Richy and I went to a pub quiz last Thursday with Juliet, her partner and some of their young mates. It was hilariously competitive and we rubbed along with a mix of patchy knowledge, a rare flash of genius and knowing fuck all. It ended, hours later, with a music round.
“Who did Bobbie Gentry write an ode to?”
“Oooh…” said Richy and I. “Yeah! Yeah! I know! That song, you know, the one about the bridge…Yeah! Billy or something!”
This is a warm tale of some kind women I met in Leamington Spa. First day as a postgraduate student. I had two full days of meetings so I booked into a hotel in Leamington for a treat. Got to the station first thing, to find trains all cancelled. Typical crap rail travel. Luckily ‘Richy to the rescue’ was working at home. He picked me up, drove me to Leamington, dropped my bag at the hotel, then dropped me at the university just in time. Several hours later, I was back in Leamington Spa, looking for the hotel.
Since Stan was a pup, a peepy thing in our garden has driven him crazy at different times of the year. He scrabbles to get out of the back door, charges the few metres to the end of the garden and barks furiously, looking up at the overhanging bushes and trees.
“Peep peep. Peep peep.”
“RUFF RUFF RUFF RUFF [I’ll get ya Peepy Thing!] RUFF RUFF RUFF!!!!”
“Peep peep. Peep peep. [You’ll never get me, short arse] Peep peep. Peep peep.”
“RUFF RUFF RUFF RUFF [I’ll get ya and I’ll eat you for my dinner!] RUFF RUFF!!!.”
“Peep peep. Peep peep. [Go away corgi features] Peep peep.”
It drives us mad too. The combination of peeping and barking is relentless.
“PEEPY THING!” someone shouts, “Get Stan back in!” And whoever is nearest (or doesn’t manage to successfully feign ‘ensconsed in very important task’), has to go and persuade Stan to forget about his vendetta and come back in doors.
I’ve noticed, recently, that the dynamics are changing between Stan and Peepy Thing. He still scrabbles to get out the back door and charges to the end of the garden. But there is a note of pathos in his bark.
“Ruff ruff ruff ruff.”
“Peep peep. Peep peep. [Get lost loser dog!] Peep peep.”
“Ruff. Ruff. Ruff. [Do I really look like a corgi?] Ruff.”
“Peep peep. Peep peep. [Stop interrupting my peeping with your pathetic needy barking] Peep peep.”
It’s easier to persuade Stan back in now. And he usually goes and hides somewhere for a bit.
I’ve been a right old weepy wreck since the A-level results and confirmation that Rosie’s off to university this weekend. I dunno. What a schmaltz-hound. Richy and the other kids have been very patient and supportive as I’ve blubbed walking around the supermarket, passing old favourites like bourbon biscuits, hot chocolate and tuna, seeing a box set of Desperate Housewives in HMV, walking past her old primary school at chucking out time.
Tom was telling us at breakfast about how, in a science class, there was a description of a blubbery, hairy animal and someone shouted “That’s yer mum Tom”.
“Oh,” said Richy, “that’s not very nice”.
“It’s a yer mum joke”, said Rosie and Owen in unison, chuckling into their pancakes.
Richy and I sat there with blank faces.
Tom’s tooth fell out yesterday.
“I’d better put it under my pillow”, he said. “But I hope there isn’t any more tooth fairy rubbishness…”
“Wha? What do you mean Tomo?”
“You know. There was that time she didn’t come. Then about two nights later she came, left a pound and the tooth. And then there was the time she took the tooth and didn’t leave a pound…”
“And there’s the tooth she left in the bathroom on the travel plug for about three months…” chipped in Richy Rich.
“Oh,” I said, “I hadn’t noticed that”.
Phewwy. I had a right old dose of hot face at work the other day. It was so bad I nearly went home SICK. Yep, sick from hot face. Crazy really. What happened was, I woke up, peeked out the window, saw the grey and rain and jumped from Summer to Winter in my mind. This meant I put on a thick woolly jumper and a scraggy old thermal top. Continue reading
Fieldwork. Life on the road. Possibly romantic in, for example, the wide open spaces of the States. Bumbling around the UK on trains and buses, staying in typical British budget hotels, is not quite so enjoyable. Here’s a taste of one journey, a couple of years ago, and the spaces I passed through on that journey. Some a helluva lot quicker than others.
So, first the cross country sleeper, London to Aberdeen. Fun, though odd, waking at midnight and opening the blind to find we were at Crewe station. Bit of a surreal bed/private/platform/public situ. Plus there are no cabin keys; you’re supposed to call the steward to re-open your door. I didn’t want to bother Stew so did a quick loo dash leaving my door wedged open, hoping some thieving bastard didn’t filch my stuff.
I bumped into an old mate, Nicola, in town today on the way to work. She, too, is in that horrible, horrible space between children’s services and sweet fuck all. After a quick catch up (that was pretty negative because of the sweet f.a. situ), she asked if I’d heard of seizure alert dogs. Her son, 17, has developed epilepsy, she doesn’t want to put him on medication and her son’s consultant ain’t very happy about this.
“Well, funny you ask because….” I started.
“Ha ha ha ha!!!!!! You always know something funny about things, Sarasiobhan!”, she laughed.
“…I read about this woman,” I continued, “she had a seizure alert dog who was brilliant. He sensed when she was about to have a seizure and nudged her, so she could take medication. She had a panic button installed in her flat that he could press with his paw to call the paramedics if she became unconscious…”
“Wow, that is amazing. I will definitely look into it for Billy”, said Nicola, paying proper attention at last.
“The funny thing was, if he felt she wasn’t paying enough attention to him, or felt like a bit of attention from the paramedics, he would walk over to the button and stand, with his paw raised, ready to press….”
“Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha”, Nicola howled, hysterically hanging on to my arm. Her laughter was infectious and we stood, a couple of hysterical women, in a sea of commuters and Summer school students. Bit of a chuckle and tonic.
More details of the story of the young woman with the seizure alert dog, and other young people’s experiences of epilepsy, can be read here.
Rosie “I’m not going to spend my entire life reading your blog, Mum” got her A-level results this morning. 3A*’s.
I am so fucking proud of her. Only LB and I were home when she went off to school to collect them. I dragged him away from youtube for 20 seconds to say good luck to her.
After she called with the results, I had a little weep, called Richy and then told LB how well his sister had done.
“Mum,” he replied, through gritted teeth, “I am telling you I am not stressed and the psychologist did not ban me from using youtube. He is criminally insane.”
Well this ain’t about you LB. It’s about Rosie. Good for you, girl. You deserve it.
mydaftlife 
