Just give me a home, where the buffalos roam.

I've just realised (although there's been a dawning of this coming on for a while, let me tell you) why God invented Retirement.  Why Nature invented a General Slowing Down.  Why Time needs so much of it to Work.  Etcetera.  An Epiphany?  A great flash of inspiration?  A sudden burst of hitherto untapped creativity?
Nah.
I just got back from dropping The Girl off on her 'Sixth Form Shadow Day' and accidentally bumped into my reflection in the rear view mirror as I was unclipping my seatbelt.
See Jackie Stallone there?
So did I.
This is clearly what happens to a person who has spent the best part of  their life trying to hold down a job of any description in the name of trying to keep a roof over their heads and something edible on the plate. 
Of course, getting up, dressed and made up in the dark this morning could also have something to do with it but I'm sticking to blaming it on the ravages of Time and Tide. My overworked body is just getting to tired to cope with commonplace funtions best left to youth.  It needs a rest.
And even whilst I adjusted my badly (embarrassingly badly)  applied lipstick from 6 a.m. I almost convinced myself that NOBODY else saw how insanely it had been flung on earlier, especially not The Girl, her boyfriend, his brother, his sister and his parents.  They wouldn't have seen anything at that hour, would they? In the bright lights of their kitchen.  Surely not.  After all, they live in the neighbouring village from Denial where I reside - it's probably in the water. And I'm hurtling towards the age where I just won't give a sh*t anyway. So,  I'm in training.
Embarrassment - moi?
I'd say.

Do the Math? I'd rather do the Funky Chicken (naked) in any well-known UK shopping centre (but don't hold me to it)

I loved my twelve times table square.  When I had it right there -  in front of me and the teacher pointed and said "six sevens!".  I could walk a path (two paths, actually) to praise.  And I arrived at the correct square... hang on a minute (seriously, where's that damn calculator when you need it?) ahem - 42.  Of course! 42!  I knew that - had I been hypnotised and regressed to that exact day at school when I had my twelve-square out - I mean.
You see I'm not a black and white person.  For me,  1+1=2 has been done to death.  We all know it.  Can we not just move on now and find something else out? A cure for cancer perhaps or maybe just read a new book which has words that are put in a different order to make someone happy.   Whoever invented Mathematics as a lesson that should be learned, was a sadist.  And it's something that apparently we ALL need to know and pass down to our children and their children ad nauseum.  There's probably even a mathematical term for this which I'd share with you if I was bothered enough to look it up.
Anyone else remember Logarithms?  What were THEY all about? And hands up who's had cause to panic  in the face of an everyday-life-conundrum and thought "shit - if only I had my Slide-Rule/Logarithms book with me right now...the world could be saved/the puppy wouldn't die/global warming would be a thing of the past" No.  me neither.
Maths homework for me meant sitting huddled over a very damp exercise book (tears), rubber in hand, holes in the pages through so much erasing, a little pile of pencil shavings as a distraction technique (from sharpening my wrists mostly) and my Mother breathing over my shoulder, huffing and sighing like she'd given birth to Forrest Gump's dumber sister.
My mum worked in Accounts.  She could add up a string of thirteen numbers in her head and still carry on knitting and not break out in a sweat.  Me?  I only had to glance at a sum and I'd want to pee my pants and hide in the girls toilets til it was all over (embarrassing at the age of thirty-four).
I just didn't get it.   It didn't have shape, or colour, or sound or smell or rhyme.  And for the life of me I didn't get why you could sometimes 'borrow' some from one number and then 'carry' some more somewhere else to arrive at the 'right answer'.  That's what bothered me.  There was only the RIGHT answer.  No debating, no 'possibles', no uncertainty or discussion allowed - right or wrong.  No in between with Maths.  BUT this is what I like.  I like the in-between stuff, the grey areas, the debateable, the uncertainties, the variations and connotations - I don't like worlds that are black and white with no shades in between.
Which doesn't cut much mustard with any Maths Teacher I know.
So it comes as a bit of a shock to find that The Girl is in the Higher set for her GCSE Maths.  Er- pardon me? When did this happen?  Currently she's skipping gaily through a field of Simultaneous Equations.  The last time we sat down and did sums together we were both nearly in tears and at each other's throats - I ended up writing a letter to her teacher in the end telling him that although 'we have both tried, we are sorry to say that we do not understand the question'. Which was the truth.  And teachers admire the truth, don't they?
And I like to think that my outright honesty with the whole 'not understanding' thing has helped forged her path toward mathematical genius - no, I do.  For, since that day she has always raised her hand when she hasn't understood the question, or else waited until lesson-end and asked if she could be helped and this - contrary to personal belief that it will result in being labelled 'slow-to-grasp' - actually works.  She's proof of this.
Although I do have a confession to make.  And this makes me very proud indeed.  I once sat up til the wee smalls on the BBC Bitesize site, teaching myself Algebra for when the Girl and I had a tough old time of it way back when.  And the thrill and pulse of sheer victory I felt when she returned with a monumental 12/15 for that night's homework, is something I will always remember.
It's never too late.
If you want to do something bad enough - especially if it's for someone you'll do anything for.
Delight equals Determination over Despair.

If the Genes fit...

So the Girl has a pre-arranged, pre-paid for, pre-tty much completely organised 'Kerrang' thing happening this coming Friday... by the way... what happened to going to KidsWorld and turning your tongue blue with Slush Puppies and falling off foam-covered rolling logs and laughing til you're sick? - it's true - it DOES go quickly, this childhood thing.  Trust me. Back to the story.
So,  whilst she was chatting on line with one of the lads who's going with the party, he inadvertently (or not -  jury's still out) misspelled the word "you're" - without the apostrophe or the 'e'.  (The sentence was something like "your an idiot" - feel free to replace stronger, more insulting teenagery-type words at will).
Gulp.
This is MY daughter we're talking about, so you kinda get the gist of where this is going, right?
She corrected him.  Only decent thing you can do.  He stuck to his guns, telling her he was using it as slang and as he's currently mid-way through A-Level English Language, he should know.
Double gulp.
The Girl pointed out that if he'd wanted to use the word as slang or even 'text-speak' then it should have read something like"ur"  and not just missed out the apostrophe.
Heated debate (again, use your own imagination) ensued.
Fine.
Lots of 'fine's during supper this evening.  a few tears.  a few more.

[I have to interject that MY advice: "A Mother's Advice" - which was actually sought, may I add - was that the whole thing should be "slept on" and re-visited tomorrow after the heat of this evening had been allowed to chill a little.  No rash decisions should be made until then. Very sensible I thought.]

Consequently, lad is told that until he apologises and admits his inaccuracy, he is no longer welcome on this pre-arranged outing of musicality.
Nothing like a sound piece of advice being put to good use.  Nothing like.
He stands his ground.  He knows what he's talking about.  The A-level course again cited as proof if proof were needed.
So another girl is invited in his stead.
An hour later he apologises.

[Of course very, very tempted at this stage to go with an "I told you so", but a Mother knows her place]

And after he's informed of being usurped in the Kerrang seats, tells the Girl that of course he's not upset, and he wouldn't dream of demanding he still goes after she's already replaced him.
There's a moral in here somewhere but for the life of me, the only one I can come up with right now is "Mother knows Best".

Help! I think I need to be Katie Price!

And not in a big-bazoomer-y type of way, not in an orange-hued, stick-thin celebrity B-lister type of way either, in fact not even in an "I married one of the fittest, most tolerant, funniest blokes in the universe but it still didn't make me happy" kinda way either.  No, I think I need to be Katie Price because of what happened to me in the shower this morning.
Incoming elaboration...
As regular readers already know, the bathroom is where I get  my best ideas.  And  today, even through the fug of the current mucus-based-bug - which let me tell you turns any wet room into an unprecedented danger zone -  I had SUCH a double, no.. triple - oh soddit - make that a gazillion-whammy of a creative inspiration that I actually left the room shaking and pruned to the eyeballs, I'd stood under the shower for so long trying to work it all out.
I KNOW it's a great idea.  I KNOW it'll be an absolute blast to write.  I KNOW it'll hit home on so many levels and touch a whole generation and I KNOW the subject so well that it'll be almost painful (in a good way) to write- but.  And this is not a massive but.... BUT I already have tandem WIP teen books I'm writing, I have a list of about 15 other 'tentative titles' of ideas that I know I'll to get round to penning "One Day" and I vacillate from one to the other according to my general mood, the weather and my state of un/dress.
(This, in case any Agent-type person is reading - is because I NEED AN AGENT to discipline me in where/what/which I'm supposed to be doing first for optimum effect.. ok, manic screech over...)
And you know what?  This, is what I imagine Katie Price has the ability... nay, the luxury to do.  She can have a great idea whilst in her equivalent of MY creative shower (she's certainly not welcome in my shower - let me make that perfectly clear - not whilst there are red-blooded men and impressionable teenagers about the house) and, knowing that she doesn't have to actually sit at a keyboard - much less LEARN how to use one to begin with - and start to draft the bones, research until three in the morning whilst ensuring surrounding areas are kept free of smeared chocolate, hob-nob crumbs, spilled tea and small creatures on the sniff for said scraps.  AND keep a bloody house running.  Oh, and a turn up regularly at a part-time job.  And feed a family - which includes cats.  Does she? Well, does she?
I'm guessing not.  Although I'm quite happy to be corrected on this point.  I'd welcome it to be frank.  It'd be nice to have a creative chin-wag with a 'writer' of her calibre. 
In my mind, she has these ideas (in whatever room of her house in whichever state of undress she chooses) and promptly farms them out to some other poor (more professional, who can spell, knows where a comma's supposed to go and which law of imperative verbs is the most important) writer who will grab her 'ideas', mould, shape and form them into some kind of semblance of order which won't make *blood pour from a reader's eyeballs and proceed to type them up into a story for her.
To which she will then put her name.
And sell a million in a morning because she's who she is.
At least Martine McCutcheon had the grace to write her 'book' herself.  I'm guessing.  Judging from the excerpt I read and the hundredweight of tissues I had to use to soak up *the blood.

(Closet) Fashionista? ! Moi?

In the dim recesses of my mind, I remember making very lame attempts at 'Designing' stuff in my mis-spent youth.  Dresses (Wedding, mostly) army-style culottes (?!)  and ethereal floaty things a la Queen Guinevere. And I've always had a thing about 'folds', or is it called 'drape'?
And  I did  a "Fashion Through Time" project at school where I discovered a love of the Thirties and Forties with their waspie-waists  and full-on petticoats. Now where did all that go I wonder?
How come at school I only ever managed to knock up a larger-than-life yellow and white checked duck (much to the consternation of my mother who couldn't see the point, much less be able to afford the princely sum of £12.50 for the material - funny how these things stick in the mind, isn't it?) oh, a cushion cover and a swing bag - which I think was  made using a loom we built ourselves too.  What happened to my designs?  What happened to the creations I drew and painted and secretly dreamed I would one day watch glide down a catwalk at the Paris Fashion Show?

No idea.

But it all came back to me last night as I was channel hopping.  And spotted the adorable Leonora Critchlow (she's the ghost, Nina, in "Being Human" and we have secretly adopted her because she's so lovely) with a mouthful of pins and chatting to a very believably disenchanted supermodel who's also her best friend.  Throw into the equation a brilliant Cruella de Ville performance from Dervla Kirwan (no sign of her nicey-niceness anywhere and Glenn Close should watch her back)  a few other cliched-but-perfectly drawn characters, and the whole thing, called "MATERIAL GIRL"* is an absolute MUST-SEE.  And as last night was the 3rd episode, I've just caught up with the first two and I have never been less disappointed in my entire life.  It's great.  it's pure excapism on a real-deal front and it's British, people - British!!!  It's 'Glee-meets-The Rag Trade' and there's even a perfectly-cast Polish/Czech chain-smoking-seamstress which probably infringes most health & safety regulations - but it works!

And I'm not a "shoe" person, but there are shoes, ladies - SHOES!  Up front - very beautiful - and in your face.  I seem to recall that during the Dallas heyday, our Joannie was reported to have even worn slippers during some scenes because it was all about the shoulder pads and make-up and not the footwear.
Please give it a go *first episode here. It's a lovely, believable other world.  It'll warm your cockles.

Wishes Never Made...

My lovely interweb writer friend, Deborah Durbin (no relation to the black and white Deanna of 1950's Sunday afternoon musical fame) would probably back me up on this - come to think of it, so would Noel Edmonds with his Visualisation techniques and his Golden Orbs - but we'll stick with Deborah because that's a much less cringey image!.
It occurred to me in the shower this morning - the best place for any kind of creative thinking bar none - that in my life I already have things I never wished (aloud) for but which I certainly could not nor would not be able to function happily or properly without.  These being :

1.  The most beautiful, happy, level-headed, content-in-her-own-skin with no hang-ups whatsoever daughter who continually (even though I shamefully embarrass her on occasion) tells me she loves me and wants to be just like me when she grows up (okay then, so slightly worrying on the mental stability front, but we can't have everything) and with whom I have the best relationship I've ever had with anyone my entire life. *sob*.

2. The most incredible husband in the world who, for some reason seems to love me for my faults and not despite them and who never fails to lift my spirits with either a reasoned argument in spirit-lifting favour or else a supremely amusing face-pull/dance/moonie at precisely the right moment.  He remains my breath of fresh air, keeps me grounded and loves me whatever my mood and state of dress.
(Disclaimer:  Actually I DID wish for him and that'll be the subject of another post - with grateful thanks to Deborah for her amazing book "There's a Little Witch in Every Woman" and to my friend at the time, Tracey for giving it to me).

3. The absolute best (paid) work in the world for my mentality. If, during 'Career' lessons at school, it had been suggested I should remain working at a school, only I wouldn't be actually teaching, I'd be cutting, sticking, mounting and stapling work onto massive three metre display boards - after firstly having designed a whole mural associated with said work, I think I'd have peed myself laughing.  A ridiculous job like that?  Me?  Are you mad!  And yet I am the Middle School equivalent of Rolf Harris working to an academic timetable ("can you tell what it is yet?").

4. Of course Bill Gates has to have played some small part in the next non-wish scenario but where would I/we be without the amazing technologies surrounding our pc's and the things we can do with them?  No more am I sitting huddled over a manual/electric/golfball/daisywheel  typewriter (remember those?) with stupid sheets of carbon and silly little strips of tippex, wondering how I can *seriously* cut and paste a whole section of story without making the manuscript look like a Christmas decoration or a doiley.  Thank the God of technology for the wonders we are able to use today - and thank goodness s/he was listening through my frustrations of finding an easier way to do it.

5. Never in my wildest (and believe me, I've had some) imaginings, could I have dreamed that One Day I could finish reading a book and then send the author a message telling them how much I enjoyed it and have the author then reply back saying 'thanks'. My god, the conversations I could have had with Enid Blyton, Jilly Cooper and Marian Keyes had this form of tehnology been available to me decades ago!

6. And a list wouldn't be complete without a mention of the Perm, would it?  Who'd have thought that all I had to do to get the hair of my dreams would be to give birth.  Not a mention of that one in the Pregnancy Manual.  I think I'd have noticed.  And I have to thank L'Oreal for keeping it 'real' and not making me appear as the silvery-haired crazy lady who sticks kids pictures on walls for a living whilst dreaming of becoming a proper author-type person one day!

Once Upon a Time...

Well, would YOU want to read on?

[this is the opening paragraph of a book I will be writing one day]
1.
The last time I saw Price Johnson he’d had his hand up the back of my t-shirt in a valiant attempt at trying to unfasten my shiny new Wonderbra. I think if I’d had a bit more to drink and a bit less savvy about me at the tender age of eighteen I might have told him it was a front-loader and let the romance commence. However, as it happened, after about twenty minutes of getting just about nowhere and finally more overcome with exhaustion than passion, he’d excused himself saying he was thirsty and wandered off into the sweaty, heaving throng that was Julian Crane’s New Years Eve party. I didn’t see him again. Not that it bothered me unduly. I hadn’t gone to the party with him anyway. I’d gone with Colin Butterfield. Only Colin’d had his head down the Crane’s toilet for most of the evening and I knew if I was going to get any kind of snog out of him, that it wasn’t going to be a particularly tasty experience – ‘proper’ boyfriend or not.