predictable but funny

If you've ever done any internet discussion of any sort, at least.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMEe7JqBgvg

groove lasagna

Last night I went to Groove Armada. And it was good. I love live music, I love to have a dance, I love the Olympia. The sound is so good, it's so pretty. And the American lady beside me said she'd been to the O2 earlier that week and it was crap, she was blown away by the Olympia in comparison. Ha. The singer was beyond fabulous in a sparkly gold belted leotard, though we did have to sit through 'Bitches with Wolves' first, and I can't even talk about that yet. I mean... gah. My husband's talented band are gagging for a support slot in the Olympia, and these muppets are getting to play Oxygen? Injustice. They're funny, but come on! I'll tell you some other time when I'm less traumatised by Southside camp, sequins and gold lam-ay (I have no accents on this keyboard! But yes, it was lame as well).

There might be a GA video later, when the revellers awake and upload stuff. If they do, I'll pop it in.

I tempted my brother and his girlfriend over to babysit with offers of lasagna yesterday. I tentatively forraged in the iceworld of mystery and frozen egg yolks that is the back of my freezer and found - more than enough pasta dough! Woo!

I love making pasta. I'll admit I was thrilled not to have to mix it but the rolling of it is a wonderfully pleasing experience. You bolt the pasta maker to the table, take a chunk of green dough (spinach!), and feed it into the shiny metal on the widest setting, and crank, and it's momentarily difficult, and you get to feel like an Italian mama for a minute (all arms and bosom and strong, see pic below). And it comes out thick, and a little crumbly, but flat, and you fold it and do it again and again, and it starts getting more malleable, and longer, and shinier, and takes the shape of the width of the machine. And when you've done that about six times, you put it through each decending setting, feeding its cool smoothness through your hands again and again. And it doesn't stick, it gets silkier, and thinner and thinner, until finally you have a long green ribbon, so stretchy smooth, to cut into pieces and boil for a couple minutes and it comes out all slippery chewy. And then the layers of sauce, and creamy ricotta all messy, and licking the ambrosia white sauce off the spoon, oh god.

And the finished product, so solid and perfect! The lasagna goes cake-like, the fresh pasta so tender and creamy, somehow, and the ricotta sweet with nutmeg against the tangy tomato sauce. Damn. I know I always say damn, but this is a damn-food moment. I only make it for special because of the work involved, and the fat factor, but every time I do, I always think, why don't I do this more often? Just rolling the pasta alone is the most satisfying thing. The last time I went to the Italian deli for pasta flour, I talked to this sweet Italian woman who was astounded I was making it - but it's so worth it. And I got the pasta machine for seven euro in a second hand shop, looking unused. You can't go wrong!

I used the lovely Nick Nairn's recipe, from the BBC food site, but every time I try to bring it up, it loads, then there's a message saying it can't be found (even though it's right there in front of me) and when you close the box is closes the site. But you can't scroll down the recipe when the box is up. A definition of frustration? Maybe you'll have better luck, though I suppose if you already have a machine you don't need my recipe. You could roll it yourself, but I suspect if you do you'll instantly morph into her. Arms and all.

Have a nice weekend, all.

booby thursday

Darn it, I wish this had happened on Tuesday now, for the sake of the title.

I went to Weight Watchers tonight, for some reason getting there early and then just having to sit and wait ages for the 'inspirational meeting' bit. So I listened to amusing conversation about how many miles you pound out while shopping intensively in Dundrum, and falling asleep quietly in the corner.

Then my friend's mum bounced in, all delighted and surprised to see me. My friend was busy changing and de-booting herself and probably squeezing out that last half point of wee pre-weigh in. Her mum is English and funny and sarky and bouncy and cynical and even though I don't see her hardly at all, there is a lovely affection there - I know Cassie from  school, since we were wee teens, and I think we have a mutual affection channelled through our appreciation of the role we each play in her daughter's life. Maybe.

Anyway.

Jenny said hello, then said, in playful eyebrow raised tones, 'What's this?'

And she reached over and gently tickled my cleavage.

I really didn't know how to answer that question, though I'll admit I did yank  my vest top further up in slightly defensive if amused surprise. I mean - it's nothing new! I've always had it. I start out the day scaffolded with underwire and vests-beneath-my-tops, all decent, but somehow gravity and my own body heat conspire against me, and I have to keep hoiking everything up all the time as things get more revealing.

See, I start out the morning demure and respectable!

I have had baby boys who are not my own lunging for my chest on more than one occasion, husbands, even but this is the first mother than I can remember doing it.

Cute boob facts, but there's SO much more to say about what's in breast milk. Live stem cells for one thing.

green grey wednesday

On the way home from Olivia's charming and lifting little song recital, I stopped at the traffic lights opposite a mossy wall, and ivy covered trees. And the soft  rain that had been falling strengthened and started to spill down, tip down, thrum down, noisy on the car roof, bouncing off the pavements.

The air looked so clear it felt as if I could  see the drops slipping from one ivy leaf to the next, helter skeleter down the trees. If you were to stand naked, with your toes dug into the leaf mould, and lift your arms and face to the drops that plummet weighted from the leaves, it would feel warm and clean, cleansing on your upturned face, your waiting tender skin.

nostalgic tuesday

Here's me in my debs dress. Over-foundationed, to say the least :) though the vampire eyes are the camera's fault not mine.

There are three stories I remember about this. The first is that it cost more to make than my father was happy about but when I had the final fitting, I called my father (the only person in the house) to come see, and he stood at the bottom of the stairs and looked up and me and said 'see, you look so much better in that than the scruffy stuff you normally wear'. Well, that's what £300 old Irish pound's worth of black velvet formal wear will do for a girl. Sigh.

Then at the actual party, a waitress dropped a tray full of vegetable soup on the ground and splashed it all over the skirt of the dress. And then I somehow upended a pint of Guinness onto it, and my date looked at me in fear and terror and said 'are you ok?' in a hushed and frightened voice. Actually I once wore it at a party in college and set myself on fire in it. Is it cursed?

Thankfully, the last memory (which came after the Guinnes but before the fire) is a happier one, but I will refrain from sharing it here, because it's dorty.

Halloween 1997. Where did my eyes disappear to? Cartoon eyes! There's a nicer one of me and Axel, dressed as a pirate, which would officially make me his lass, I suppose, but I can't find it. No idea why.

Note my jingle necklace, that I wore day in and out. I loved it.

If anyone has a teenage girl who doesn't like herself, force her to stand in front of the mirror and shout: it doesn't matter what you think!! You're enrobed in Youth! Youth!! Appreciate it now, before it's too late!! Look how big your eyes are! How sweet and round your face! Aghghghgh!

Then I suppose you go do the same for yourself, quick, before you're sixty. And if you're reading this and you're sixty, well, your eighty year old self will tell you the same.

blue monday

Sixteen years ago this afternoon I sat in a cafe and waited nervously for the boy I'd asked to come meet me there.

He came in, freezing cold from cycling in the sleet, his long hair and leather jacket dripping. He didn't look happy.

I swiftly ordered a second hot chocolate for him, wanting to warm him up, and lighten his mood. And after hemming and hawing, asked him if what we were doing was serious. And I've just remembered, that when he affirmed that it was, I think I said, 'Ok. I will try not to sleep with your best friend anymore.'

Which wasn't the classiest promise to make, and no wonder it took him some time to trust me, and it had taken me six months to hunt him down to that point. But, I knew myself, then. I wasn't sure what I could be.

And I did think, oh I'm going to hurt him. And he's too nice for me.


And then he went on an already booked holiday, and god, I missed him. And he talked about me to his friend for a solid week. And when he came home, we said, we're going to move in together. Yes.

And we did, six months later. When I was 18 years and 4 months old. And while I couldn't imagine spending the rest of my life with him, I couldn't imagine not. And it was remarkably easy not to sleep with anyone else.

I wish I could talk to the 17 year old I was then. Learn from her, because I don't remember what it was like to be her. I wish I had her dreams and plans back, but all she knew she wanted was to go to college, and have someone of her own to love, someone who'd love her back. And a house to live in. And children, children.

And I wish I could teach her too. About expectations, and self worth. And how fast sixteen years can pass by.

tender sunday

My heart feels a little heavy today.

Things are not quite as I would have them be.

And my hands are starting to age...

I remember my mother pinching the skin

on the back of her hand, then mine

saying, what matters is how fast it springs back

Suddenly, it's no longer such a consolation.

Yes. Today is a day with less elasticity. Less bounce.

it doesn't seem so long ago I was lighting candles...

And now, finally, look!

Congratulations to Xbox!

it took me so long to see what this actually was! is it just me?

source

In Wheat We Trust

Yesterday I was discussing attitudes to food allergies with my godmother, who told me the story of the Bishop who was coeliac, and who was being made ill by the host.

Some kindly nuns nearby started baking him gluten free communion wafers, but apparently the Pope Said No. The Lord decreed that the host must be wheaten, and that was that. Gluten was a must. Sadly in those ancient days they hadn't started modifying wheat for mass production, so the Lord didn't feel it was such an issue...

Like a good bishop, this one continued to take communion every morning (it's more intensive if you're a bishop, apparently, you don't get away with once weekly) and eschewed the gluten free wafer. Given that he believed in transubstantiation, it must have been difficult to reconcile his faith with the fact that the body of Christ was slowly killing him... and apparently he did die young.

I think the moral here must be about human inflexibility, and the insanity of the sacrifices we insist on making for the sake of enforcing arbitrary rules. This is not what humanity should be defined by.

I don't know what to write about. I feel devoid of interest. In both the sense of interesting or interested. See, you're bored already.

I asked Olivia what I should write about and she seized the chance to suggest (again) that I should write about her father snoring like a hippo, on my blog. I don't know why she's so keen on the idea yet she is. She even told him about it. I hastened to assure him it wasn't my idea, but he seemed alright with it.

There's a sort of a sad bed saga in our room. After years of a not very comfy mattress, I splashed out loadsa money on a natural latex one, and a bed by the same company that was just lovely. It arrived late, and the more affordable range mattress was always pretty uncomfortable. I should have got the deluxe one with all sorts of padding, but the money was getting silly - the one I tried out in the shop seemed fine, but it was on raised slats - oh, all this detail is very boring. In the end, the guy who sold it to me gave us a lovely free wool stuffed mattress topper, which helped a lot, but not enough, and I wake up every morning with crippling back pain. And Axel's snoring has got worse and worse. Though, age, smoking and lack of excercise probably contribute too.

So I dream of a perfect pristine bed with crisp covers and fat pillows and blackout blinds that work. And silence. Aloneness. Sleeping in solitude, unwoken all night long. Not stirring til I wake naturally, except maybe for a quick second at 6.30 am where I briefly surface from a dream of some handsome celebrity, wake enough to register my blissful comfort, warmth and sleepfulness, and the loveliness of drifting back into the dream again, for hours and snuggly hours.

pancakes!

Yesterday was pancake day - I didn't realise til late in the day... then made delicious pancakes and served them to my family: Olivia burst into tears and wailed loudly because she had such bad stomach cramps. Bodhi tried to snuggle with her then burst into tears and scream-wailed loudly when Axel stopped him from cuddling with her under her duvet on the sofa. Axel stormed off to eat his in front of the computer and slammed the door.

Ah, la, my family life...

Anyway, if anyone wants to make them what I did. Bear in mind they come out different every single time. I am aware it is now Lent, but I don't really expect anyone to be giving up pancakes.

Angry Pancakes (or so it seems)

1 cup Dove's Farm self Raising Flour (it's gluten free, you don't have to use it, but it's nice and light and fluffy)
small amount of baking powder ... it's up to you, I vary it. Start with half a tsp, I suppose.
1/2 tsp cinnamon.

Mash one banana, add one beaten egg and one cup of whatever milk you fancy - lat night I used half soya, half lactose free. Rice milk is good too. 1 Tsp vanilla. Actually, if it's too thick, just add more milk, I usually do.

Mix the wet into the dry, leave it in the fridge for a while and then fry them. I did two little round ones instead of one big one per batch and they suit that - they were all nice and fat and fluffy.

It was SO COLD last night. I was trying to read stories online in the computer room, as I damaged my laptop cable and can't sit in bed anymore... upstairs there's double glazing, downstairs there's just iciness. I had to fortify myself with a hotwater bottle and a final hot pancake. I wasn't going to give in to the last pancake, but I had a sudden sensual memory of being cold and hungover at Feile so many years ago, and getting hot coffee in a styrofoam cup and freshly cooked donuts in a paper bag, and they were just oily, doughy, sugary manna, and we went back for more, and nothing was ever so comforting, they stopped the shivering and brought out the sun.


So. I bow to fried flour based goodness. And I wish I could find a dusty, hidden switch under the stairs that my inquisitive fingers could reach out and flick, and magically cause my family to chill the fuck out.

pretty

There's been no pictures round here in too long.

source

pukey

I have had more stomach upsets in the last month than for years... I have no idea why. I think this time Eddie Rocket's might be the culprit, but ugh.

So I have nothing to post about but vomit this morning, and while I might have managed to wax descriptive about it, something tells me you don't want that.

Vomit, diarhea, lakes of dog pee... that's all I got.

Call back later!

In the interests of fairness...

I got red roses, and the kids got cards from their secret admirer, with a single rose each (that Bodhi loves) and he got a red hoodie and Olivia got a pink heart shaped box of chocolates with  a bow on that they've happily sickened themselves on already.

And Olivia made us stay in bed while she went down and made us all a surprise breakfast in bed sandwich, even with the butter cold and hard to spread... cheese for Axel, ham for Bodhi, jam for me. And a sweet card which I might get round to scanning later.

For now I must clean the kitchen, as it has been some time...

Valentine's Day

I'm too old now, for Valentine's Day. And oh, I'm glad.

My husband has been our daughter's secret admirer since her first February, with a little potted primrose and a card outside the door, teddies with hearts. I suppose it's my turn to do the same for my son, but it doesn't quite come naturally, I must admit.

Ms Moon wrote a post, about the pressures and stresses of it, of never feeling that anyone got it quite right. Well, my feeling is that Valentine's Day is for tweenies and people who are newly in love and want any excuse. After that, we're free of it! My heart cries for the awkward 13 year olds without cards, the lonely ones without dates who have to watch contrived displays of affection, from prettier, more popular people... life is full enough of opportunities that prove it isn't fair without us contriving them.

My husband and I used to write each other silly little Roses are Red rhymes in our cards, and I loved them, but as time went by he stopped... he also stopped signing my birthday cards and Valentine's Day cards 'I love you more with each passing year' as it became more apparent that the opposite was in fact becoming true... but last year, and I think I wrote about this, the poems made a return, and it was nice. But I dunno. One swallow doesn't make a summer, maybe.

Anyhow, in terms of Valentine's Day and Romantic Expectations, I devised a Tactic that is working well for me. I buy Axel a bunch of really nice flowers, in the event that he gets me nasty ones with crysanthemums in them again, and that way I have nice flowers to look at one way or the other and it's all good.

And something fun - as I was going for my walk the other day, I noticed the hearts below sprayed on various walls along the road. It may not be Banksy, but I like it. There's something youthful and proactive and exhuberant about the project.

Then yesterday I was walking past the first one again, where it had been sprayed on the white wall of the Stepford type housing estate, and it had been painted over but someone had written LOVEHEART #6 over it in big black marker. Which I thought was fitting. Especially as I then passed a pair of discarded shitty underpants just up the hill, and pondered about how no similarly civic minded painter-outer citizen had picked them up and put them in the bin. I'd rather see a heart on the wall than a pair of shitty knickers on the ground...

So happy Valentine's Day, all, I hope you get the heart not the pants!

gotta love those emo babies

Olivia came upstairs last night watery of eye and quavery of voice to complain at how unfair it was that the Mario level she was so hard, she kept dying, it was so not fair! She was angry, she was upset, she was railing at the injustices thrust upon her so early in her young life.

I tried to placate her with a personalised version of 'if you don't succeed' and reminded her of how she thought she would never be able to whistle, or snap her fingers, or read, and how all of those things fell into place with practice. She looked unconvinced, and still wobbly of lip. And I thought I'd never be able to drive, I said, it was so hard when I started. At that her eyes sparked with wicked mischief and amusemet, and her wobbling lip twisted in an attempt to repress her evil laughter, which burst forth when I challenged her as to whether or not she was insulting my driving skills. She was... how sharper than a serpent's tooth it is...


This evening, and lately, the place has been emotional - Bodhi's not very well post tummy bug and is by turns violent and heartbroken, and bemoans his fate with loud screaming wailing. Tonight saw him sitting on the stairs for 3 minutes twice, for space-pistol- whipping and then biting his sister. He finds this exile extremely difficult and sobs his way through it.

A little later, he made his way over to Axel's guitar, and strummed it while singing into a green plastic phone:

Do a Sad So-ong
And don't feel sad...
And it's all of me-ee
And I stayed on the stairs...
And talked to mu-um

A sad so-ong
A song about being sad...
I did a pu-ke
It was in my mou-th....

Musical genius!!

funny coincidence

Last week I told you about the appearance of Youth in the school when I was picking up Olivia. Today I happened to be walking and got chatting to said Vision's older sister. It turns out she's not her older sister at all, but her mother, and she remembers me from secondary school - after I had left, she left in Transition Year to have a baby (more productive than mini-company, eh?) and the girl  I assumed to be her younger sister is actually her 14 year old daughter... who looks alarmingly older than 14, while her mother looks alarmingly younger than 29, I suppose.

It's a funny little world really. This somehow felt more significant while I was walking home thinking about it, but now I'm surrounded by my own two whinging demanding youth sappers so I can't think and must go attend to a sore tummy and a cheese toastie.

Chupa Chups for grownups...

What will they think of next?

funny friends

Tinman made me laugh and laugh this morning with his perfect image of his own demise. I'm not sure what that says about me, other than I have great taste in friends with humorous vision...

diary, January 1, 2010

I Was Saving Them To Write On You

Let my words
sink into your skin.
Impermanent ink
fades out of sight quickly
but my love remains a while,
invisible.

pictures

Somedays I feel like giving up on words altogether and just posting found pictures that speak to me instead. Except then I'd have to start drawing again because while sometimes you can find the perfect perfect thing you want, sometimes there's nothing out there in cyber land. I wonder is the internet a cyber I Ching, and we don't realise the messages our searches are sending us much of the time. Sometimes we do. Oops. My sentence ran out too soon. I can't really start drawing again, because frustratingly I'm not good at it. I can make the words do what I want sometimes but the lines and the colours tend to stubbornly refuse to recreate the pictures that burn so clearly in my head. Stupid hands!

I want to be a little Emo girl cartoon, and run around my pages in stripey stockings and big black eye makeup and mascara tears, all ageless and heartful and free...

                                            

 

friday morning non post

I went to bed  early last night but I still woke up tired. What is up with that?

I want to ring the vet and see if she'll put the dogs down, but I'm scared she'll say no, I'm scared she'll say yes, I don't want to do it and admit that I'm willing to take something's life just because I don't want to deal with it  any more. Not Christian... breaking promises once insisted upon... arg. But I don't.want.to.clean.up.any.more.dogpee. I want a house that smells fresh and is free of dog hair.

Arg. Would anyone like a sprightly 16 year old Jack Russell?

I need to clean up. I want to write something but my ideas are all stupid. I'm going to go for a walk, it's sunny, maybe inspiration will come that way. Maybe I'll call in to the vet in person, that might be easier.

I wish I had some thing to say for your friday morning interest but sadly I don't.

I need a holiday. I feel like moving house. I got my P60 today and when I see what I actually earned last year, it seems so pathetic. Sigh.

Right. Breakfast, then into the open air where things will all seem more buoyant. Everyone seems depressed and miz at the moment. January's over. St Brigit's day is past. Shouldn't we be welcoming the Spring... I have some animals to sacrifice to it...

something lovely

Glimmer's new post. And the one about sleepwalking. Beautiful.

I don't resist new blogs when people tell me about them. They think I do... but it just takes em a while to do stuff. I like a wait period between idea and action. A time to let things settle and percolate.

For me, that philosophical idea that we can never really move anywhere because we have to cross half that distance first, and half that and so on ad nauseum (Was it Berkely? I can't remember. Someone empirical) feels really true. So if anyone's waiting for me to do something, it's always a good idea to email a kick in the arse...

Blog Award Nominations

Today's the last day to do your blog award nominations for 2010!

I've done mine, but it's made me realise how out of the scene I've become this year. But I was telling Danielle about them, and he was all delighted... you mean it's Real Life?? Not just awards for your sidebar?? Are there TROPHIES?? I want one!!!

And he's totally right, I'm so proud of our blog awards. Yeah, we live in a teeny country, yeah it's a cliquey incestuous blog scene because of it, but fuck it, look what we do with that!

I want one too, of course, except for the speech giving photo taking aspect, but then I read something like this (random non-irish post I read today) and slap myself upside the head for entertaining the remote idea.

Haiti

I think I mentioned in a post that my godfather's brother had gone missing in the earthquake, but didn't follow it up. I just got this email from my friend and thought I'd pass it on, in case anyone wanted to donate further:

You may be aware that my uncle Andrew Grene was among the victims of the Haiti earthquake, having been in the UN mission there at the time.



In order that some good may come from this tragedy, his brother and best friend have set up the Andrew Grene Foundation, a charity dedicated to supporting the people of Haiti, particularly the children, through education. If you have been wondering how to give money effectively to a country devastated by a natural disaster while already struggling with appalling poverty, this is one such way.

A Vision of Youth

For the last couple days I’ve woken up tired and pale and looked at myself in the mirror and thought for the first time, ohh, I look ooooold… Suddenly there are wrinkles round my eyes, and I just look.. ha, well, bet down, as they say. Today’s better, thank god, but you can tell it’s encroaching.


Yesterday I went to collect Olivia from school, and huddled by the wall, shivering slightly, ensconsed in my hoodie that is definitely a never-to-be-seen-outdoors item of comfort clothing. I stood by too mum-friends, both in sensible anoraks, and Anne explained to us how she was needing to grab her daughter and run as she had some litany of tasks to do. Hence, she was zealously guarding first place in the queue.

And then, through the door, walked Youth.

Someone’s school-girl auntie, in a trendily disguised school kilt and funky punky hair and makeup, the epitomy of 16 year old gorgeous freshness. And potential.

‘Oh, look, Youth just walked in,’ I said, and the three of us laughed, and cringed a little.

And then the bell clanged over our heads, and we went in to rummage for the kids’ coats, and Anne took her rightful place at the top of the queue… and hilariously, adding insult to injury, the walking embodiment of youngness walked straight by her, to the classroom door, and got her nephew out first!

Yes. No age before beauty here… Youth laughs at your rules and tradition, it respects our stature and experience not one bit…

moanmoanmoan

There's something wrong with my car... again.

Ok, I stayed up too late working, again.

I have a tummy bug.

I went back to bed this morning, but I still feel sleepyickybleh.

My husband did something really annoying yesterday: I'll keep my resolution not to moan about it on the blog anymore but it's still pissing me off. And god, just realised I just had a dream about being ill and standing there while my mother in law insisted on making my bed, all wrong, with Axel angrily helping her do it all wrong, and me trying to beg them to fuck off, while pulling the rugs she'd put in out and put the sheet back under the covers. And having Axel storm off in a rage, and just thinking, yes, all of you, just fuck off!

Wanna sleep all day and have someone bring me medicinal tea and a hot water bottle and take my children away to a land of delight and entertainment til after dinner time.

Bleurg.