Direct Action - By The Dog!

I need to buy an alarm clock with sharper edges because the only way an alarm clock will ever wake him up is if I beat him with it! Robbie was late home last night and he'd had a hard day so I understood that he needed to unwind for a while. I went off to bed shortly before midnight leaving him to follow soon after, but he did his usual trick of falling asleep on the sofa and he didn't get to bed until the dog decided to chuck him out of the lounge. Megan is a very placid dog, but she has her limits and when the snoring gets too bad she wakes him up and sends him off to bed. A couple of weeks ago he was asleep on the sofa and he woke with a start to find the dog standing on top of him licking his face. It frightened him half to death and he thundered up the stairs as if the devil was after him!

This morning was a rush because I couldn't wake Robbie up, I had to resort to threats of harm before he finally struggled out of bed. I will not see him again today because he is going off to a gig after work, a group called the Bombay Bicycle Club. I am not really interested in music so When he first mentioned The Bombay Bicycle Club I had visions of Robbie on a bike, what a scary thought! I will be asleep before he gets home tonight, so I expect I will have similar problems waking him up tomorrow morning.

First Catch Your Cat!

The wanderer has returned from his busy weekend playing trains and he is now sitting in the corner snoring and the dog is sprawled on the floor also snoring! I shouldn't moan at least while he is dozing it gives me a break from listening to tales of his wonderful trip to Swanage. He didn't seem so interested in my adventures over the last few days, I don't blame him it really.

On Friday I went to the dentist, only minor treatment needed, the pain was financial rather than physical! The trip to the dentist was followed by a trip to the vet for George the cat, he was also in need of dental work. He had all his teeth out soon after we got him because they were in a bad state and causing him pain, but recently a fragment of tooth or root has come up through his gum and it looked inflamed and painful. Typically the fragment came out on Friday morning before we went to the vet, George needed antibiotics to help with the infection. More financial pain for me and serious indignity for George.

Unfortunately George gets travel sick, on the way to the vet he vomited and on the way back disaster struck he had a serious bowel accident. When we got home I opened the cat box carefully because he was covered, but he shot out of the box and hid under the table – thank goodness we don't have carpet! I dashed to the kitchen for wipes and cleaning materials and by the time I returned George had managed to 'pebble dash' the dog as well. I was starting to lose the will to live, but after an entertaining hour bathing the cat and washing the dog I managed to get the house cleaned up. After that it was back to the same old routine, laundry, shopping, cooking, taking people here and there and then fetching them back again. There was also the little matter of getting the cat to take his tablets!

Conspiracy Theory

Robbie is still going on about his yellow T-shirt. He insists that I hid it because I was intending to demand a ransom for the safe return of his top. There are several flaws in his theory, but I can assure you that if I had hidden his T-shirt, he wouldn't have found it! I will admit to private fantasies about a mixed wash accident, but if I removed every item of Robbie's clothing that offends me he would spend his life naked! The truth is that he didn't look properly, I have kept a packet of chocolate fingers in plain view for over a week without him finding them and he still hasn't spotted the Polish Jaffa cakes that I bought two weeks ago!

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Look at Me

Last Friday I wrote about the cat thinking we should look at him rather than the TV. Here is the evidence!

You Can't Be Serious!

Last week Robbie insisted that I had lost his favourite yellow top, allegedly he had searched everywhere and he couldn't find it. I hadn't touched his T-shirt, and I knew that it wouldn't be far away so I didn't take much notice of Robbie. The next thing I knew he arrived home from work with a new seriously yellow top, it was so yellow it almost knocked you over! He claimed that everyone at work loved it - maybe they are all colourblind! I didn't like it, it gave me a headache just looking at it, and anyway after all the drivel emanating from the Liberal Democrat conference this week I don't want to see anything yellow for a very long time. Surprisingly as soon as he had replaced his 'lost' top the original reappeared, I have my own conspiracy theory about that!

Robbie has been in a serious strop recently, and in the process of acknowledging that he had said some deeply unpleasant things he offered to have his mouth sewn up, it will not happen of course, but it is such a tempting thought! Unfortunately Robbie and silence are strangers to each other.

University

It was a busy day yesterday, Laura started university, she was only there for a couple of hours but it seemed to go well. Her greatest concern seems to be the her ID card, she hates the photo they took of her! I told her that it is traditional for passport and ID card photos to be unspeakable, but she is convinced that this is the most unflattering photo ever. I can't see anything wrong with it, in fact I have had worse photos myself and some of Robbie's ID card pictures have been seriously scary!

Sam was feeling unwell when he got home from school, he had a pounding headache and he was finding it impossible to stay awake. I could tell he was genuinely unwell because we went to Grandma's for tea and usually he loves to be there, but yesterday he just sat curled up on the sofa and he went to bed as soon as he got home. I expected him to be too unwell to go to school this morning, but he came down in his school uniform as usual, he looked dreadful and he said he had a pounding headache. I suggested that he should stay at home, but he was determined to go to school, he said he had coursework to hand in. Now I am convinced he is ill! The Sam I know would never pass up the chance of a day off school, maybe he is growing up at last!

Visual Disturbance

Robbie was in a much more pleasant mood last night, in fact he was doing his best to be very helpful. So when I mentioned that I was having difficulty viewing the television because a furry interference preventing me from seeing the bottom third of the screen, he assured me that he could see perfectly. He came over to look from where I was sitting, he could still see, he crouched on the floor and finally admitted that there may be a slight imperfection in the picture. I told him that was not what I was seeing, I was losing the whole bottom third of the screen. He got increasingly cross because he couldn't see the problem, so I drew it for him, then he got cross because he had been wound up, but he agreed that moving the sofa a little would solve the problem.

The 'S' Word

I had an unusually silent day yesterday, because Robbie decided he wasn't talking to me and I decided to leave him to stew in his own juice. We have plenty of children in our family already, I really don't have the time or the energy to deal with a 37 year old kid. Wednesday is a very busy day for me so I wasn't really troubled by his silence, I hardly noticed it. He didn't arrive home at his usual time, in fact he didn't arrive home at all so his dinner went in the dog and the apple and blackberry crumble I had made remained uneaten. When I had done all my work I went to bed and I was woken at around half past eleven by Robbie, still in a strop commanding me to make sure I didn't leave the key in the door. I think that was a coded message for please can you pick me up from the station, but since he couldn't even be civil I wasn't going to offer. I went straight back to sleep, so I don't know when he got home or how he got there, but he didn't manage to get himself to bed until just before 4am - I suspect he fell asleep in the lounge.

This morning he was silent and his lip was sticking out so far that he was in danger of tripping over it. I didn't have anything to say but eventually Robbie broke the silence, he almost spat out the words “Look I'm sorry”. I was quiet for a moment, I told him I was glad he was sorry but to have any meaning an apology needs to sound sincere, he tried again and came a bit closer to a recognisable apology. He knew he had been completely out of order, but in true Robbie style when he found himself in a hole he kept on digging – if he wants to dig there is a whole garden outside in need of his attention!

He went to London last night to see a group called The Editors, I believe he had mentioned it to me last week, but he really should have reminded me yesterday. Never mind, he missed out on a nice meal and he made his own life unnecessarily difficult; maybe he has learnt a lesson but somehow I doubt it. He now acknowledges that the bookcase resembles the Leaning Tower of Pisa, he says he is going to repair it – I wonder why Heath Robinson springs to mind! I know that he is deeply attached to his railway books, but why do they all have to be in the lounge?

Throwing His Toys Out of the Pram

To say that I am angry is a huge understatement. Robbie was home late last night because he had been to the North, I messed up my evening in order to pick him up and everything was fine - until we got home! An innocent remark about his bookcase caused him to throw his toys out of the pram. The bookcase is already full and groaning under the weight of books and a simple request not to load any more books on to it was all it took for Robbie to fizz up and bang. Anyway he clamped on his headphones, plugged himself into his laptop and tried to annoy me with his music that was so loud it spilled out int the room. Failing to get a reaction he turned to Facebook and advertised for a good home for all his railway books, my comment that he should grow up prompted him to add his model deltics to the list (because I had bought them for him). I am not sure how he thought getting rid of that much clutter was going to hurt me, but I was sick of his childish games and decided not to succumb to the temptation to advertise 'Annoying husband free to a good home'. I gave up and went to bed and the silence has been 'golden' ever since! He must know he was being ridiculous and regret his actions because he deleted his facebook comments, but so far the 's' word has eluded him!

Beware of Surprises.

Next week is my birthday, it is not an event that I look forward to for all sorts of reasons, but there is one thing that really scares me - surprises. I don't like surprises and I especially don't like the sort of surprises that Robbie dreams up. He always asks what I would like for my birthday, I don't really need anything but I give him a few ideas, but he always says that he will surprise me. Last year it was the clock, the one with the test card on it, it was more of a shock than a surprise. I tried really hard to like it, I even put it on the wall but it felt as if it was taking over the room, it was either me or the clock.. I have spent the rest of the year trying to loose it! I even suggested that he should have it at work, but apparently he doesn't have anywhere to hang it. It is a huge thing, and it would swamp any normal sized room, so before you decide that I am a horrible, ungrateful person, ask yourself if you could live with a clock like that. I would have much preferred a day with Robbie instead of a present.

It is Inexcusable!

I detest London Midland, yet again they managed to mess my day up. I am sick and tired of them randomly cancelling trains and not bothering to tell anyone until it is too late. Having had to get up early on Sunday morning to deliver Robbie to the station I was less than enthusiastic about having to do a mercy dash to rescue him from some out of the way place in the evening. Robbie rang me to say that he had noticed that his train from Birmingham (and a number of others) seemed to be listed as cancelled. I told him to come home via Kettering instead, but he refused so I gave him an alternative - sleep outside the office or travel back by East Midland Trains. Still undecided he said he would ring London Midland to see what was happening but that proved a fruitless exercise, they didn't even know what day it was and they couldn't give him any firm information about his train. A clear example of 'the plan is, there is no plan' it is inexcusable. Eventually Robbie saw sense and travelled home via Kettering, annoyingly it cost him extra to do so, but there was no alternative. So I had to trail off to Kettering in the dark to pick him up, why is life with Robbie always so exhausting?

Questions, Questions

On Friday and Saturday Robbie was on his best behaviour because he really wanted to go 'out to play' on Sunday. Robbie being extra nice is certainly better than Robbie in a strop, but it is still fairly challenging because it seems to send his brain into overdrive and he bombards me with daft ideas and constant questions. On Friday he made me stop in the dog food section at the supermarket while he explained exactly how he wanted to reorganise our bedroom, interesting ideas but why did he have to choose that moment?

On Saturday morning he cuddled up to me and asked “do you ever wonder why the fluff that collects in your belly button is always blue?” I can honestly say that I have never considered the matter, but that wouldn't be a good enough answer for Robbie so I told him that it was a chemical reaction when the fluff was close to the skin for too long – he believed me for at least ten minutes!

A little later at a time when it would have been reasonable to expect his full attention he announced that there was something that he had never understood, he then asked “what is anti pasta?” I told him that judging by the way he pronounced it, it was probably a militant organisation that disliked Italian food! By then the 'moment' was lost, so I explained that he probably meant antipasto and as far as I knew it was an appetiser offered at the start of a meal. I don't like foreign food so I am not really the best person to ask about such things.

He got through most of the afternoon without incident, but only because he was saving himself for a seriously tactless random comment. That evening I was standing in the kitchen cooking while Robbie was washing up, when he suddenly asked “do you think you will have the menopause soon?”. I was tempted to answer it with my own question and ask if he thought he would need stitches today, but listening to him trying to dig himself out of trouble was so entertaining that I forgave him!

Has The World Gone Mad?

I am starting to think that there is a streak of insanity running through our town. A couple of days ago I was driving through the center of town when I caught sight of an odd looking man. A second look revealed that he was holding a lead and he was taking his ferret for a walk! The poor creature must have been terrified of the traffic. This morning I was driving through town not far from the place that I saw the ferret when I pulled up at traffic lights. The passenger jumped out of a van that was slightly ahead in the lane next to me, I didn't take much notice of him, until I suddenly noticed that he was mooning! I have no idea why he felt the world needed to be treated to that view so early in the morning, it certainly blighted my day! It reminded me of my visit to the zoo a couple of weeks ago, a baboon did something similar - but it had more reason to be proud.

The other mad thing concerns Laura's friend, a bright bubbly girl who has just passed her A Levels and is about to go to University. Laura was driving to the chemist to drop off our prescriptions and her friend was holding them. She asked Laura if that was her brother's full name, and thinking that she meant Samuel William David, Laura replied that it was. Her friend then asked why we called him Sam, and Laura explained that it was short for Samuel. Her friend's confusion only became obvious when she said "I think Master is a really cool name" Laura had to explain that it wasn't a name, it is just the male equivalent of Miss!

Fairy Steps

Robbie apologised for being a miserable old man yesterday. The reason for his strop was (allegedly) that I had made him late and he would miss his train. Robbie is an unstoppable force and absolutely nothing could make him late if he didn't want to be delayed. Yesterday morning he did everything possible to make himself late, he even stopped to put the recycling out for collection - he never usually does that. Even when he got to the station he wouldn't hurry because he was adamant that he was too late and it was all my fault. It is hard to describe Robbie walking in fairy steps - but I wish I had it on film! Anyway despite his best efforts he caught his train so I didn't make him late after all!

The evening before, Robbie had told me that he'd turned down the chance of 'playing trains' at the weekend because he needed to be at home. Roughly translated that means that he dare not push his luck any further after last week! Of course what Robbie says does not always turn out to be what Robbie does. Yesterday evening he had been reasonably pleasant, he was sitting in his corner glued to his computer when he was overcome with what I can only describe as an excess of pleasure. His moans of excitement were rather disconcerting, but I knew that only one thing could have that sort of effect on Robbie - a train! Not any old train, his favourite deltic, Royal Scots Grey. Apparently it will be at Neville Hill at the weekend and despite not having broached the subject yet, I know that I will have another lonely weekend, because where the Royal Scots Grey goes Robbie is sure to follow. Oh well, if I have to put up with another weekend without him, I'm going to enjoy myself too, maybe I will go somewhere nice.

A Short Lived Smile

I managed to put a smile on Robbie's face last night - I bought him some Polish Jaffa Cakes! unfortunately the smile didn't last too long he is like a bear with a sore head again this morning, but at least I know he is still capable of cracking his face. Actually he even laughed at one point last night, but that was only because he was laughing at me for not knowing who Jane Fonda is. I know now, I looked her up, she was in that L'Oreal advert, apparently she was in some films too but I didn't see any of them. When he stopped laughing at me for that he decided to test me on other people I may not know. He started with John Lydon, but I did know who he was because he was in a butter advert. I didn't know what group he was in but I don't think I would have been interested in him, I was never that interested in music and judging by the song that Robbie played last night his music wasn't exactly attractive.

Robbie says that his colleagues keep teasing him about his yellow T-shirts, I don't really understand they just pick on the yellow ones they are quite tame compared to his vivid blue one, and his lurid pink one can only be viewed with sunglasses! If that is not enough to scare you, there's always his luminous green and brown shorts. Robbie wouldn't be Robbie without his loud and slightly alarming clothes, they are just like him really!

The Kitchen Police

Robbie is still moaning about the 'unauthorised' knives I bought. I really don't understand him, he says that it will cause extra washing up, I hardly think that three knives and some extra tea spoons are going to cause much difference. I only bought them because he was moaning last week that we had some missing knives, and in our house tea spoons seem to the same place that scissors and biros disappear to. I think his real reason for objecting is that they don't quite match the others and that annoys him, we have a set of best cuttlery and we even have a very posh set that hardly ever gets used, but Uri Geller's understudy lives in our house, so for every day we have cuttlery that can easily be replaced.



Sam went back to school yesterday, being a typical fourteen year old he had been very difficult trying on his new school trousers so that I could turn them up. He took them upstairs, tried them on and came down carrying them, he wouldn't let me see him with them on, but he showed me how much needed turning up. So at the weekend I carefully turned up one pair, on Monday morning he put them on and they were ankle bashers, so I had to hurriedly sew the second pair to the correct length! Typical boy, a little more effort on his part in the first place would have meant a lot of effort for me! this morning I have to adjust pair one to the correct length and turn up pair three, thankfully I didnt have enough faith in Sam's measurements to turn up all three pairs on Sunday!

Mr Impossible

During last week Robbie mentioned that he would like to travel on the last HST to Newquay on Saturday and he asked if Sam would like to go with him. Sam had a better offer for Saturday and he wasn't interested in going on a train, but I said that I would think about going with him. On Friday between all my other jobs I went out and bought soft drinks, bread rolls, sandwich fillings and various other packed lunch treats for the train. Oddly when Robbie got home he didn't seem to want me to go with him, he kept reminding me that I don't like HST's and that I would need to take a footstool. In the end I said that if he didn't want me to go I wouldn't go, he then said that he did want me to go, I was totally confused and said I didn't know.

I went to bed at half past midnight and as soon as I got into bed Robbie decided that he had to ransack the bedroom looking for his yellow T-shirt, because (allegedly) he always wears yellow when travelling on an HST – whatever! I got cross and told him to go away, he'd had all evening to sort out his clothes and I was not being unreasonable by wanting to sleep at well past midnight. I don't recall seeing him again, I must have fallen asleep. I went to the bathroom at about 5am and when I got back into bed I prodded him and said that he would soon need to get up. I went back to sleep and when I awoke it was nearly 7am and the room was deserted – he had gone without me!! I was furious, he could have at last woken me and asked if I wanted to go, I was really hurt. He always wakes me up even when he doesn't intend to, so he must have sneaked out really quietly to avoid taking me with him. He didn't wear a yellow top (he thinks I have stolen it), he wore black with luminous green writing instead!

I had plenty to keep me busy all day but I was so angry with Robbie. As always when he is in trouble he stopped answering his phone, so I didn't know what time to expect him back, it must have been after 11pm because I had already gone to bed. He did wake me up when he came to bed but that was much later, I think it was getting towards 4am!
He apologised this morning, but it didn't last long, he had a full scale tantrum because I bought three new knives (to replace some missing ones) without consulting him, and they do not quite match our set. He yelled at me all because of three knives that cost less than £1!

We also had a heated argument about London Midland and their problems. I can't imagine why anyone wants to travel on lurid green trains anyway, but I am fairly sure that the company could have resolved this months ago because the contracts need to be changed to accommodate the needs of the business. It really infuriates me that neither side in the dispute show any regard for the public. The union spokesman needs an urgent course in basic English (not to mention a Gok Wan style makeover!) and the spokesman for the company was totally unintelligible - I found myself wondering if he even knew what a train was! I can understand why they seem unable to negotiate about Sunday working, with both sides in the same room it must be like Bill and Ben meets the Clangers!

So having hardly seen Robbie all weekend he is sitting in the corner playing his music so loudly that I want to go and punch him on the nose. I will resist the temptation. I will go to bed to listen to my radio instead – at least I can get some sensible conversation from Radio 4!

Obsessive Pets

I was half listening to the review of the newspapers on Radio 4 this morning when a story about a cat caught my attention. Apparently a cat in England has become the first feline in UK to be diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder for excessive grooming. It may be the first formal diagnosis but I think obsessive behaviour is fairly common in pets.

Our dog Megan has an obsession about rounding things up, when we had a rabbit she would spend hours running round in circles to make sure that the rabbit didn't escape. We had lawn circles where she wore away the grass. Maybe crop circles have nothing to do with aliens, they are probably caused by demented border collies trying to round up rabbits!

Oreo the cat has an obsession with moths, he has declared the bathroom a no fly zone and he patrols the area to ensure that any moth foolish enough to fly in through the bathroom window is caught and eating in record time. That brings me to his other obsession - food! He will eat absolutely anything, he is like the Robbie of the cat world, he even stole and ate some wine gums the other day!

Dave the cat is a feisty character, but he also has his obsessions. He is very attached to me and whenever I sit down he is there within seconds ready to sit on my lap. He gets on well with Robbie too because Robbie feeds him, but if Robbie sits next to me or attempts to hug me, Dave appears and pushes himself between us to make it quite clear that that he is my best friend and Robbie should go away!

An Imaginary Friend?

Is it so unreasonable for me to want an uninterrupted nights sleep? One way or other Robbie always manages to wake me up. On Tuesday night he came to bed after me, I was aware of his arrival but not fully awake. He did his usual trick of falling asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow, it took me longer, but I had started to doze again when suddenly he jumped and gave a little shout. I wondered what was the matter, my heart was pounding because I thought he had been taken ill, but I think he must have been dreaming. He insisted that someone had been sprinkling talcum powder over him! He was adamant about it, he didn't actually accuse me of doing it, but that is what he meant - unless it was his imaginary friend sprinkling imaginary talc! I pointed out the obvious, there was no talc on him, but he still wasn't convinced so I reminded him that I have better things to do at 2am than sprinkle him with talc! I told him that if he didn't stop waking me up, he would need to watch out for significantly heavier objects, because the temptation to throw something at him was becoming irresistible!

Happy Birthday Sebastian

I just wanted to say Happy 18th Birthday to Seb, I hope you have a good day and I really hope you like the present. Suddenly I feel very old, three of our children are over 18 now!

Sam was really funny when he was writing Seb's card, I wanted him to put more than his usual 'Sam' on the card so I told him to put 'love from....' He gave me a defiant look and said "Mum, he is having a birthday, not coming out!"

Target Practice

I can't cope with the shower not working, yesterday evening with Robbie was not a joyful experience, it was like Bazil Fawlty crossed with The Tasmanian Devil! It was so bad that I even offered to take him to my mum's to have a shower. He refused because he has to have his shower at 5am, he allows three and a half minutes to shower and one and a half minutes to dry himself so he can't fit the journey to my mum's house into the timetable! He'd better get it sorted soon because I really will harm him if he is not very careful!

Anyway after his bad behaviour yesterday, he had to make a bit of an effort to get back into my good books, but only Robbie would use a line like this as a sign of affection. His exact words to me this evening were "did you know, today was the start of the partridge shooting season?" If I had a gun I can assure you it would not be trained on any partridges, I have a much larger target in mind!!