Carols from St Bob's Cathedral

(To the tune of 'Away in a manger')

Away in a manger, (well, his Digger bed),
My little lad Charlie laid down his sweet head.
Next door in her boudoir, his sister did sleep,
her head filled with dreams of the haul she would reap.

T'was the eve before Christmas, and the lounge was packed
Of stockings and giftbags and presents in sacks.
The kids had been spoiled, with toys by the tonne.
The cats had a present, the guinea pigs had none.

In the morning so early my children did wake.
The Daughter so excited her hands they did shake.
Like tiny tornadoes they ripped through their stuff,
for goodness sake kids - is 5 sacks not enough?!

Completely spolit rotten, those two kids of mine!
Those hours spent wrapping, that effort and time!
And all of it done with in less than an hour,
no sooner had they finished, the mood it turned sour.

The kids they were rowing, the tears they did flow.
All of us stuck in with nowhere to go.
When dinner was ready we sat down to eat,
"But I don't like roast dinner!" the Daughter did bleat.

Two dinners went untouched, two plates full intact.
The veg went to the dustbin, the turkey to the cats.
I knew what was coming, my time I did bide,
as it got to half two and "I'm hungry!" they cried.

As day turned to evening, the mood got more light,
knowing the kids would soon retire for the night.
Christmas is stressful, no doubt about that,
there wouldn't be this headache if we just had the cats!

They say that Christmas is a time for good cheer,
Well I say good riddance - and roll on New Year!!

So this is Christmas...

Well, we are but a few days away from the birth of our Lord, if you're a religious person (or the birth of Santa, if you're my three year old) and yes, finally, I'm feeling rather festive. The tree and decorations are up - despite the best efforts of the cats, all the presents are wrapped and the food shopping is done. None of it has gone smoothly though, as is to be expected; this is me after all! I thought I was being clever, buying a 'slim' tree, as space in our lounge is quite limited. Slim is definately the word - it's 7ft tall with the circumference of my waist. On first glance it's ok, but look at it too long and it's just a long twig with tinsel on. As for the wrapping, I ran out of sellotape with just a few to go and had to use brown parcel tape (sorry kids, Santa went to the Co-Op but refused to pay four quid when all he had left to wrap was a pack of hair bobbles and a tube of Smarties). It's The Daughter's fault I ran out anyway; her and her obsession with wrapping anything and everything up as 'gifts' for people. Over the last week I've been presented with parcels of Hama Beads, one of the cat's toys, a coaster and half of her Sylvanian families. It was sweet the first few times but kind of lost it's charm after the hundredth unwrapping of a bottle top.  Especially as each 'gift' was given wth the words "I want it back"!

As for the food shopping, that went as expected. I joined the queue to get in Sainsbury's, the queues to pick stuff off the shelves in Sainsbury's, the queue to pay for stuff in Sainsbury's and the queue to get out of the carpark at Sainsbury's. I could have cried as I handed over my debit card - both at how much I'd spent on festive filth, and at the thought of how fat I'm going to get eating it all. And then I got home and realised I'd forgotten sausage rolls. Never mind your 'onion bhaji dippers' and your 'tempura king prawns with sweet chili and glitter dip' - a self respecting buffet isn't a buffet without sausage rolls.

I've had my festive illness (tonsilitis this year). I've bought the cats their present (Dreamies). The kids have some new festive pyjamas. And I've bought Santa a bottle of Stella and some maltesers. So I think we're good to go. Before I know it, it'll all be over and I'll be settling down with a selection box and some onion bhaji dippers to watch the demise of Derek Branning (I know Kat Slater is a bit of a grubber, but Derek Branning, seriously? He looks like a balloon with a slow leak!!) and festive versions of family favourites that were filmed in August. I shall see you on the other side - with a waist significantly bigger than our skinny tree and a desperate urge to take the decorations down so I can dust properly. Happy Christmas everyone Xxx!!

Where are the Elves when you need them??

I have what is known as 'Wrappers Back'; a condition quite common at this time of year. It comes from sitting on the floor for hours at a time while surrounded by 8000 gifts - all of which are mocking me with "Stop getting distracted by Emmerdale and wrap us goddammit, there's only 2 weeks to Christmas and we're still sitting in carrier bags!".  There are little bits of sellotape stuck all over the nearby furniture, to save me having to use my elbow to hold a flap of paper down while I try to break off tape with my teefs, and scrappy bits of paper that I cut a bit too small for the slow cooker but will do for the jigsaw I need to wrap in 28 presents time.

I start off wrapping with gusto, but the novelty doesn't take long to wear off. As the backache sets in and I'm missing Eastenders thanks to figuring out how to wrap a triangle shaped present (with great difficulty), my mind starts to wander to Christmas morn... Will my offspring marvel over those carefully wrapped gifts? Will they chime "Oh mama! We can scarcely bring ourselves to open these gifts, so beautifully are they presented!"? Will they open each one with decorum, reading each label in turn and appreciating the time and effort that has gone into each one? Will they chuff. If this year is anything like the last, they'll both be tearing through the paper with all the fervour of a starving dog in a bin! The Boychild will want every single thing taking out of the box to play with (why does everything come screwed and wired into the box these days? What's wrong with a bit of polystyrene?) which means he'll still be opening his mid-afternoon. While The Daughter goes through her sacks like a tiny tornado, barely even looking at what she's got. Maybe she'll be momentarily slowed down by the dog-poo game though, and I swear - if that game comes as an almighty disappointment after all the wheedling she's done - it's going on Ebay first thing boxing day! There is ONE thing I like about wrapping - instead of cutting the paper, I do that 'Szchuszching' thing, where you slide the scissors through the paper. Makes me feel like a ninja.

Well, I'd better get wrapping, there's a 15 minute window til Emmerdale starts. On the other hand, I could just stick a load of sellotape round the carrier bags and save us all the effort..?

It's beginning to look a lot like...dog poo?

All my Christmas shopping is done! Hurrah!! I actually thought I'd finished last week, but then The Daughter decided to write a letter to Santa, and none of the things she'd been rabbiting on about all year - or that I'd bought - were on the list. Eek. She'd asked the bearded fella for a photograph maker (neither The Husband or I were able to figure out what she meant unfortunately. "A camera?" we asked. "No! A photograph maker!" she shrieked, giving us the 'You're both morons' look), some Lego (out of the question, she's only just started playing with the bits she got for her birthday. In March. Plus I resent paying £30 for something so tiny it finds its way up the hoover from the other side of the room), a secret diary thing that looks like it has to scan your retina and verify your fingerprints before you can open it (I obliged with this one, only I bought her a cheaper version with a little key you keep on a bracelet. I mean, seriously, what sort of secrets can a five year old need to keep? 'Monday - stole a mini Twix from the fridge and wiped a bogey on the wall next to my bed'?).

The last item on the list was something called 'Doggie Doo'. Now, for those not down with the kids (there's no need to be ashamed, I had to Google it), this is a game whereby a plastic dog poos, and the players have to collect it - the one who collects the most, wins. This is all the rage amongst her peers by all accounts, kind of like Furbies and Girls World's were when I was growing up. I felt so bad at hardly getting her anything she'd asked Santa for, that I went to town and bought it yesterday. I can't actually believe that I parted with £18 for a game where she has to collect poo to win. If I'd known that was the sort of weird dickens she was into, I'd have wrapped up a cheap scoop, a bag of cat litter and an envelope containing a years pass to clean out our cat trays!

We didn't have anything like that when I was a kid. Although, to be fair, I would have wanted the dog-poo game too. Not that I would have got it though! I asked for 'Mr Frosty' every bloody year for about a decade and never got any closer to it than gazing wistfully at the picture in the Argos book! Yes, that is a hint of bitterness you detect. I was almost tempted to buy it for myself a few years back when I discovered they still sold it. But I bet the long-held dream wouldn't live up to the reality. I wonder if it will be the same for The Daughter when she unwraps her Doggie Doo on Christmas morn. I shall have to refrain from muttering "What a load of crap...literally!".

How to behave in the nude **warning - not for little eyes!**

We women are strange creatures *cue men across the globe agreeing like a sea of nodding dogs*. I was at the gym this morning, and was getting myself dried after a shower, when a woman walked in and put her stuff down on the bench. Until this point I had been on my own, and quite happily skipping about in the nude. Well, not actually skipping, that would have been a bit strange. But as soon as she came in, I yanked the towel up and began the 'trying-to-get-dressed-under-a-towel dance', like I was in the middle of a crowded beach. I go to the gym 3 or 4 times a week, and keep myself in fairly decent shape, so why I was suddenly overcome with modesty, like I was covered in scales and warts the size of satsumas. Which I'm not, by the way. I could get into a deep debate about how women are made to feel insecure thanks to all the airbrushed images we are subjected to in the media blah blah blah. But the fundamental difference is that men do not give a rats ass. There's none of the awkwardness, the fretting over cellulite, surreptitiously comparing boobs while trying to hold a conversation about how much things at Asda have gone up recently. In fact, I think this pretty much sums the two genders up perfectly...

HOW TO SHOWER LIKE A WOMAN:

• take off clothes and place them sectioned in a laundry basket according to colour.
• walk to bathroom wearing dressing gown
• if you see husband along the way cover up any exposed areas
• look at your physique in the mirror, make mental note to do more leg lifts/sit-ups in the morning and wonder if bingo wings are bigger than they were last week
• get in the shower
• use face cloth, arm cloth, leg cloth, long loofah and pumice stone
• wash your hair once with sage and cucumber shampoo with 43 added vitamins
• condition your hair with grapefruit and mint-enhanced conditioner
• wash your face with crushed apricot facial scrub for ten minutes until red and close to bleeding
• wash the rest of your body with gingernut and jaffa cake body wash
• shave armpits and legs
• turn off shower
• sponge off all wet surfaces in the shower
• spray mould spots with tile cleaner
• dry with towel the size of a small country
• wrap hair in super absorbent towel
• return to bedroom wearing long dressing gown and towel on head
• if you see husband along the way cover up any exposed areas
• spend 40 minutes drying hair with hand held jet engine

HOW TO SHOWER LIKE A MAN:

• take clothes off while sitting on the edge of the bed and leave in a pile on floor
• walk naked to the bathroom
• if you see wife along the way, shake your willy and make a "woo-hoo" sound
• admire your physique in the mirror and the size of your manhood. Scratch backside
• get in shower
• wash your face
• wash your armpits
• blow your nose in your hands and let the water rinse the snot off
• spend majority of time washing privates and surrounding area
• wash your hair with stuff from the bottle nearest to hand
• make a shampoo mohawk
• pee like a racehorse and schusch the yellow water down the drain with your feet
• rinse and get out of the shower
• fail to notice water on the floor because the curtain was hanging out of the bath
• admire size of manhood in mirror again
• leave shower curtain open, wet mat on floor, light and fan on
• return to bedroom with towel around waist
• if you pass wife, pull off towel and make a "woo-hoo" sound as you shake your willy at her
• throw wet towel on bed
• run fingers through hair twice to dry it

And if you needed further proof that men truly are a different species when it comes to nudity...

 

I rest my case.

It could be MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Being skint is pants. I know I shouldn't really complain; we're not completely impoverished to the point where Charlie has to wear his sisters handmedowns (unless I'm feeling particularly cruel), or having to sell body parts on Ebay. Yet. But as I look out the window at the rain, and our blue bin being blown across the road like it's got a motor and someone very small driving it around, I yearn to be able to afford to just sod right off somewhere hot. Being on one wage, things are tight at times, and (like many others) I've been trying to economise. Aldi is good, but I can't manage to get a whole weekly shop there so end up popping to Asda for lettuce, and come out with £20 worth of sweets and a jumper.

When it comes to the food shopping, it's quite difficult to make cutbacks when you're a) an impulsive bi-polar who has as much self-control in a shop as a dog on heat at Crufts and b) you're a bit of a food snob. I refuse to compromise on certain things, because in many cases it's a false economy. Cheap meat has more fat on it than erm, something very fat. Economy bread tastes like cotton wool. And Smartprice chopped tomatoes are basically tins full of all the cores from the tomatoes that go into the decent brands.

As I check my bank balance, I can't help but wistfully dream of what I could do with a decent lottery win. I wouldn't be greedy about it - I'd be happy with a few million. Actually, I'd be happy with twenty quid at the minute, but you know what I mean. A holiday would be the first thing on the list, somewhere very hot and luxurious, where I'd lay roasting myself while minions brought me beer and Haribo. *Sigh*. Of course, I'd pay for the very finest boarding kennels for the cats...and the kids. Only the best for my lot! When I get back I'll go shopping for a new car, and for new clothes to go new car shopping in. I'm still undecided about a new house. Part of me can see myself as Lady of the Manor, allowing the cats to live in the West Wing and a private cinema/gym/bar in the East Wing. But then another part doesn't want to leave this house. Maybe I could offer him-next-door lots of money to move out, and just have his house as well?  Plus, that way I wouldn't have to listen to his girlfriend and her excessively loud laugh. Yes, I'm liking that idea. Maybe I would buy The Husband a new car, if he was nice to me. If he wasn't nice I'd just set a bit of cash aside for him to get his aircon fixed and for the regular turnover of tyres his car seems to have. I'd pay for the kids to have proper haircuts at a top salon, instead of having to hold them down chanting "Head up! Sit still or I'll cut your ears off!" as they get DIY trims.

The only tiny thing standing between me and a life of luxury is odds of 1 in 13,983,816. Oh, and buying an actual ticket. That might help...

I'm a 'celebrity'...get me a career revival!

Most reality tv bores the bellybutton fluff out of me. I stopped watching 'Big Brother' years ago, mainly because watching a houseful of ego's with enough talent between them to fill a thimble is about as much a form of entertainment as picking the hard skin off my feet. The so called 'celebrity' version of it is no better, and is cringeworthy for all the wrong reasons. But once a year, I make an exception. The hilarious Geordie munchkins Ant'n'Dec (think I've finally grasped which is which thanks to Ant always standing on the left, like his name-see!) bring some sunshine into the dark winter days in the form of 'I'm a Celebrity - get me out of here!'. I bloody love it! Whoever thought of it is a genius. Even The Husband, who doesn't watch crap like that, sits down and says "I'll just watch this bit and then I'll go and wash the pots" and is still there an hour later.

Taking a mixed bag of  (mostly) famous, privileged people into the middle of the hot, humid, creepy-crawly filled (and I know - I've been) Australian rainforest is brilliant viewing and I never tire of it. Granted, there are a few no-marks on that programme too, but there's nothing like having to crap in a hole in the ground and eating possums bumholes in order to eat to level the playing field! There are a couple of them in this year who I've no idea about. The lanky posh bloke with legs like knotted string is from another reality show, so I'm clueless about him. And the female mp means nothing to me, other than she looks a bit like Bianca's mum Carol in Eastenders. I didn't know much about David Haye either, but I now know is a thoroughly nice man. With the abs of a superhero and buttocks like two hardboiled eggs in clingfilm. Limahl ("from the 80's" he said, like he'd just arrived in a time machine) is literally the most boring man ever to walk the earth. Everything about him makes me want to take a nap. But Helen Flanagan - her what was Rosie off of Corrie before she left to become a full time WAG - is hilarious. Mostly unintentionally. She was made for programmes like this - the public cruelly voting her in for every bushtucker trial, just to see her shrieking like a big blouse and failing miserably. Despite looking like a tramp and smelling like dirty bums, she's still so aware of the cameras on her that she walks round pouting like a fish that's been yanked out the tank.

there isn't a thing I don't like about this programme. Even when I'm dry heaving along with the eating trials, I love it. I get somewhat disappointed when some of them are ruled out of trials on 'medical grounds' (which is a nice way of saying they're too old or fat), but then you get a classic televisual moment like Rosemary Shrager trumping in Limahls face when they'd only been acquainted for about ten minutes. Brilliant. And the best thing of all? Knowing that there will always be a constant stream of celebs so desperate for cash or airtime that they'll do practically anything. Bring it on!