not a problem on the Costa. As you leave Malaga airport you are greeted with a huge billboard advertising bust enhancements. One can have one’s pillows re-stuffed and fluffed and still get change out of 4000 euros to afford the requisite new underwear/scaffold. Plastic surgery is so ‘in’ that a very pleasant afternoon may be spent marvelling at the facial alterations and wondering where all the spare skin goes.

First prize went to a woman who was wearing every possible combination of animal print over a suspiciously pert chassis totally at odds with a face that had that disturbingly melted look of those who have OD’ed on Botox, fillers and desperation. Her forehead said twenty; her eyes said seventy and her hands said Tutankhamun. Wearing enough gold chain to moor the Titanic and make up that would be over the top for a drag queen she teetered along clinging to the husbands arm. The husband one almost didn’t notice. But he was making an effort – atop lemon slacks, a lavender silk shirt was trying, unsuccessfully, to hold in his impressive gut and over this ensemble he had casually thrown round his shoulders a red leather jacket. What was not so casual was the fact he had the top button done up – the Costa’s own caped crinkly. To be fair I don’t know if he was crinkly, I didn’t make it to his face before my brain shut down.

They wanted to be looked at and we obliged, a good time was had by all - Which is more than can be said of a friend who had been whisked away to a five star resort in Mauritius for a half term birthday treat.

After circling the airport for an eternity she landed and immediately went down with flu. Still she wouldn’t have wanted to go outside – it was raining. It rained all week, which with two kids and a workaholic husband must have taken the shine off some of those five stars. Still, you have to laugh and she did – amusingly updating her facebook page with the latest typhoon warning while resting her broken toe – another of the week’s little gems
Her last update informed that the butler was packing for them and frankly, why not? Although it did make me a tad nervous on her behalf…
“Excuse me madam, did you pack these bags yourself.”
“No…the butler did it.”
“Ah…if you’d just step this way…”

While it’s always fun to be able to sound like you’re in an Agatha Christie novel it’s not worth a cavity search.

Back in Gatwick Baggage Reclaim, I finally got a good look at skin-tight woman. After directing her companion to add a final bag to the wobbling pile on their trolley she turned and sashayed past me in her 4” heels. Fantasy was sadly let down by reality. Her attitude and accoutrements had set me up to be green with envy at her ravishing beauty but underneath the glamour of dye, paint, false eyelashes and pout she was disappointingly plain – OK, she was munted. But good luck to her. Life may have given her carpet slippers but she put them in a Manolo Blahnik box.

I, myself, have taken to wearing wellies, my slippers having been destroyed by the Gargantuan Puppy. GP has doubled in size and weight during our week’s absence and is taking a delight in savaging the dirty washing stooks in the kitchen.

As I salvage yet another sock from her needle jaws I click my wellied heels three times and whisper ‘There’s no place like home…there’s no place like home’

And as if by magic, I’m there.

Me and You and a Dog Named…..err

What’s in a name? Well quite a lot as it turns out. For, as a family, we have been trying to name the new arrival.

A few days ago we went to look at, I repeat - LOOK AT - a litter of Golden Doodles. Although they do sound like a 60s Motown group, Golden Doodles are a Golden Retriever / Poodle cross. Like a Labradoodle but even more ditzy, if that were possible.

I have never been a fan of viewing the litter – How do you only take one?

When I was a girl, Harry was working on a job and while off set got chatting to the Animal Wrangler. She had a donkey that needed a good home. Harry rang my mother, Maureen – “Yes, that’s fine, we’ll have it.” she said.
Five minutes later he rang back “Err, the donkey’s got a friend.”
“No problem.”
And five minutes after that, “And the friend’s got a foal.”
“So it’s just the three then?”
There were originally 4. They were in a sorry state when rescued and so had been named Near, Miss, Narrow and Squeak – but Miss hadn’t made it, she was too far-gone. After a career in show business (that saw Near land a pivotal supporting role in a film about Jesus), ours seemed an appropriate place for their retirement.

17 years ago - the last time I was shopping for a puppy - We were presented with the two remaining girls of the litter and asked to choose which one - “Wadda ya mean, which one?” Yet again, like the Rangers, we couldn’t leave anyone behind. So we took them both, which meant that while they always had each other we never really had them.

Mindful of all the above, we girded our loins and approached the Doodle litter with full emotional armour in place.

Well… I did. The Better Half has never had a dog of his own, by dint of having a brother with rampant asthma. He has taken care of dogs - he inherited my late lamented two. But while I could only see the old girls for the bundles of fluff they had once been, he, understandably, could only see them as the flatulent dust clouds they had become. They were also unbelievable toxic to the asthmatic brother who has spent many a Christmas wheezing outside, only coming in for turkey and to retighten his bronchi.

As Doodles have a reputation for being slightly more allergy friendly than most breeds you can see why we were interested.
‘Interested’ is not a word I would have used to describe the better half after seeing the litter - ‘drooling’ is more like it. Puppy power strikes again.

There were 7 puppies in all and we literally had the pick of the litter. There were 3 big cream coloured boys, doing what boy dogs do best, three cream girls all of whom were breaking the cute-o-meter and then, giving off the aura of last puppy in the shop, was one black fur ball. Timid, shy and set apart from the others, so that she wouldn’t be set on as the odd one out, she was a natural born pessimist – I knew which my money was on. The Better Half’s eyes kept swiveling back to this one pup that wasn’t trying to gnaw him. We arranged to return with daughters in tow the next day. Taking with us a deposit, just in case – yeah, right.

No. 1 daughter also wanted the black one. It was hard to say what No. 2’s preference was, as she spent all her time saying either “Was-sat?” or “Dog” to anything that wagged.

If we wanted, we could take the puppy then and there. Right, everybody in the car, find the nearest pet shop and load the boot with everything it could ever possibly need.

When we returned to pick up the pooch the better half went in to collect her. As he approached she was the only one who barked in recognition. Ah… kismet.

All we have to do now is name her.


Answers on a postcard please.