Bacon, Not Bacon (Part 1)

Well, what an eventful time we’ve had in Paris!

I’m composing this sitting in my seat in the Eurostar on the way home…..it’s only a whole 24hours late, and I’ve just finished coping with the dual stresses of French public transport ‘diabolique’, and The Family all getting their combined knickers in a big old twist (as in combined stresses, rather than they were wearing one gigantic pair of pants between them!)

But, as all good stories do, we should start at the beginning….

Ahhh, Paris! The city of love! Of shopping! Of glamouressness!

Sparkly Eiffel Tower!

Now because this is me, of course it was all those things…(ha!)……

I fell in love with a gorgeous Parisian man named Claude, bought a couple of Dior handbags and waltzed down the Champs-Élysées in my towering Louboutin heels whilst dragging a small rat-like yet highly fashionable dog-type creature behind me.

Humn, maybe it didn’t happen quite like that…

So, what really happened?

Well, we arrived at our hotel and all went swimmingly until the next morning when we went down for breakfast. We were shown in as usual, went to get our chosen food from the buffet and sat down to break our fast (sounds very dramatic when you put it like that doesn’t it?)

No sooner had we started than we get a bustling little French man pop up and start whittering on about us sitting in the wrong place and eating the wrong breakfast. ‘Wrong breakfast?’ I hear you say!

Apparently there was a swish option and a pleb option. We’d been allocated the pleb option (how very rude!), but had managed to find our way to the swish side.

There goes the bacon then!

The little waiter looked as though he’d very much like to take our laden plates away from us, but manners just about managed to win through.

On inspection of the ‘plebfast’ as we came to call it, we realised that the absence of any bacon was a permanent feature, and no amount of asking the smirking boy-waiters would bring forth any of the basic breakfast delicacy, however much we managed to convey any feelings of desperate bacon-related need! Tiny random sausages there were, but the best bits remained tantalisingly close on the other side, yet forever out of our reach.

Breakfast continued to be a shoddy affair each day, contributing to the hotel’s frankly undeserving 4 star rating, but we managed to make a joke of it, cram our cheeks full of pain au chocolat (apparently even plebs are allowed these) and get on with exploring the city.

And the city decided to explore me too. Well, one of its many pigeons did. In the form of a giant green poo. Directed cleverly into not only one of the pockets of my handbag, but onto my camera as well. Apparently it’s lucky. I just think it’s grim.

So there I was, travelling around one of the most beautiful cities man has ever built, snapping away with my poo-filled camera having a smashing time, when a young girl stopped in front of me, picked up a ‘gold’ ring from the floor and tried to give it back to me so she could claim a reward.

Now all I could think of at the time was if this seemingly useless rubbish con ever worked on anybody. You would have to be pretty thick to be taken in. (In my opinion-I apologise now if I have managed to inadvertently brand you brainless because you fell for this one!)

I have a brain, and am perfectly capable of keeping track of my rings. After all, they reside on my fingers, fit well and don’t look at all like the one she was offering me! I politely declined to enter into her game and walked on.

Suddenly though, it was if the whole of Paris was trying to re-unite us with countless pieces of recalcitrant digit adornments…We couldn’t take more than five steps without another ‘helpful citizen’ picking up yet another shining band of not-precious metal and insisting we take it from them.

What I couldn’t work out to start with though, is how they ever expected anybody to believe that the shiny object ‘on the floor’ in front of us would have been ours….I’m fairly certain that most people don’t go around flinging their possessions out in front of themselves in the hope that some helpful handily-situated layabout will see them and rush to their aid….They were retrieving rings left, right and centre….yet always from pieces of pavement I hadn’t yet walked on!

Ah well, maybe they got lucky once or twice a day, who knows? I can’t think of any other reason they would carry on day after day trying to be the scruffy French version of Ernest Jones!

Anyway, more on my travel nightmares later; but for now, I will leave you to check all of your rings…if you have lost any, pop out your front door to see if you can find a frenchman….They usually have a pocketfull!

Love,

Fatty Blob Head

Family Olympics Slightly Less Glam Than London 2012

What ho Chums,

Hope everyone’s having a spiffing August? Those of you who are lucky enough to still be young and learning…Hope you’re enjoying your summer holidays? And those of you who are nowhere near young enough to be at school except in the teaching capacity….How is your time off going?  I have many teacher friends who (bless them) get very excited as the summer holibob looms, then as soon as they’re in it start grumbling about how fast it’s going!

Then there’s the rest of us who only just remember what six weeks of freedom feels like!  Gone are the long, gorgeous days where we used to spend all day outside making up games in our street: I remember one lovely summer, one of The Friends and I used to create a whole ‘house’ from the one solitary street sign! Yep, a thin piece of metal hammered into the ground was the focus of our attention for at least three afternoons…Ah, the imagination of children!

Of course, playing with a street sign might make me sound as if I didn’t have one toy or real game to my name.  I did, I had many lovely toys (very 1980′s themed such as sylvanian families, trolls with massive pink Jedward-stylee hair and a pair of in-line roller blades that hardly got used as I was totally pants at skating in them and feared for the life of both my ankles!) Yet even with all these cracking toys, sometimes the most simple things are the best: For example, give a child a big cardboard box and they’ll be happy for days, creating many different worlds with just their imagination!

Now I am a grown up (sort of, I think I will always be 22 in my head!) August means very different things to me….As the 24th looms with alarming and relentless inevitability, I find myself thinking back over the last 30 years…..

…….Which is a bit of a nutty thing to say really, because I can only really remember stuff starting from age 5, but no-one ever says that do they?

One thing that stands out from all in my memories is the continual and (usually) healthy family rivalry that has always existed, and will always I should think!  Obviously, The Brother and I have always made everything we possibly could into a competition:

One of our favourite games (which I am ashamed to say we’ve really only just grown out of!) was strangely named ‘You are the Liebfraumilch!’ I have no idea why we called it this, as it involved trying to push, overbalance or pull the other onto the sofa before you yourself hit the cushions!  Now obviously, being a bit of a Fatty Blob Head from quite an early age, lets just say I had the weight advantage in this game!  I used to hold my own quite successfully, until about the age of 14.  It was about this time that The Brother got really quite ridiculously strong, and he’s never looked back since! I very rarely get to crow ‘You are the Liebfraumilch’ these days…..The only time I manage it is if he’s not expecting it, in fact not even realising we’re playing the game (Cue evil laugh: Mwahahahahaaaaaaaa!)

So all this family competitiveness was bound to get rather more serious and official as we grew up….(Not that we’re Olympic standard or anything!) The Parent spotted a chart in a shop last year, and presented us with the perfect item to keep us amused for a whole year:

This simple piece of printed cardboard has kept us busy all year.  We’ve got til new year’s eve to complete as many of the 72 different tasks as possible! Hurrah for the Family Olympics!

Now, some of the tasks have been simply made for me:

• Stay in your pjs all day.  Easy Peasy! Next!
• Laugh til you cry.  Done. One of The Friends sent me a big long list of iBone autocorrects that had me rolling about in a very unladylike manner, with tears streaming down my very red face.  Unfortunately I was sat in a cafe at the time, and was making a bit of a tit of myself….I felt the need to read one out to the bloke sat next to me as he was looking to see why I was almost wetting my bridgets….I think he enjoyed it but the same can’t be said for the little old lady who was on my other side…She looked at me as though she wanted to call the men in white jackets!
• Build a snowman.
• Build a sandcastle. Behold both below!

The Brother’s was just too cool!

Now obviously I wish there was a lovely, rose-tinted story to go with the above sandcastle…A halcyon day full of fabulously remembered childhood times that included eating sand-filled sandwiches whilst sat on the fabulously hot sand watching the world go by…..Unfortunately (just for a change) this was not to be……

Picture the scene: Me fully clothed with just the bottom 5 inches of my jeans rolled up to keep the sea and sand off them, brandishing a hastily purchased spade and ‘bucket’ for the occasion.  Now as I’ve grown up, I’ve got a bit funny about sand…You’d never catch me rolling about in it these days, as I just don’t like it when it creeps everywhere and you’re still finding it days later!

So there I am, having a sandcastle competition with The Parents, and I’m trying to do it all from a standing position with a tiny spade that can only have been made for borrowers to dig their vegetable patches with!  I was so busy trying to avoid the demon sand (silly really, as I was attempting to create a pinnacle of building excellence with the stuff!) that I got one foot stuck in a particularly squelchy bit, tried to step back, failed miserably and landed on my (admittedly comfortably padded) bottom with a squeak followed by an ‘oompfh!’

Add The Parents crying with helpless laughter (well done them, they got a sticker for that!) and not helping me in the slightest, things could only have got more horrifyingly embarrassing if there had been any other witnesses to this shameful display of clumsy athletics…….Oh good, yes…That family over there will do….With the hot dad….Brilliant!

My shame was compounded further by the cutiepie four-year old poppet who asked said hot dad: ‘What is that lady doing lying in the sand?’ in a loud voice only a four-year old can achieve!

To top all that off, The Parent won the sandcastle competition (Though I’m wondering if he didn’t bribe the judges with wine…) and I went away from the whole sorry experience with a pulled leg muscle!

So there’s just a few of the stickers I’ve already got…..I’m going to find some of the others slightly more tricky: No tv for a week? Humnnn…..Turn your mobile phone off for 48 hours? Arrgh! I’d rather chew my own arm off!

Guess which one was my very first achieved sticker?  Yep, that’s right….Bake a cake! (Mmmmmmmmmm Cake!)

Love,

Fatty Blob Head

 

Beanz Meanz Mess!

What ho chaps!

I find myself awake rather more early than I’d planned on this Sunday morning, which is pretty amazing really, as I am known for my unending and eternal love of sleep.  I adore it, and as I’ve probably said in the past (I know I do tend to go on the odd loquacious ramble) that I have been known to sleep in some rather strange places including a bus on the way to a night out in Spain…..Not one of my finer moments I’ll admit!

I tend to do that attractive pose which involves my head being flung right back and my mouth wide open as if I’m doing a terrible and highly embarrassing impression of a gormless trout.  What’s more awful is the point when my head dips and I do that thing where you wake yourself up with a jolt, then look around in what I hope was a highly furtive manner to see if anyone has witnessed this beautiful display of female allure!  I can usually detect a few smirks here and there!

But, enough about my near-constant state of gorgeously attractive somnolence, and so to today’s title:

Beans.

Baked beans, green beans, human beans, bean sprouts and coffee beans. Just some of the many different varieties of the humble yet useful and versatile bean.  (Ok, I feel as if I’m now randomly trying to do some sort of odd, bean-obsessed advert extolling the virtues of beans, so quick-back on topic please!)

The Parent and I had an encounter with a few beans this week.  Strangely, I didn’t count them so won’t be able to give you the exact number of beans we had to contend with, but I think I can safely say it was in the billions….

The Brother recently purchased three Big Bertha bean bags. (Other giant bean-filled bags are available) They arrived on thursday in the biggest boxes imaginable.  They took up my lounge to the point where I hadn’t seen The Parent for what seemed like a few weeks, and all she was doing was sitting the other side of the sofa with these hugemongoose boxes in between!

I flung down my long-nosed pliers and informed The Parent that we weren’t waiting for The Brother, and that we would unpack the boxes ourselves.  What followed was a lot of pulling, pushing and a few mild curses (on my part; The Parent is much more angelic and serene) but eventually we had finally managed to separate the boxes from their prizes.  What was now before us was the evidence of what seems to be a highly cheeky and lazy company:

A giant plastic bag of those nightmare-ish polystyrene beans in all their tiny yet inherently evil glory.  And a neatly folded suede bag to put them in.  Why they couldn’t have sent them to us ready assembled I do not know….Presumably they would have a reason, but I’ll wager not one sufficiently impressive enough to appease me enough at this point:  I knew it was going to be very messy!

Helpfully, the company had provided instructions on how to get a bag of beans the size of an average 16-year-old, through an opening the size of an average hamster. (I always measure things by ‘how many hamsters?’  It’s a very effective system for measuring things, and I still can’t see why it hasn’t caught on….that is until the hamster escapes then I’m left with lots of things that need measuring and no possible way to achieve this!)

Anyway, I digress… The company had very helpfully instructed us to fill the bean bags in the bath.  Looking back, this was the best advice we could ever have been given, because halfway through the first one, the pesky beans got carried away and decided to make a determined bid for freedom, and we were left with this:

There were beans everywhere!  In our hair, up our noses, on the floor!  I even found a few down my bra, these dratted beans were so determined to escape!  Now I found myself running around like the proverbial headless chicken looking for something to scoop up said beans.  In the end I settled for a sieve from the kitchen which turned out to be surprisingly effective!

If I knew how to tweet, I’m sure my twit at the time would be something along the lines of: ‘Crouching in bath scooping beans with The Parent giggling helplessly beside me!’  Now if that wouldn’t have brought the nice men in white with a straight-jacket running, I don’t know what would!

After having survived the inevitable snow storm that these tiny balls of hell had created, we moved on to beanbag number two.  Only a few beans spilled on that one, and by the time we were on to number three, we were feeling rather smug and proud of ourselves: Not a single pesky little bean, hurrah!

So!  Now The Parent and I were expert bean bag fillers (we were considering a change in career, we were that impressed at our obvious natural ability!), we continued to read the oh-so-helpful instructions (They should have called them destructions) and next on the agenda was removing all the excess air from each bag.  This, we thought, was going to be the easy part!  We lounged on the bags dispelling all the air we could find, with the zip open at only about half a hamster. (See? You know you want it to catch on!)

All was going rather well until those persistent little devils suddenly popped out of the hole and scattered themselves around the room!  It was a little spurt that had us in absolute stitches, and kept happening as we would try to put them all back again! Actual tears were streaming down our faces as we realised we were facing a loosing battle with the bean bags who looked as though they were breaking wind!   Phfrrt!

When we had recovered and stopped rolling around the floor as though we were a couple of giggling nutters (Maybe it was the beans? Maybe they were giving off some odourless fumes and we were a tiny bit high on beanbag, who knows?!) we zipped them all up with a mighty cheer and went to have a well-earned glass of squash. (It was 11am- pink fizz isn’t usually allowed until at least 11.30!)

Innocent looking things, aren’t they?!

We used them for this first time last night, and I can safely say they were brilliant and worth the fuss!

I’m sure I’ll be hooooovering up the odd recalcitrant bean for many years to come yet…I spotted one hiding in a plant pot yesterday, and I won’t be surprised if The Brother complains at some point this week, as they’ll probably manage to make their way into his soup!

Love,

Fatty Blob Head

Leave Headbanging To The Professionals….

Right.  Ok.

Now I know there’s entirely no excuse for my absolute tardiness and inability to write a post since January.  It’s disgraceful and I am filled with horrendous amounts of scalding shame……

So what has affected my ability to put pen to paper these past months? (Not that it’s actually pen to paper any more, but finger to key just doesn’t have the same romantic-type writer-ish ring to it, now does it?)

I’d like to say that it was because I was kidnapped by an insanely scary yet pure-at- heart band of ruffians who put me to work in a sock factory making well, er, socks. (obviously).  They’ve only just let me out for good behaviour and because I reached my own personal goal of twenty finished socks!  Woo hoo!

Twenty finished socks? I hear you say…that is an absolutely pathetic number of socks, seeing as you’ve been AWOL for 5 months!  Ah, but you don’t know what the socks were made from do you?  They were created with the silk from a very rare and scary spider.  As I have no doubt mentioned before, spiders are not my most favourite thing on earth, so milking them for their silk, (or ‘Silky Milking’ as we in the trade call it) was a harsh and acutely terrifying experience for me!

But that of course, isn’t what happened…  You, dear reader, are slightly silly for even believing that story even a little bit…I know I paint such a rich and interesting picture that you’re saying to yourself…’This must indeed, be true!’ but come on; milking silk for socks?  He he! I bet you feel just a tad bit foolish for being so gullible!

I am now the proud owner of a business!  Yeah baby!  As before (when I was writing blogs willy nilly) my laptop has been permanently attached to my knee, but I have had to employ the willpower of a god (someone really strong like Thor or Odin rather than one of the less impressive ones obviously) to keep my recalcitrant fingers from wandering on to wordpress…I have my very own website and everything! Feel free to pop along and have a gander..I’d love to know what you think:

I had some stunningly-marvellous-websitey-genius-people helping me obviously, but I am rather chuffed at what I have managed to cobble together!  It was all done with a generous helping of very little sleep, lots of cake (mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, cake!), some healthy yet probably slightly childish tantrums at The Brother when I couldn’t possibly understand why I needed to acquaint myself with SEO keywords and Cookies (I assure you-not the chocolate chip filled, interesting kind!)

So that’s my excuse (the real, non spider story one too) and I’m sticking to it!  After a ridiculously long bout of hard work and inforced reclusiveness, I am back in the world, and don’t feel such debilitating guilt for taking an hour off on a sunday to catch you all up on FBH news….

Of course, the random occurences and embarrassing happenings haven’t just stopped because I haven’t been writing about them, oh no!  They continue their at inevitable and alarming pace….And so to the title of this particular blog:

As I may have mentioned in the past, I am a person who is 5ft 9in.  Now, this in itself is not a bad thing.  I am able to reach up high in supermarket shelves to help little old ladies to the high up cake (who have been known to bark at me rather than just ask, how rude!), I can also see above most crowds, and make a rather impressive lamp-post with my arm in the air brandishing my illuminated phone for The Titchy Friends along dark alleyways when we’ve had one or two glasses of pink fizz!

So all in all, I have grown used to how tall I am, and the relative pit falls that are associated with what feels like giving the Empire State building a run for its money!  One of these afore-mentioned pit falls happens to be how often I unsuspectingly bang my head (Ah ha!  Now the title becomes clear, heh?) and a few recent instances come to mind:

Instance 1 (Also known as Handbag Head Horreurs!)

A new handbag always has me clutching it protectively to my side, so imagine me in the cinema loo:  No hook.  There’s no way on this great earth of ours that I am putting it down on any manky surface.  Ever.  What to do?  It will fall off and become a nuisance if I leave it on my shoulder…..Hang it around my neck: Huzzah!  A nifty and rather clever solution, if I don’t say so myself!  Everything is going swimmingly until it comes to pulling up my jeans (yes I know this might be ‘too much of the informations’ for all of you sensitive creatures out there, but bear with!)

I lean forward, and in that small pocket of time, stupidly forget about the sheer volume and weight of said handbag (I am one of those people who will be able to produce whatever you need: paracetamol, nail file, plasters, cake, safety pins, lip balm, mints, chocolate, washing line, kitchen sink…)  As you can probably guess, I lose the battle with my now evil and cackling handbag, and crash my poor head into the stall door in front of me.

Now this is a popular cinema, with anything up to 30-ish female patrons making use of the facilities at any one time:  Once they’ve got over the fact that there seems to be some sort of crazed monster trying unsuccessfully to escape the stall, there ensues a deathly silence only punctuated by a nervous giggle from one small girl.  The next painful dilemma for me then is: Do I stay in there and quietly die of shame and embarrassment, or do I walk out of there, head held high as though nothing strange whatsoever has occurred?  Much as I’d have liked to do the former, the latter won-just! (I think Ryan Reynolds was in the film I was about to watch, and the prospect of watching him gorgeously smoulder on the big screen for two hours would probably have got me out of that loo even if I’d managed to lose all my clothes and grow a tail!)

And now we come to yesterday’s delightful occurence, and the reason that prompted me to pull FBH out of semi-retirement:

Instance 2 (Also known as The Cake Made Me Do It)

Cake. (mmmm, cake)  Yes It would be about cake wouldn’t it?!

Picture the scene:  In a coffee shop with The Parents, The Brother and New And Lovely Sweetie Of The Brother (Catchy title, I know!) and New And Lovely Sweetie Of The Brother asks me if I’m having cake. (She’s new, she’ll learn that is a most redundant question!)  So anyway, I look towards the cake.  I can’t see what the inside of the toffee cake looks like, so I lean in to get a closer look.  What my cake-distracted brain hasn’t quite managed to compute in enough time, is this:

As with any sensible coffee/cake establishment, there is a highly polished (almost invisible – honest) pane of glass in between me and the cake.  Sensible, otherwise they’d be forever having to quell cake-induced riots I’m sure…

A most almighty crash occurs, with my head being the main protagonist in a very excruciating and mortifying scene where, thankfully the glass remains whole, and where New And Lovely Sweetie Of The Brother and I are able to laugh our way up the queue, and hopefully dispel anyone else’s view of me being mentally unhinged by our ability to see the funny side!

I also crashed my head in exactly the same place on The Parent’s car boot later on, but as this was simply painful and not funny, we shall gloss over my obvious misfortune and go straight on to the fact that:

I managed to achieve a personal best by mentioning the word ‘cake’ 16 times in one blog post.  Hurrah!

I hope this finds you all well, and in less pain than me, as no doubt you are all sensible people and manage not to be taken in by cake (woo, 17 times!) on such a regular basis!

Love,

Fatty Blob Head

Almost Midnight Pancakes

Hello chaps!

Now I know I have been beyond rubbish when it comes to actually doing any blogs for the last few months, and for this I apologise most profusely!  (Setting up your own business takes time, energy and a lot of biscuits!)  But of course I couldn’t let the Christmas season slink on by in a flutter of glitter and cake (Mmmm, cake!) without a few words on the subject….

So what does Christmas and New Year mean to me?  Well, pretty much what it means to everyone else:  The insane panic of the forgotten presents, random family members popping up when you least expect them, chocolate, pink fizz, and the same films and tv programs every year……

Now this may seem tedious and slightly boring to say we watch the same programs every year, but Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without at least one episode of the Vicar of Dibley (Think an abundance of Christmas dinners and Dawn French squeeeezing that last mangy looking sprout in between her teeth!)

We even have a Home Alone night every year where I, The Brother and The Parents sit down to watch Home Alone 1 and 2 (Not 3-No Macaulay Culkin?  How rude!) and laugh in exactly the same places as last year!  Over the years as The Parent has got a bit older, he grumbles if we make him watch a film in the evening; yet with The Home Alones he chuckles along with the rest of us, and it is now a firm Family Tradition!

Other Family Traditions include stockings in the bed on Christmas morning (Yes I know The Brother and I add up to nearly sixty, but we will do this til one of us ambles off to have a family of our own!)  Over the years this Family Tradition has improved considerably; it now includes a snazzy bottle of fizz usually balanced precariously in the duvet, to go with the stocking stalwarts of:

Chocolate coins (get scoffed as soon at they get pulled out of said stocking!)

A Toothbrush (Father Christmas always gets the specific make wrong but hey, he tries!)

A scratch card (I’ve won a small amount once in 13 years)

A chocolate FC (I bite his head off first, oops never mind!)

An apple and an orange (I think FC picked this one up from when The Parents were young whippersnappers….a nod to healthy eating at Christmas!?  They never get eaten, and The Brother once left his in his stocking for a whole year….Mouldy wasn’t a descriptive enough word for what was left!)

There is of course different little pressies every year too.

About 5 years ago I noticed that Father Christmas was doing a wonderful job with everybody’s stocking, including his own…

SPOILER ALERT: IF YOU ARE YOUNG ENOUGH TO BE UPSET BY THE ACTUAL ORIGIN OF FC BEING MY MOTHER, LOOK AWAY NOW!

What?  That’s not how a spoiler works?  Eh?  Oh!  I’m supposed to give a warning THEN tell them the news!  Oh well…..Ooops.

So I took over her stocking so she didn’t have to open presents she’d wrapped a mere 7 hours beforehand and look excited!  Now she really is excited with the small random bits I collect for her, and everybody’s happy! (Especially after the fizz at 8am, whoop!)

Inevitably, the actual job of filling our stockings fell to me.  I am always the last one awake on Christmas Eve, so I get to actually be FC!  I am sorry to say there’s no mince pies, sherry or costumes involved, yet I am stupidly excited as though I was a little girl-so this makes up for the lack in traditional dress and nosh!

Now the naughty person that is The Brother encouraged me to the last glass of Fizz in the bottle before heading to his bed, so let’s just say I was a tiny bit Merry Christmas at this point!   Rustling bags whilst giggling and muttering HO HO HO under my breath, I filled each stocking with goodies, sprinkling a liberal quantity of monetary chocolate: the real currency of the world!

That’s what I thought I was doing anyway…..!

What was really happening was the following: I was ambling about shoving pressies in willy nilly, managed to let my stocking fall through the banisters and knock into a photo frame that resides on a ledge on the stairs and send it crashing to it’s noisy demise at the bottom!

Stealthy wasn’t quite the word!

And so to the title of this particular blog:  Almost Midnight Pancakes!

A new yet hopefully annual tradition that popped up on New Year’s Eve this year!  It was all down to The Parent planning one pudding but not quite making it with the right ingredients, pancakes being the next best (and available) alternative!

Have you ever tried making (and flipping in a slightly drunken yet very hilarious manner) pancakes at almost midnight on NYE?  No? Well I thoroughly recommend it!

So the recurring theme throughout Christmas just might have been fizz in various forms and quantities…I think I’m off to do some sort of detox thing…..Orange squash and Macaroons I think!

I hope you all had a cracking festive season, and if anyone has any annoying friends who are counting down to next Christmas as I have…Tell them to put a sock in it!  (Or should that be a mouldy fruit stocking!?!)

Love,

Fatty Blob Head

Duck A Doodle Doo

Hello There Chickens!

Sorry I’ve been AWOL for over a month. Naughty I know. I had some stuff going on then just got out of the habit. But, I am back! Maybe with not quite such a stream of posts as before, but we shall see!

So, what’s been happening? Who’s been doing what? Anyone conquered any countries recently? Been awarded any medals? How about finding the cure for crusty ears or inventing a new type of fish?

No? Well what have you been doing?! What can you show for your time if not a brand spanking new species of fish? I have of course, her name’s Gloria the Slightly Mottled Blowfish, and she’s busy swimming around in my bathtub.

So now you have got over your inevitable envy over my poisson-related abilities, I shall proceed to tell you about my holiday with Ruby.

Ah, Ruby Ruby Ruby (aaaahhahahhaaaaa!)

(Sorry, had to be done!)

‘Who or What is Ruby?’ I hear you cry! Well, Ruby was the name of the 65ft Narrow Boat that was home to The family for the whole of last week. For those of you who might not be able to picture clearly what I’m blathering on about, here’s a visual aide:

This is not actually a picture of dear Ruby, as for some reason I managed to avoid taking even one single shot of the actual boat, just lots of people and far too many pictures of ducks! (I like ducks a lot, they make me laugh and they all have such silly personalities!)

Anyway, you get the idea of the type of boat we stayed the week on…a floating caravan with added ducks!

And which exciting corners of the British Isles did we manage to visit in this floating hotel? To Birmingham and back!

For the wonderful readers out there who don’t grasp the funny side of that statement, it’s because it’s roughly 20 miles from where I currently live, and as far as trekking across vistas undiscovered goes, it’s not going to make the top list! I go christmas shopping in Birmingham!

This could all be down to the fact that the top speed on Ruby was a nifty 4mph! Yup, that’s not me typing it wrong, it truly doesn’t go much faster than that! But it’s possible to enjoy life in the slow lane, and that’s exactly what we did!

Of course, apart from the snail’s pace speed of things, there were other drawbacks; the two main ones being the bathroom that had been made for a child’s doll house and the bed so wide it can only be accurately described as a kingsize er, I mean plank! Yup, It was like sleeping on just the one floorboard. Maybe I’m doing it an injustice by describing it thus, but I would have challenged anyone to have a good night’s kip on that bad boy! Maybe only the likes of Kate Moss; she probably would have declared it luxurious.

An ice lolly stick with a bit of foam on top. A piece of skirting board with a nod at cushioning (and not even the posh skirting board that’s a couple of centimetres wider!) You get the idea!

So, borrower-sized facilities aside, what else did we get up to? Well, I have to get the embarrassing bit out now, as it wouldn’t be me if there wasn’t something making me blush going on!

It was the first day and we’d picked up the boat from the boat yard, had the little chat about from the boaty man (how to drive it safely, working the loo, where the horn was located, don’t use the microwave or hairdryer unless the engine’s running etc) and all was going swimmingly. I was ambling along on my way to open a lock with my windlass, full of the joys of being in the open air and avoiding little doggy presents: Usual stuff for a day on a boat!

What I hadn’t remembered was how much effort I’d have to put into winding the paddles of the locks up and down, and what an unsuitable top I happened to have flung on in a blind panic that morning! Now, even on a normal (upright) day, said top is one of those pesky numbers that has to be constantly checked for any inadvertent boob showage, so imagine my horror when I realised I was basically flashing most of my top half to passing unsuspecting joggers, cyclists and even other canal users. The looks ranged from grudging appreciation, comedy double-take shock, to one bloke who nearly toppled over into a 10ft lock!

Add in the wind factor that constantly blew out the skirty bit of the top to giant proportions, and you’ve got the beautiful image of me appearing to be a cross between the Michelin man and a rubbish dancer who’s failed the burlesque exam!

I even think I scared a few ducks!

Of course it wasn’t all bad! The best part was driving the boat. Navigating your way into locks is like playing toy cars with the garages when you were little! I believe it’s the only instance in life where you can drive into the side of things and get away with it! I can’t imagine ramming my car into the side of the local multi storey and people still smiling indulgently whilst encouraging me to try again….’Better luck next level’ is not something you hear too often in a car park! On the canal, even The Parent was clonking the front of the boat into various pieces of brickwork and concrete, the worst comment being ‘oops!’

Then there was Heron Watch (Bill Oddie would have been so proud!) What happens is this: Whoever’s driving at the time yells ‘Heron!’, and I have to execute what can only be described as a mad scramble to where I left my camera, usually at the completely opposite end of the boat (It’s a DSLR and heavy!) to where I was at the time, then pap the unsuspecting birdy until it flies off into the distance:

And another: (unless it’s the same showy-offy birdy who keeps coming back for more?)

Other stuff that happened included:

Staying in the centre of Birmingham where drunken revellers assaulted our boat all night. Some even clambered on the roof to have a little dance while we all tried to sleep. The Brother slept in his clothes so he could fend them all off, poor dear!

Chavs stealing a boat, a letchy old fisherman yelling ‘where’s your bikinis?’ to the three females on our boat at the time, a spot of canal rage, another silly fisherman shouting at us for going through a lock because there was ‘Too much water for the fishes!’ My amazing lock driving skills, apple scrumping, and scalding myself in the extremely hot shower after I had bent over backwards to wash my hair (short people shower only!)

Oh, and a pesky duck every morning with a cockerel complex. So loud and so early!

My list for one day’s drive through the outskirts of Birmingham’s canals:

27 footballs

Countless bottles

One metal beer keg

7 fire extinguishers

1 obligatory shopping trolley

1 stuffed whale teddy the size of a 6 year old

And an angry duck chasing a swan (usually the other way round!)

All that’s left to show you is a few pics of The Brother being an absolute nutter by jumping over the canal locks (scary wide to a normal person!)

I shall leave you to your gasps of amazement at his bold yet slightly enviable stupidity! Makes quite a good photo though, so I of course encouraged him, much to The Parent’s dismay!

Love,

Fatty Blob Head

The Sticker, The Chatter and The Bore.

Picture this:

You’re at one of those big events such as a 30th birthday party. It doesn’t have to be a 30th obviously, but as I’m at that stage in my life when most of The Friends are being 30 willy nilly, (or left right and centre if you will!) then this is the type of event that sticks out in my mind.

There’s usually three types of people at these parties:

The Sticker

The Sticker does exactly what the name suggests, and makes an art form out of attaching themselves to people he or she knows. Sometimes The Sticker only knows one or two guests, and this can be rather tedious if one of those people happens to be who the party is for….I myself can understand the motivations of The Sticker, as I used to be one!

Walking into a room full of strangers and only knowing a tiny percentage of the assembled guests can be beyond nerve-wracking. Of course in these situations, I find it useful to follow this simple rule; Don’t make a tit of yourself when making your entrance! Waltzing bang slap into the back of someone’s chair in the darkness is not a good way of blending in, especially when that someone has a glass of wine in their hands which ends up all over them and their other half as a direct result of your clumsiness! Let’s just say this particular course of action doesn’t particularly endear you to any potential new buddies!

The Sticker also has a bit of a thing about going to the bar. He or She might desperately want a drink but the scary amount of space between the cosy table and the corner might leave theirself open to attack. What’s much better to do is wait until the one person they know is off for a drink then give them some money to purchase the eagerly anticipated glass of wine for them!

This tactic is not limited to big gatherings such as parties or weddings! It can also work a treat when out in pubs and clubs and The Sticker is faced with an assault course type scenario between them and the drink!

The Chatter

The Chatter is a good all-rounder. They usually know more people than The Sticker, but not always. Sometimes The Chatter knows the same percentage of guests as The Sticker, but has the confidence and poise to approach new people and conduct themselves in a sensible manner!

The Chatter will circulate and make sure they talk to everyone in the room. They are also perfectly at ease with all things sociable and will have interesting views on everything from current affairs to the latest scandal in the soaps!

The Bore

The Bore is the one to watch! This creature slowly moves around the gathering before seemingly effortlessly ensnaring its prey, and here’s how:

The Bore is initially entirely undistinguishable from The Chatter. They spend the first part of the event acting in exactly the same manner as The Chatter, usually (but not always) with a glass of wine which seems to magically replenish itself. The Bore then proceeds to imbibe enough alcohol to tip him or her over the edge into the extremely tedious world of The Bore.
Beware these creatures, as once they have you in their clutches, they will proceed to expound upon the most banal of subjects. Some of said subjects I have endured in recent times include:
Building regulations.
Car maintenance.
Pedicure etiquette.
Pumping iron. (Did he really look at me and think I’d be the type to listen avidly to this? Really?!)

To name but a few! When The Bore really gets going, you find yourself shifting from foot to foot, your eyes glaze over and you start fiddling with something about your person:
The drink you’re holding, the stray thread on the new shirt you put on this evening, or even an ernest attempt to get that splinter out of your finger which inevitably involves gnawing on your hand for half an hour.

None of these symptoms of restlessness and boredom will even register with The Bore, and it’s at this point that you have got to rely heavily on the sympathies of your friends or even The Bore’s.
Hopefully they will have noticed The Bore zero in on his hapless victim, and waited a sufficient amount of time (so as not to appear rude!) before swooping in and intervening.

This snazzy little move is called The Conversation Save, and is quite literally the only thing that rescues The Sticker or The Chatter from the clutches of The Bore.
Lines I’ve used in the past include:
‘Hey, did you know your Gran was looking for you?’
Or
‘You know how you’ve always wanted to meet Rowan Atkinson? Well he’s over there in the corner!’ (this one was a tad far fetched but did the job beautifully! That is, until The Chatter, having been saved got so disappointed that the Legend Atkinson wasn’t actually at his aunt and uncle’s pearl wedding anniversary party that he moped in the corner and let himself get caught by The Bore again!)

So The Conversation Save. The only thing in The Sticker or The Chatter’s arsenal when it comes to counteracting The Bore.
Next time you’re at a party, have a look round and see if you can spot the three types; who knows, you may even find someone executing a cheeky little Save of the Conversation variety! Here’s hoping it’s not to save the person you happen to be talking to!

Love,

Fatty Blob Head

Lamination Is An Art Form

Ask anyone who has ever worked with me and they will tell you that I have a slight obsession with all things stationery.

I used to come back from my lunch breaks clutching snazzy new pens and marker pens with a huge grin on my face.  I rather think that my colleagues used to smile over my excitement in an indulgent manner, whilst really thinking something along the lines of ‘blimey what a nutter!’

The only thought that keeps me from cowering in a vaguely shameful heap is the fact that I have met others that seem to regard pens pencils, rubbers and other means of being creative, with the same intensity of feeling! (Thank goodness!)

One of the Great Aunts used to collect pencils from all over the UK and the world.  She’d line them up on a shelf and they’d display themselves for all to see, proudly stating that they were from Ironbridge, or the Black Country Museum, as if challenging you to visit everywhere and acquire an even bigger collection!  Well I don’t think I’m quite at that stage yet, as I tend to keep my higgledy piggledy collection in the usual receptacles; old mugs with inappropriate sayings on, or shoved in the front of drawers and even a few down the side of the sofa for good measure.

I’ve even discovered that when I’m busy, an extremely useful place for a pen is shoved into the ponytail of my hair; ready to be grabbed at a moment’s notice.  The only drawback to this is in the same vein as the hiccoughs; (read Hic! Ha Ha Ha! if you’ve not already) I get loads of random people bounding up to me and asking (in a highly amused voice as if they think they are a comedy genius) ‘Er! Did you know you’ve got a pen in your hair?’

What?  What!!  A pen in my hair?  How the devil did that get there?  It must have been a cheeky pen-stashing pixie-type being leaping up onto my shoulder in a malevolent, invisible manner!

In fact now I come to think of it, I have heard of a pen-in-hair epidemic down south; someone should tell the authorities, we must deploy the SWAT team specially created for such a disaster: Special Weapons And Pesky Pen In Hair Removal, or SWAPPIHR for short!

Of course I know I’ve got a pen in my hair, I put it there, you cretins!

Anyway, for what seems like the 358th time, I digress…..

My love for stationery has always included the secret desire for a laminating machine.  Many times I have almost bought one; the only thing ever stopping me is mainly due to this fact: I really don’t have anything that needs laminating….How annoying!

So when I was asked to do a spot of laminating this weekend at the Food Show, I actually did a rather good impression of calm nonchalance; what was actually going on was something more along the lines of  ‘Oh man alive, I’m going to get to do some laminating for the first time EVER!  Keep calm, don’t think about the fact that I’m realising one of my life-goals! ARRRGGHH!’

I turned it on and gave it a little pat, then stood back whilst it warmed up and waited.  And waited.  Then waited a tiny bit more.  After that I did some waiting.  After a little snooze, a few biscuits and a couple of chapters of War and Peace, the light on the machine decided to turn green, finally!

Trying to keep my hands from shaking in anticipation, I fed the first A4 sheet in its little plastic wallet into the waiting hot jaws of the machine.  And my first ever go at the subtle art of lamination?  A disaster! It came out folded almost in half with wobbly bits in the corner, and a general air of indignant hot plastic!

Attempt 2 up to 7 didn’t fare much better, much to my continuing dismay…I even had a sheet that refused to exit the machine at all, instead opting for the crumpled up bubbling hot option, rather like me trapped in a sauna wearing a dressing gown and slippers!

To say I was panicking at this point would probably be a bit of an understatement.  The last thing The Cousin needed was me coming running up saying I couldn’t even work what is most likely the more simple of the office machines! (Earlier I had conquered the scary looking caravan-sized photocopier with ease!)  She was busy dealing with real issues such as exhibitor pitches and generators, she would have looked at me as though I had gone loopy and pleaded with me to get a grip!

Just as I was about to descend into a proper technology-fueled meltdown, The Brother ambled by and airily informed me that it had an internal snag, and to post the paper in from the left, not the middle.  Brilliant.  Could have done with that info half an hour ago!

So attempt number 8 was the winner!  A beautiful, sleek job with lovely neat edges:  Perfection personified!  I couldn’t help but wave the completed lamination above my head in a highly excited, celebratory manner as I marched round the site looking for the noticeboard to attach it to!

After all that, has my anguish with the grumpy machine of lamination put me off owning one?  I doubt it!  As soon as I have a bona fide reason for a spot of laminating, I’m off down to the local stationers to do a deal!  Of course my own version would be entirely well-behaved and produce gleaming finished products every time, I’m grinning at the prospect as I write this!

As far as I know, there weren’t any complaints of anyone being offended by my shoddy laminates, so I’m fairly sure I got away with it!  This time anyway!  And if you ever need any office work done, I think I’m definitely the girl for the job, don’t you?  He he!

Love,

Fatty Blob Head

Happy Birtday, Stephen Fry

Right then, a little experiment if you will….

If you could navigate away from this page for three seconds, pop yourself onto the google webpage and see what today’s picture is……..

 

 

Did you do it?  Is is glamorous?  Are there multitudes of sparkly, gorgeous pictures of FBH in various famous locations, as if I were gracing the cover of OK magazine or some such other publication to show I’ve made it?

 

What do you mean, no?  But I thought that’s what happened when it’s your birthday?  Google go all out and tell people how old you are with a snazzy picture that still says ‘google’ but also cleverly illustrates the best bits of your life!  On mine it should have had a big cake, (mmmmm, cake!) a picture of me marrying Colin Licky-Neck Firth, and a tapestry-type image depicting the final downfall of Shirley the alcohol snake!

So all that wasn’t on google, across the whole voluminous worldly world-wide spiderweb?

Well, I am disappointed.  I was under the impression that google did that on your birthday, but it seems I am sadly mistaken. I won’t dwell too much on the fact that I’ve been looking forward to that moment for months, and even had an ‘I’m on google!’ party planned for later on this evening……Never mind, I suppose I must learn to be content with my lowly status for another year….

But as far as birthdays go, I have high hopes for this one!  The Parent has promised to pay special attention when icing my cake, (mmm, cake!) as in past years she has managed to miss out a rather important letter ‘H’….She obviously went down the ‘well only special people get it spelt that way…think yourself lucky!’ route; but at the end of the day it still read ‘HAPPY BIRTDAY’.  Of course since then it’s become tradition, and even extended to one of The Friend’s rather important 30th Birtday cake!  (The Parent claimed this one was on purpose too, he he!)

So I have a lovely, long day off and I plan to do all the traditional family activities we save up and only do on a Birtday…

We started with Birtday in the bed; the only slightly terrible thing about this part of my day was the hour in which the ceremony was conducted.  Some lovely member of The Family dragged me from my cosy bed at 6am to get into the guest bed for champagne and presents.  Why 6am, I hear you gasp?  So the unlucky non-Birtday people can still go to work on time, the poor mugs!

Yet the ungodly hour was to be endured, especially as the ingestion of a glass of Champers so early in the morning served to put all qualms about being up at rude-o-clock on one’s own creation anniversary firmly to bed!

What didn’t happen this year though (somewhat disappointingly) was the strange yet pleasing phenomenon of a Double Whammy Birtday.  This is so named because of the year we were all camping in the middle of nowhere with The Gang. (the oldest group of The Friends:  All of The Parents are great friends too!)  Anyway, The Gang Parents slipped up slightly by celebrating my Birtday a day early….

Did they lose track of the calendar? (Don’t forget this was way before mobile phones!)  Were they drunk? (Probably!)  Whatever the reason I was not complaining, for as soon as they realised their mistake they had to rush to the nearest supermarket to do it all again the next day!  Double Whammy Birtday Presents!

Then there was the year that I cursed Newton and his darned pesky gravity:  I now know how to accept a tall ice cream sundae glass on a saucer from a waitress….So graceful is the manoeuver that you would never have guessed I was once an awkward 12-year-old who’d just thrown a frozen pudding onto her lap!  I do remember being more annoyed that I had lost a yummy ice cream, rather than the mess I’d made of my new top.  Ah, how times have almost changed; Now I’d be annoyed about both the mess and the loss!

Anyway, there are many more stories I could tell you if I had more time, but there’s too much Birtday fun to be had today so I’m off!  Off to enjoy my whole day of being 28 and 365 days old!

Oh, and Happy Birtday Stephen Fry!  As always I am honoured to share my day with you, you utter leg end!

Love,

Fatty Blob Head

 

 

Cruise News #1: Train Shame

Heisann! (Norweigan for Hi there!  Get me, I go to Norway for a week and return basically fluent!)

Greetings….I have arrived home from my trundles around the Fjords of Norway, and blimey, was it spectacular!

Norway is full of fantastic vistas, fabulous scenery, gorgeous architecture and  boatloads of history.  What it also had last week (as what can only be described as an extra special treat for the locals) was a bunch of loons running around on a cruise ship!

Ah, I do love me a good cruise!

On hearing that I spend the best part of my holiday days on an overgrown ferry, most people give me funny looks as if to say ‘Why?  Isn’t that where old rich people go to pop their clogs in style?’  Well, to any of you non-believers out there I am uttering the classic yet not massively poetic phrase:  ‘Don’t knock it till you try it’.

Who could complain about being waited on hand and foot by cheerful, warm and funny staff?  Or the fact that just a few hours in on the first day you can give a member of the bar staff a meaningful look and he’ll hot-foot it over to your sunlounger with your favourite drink and some nibbles? (Ooh, last year’s was a Candy Apple Cosmo, and this cruise’s Beverage of the Year goes to the Amaretto Sour.  A cheeky little concoction I will be attempting to recreate on my next cocktail evening; anyone fancy popping along to be my willing taster-guinea pigs?!)  Then of course there was the odd bottle of fizz:

(Not all for me, I promise!)

Aside from all that, there’s also of course the travel aspect.  Visiting countries for a short amount of time to see if you like them enough to go back later is a genius idea.  It’s as if you’ve got your very own Judith Chalmers from Wish You Were Here prancing about giving you the history and culture on a plate!  Granted there’s usually a visit from Shirley the Evil Alcohol Snake on the trips off onto shore, but this cruise wasn’t too bad in that respect, I believe I behaved most admirably! (Mostly)

Incidentally, did you know that ole Judy C (OBE dontcha know?) never wore one pair of knickers whilst filming WYWH?  That’s more than 30 years of evading the VPL on camera!  Now is that why she was awarded the OBE?  Because if it wasn’t, it sure-as-nora should have been!  Bless ‘The Chalmers’, what a legend!

Ah, just for a change I digress, what was I saying?  Oh yes!

The travel aspect is definitely a winner.  I have been to some amazing places on cruises; although it’s only for a few short hours at a time, you can really get a feel for places, enabling you to plot return visits in the future.  This cruise we went to Bergen (Hergen Bergen Shmergen Flergen), Alesund (Alison-ed) Flam (Er, Flam!) and Stavanger (Stubby Bangor) and they were beeyoootiful places with stunning views!

One place even had a woman who lived on a rock in front of a waterfall.  She very kindly came out to sing and prance about for a bit when the visitors turned up, bless her!

Now we hopped on and off the train to wave and take pictures of this lady (Who I believe was called Helga, though I couldn’t get close enough for a chat so I don’t know for sure…..That and to reach dear old Helga meant that I would have had to leap into a giant raging waterfall that would have ended my existence in an instant!  No idea how Helga gets about, she must have a lift installed round the back or something)

The train was the steepest inclined thingummy whotsit in the world. (I’ll ask The Brother to clarify that title as I may have got it slightly wrong)  It went up and down the mountains on the same track, meaning you had the same views twice for over an hour each way.

Now I loved it on the way up, yet on the way down (having taken as many pictures through the grimy glass as possible) I felt the need to address the most pressing concern of the time:  My lack of sleep.  I think I’d had roughly 4 hours the night before, so my eyes were protesting rather expressively!  In fact the woman who I was standing across the train from looked faintly alarmed!  I kept blinking rapidly and yawning in her general direction, even doing the pretty ineffective ‘holding the eyes open with fingers’ trick.

In the end I gave up and sat down on the floor of the train and dropped right off into a sneakily wee slumber whilst sitting upright.  (I can sleep anywhere, me!)  All was going swimmingly (or should that be sleepily?) until The Brother aimed a swift kick to my side to wake me up.  Joy.

Being The Brother, it would have course been impossible to rouse me from my dreams with a pat on the head or a gentle shake of my shoulder.  Even a reasonably loud chorus of his favourite self-composed ditty  ‘Jennifer, Jennifer, Jennifer Crumpet-Head’ would have been infinitely preferable to the boot I actually received!

He was forgiven slightly when I realised that being woken up (from a floaty delicious dream about Jensen Ackles, mmmmmmmm!  Licky Neck Jensen!) was for a good reason; namely that there was a long line of disgruntled-looking hikers waiting for me to move so that they could exit the train and er, go off doing hiker-ish sort of things, presumably!

So:  Rocking train + pins and needles = awkward manoeuver!

To aid in my swift removal from the floor, I sought my dear sibling’s help.  I grabbed his hand, trying to ignore the massive bout of needly-pinnish sensations coursing through my limbs.  To give him a small amount of credit, (though extremely tiny really!) he did take the strain and attempt a half-hearted tug which resulted in me trying to get up off the floor with one arm.  This is not as easy as it sounds, and did not go well for me:  I twisted round and round as if The Brother was trying out for an odd, human ribbon twirling contest!

Gone was the graceful procedure I had planned!  What I was left with was a sprawling, half twisted grimace of a move; with me facing all of the disgruntled hikers face on, whilst The Brother was still valiantly trying to guide me upright by tugging on my arm as though he was trying to draw water from a well!

Oh the shame!  Thank goodness none of the hikers happened to be young and attractive……!

Wait, oh yes that’s right…..They all were!  It must have been National Tasty Hiking Day, as they were all wearing identical sniggery smirks on their impossibly beautiful faces!  Brilliant…..

Ah well, I hope one of them twisted their ankle or got plagued by swarms of menacing vampire ladybirds or something!

Right then, enough for today….More Cruise News tomorrow!

Love,

Fatty Blob Head