Departures 24.06.07

Well, I've been abandoned again! This time he has gone to work - who in their right mind would go to work on a Sunday just to be allowed to do more but different work during the week - he's potty. Even worse there were no trains running so his journey to and from work took twice as long!

So I found myself alone in bed this morning with nothing more exciting to think about than the imminent departure of Tony Blair (at last!). It seems that now that he has finally been dislodged from UK politics he is to be paid a ridiculous sum to head overseas with the aim of bringing peace and co-operation to the middle east. Now I don't have too much trouble with the idea of paying him to go away, somewhat belated maybe, but a good idea. The bit that troubles me is the plan to send him to the middle east, surely they have enough problems without having to put up with him as well! Apparently this was the idea of President Bush; I know he makes Winnie the Pooh look like a genius, but where on the Blair CV is there anything to suggest that he could bring peace and harmony to any part of the world? The man couldn't even get on with his own chancellor and surely even Bush cant imagine that Iraq was a success!!!

My prediction for the Deputy Leadership proved somewhat wide of the mark. Harriet Harman surprised everyone by just scraping a victory over some other faceless wonder who for some reason or other was the bookies favourite. Not that it matters, she will have about as much power and influence as the milk monitor in a primary school. Whoops, that aged me a bit! We did have milk monitors 'in my day', we also had a book monitor and an ink monitor, but the prized job was bell monitor. It was the job of one of the oldest children to go to the hall table and ring the bell at the end of each lesson. It was a polished brass bell with a lovely wooden handle, it was very heavy and surprisingly loud

Back to reality, another more upsetting departure has been announced. Thierry Henry is to leave Arsenal for Barcelona - that is something worth feeling sad about!

The Sights You See When You Haven't Got Your Gun! 12.03.02

Robbie had an early start this morning, he is off to Leeds to talk to Network Rail - I suppose someone has to talk to them! He has this annoying habit of setting his phone to wake his alarm clock up. He fails to answer the phone, then sets the alarm to snooze. He seems quite capable of doing exactly that, but snoozing is the very last thing on my mind. I end up threatening him with a near death experience and he plods off to seek sanctuary in the bathroom. By this time I am wide awake and all I can do is fantasise about taking revenge on him - maybe a mouse trap in the bed would be fun!

As if that wasn't enough I was then treated to the alarming sight of him trotting around in nothing but long socks and knickers looking for a shirt. The socks make him look like an overgrown boy scout! I had ironed 7 shirts and a mountain of other stuff at the weekend, but somehow I had 'conspired' to leave him shirtless this morning. Apparently only one shirt in his vast collection is suitable to wear to Leeds, and oddly enough it just happened to be the only unironed one!

On the subject of clothes, I watched a bit of the Rugby yesterday, It was good to see England win, but they are a fiercely ugly bunch! What was going on with the shorts the French were wearing? They were ridiculously short, it looked as if they were wearing nappies. I'm not really into rugby, Arsenal are much prettier!

The Shadow 25.02.07

The new black guinea pig has been christened Shadow, she is very cute. I am not sure if it was the naming of the guinea pig or the post mortem on today's Arsenal game that led Sam to ask why Black people don't like to be called coloured. I just said that it is what they prefer, and it would be disrespectful to use words that could cause offence. I could see Sam busily processing that thought, then he applied his devastating logic to the matter. He said that it was factually wrong anyway because white people are more coloured. In response to my confused look he explained that we are pink not white, but when we are cold we go blue, when we are ill we go green, when we are sunburned we go brown and when we are angry we go red. I see what he means, he really does have a unique way of looking at things!

Thoughts on Football

My post about Robbie's Walsall football shirt has prompted a number of people to suggest that I don't like football. My problem on that occasion was nothing to do with football, it was the 'vision in pink' who was expecting to be allowed out of the house looking like that.

I come from a town which calls it's football team the 'Cobblers' for good reason! Some people will suggest that it is because we were historically a centre of shoe manufacture, but you only have to watch them play to see that they live up to their name! I support Arsenal because they are fun to watch and they are much easier on the eye than any of the other teams! I don't watch much sport on TV, I have better things to do, but I enjoy watching Arsenal play and I love watching snooker. I detest tennis because the noise of the balls drives me mad and motor racing is too noisy and totally pointless.

So what does all this rambling about sport have to do with Robbie. Well, several people have asked how I put up with him. I don't 'put up' with him, I love him and we have a great time together, he may not be very practical, but that doesn't matter. He isn't interested in sport, so we have lots of time for family things. He is kind, funny, thoughtful, sensitive and he is interested in all sorts of things. Some of his qualities are less obvious to the casual observer, but if you can't work out why he is special, you are missing something!

Fancy Footwork

It is only just over a year since we got married, but it feels as if Robbie and I have been together forever because despite 'eccentricities' we get on incredibly well. There were lots of reasons why we didn't rush into getting married, but there was one major obstacle for Robbie - I wanted him to wear shoes! For any readers who don't know him, he always wears Dr Martens (because he has different sized feet). Eventually Robbie negotiated a deal re the shoes for the wedding. He would wear Dr Marten Oxford shoes for the big day and I would make no objection to him buying a new pair of purple Dr Marten boots. I wouldn't have minded him buying the boots anyway, but I let him think he had struck a tough bargain! He does make me laugh.

He was even brave enough to suggest that I should also wear Dr Marten's. Apparently they do make Dr Martens for women, but there is no way on earth that I was going to wear them for my wedding - or any other occasion. Robbie's boots are incredibly heavy, it would have been like getting married in diving boots, I wouldn't have been able to lift my feet up! My friend got married wearing an Arsenal top, I was tempted by that idea, but I don't think I was designed for sports wear!!