Sunday 19 January 2014

This week...

I have sustained two cooking burns and fallen down the stairs. Falling down the stairs wasn't too bad, maybe a touch undignified, but no serious damage. Until I got out of bed the next morning with what felt like a bruised coccyx (a fine word; I am delighted to use it, although tailbone comes a close second). It would make sense, I thought, since the fall was a sitting one, bumping my bum one step at a time in a rapid progress to the cellar. (I must get the decor sorted out.) Anyway, it put paid to my morning Ramblers, even though I had out my fancy boots and all.

Also out of time, I am behind on my Knicker Drawers. I have a beautiful commission for a lovely young lady and I want to do her proud. Not that I've ever met her, nor likely will, but if I pass her in the street I should like to imagine she is thrilled by the long tendril ties and soft wrapping cover of her book. May it see her through happy college years.

I bought a roof rack to take Tiger's windsurfing gear to our local lake. Stupidly, I have only now begun to consider the consequences of this one.

My washi tape arrived! (So much for the free delivery. It cost me a tenner to get it out the Post Office.)

And of buyer beware... I visited a car boot sale this week, and bought from a lovely gentle elderly man a pair of leather gloves for one pound. Then I discovered they were both left hands.

However. I have been amusing myself with Squirrel's appalling spelling. On the worksheets she submits to the indefatigable tutor, she has hydrogen making a poping sound when it is lit. I like to imagine it also softly incants In spiritu sancto as it goes up in flames.

And I am becoming expert on Brazil. Thanks to the long hours spent talking about how you can present statistics and why Brazilians have 360 holidays every year. (But I would like to add that I am not worth kidnapping by your local drug lord to extract my up-to-the-minute, world-class knowledge because actually I am only half listening to it, chipping in whenever I have a petty whine about why can't I go to Rio? Why can't the children go to Rio, etc. etc.*)

I am in continued negotiation with a local exam centre. They are now at me with demands for character references.

Speaking of the children, on the home ed front, they made it to a (cut-price) ice-skate session. Tiger also enjoyed a workshop at Buckingham Palace, Queen's Collection, on Castiglione. As a non-attendant adult, I had time to enjoy an excellent chin-wag with Mich. She impressed me hugely by knowing the local pubs and taking me to a toilet that looked like a brothel.

But forget the children! They are busy hot-housing themselves with chemistry, geography and Latin. I also had a great time talking with my-twin-sister-separated-at-birth-even-though-we-are-ten-years-apart who told me about her fab start to 2014! It involved not only punching a public servant, but also spending an uber-glamour evening out, sat on a toilet sulking for two hours while listening to the bulimic vomiting going on in the cubicle next door! (I think you can probably see why I get on with her.)

*Worse, I once went to Rio and had dinner with A.S.Byatt. Not that she'll remember. But then I had kids. The end.

4 comments:

Michelle said...

By the back stairs no less :-). Sorry you've hurt yourself x

Unknown said...

I think I need to have a rummage through your knicker drawer. My friend Emma would love one for her birthday, I'm sure, (or maybe I would just love one for me?). Do you have any info anywhere about ordering, prices etc?

Grit said...

i am weedy and pathetic, michelle, and i need someone to look after me. i shall come and live with you. you're organised, efficient, and i can sleep on your sofa. xx

hi Fay! tell me by email on gritsday@gmail.com ; tell me about the person it's for; the colours they like; whether they need a book for collecting, writing, drawing, or just for holding and imagining. prices vary depending on size but you can be sure it's not as large as you feared. all books include leathers, handmade papers, nets, fabrics, story bits, secret bits, and twiddly bits... any commissioned book will carry personalised items. or you could probably spend about the same amount in paperchase and buy one of 500,000 journals from a production line making them all exactly the same... just saying, now! xx

Unknown said...

I will have a think then shall email you. I think I need one for me actually, sod Emma!