K8 the GR8

I bit down hard on my lower lip and nervously watched the water level in the toilet bowl rise.  I stood back, then breathed a sigh of relief to see the flood waters halt just below the rim. 

“Uhh… Teasy?”

“Yeah.”

“Your bog’s banjaxed.  Sorry about that.”

Teasy pulled her baby out of the dog’s drinking bowl and sighed.  She already knew, and was feeling forlorn.

“I can’t afford a plumber.  Cheque’s not cleared yet.  Dad told me how to fix it though…”

She described a process by which the drain outside is disconnected, hopefully releasing pressure in her tubes.  “It’s not pretty.” she warned.

We sat in silence for a while and stared at the grey rain pelting off the car roof outside through the window.  I felt her pain, and understood that keeping her three children indoors and out of mischief while she farted about in the mud outside solving miserable household problems would be a taxing job for a single mum.

“C’mon, then.”  I said.  “I’ll hold the babby, let’s go outside and have a look.”

Teasy was reluctant.

“C’MON!” I shouted cheerfully.  “Now, before I change my mind!”

We trudged outside, down the decked steps, and into the mudbath.  We meandered around to the bog outflow pipe.  It was duck-tape city.  We began to peel at an elbow-joint, and freed it up quickly.  I passed the baby to his mum, and got a hold of the loose pipe.  I pulled gently and a hissing sound began to fizz from the joint.  Brown gunge began to ooze with urgency. 

“Wahay!” Teasy shouted.

I yanked the tube free and jumped 20 feet backwards.  Glugluglugusshhhhhh.  We watched in revulsion as the problem rectified itself, then went about re-connecting and shovelling while grinning like crazy, to prevent our gag reflexes kicking in.  (This is a trick I am very glad I learned.  Pass it on.)

“Mission succesful, hey?” Teasy shouted.  “Who needs plumbers?!?”

“Right on.”  said I.

Sisters are doin’ it for themselves!

I’m still waiting for those yella feckers to get back to me so that I can follow through with Brian’s meme!

In the meantime, Grannymar’s throwing them around like there’s no tomorrow!  Hers, however, is one of those lovely memes that involves no imagination, just a few keywords in the search-bar.  Yes!  It’s dredge up your old posts time!

Ze rulez:

Post 5 links to 5 of your previously written posts. The posts have to relate to the 5 key words given here (family, friend, yourself, your love, anything you like).
Tag 5 other friends to do this meme. Try to tag at least 2 new acquaintances (if not, your current blog buddies will do) so that you get to know them each a little bit better.

*sweet*

FAMILY; This is a post I wrote about me aul’ pair going on holidays leaving me in charge of their gaff, and all the fun I almost had.

FRIEND; A tasteless joke my buddy Lou told me, and an amusing study on the effects drugs have on web-building, which has nothing to do with the subject matter but I’m terrible for writing about friends because I don’t have any.

MYSELF; A very long and deep confession about a strange personality flaw I have.

MY LOVE; This is a post that proves my inadequacy at expressing feelings, I just can’t do soppy.  I prefer metaphors.

ANYTHING I LIKE; Some inspiration I found in my little book of complete bollocks.

This license to regurgitate is hereby passed to Going Like Sixty, ShiteDrivers.com, Well done Fillet (an excellent site recommended by Humblehousewife!), errr humblehousewife, and my dear dad, Read Hambles!

Jesse took his blind date to the carnival. “What would you like to do first, Amber?” asked Jesse.
“I want to get weighed,” replied Amber.
They ambled over to the weight guesser. He guessed 120 pounds. She got on the scale; it read 117 and she won a prize.
Next, the couple went on the Ferris wheel. When the ride was over, Jesse again asked Amber what she would like to do. “I want to get weighed,” she said.
Back to the weight guesser they went. Since they had been there before, he guessed her correct weight, and Jesse lost his dollar.
The couple walked around the carnival and again he asked where to next. “I want to get weighed,” Amber responded.
By this time, Jesse figured that she was really weird and took her home early, dropping her off with a handshake.
Her roommate, Laura, asked her about the blind date, “How did it go?” Amber responded, “Oh, Waura. It was wousy.”

The Accidental Terrorist has this metrosexual friend who on the surface seems well ‘ard, until he opens his mouth or confesses his favourite film.  He loaned the latter to us last week, and told TAT to ignore the blurb and promise to watch the whole thing in its entirety.  TAT seemed unimpressed but resolved to try.

The film was ‘Bitter Moon’, a film from 1992, directed by Roman Polanski (Name sounds familiar?  He also directed The Pianist, Ninth Gate and Rosemary’s Baby *oh right, him!*), starring Hugh Grant, Kristin Scott Thomas, Emmanuelle Seigner (Polanski’s missus!) and Peter Coyote (the mean scientist guy from E.T.).

What do you mean you can’t believe I haven’t seen this yet?!  Shut up.

Whoa.  What a film.  It almost fell victim to the halfway-through *lets just turn this shite off and watch something else* syndrome, had it not been for TAT’s promise to his friend, for the story build-up was looking decidedly chick-flickish.

It is, however, not necessarily chickflickish at all, unless you are a woman who likes to watch YOP being licked from a pair of diddies over breakfast.  It is full-on sexual exploration down every alley you could think of (’scuse the pun) without being a pornographic flick. 

Do. Not. Watch. This. Film. With. Your. Parents.

(Or with a new boyfriend, or a prim cousin, or a neighbour with a beard.)

A prim English couple (Grant and Scott-Thomas) are trying to put the zing back into their static love life on a romantic cruise.  Grant meets Coyote, who plays a disturbingly creepy man in a wheelchair, a writer with an apparent love for both the sound of his own voice, and the bounds of the sexual imagination.  He is accompanied by a very intriguing but distant French wife.  Their story unfolds, a story which is wild with passion and experimentation at first - as is the case with most new couples - then develops into a story of manipulation, cruelty and poetic come-uppance.

This film will make you cringe.  It will make you want to throw yoghurt at the t.v.  It will make you want to throw your hands in the air and shout “BUT WHY?!?!?”  It will make bile rise in your throat and it will give you a stiffy, all at the same time.  You will not have seen everything until you’ve seen this film.

Just remember what I told you about not watching it with your parents.

‘Well Holy God’, as Miley would say… I can’t understand this brain of mine. 

The Accidental Terrorist and Pedro the invincible are downstairs on the xbox playing Assassin’s Creed, a game which is so good, I have managed to pull two whole all-nighters playing it.  This is no mean feat for a mother of two chisellers, but it was worth it.

I disconnected my laptop from the TV feed so that I could take it upstairs, away from the madness.  I knew full well that this was a rare opportunity to snatch an hour or two away to write on me blog, but I had a heavy heart.

“What the fuck am I going to write about?” I implored the likely lads.

“Write about not knowing what to write about” said TAT, his attention elsewhere.

“Fuck off” I said.

“Write about Assassin’s Creed” suggested Pedro.

“They don’t care” I said.

Pedro didn’t seem to care either, so I wandered away.  And now here I am with nothing interesting to say.  Even a faceful of vodka doesn’t seem to help.  I’ve emailed a whole lot of friends about that tag Brian snared me on, but nobody has replied yet, except me aul’ mate Lou.  Either I’m imaginary, or they’re stumped.

So… some random madness from my recent past will have to do;

~:~

Apparently a woman walking into a hardware store in Ireland and asking for chimney cleaning equipment is hilarious.  There must be a joke out there somewhere to this effect because the two blokes behind the counter went very red and giggly for some reason.  They kept asking me about length, and I kept replying with ‘two storeys’ which amused them further.  I don’t get it. 

~:~

When a young mother is walking through a supermarket with a toddler, and if the toddler is screaming and the mother is doing nothing about it, please don’t pass comment.  She is doing her best, for it is not her that is at fault.  It’s the supermarket’s fault.  They have a very clever way of placing Creme Eggs and Kinder Surprises beside vital groceries.  This is the devil’s work, and whoever came up with this idea should be dragged into the street and shot.  I paid for that half-eaten apple, but I shouldn’t have.  I should have left it in the centre of the Creme Egg stand.  When a child is denied chocolate all hell breaks loose, and this hell should have a live feed to the audio system in the general manager’s office.

~:~

I chanced my arm the other day and wandered into a newsagent to ask for tobacco with only 4 euros.  I thought I’d get laughed out of it, but no!  Apparently you can still buy half-packs of handrolling tobacco even though ten boxes are obsolete!  This means the government must be okay with kids smoking rollies.  If this is true, then they really should advertise how to roll a proper rollie, to get them off the dreaded Johnnie Blue’s.  If there are any children out there who would like me to post a list of numbered instructions as to how to roll a cigarette, please let me know.  I would be delighted to do my bit for the country!

~:~

What else is there?  Here is proof that everyone’s parents are mad, not just mine.  Jack McMad has some excellent suggestions for improving perambulating activities around Dublin City, Roy’s Taxi gossip continues to have me shitting bricks about starting this taxi business, Jefferson’s been to the zoo, Going Like Sixty is having another ‘holy shit!’ moment, Medbh’s being esoteric,  Baino’s doing her best to find a bug in her system, and Thriftcriminal’s bitchin’.

Me dad thinks he’s lost his sense of humour, but he’s just suffering from the same thing as the rest of us. 

I had one of those ‘almost’ conversations the other night.  It was an ‘almost’ conversation because it didn’t actually happen, but I imagined it taking place for a full 20 minutes before I decided against broaching it.  This was unfortunate because I was watching one of the Sopranos final series at the time, and  I’m always too embarrassed to ask the Accidental Terrorist to rewind after I’ve had a zone-out session.  It’s a very flaky thing to do, and saying something like; “Sorry, love, could you press pause for a while, I have some serious thinking to do…”  sounds so pretentious.

~o0o~

The conversation would have started with this question:

“Hey babe, after all those long talks about religion and belief and all that, I’m feeling a little hypocritical.  How bad would it really be if we decided not to celebrate our family stuff through the church at all?”

The conversation would have lasted a good three hours, and I think I already know where it would end - this is why it was an ‘almost’ conversation.  See?

~o0o~

Our kids still haven’t been Christened.  Well that’s not entirely true… Laughing Boy was very sick as a baby and we were faced with a numbing ‘just in case’ situation.  A nun called into his hospital room one morning with an old brown suitcase.  Inside was a bible, holy water, some lace to represent a Christening gown, and other various religious accoutrements.  We had asked her only to give him a blessing, but instead she went the whole hog.  It was quite sad at the time seeing as his daddy wasn’t even there.

As for puppychild, well… I’ve just been putting it off.  She’s three now, and my dear mum keeps offering to help me arrange a local Christening, saying it’s as easy as dropping a hot spud.  She even offered up her garden for a small party.  I just can’t pick up the damn phone to start the ball rolling.

Then there’s the wedding.  Being the Queen of my family, it’s up to me to arrange such a gig.  I’ve never been one for the white wedding and the flowers and the horses and the horses d’ouvres and all that.  A massive cash injection for something that’s supposed to be intimate?  I don’t get it.  I’d rather go abroad or do something different… a scuba wedding maybe.

I blamed myself, this laziness bug that lives with me.  Time speeds by and before you know it, you’re three years behind yourself.  This is partially true, but I’ve been listening to this other voice that’s telling me to be true to myself and to my family lately.  You’d be lying!  it tells me.    You can’t renounce something you don’t believe in!  Your sins are your own, there for learning, not for shame!  You’re feeding that poor priest a whole lot of crap, but what did he ever do to you?  Be honest!!!  Strap on a pair!!!

I played guitar for a local choir recently.  I lasted two weeks.  I couldn’t stand the hypocrisy of what the priest was saying… something about the passover, about Israelites having to slaughter livestock to save their first-born from the wrath of God.  Everyone was chanting and mumbling like a gang of Templars, leaving me wondering whether it was I who was blind, or all the others?  I remember mass as a child, how awesome it all was… people dressed up in finery, pictures of torture on the walls, wine, candles, and a man who was murdered horribly on his 33rd birthday.  How could a kid not want to know more?

Now though, I think I know enough. 

Why is it so hard to find a way to celebrate family affairs in a way that feels right?  The God I believe in, the God of two halves that set this whole comedic opera in play for whatever reason, hasn’t given me any signs yet.  An even bigger problem yet is the breakaway.  To claim that the Church and God are two different things altogether, is like disrespecting your elders, but on a massive scale to me.  I think this is why so many people have Santa syndrome.  They continue holding masses for family occasions, they leave their auntie’s present of a Sacred Heart on the wall, and carry on blessing themselves as they pass cemeteries.  If they stop and listen to logic it all might go away and their family structure would dissolve.  They would be frowned upon, and would fear that the gates of heaven would close, even though they probably have the key in their pockets anyway.

Ireland needs more options.  It feels like we’re sitting in the front row of class here… we’re being watched like a hawk with no chance of passing any notes to the Buddhists in the back row.  The Muslims are outside sunning themselves on their prayer mats, the Taoists have already graduated, and the Extremists have jumped out the window.  It feels like there’s no-one else to talk to except the Protestants - even they seem to be seeing things a whole lot clearer than us Catholics.

Would anyone object to my starting my own ’Church of the Open Mind’?  Do you think it would catch on? 

‘Careful now!’