Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Stand up proud.

It's a proud day for citizens of Leicester!

One of our own is being honoured!!  :)  

 Congratulations Mr. Slapdeeback!! (See: Eddie Izzard's absolutely laugh-out-loud hilariously fantastic bit about Humperdinck.  Better still, watch the entire DVD of Dress to Kill. You'll thank me.)

My personal fave to come out of our great city has got to be this man.  His story makes me cry!! 

Posted by Marmite Breath at 11:32:45 | Permanent Link | Comments (1) |

Monday, January 30, 2006

Happy Birf Day Tomasso

Our boy is four today! I’ve been close to crying all day just thinking about it.   I love watching my kids grow up. I never thought I’d be a mother, let alone enjoy the job, but I truly do. Tom’s face this morning when he opened his eyes was so sweet. I had whispered Happy Birthday to him, and the realization that the day was finally here was dawning on him. He opened his eyes and immediately grinned at me and I melted. We went downstairs to open all his cards and presents and I couldn’t help laughing at how excited he got when money fell out of cards. Kids are the same, no matter the era or place. He kept saying, “Wow, people must really KNOW that I am four years old now!”
He went to preschool and had a big fuss made of him (and was thrilled when they had a Happy Birthday poster on the door), and he also went for a special “Birthday Haircut” so he could look like a proper big boy. One of the highlights was when we picked up his cake and he saw it for the first time—it was just classic. He could barely contain himself.   The cake was Transformers!! That made his day.
 
When we picked up Hadleigh from school, she ran up to him and hugged him, shouting, “Hi Birthday Boy”. If I had died at that moment, it would have been with a smile on my face. She wasn’t always happy to see him. In fact, four years ago today, her life changed—not for the better, according to her. She was pissed off from the moment we saw the ultrasound and discovered that the girl I was supposed to be carrying had a willy. She’s never made any secret of her disdain for him, but lately, the ice is thawing. Her greeting to him after school almost made me cry in public, which would be bad since I always try to maintain a cool veneer in public.
I spent a lot of time today just lost in my own thoughts and memories. I thought about the day that Tom was born, obviously, and how it was lonely giving birth in a foreign country, and how all I wanted was my Mum. I remember calling her the morning after I had been having contractions all night and wondering if they were for real. I think the conversation went something like this:
 
Me: Hi Mum
Mum: Hi Nat. Are you okay?
Me: Er, I’m not sure if, oh, hold on, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGHGGHGHGHG, um, well, I think I might be in labour. *small sob*
Mum: How long have you been having contractions?
Me: I was having them all NIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT, oh shit, this hurts, and *gripping chair* um, they’re starting to *grunting* really HUUUURT!! But I’m not sure if they’re REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAL, AAAAAAARGGHHH @#$%&*#$!!
Mum: You’d better call Aaron home from work right now, Nat, I’d say you’re in labour.
 (Implied message: I love you Nat, but you’re a dozy cow).
 
Other highlights of Tom’s birth day include driving 20 miles to the hospital on bumpy Neapolitan roads, and being starving and having to watch Aaron eat a subway sandwich while he sat at the end of my bed and watched them put a catheter in places that I don’t want to even think about. It still freaks me out that he was able to eat while watching that. A really memorable part of it was, I have to say, falling in love with the anesthesiologist. I don’t remember his name or anything, but damn, he was good. I remember them telling me I was dilated to six and then thinking, “Jesus Christ, nobody’s giving me a medal when this shit’s over. I’d better get the drugs now before they tell me it’s too late”. Anyway, God bless that man with the needle, wherever he is. I hope he’s erased the memory of my sobbing, hysterical self.
I do remember worrying about Hadleigh, even though she was with some nice people.  I wish that we could have had family there. It was just too risky to try and plan trans-atlantic plane tickets around my water breaking. Mum and Dad came to visit ten days later, and it made everything seem much more normal. Then it was as it should be—me, all chubby and with huge boobs (YAY!!), Hadleigh with her Grandparents adoring her, and Aaron and my Mum busy making me feel loved and happy. Oh, and Dad drinking wine. Aaaah, normalcy.
 
Now four years on, and this baby has grown up to amaze me every day. This weekend he said, “I think God is playing checkers with us. The earth is the checker board, and we’re the pieces”. How profound is that???
 
Happy Birthday Tom-Tom. I hope the world knows how lucky it is to have you in it. 
 
PS) Here are both kids on their birthdays.  I was just as mushy about Had's birthday, but I didn’t have my own personal blog to record the mush. Of course, the lack of evidence will convince Hadleigh once and for all that I love her brother more than I love her.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Posted by Marmite Breath at 21:48:48 | Permanent Link | Comments (4) |

Wednesday, January 25, 2006

Clever Clogs

Sexy Carpenter made the Dean's List!!!! 

Getting me knocked up and marrying me was proof that he had brains, but this, well, this just makes me glad I keep him around.  ;)

Posted by Marmite Breath at 22:59:44 | Permanent Link | Comments (4) |

It didn't have to happen, people.

Sometimes we get complacent.   We get content with life and we stop questioning things.  We don't stop to question why things happen, because we assume that it's the ebb and flow of life and that things balance out in the end.   That sort of blind faith in the universe can only end in tears.

This post is a wake up call for us all.  The following picture is not pretty.  You won't see anything like it in any textbook or pregnancy manual.  Y'all, please don't look at this picture if you're eating.  I beg of you. 

If you or anyone you know is pregnant and is less than five feet tall, please, don't let them eat endless supplies of Italian Gelato (even if it is forced upon them by well-meaning and caring Italians, like mine was).  Next thing they know, they'll be 183lbs (13 stone) and their husband will take to calling them, "My little Water Buffalo". 

(Sad fact:  I wasn't even full term when this picture was taken.  I still had almost three weeks to go.   But this is what I looked like approximately four years ago. )

Let this be a lesson to us all.    :)

Edited to add:

Aaron just came over to the computer and read my blog over my shoulder.  I think he must have been trying to make himself sound better, but here, hilariously, were his comments.

"Hey!  I never called you my little water buffalo.  I just said it was like sleeping with a water buffalo".

Yes, darling, that makes it all better.

Posted by Marmite Breath at 12:38:28 | Permanent Link | Comments (7) |

Monday, January 23, 2006

Mirror Mirror

Today was a bad mirror day.  Some days, I manage to not look in the mirror very much, and that's fine with me.  I use it to brush my teeth, do my hair and make up, etc, but then I avoid it like the plague for the rest of the day.  It's not that I think I'm the ugliest person on the whole planet, but I just don't enjoy looking at myself.  I'm very critical of most of my features, and I could do without the bullshit feelings that accompany most looks in the mirror.    I'm not sure when it started.  I don't remember being a kid and thinking, "God, Nat, you're a complete dog".  I don't even remember thinking that as a young teenager.  I was always "little" and "funny" and I was happy to be described by those words.  I'm not sure when I started hating my nose, hating my hair, thinking I was too fat.  When was it??

There's a story, it's become legend in my family now, and I want to get it all down for posterity's sake.  I was 17 years old, walking around Eyres Monsell with my sister, Rhonda.  We were on our way to Dean's house.  There were a couple of youths (as Adrian Mole would say) playing footie in the street.  As we passed, they started shouting things at us.  At one point, they yelled at Rhonda, "You're a slapper!"   I couldn't believe it.  I wasn't going to put up with that bullshit, so I started yelling back at them.  They cut me off with, "You're not just a slapper; you're an ugly slapper!".  I remember just being so humiliated and walking off quickly.  I know they probably never thought about the incident again, but I refer to it at least once a week, to anyone who will listen, which, frankly, has dwindled down to the dog.  And even he's sick of the story.

I'm officially getting over this now.  Really.

Posted by Marmite Breath at 22:01:43 | Permanent Link | Comments (5) |

A Pox on Our House

Le Sigh.

Tom's got the lurgy. (Can I just say how much I LOVE saying that word?  It always reminds me of being eight years old and pretending that all the boys on the playground had it.)  Also, I must say, the lurgy sounds much more threatening and much more likely to be a real disease than its American cousin, the cootie)

Okay, so he doesn't really have the lurgy,  it's really conjunctivitis (pink eye), but it's a bit disgusting.  The poor kid couldn't open his eyes this morning.  Unfortunately, it hasn't affected his mouth or his ability to completely rabbit on about anything and everything.  As I write this blog, he is talking about a robot that he just invented.  Would I be a bad mother if I locked myself into the shoe closet to get away from him?  I mean, I don't want to be rude (tm Simon Cowell), BUT, I can't listen anymore to how his imaginary robot has special powers that enable it to hook up to the game of Candyland and then take pictures of all the characters.  It's so boring!!  There!!  I said it!!  I'm a shitty mother!!!  Ah well, it's something I've suspected for a while now, but it's quite freeing to just say it out loud for all the world to know.

Oh dear, I think His Nibs has  realized that I'm just saying, "Hmm, that's nice" and not really paying proper attention to him, so I'd better go.  Also, I need to fix dinner before Sexy Carpenter gets home. 

 

Posted by Marmite Breath at 16:56:40 | Permanent Link | Comments (1) |

Sunday, January 22, 2006

Trailer Park Couture

I.really.want.this.shirt.  Or this one.   I wear a medium, for anyone who is interested in being my Secret Santa.

Why yes, I AM in complete denial that I'm old.

 

Posted by Marmite Breath at 15:57:58 | Permanent Link | Comments (2) |

Snore of the Rings

Sorry, I really did try.  I wanted to like it.  I had such high hopes for the book, truly.  Not that I envisioned myself going to Hobbit conventions or anything, but still.  I couldn't even finish a whole chapter.  I'm sure all the Lord of the Rings fans out there are going to call me an uncultured philistine, but I don't care.  I can sleep at night knowing that I love literature and don't need to be a LOTR freak to prove it.

PS) Is there really such thing as a Hobbit convention??

Posted by Marmite Breath at 15:48:15 | Permanent Link | Comments (2) |

Do As I Say (Not As I Do)

This photo session drove Hadleigh completely mad.  In fact, while we were preparing for it, she said, quite calmly, "This is all gonna be complete S.H.I.T"  And yes, she spelled it out. Okay, I may have said something like that a few moments before, but I didn't know she'd take that to heart!

 I should have expected a comment like that from her.  She reminds me of Wednesday Addams from the Addams Family.  Or Courtney Love, I can't decide.  At lunch when I was about to yell at her for her smart arsed comments she rolled her eyes and said, "But sarcasm is such a good weapon".  What do I do with her?? 

On the flip side of this, there's our Tom.  He's happy to please me by sitting still for a picture--especially since I bribed him with chocolate.  Aaron was trying to make them laugh by licking my ear or licking his finger and sticking it in my ear, but that seemed to piss Hadleigh off even more.  She is only eight, but she suffers from an acute case of adolescence. 

Now off to the art supply store--Hadleigh's bribe was buying art supplies.  *sigh*

The thing that makes me smile about all this is that I have pictures of myself in such a mardy arsed state.  Grandad Tom used to just bring out the worst in me when he got out the camera for a photo.  I invariably had my bottom lip stuck out or was on the verge of storming off in a huff (usually ending up sulking behind a chair).  Anyway, I turned out fine (shut up!!) so there's hope for my Hadleigh yet!

 

 

Posted by Marmite Breath at 15:31:57 | Permanent Link | Comments (6) |

Monday, January 16, 2006

Guilty Pleasures (and ranting--I can't stay on topic)

What are yours???

Mine are:

VH1's Celebreality (Celebrity Fit Club, The Surreal Life, anything involving the horror that is Flava Flav).

Vienna Sausages and Spam.  I eat them once every two years or something, but I've never been able to shed my white trash ways and give them up forever.  Fried spam is a particularly terrible thing to admit to.  It mutated from eating fried luncheon meat with Alana Mountenay, a girl I grew up with in Leicester.  I also used to love scratchings from the chip shop--they're the crispy bits of batter that collect at the bottom of the fish and chip fryer.  Oh my God.  What must I have done to my arteries?  But they were so good!  Once again, showing my prole roots--they were free.

Speaking of Celebrity Fit Club--here's my vent for the week.  There's a girl on there who is 4'11", (like me) and weighs 128lbs.  I weigh 126.  Why in the HELL is she on there?  I'm nowhere NEAR happy with my body, but I don't think I need to be on Celebrity Fit Club.  Aaron tried to say that okay, she's not really fat, but it's about getting fit, but the clincher of each episode is making them get on a giant scale and they are given a weight loss goal every week.  I'm sorry, but Bruce Vilanch who is over 300 pounds NEEDS to be on that programme.  Countess Vaughn, though she might be a couple of pounds overweight, does not.  Just my opinion.

 

Posted by Marmite Breath at 23:35:58 | Permanent Link | Comments (3) |
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