Domestic Oubliette

Definitely This Year

2012-01-10T16:23:00.001Z

2012

D'Oub plans for 2012.

1) Write more. So far, have written either a flash fiction piece, or the first paragraph of a new short story. Haven't decided which it yet. Have also written a few lines of a blog post. Result.

2) Give up coffee. This one is a toughie. I love my lattes. I reckon the impact on the economy by the end of January could be drastic. But sometimes one has to think of oneself and not ones fellow man. I've been trying to save this stoopid country single-handedly by spending, spending, spending - a high proportion of that on lattes and cake - but so far we seem to be still requiring bail outs faster than the Titanic.So, I must think of my waistline and my wallet.

Iloveyou!Iloveyou!Iloveyou!Iloveyou!Iloveyou!Iloveyou!

3) Go to bed before 2am. I spend much of my days in a sorta zombie haze. I pity my poor children, being raised by a zombie mother. It's surprising that Baby Oubs first word wasn't 'Brainzzz.' But I am such a night owl. I could be crawling through the day, my energy so low from tiredness that I'd sell the children for a half pack of hobnobs, if I could take a daytime nap. But, hit 10pm and suddenly I could run a half marathon. What's that you say Mr Oub? Watch a movie even though its five minutes to midnight and the movie is three hours long? Capital idea!

4) No more over-committing myself. Life had gotten a tad crazy round the D'Oub house by the end of the year. We had the most busy insane six months of our lives. It wasn't anyone thing, just a celestial convergence of events that meant we only had about two weekends free from one commitment or another from August to the end of December. Combine that with me going out roughly four out of five week nights (writers group! pottery class! scrapbooking workshops! Other stuff!) Then combine that with the sleep deprivation and the coffee addiction. How I am still standing I don't know. (It could be the medicinal Christmas Cake that saved me.) So, 2012, I'm saying no. No to doing everything and yes to trying to be a bit more selective. It'll be hard, but suspect it's a good idea.

5) On my bike! Due to the aforementioned schedule craziness, the D'Oub family who had all possessed new bikes for months, hadn't been able to go out on them :( This made us very sad. But, new year, new opportunities. We've been out three times since the new year, Baby Oub has her little bike seat, so everyone is go, go go.

It is amazing that with the giant heads we posses that we were able to find cycle helmets to fit us all. Giant I tells ya.

So, what do you think? Achievable. Should be.

We'll see if Christmas 2012 sees me lithe, literary, alert and latte-free.

Just don't surprised if it's more corpulent, critical, catatonic, and caffeinated.

I've Put A Bloody Poem in a Bloody Shop! Finally!

2011-12-21T19:30:00.000Z

I cracked it!

I wrote a poem!

I was in the shower this morning. While washing my hair I spent a few moments pondering my friend, the Shower Spider. He lives in the top corner of my shower. He's been there aaaaages. I'd really hope there weren't enough flies knocking around my bathroom to keep him fed. But he has been there really quite some while. Hmmmmm.

He migrated briefly to the sink area, but that didn't last. He was soon back. Most sane people would have removed him by now, but I must admit I'm kinda fond of him. And the adrenaline rush each morning, wondering will this be the morning he finally falls on my nudee body, really sets you up for the day.

Well, anyway, whatever it was about spending some quality time with my arachnid friend, but a poem popped, practically fully formed, into my head! It's not Yeats. It's not even Pam Ayres. But, it is a poem, it is festive and it is perfect (enough) to PUT IN A SHOP!

YAY!!!

So, while doing my Christmas shopping, poem clutched to my sweaty little hands, I set about joining the illustrious ranks of the International Put Your Poem In A Shop Month brigade.

I wasn't very brave, I went into Homebase. Homebase near me is always deserted. I could probably run a writing summer school in the soft furnishing aisle and would be left unmolested the entire time. Sure, yes, it was missing the frisson of danger, but my life is just one wild crazy ride as it is, so it was no harm to dial down the insanity for a few short civilized moments.

Anyway, fifteen minutes later, I left Homebase with one really nice candle and without one really brilliant poem.

And here is the evidence -

Would you pay 15.59 (down from 17.99) for a 'handkerchief' vase? sounds unsanitary personally...

The close up!

And here it is just in case even my bestest writing isn't enough...

Dear Santa,
I've been a little bit naughty
But I've also been a little bit nice
What say you still give me a pressie
And we'll go halvsies on the price.

Hurray!!!!

Block!

2011-12-19T22:50:00.000Z

Panic.

I've forgotten how to write poetry!!

i want to take part in IPYPIASM but nothing! Nothing will come out of my brain!

I've tried and tried and tried and it looks like I broke my poetry bone. Sprained my sonnetness. Twisted my tercet. Od'ed my ode... (etc...)

I went along to a lovely reading tonight. The wonderful Emerging Writer was reading and was, well, wonderful. And the brilliant Louise Phillips was there too! Poetess extraordinaire Eileen Casey was running the event. I was enveloped in a hug of wordy gloriousness.

How do I feel now?

The Cat Sat on the Mat.

Arghghghghghgh!

Help!

My only friend in this lonely hour! Hic.

Sickness, Stagefright and Toast

2011-12-17T23:15:00.000Z

Gah! International Put your Poem in a Shop Month is slipping past me and nary a contribution!

Last year I had a really good excuse. What with being all pregnant and then all c-sectiony, and the weather being all ends of days snowy. It was fair enough that I didn't get out. But this year. What sad excuse will I roll out for my creative cravenness? My literary loucheness? My apathetic poeticness! My phlegmatic phonetics...

Well, baba has been sick. And had her first birthday. She was sick for her first birthday. All photos have her looking miserable. She was probably pissed that I made no effort for it though. What can I say, she's baby number four - oh look, you're a year old, well done. What do you want? A medal? No cake was made. I bought her the chavviest red track suit as her only present. I'll laminate Childline's number for her.

Sick... but wonderfully quiet.

That said, she did achieve two things of note this week. 1) She was so sick she didn't have the energy to screech. It was a blessed release. For the past ten days we have not had to listen to her go 'EEErnnnnnghghghghghgghgghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh' for 90% of the day. and 2) She said her first word! I was able to muster up some excitement for this. Mainly cause it was quite a good first word. We did have two possible other candidates for first word - 'Clap' and 'Dance' (a future on the stage perhaps?). But we couldn't definitely say that she meant to say these words. But the other morning was different. I was sitting there with my cup of tea, poached eggs and toast. She had a rusk. She wasn't into the rusk. She was pointing at my breakfast. I said, 'Toast?' She looked at me, thoughtful. 'Toast' she said.

Sod this Baby Atkin diet - give me Carbs!!!

Can you beat that? How could you not love a creature whose first word was toast? She'll go far.

In other news, Big Sister Oub is in the bad books. Oh yes. As a mother I ask only that my children are brilliant and talented at all times and show the world that both my genetics and mothering are superior to all others. I don't think this is too much to ask. Well, Big sister Oub has disappointed! She has displeased me.

It was Christmas Concert time. She was star of the show last year. Charmed the audience and quite frankly set me up as Alpha Mother among the Montessori Mafia. I was Don D'Oub. I wasn't actually there for the concert last year, what with me being held in a maximum security maternity hospital, but I did get to see her opening night triumph via live satellite link up. Hmmm, or maybe it was on video a few days later. I'm not sure. I was on a lot of morphine. (Not kidding about the morphine.)

But this year I got to be there! I could accept the admiring glances from the other mothers in person. I could be a shining beacon for nurture versus nature right there, right then!

But, I could tell from the moment I walked in that all was not well. Big Sister Oub was surveying the crowd. Cause she's a sentient 4 year old now. She knows that the crowd is made up with actually people this year. When she was three she didn't care! But now, now... now she has stage fright!!!

Ah jaysus, me no likey!

She made it half way through before she collapsed in tears and had to retire to my knee for the rest of the performance.

I wasn't happy. Uh huh. She has disgraced me in front of all the mothers. I will most likely be challenged by one of the other, younger, mothers in the car park now. I cannot avoid being beaten and cast from my pack to wander in the wilderness alone, looking for somewhere to curl up and expire...

Think of me, in my decline.

Remember me as I once was. Great and better than everyone else.

ahem.

I'll go write my IPYPIASM poem now...

Schools, Boobs and Lost Tribes of Papua New Guinea

2011-11-29T15:25:00.001Z

What's Team D'Oub up to at the moment? Lots and nothing. Never has the name of this blog been more accurate.

One is rather domestically imprisoned at the moment. But, we're looking at the last month of 2011, Baba Oub will be 1 year old in a couple of weeks, so roll on 2012 and maybe a return to creative ways.

What we have been doing is obsessing over secondary schools for eldest Oub child. We went to visit another one a week or so ago. They had an Open Day. Everyone turned up. I mean everyone. Old ladies had heard that Confey College was open. Prisoners applied specially for day release so that they could have a look. Tribes from Papua New Guinea who had heretofore never made contact with the rest of the human race showed up. My youth, missing in action for some time now, was spotted strolling the corridors.

It's a great bloody school. Excellent results, lovely building, co-ed, polite students. Clean toilets. I dunno - how important are clean toilets to the over school experience? I've been in the loos of the other two schools and urgh, mingin' just isn't doing them justice. "So, Mrs Oub, why did you pick Confey College for little Master Oub?' "Clean toilets."

But, things are never simple. We did our tour of the school with the rest of the seven billion inhabitants of earth. And we were just generally blown away. Seeing as we felt there might be a bit of competition for spaces, we decided that I'd pop into the school super soon and put sons name down. Because this school has an unusual enrollment policy. You pay them a non-refundable 100euro, your child is guaranteed a place. Simples.

So, off I headed the very next morning. Knock, knock, knock on the secretaries door. One little conversation later. They're changing the policy. The board of management are putting into place a proper enrollment policy. A policy, if it is in line with the policy followed by pretty much every other school in the country, will see us bottom of the list!

But of course.

I tried bribing the school secretary. I tired flattery. I tired threatening her! Well, I didn't actually threaten her, but Baba Oub was in the room, so there was an air of menace... But to no avail. We've put his name down. Time will tell...Sigh...

What else have I been doing?

Breastfeeding. Extreme Breastfeeding. I should be put in a packet with instructions on the back that say 'Just Add Water'. I am a shrivelled husk. Baba Oub has discovered the auld pulling up of the top. My beleaguered boobs are being pawed at day and night. And when Mr Oub is done, baba is always hungry.

This blog post has been disturbed four times by demands for milk.

She is drunk on the power. No longer does she have to wait for mama to decide that she can have a feed, no, she can grope like the office letch for access anytime she bloody wants to. She is a milkcoholic. It's just boob, boob, boob, all the time. And she just screams if she can't. She's like an addict! Is there rehab for babies who like boob just that little bit too much? A twelve step program to recovery? It's time for her to admit that she is powerless over boob and that her life has become unmanageable... She needs to make a list of the people she has harmed and make amends to them all...

Hello, my name is Baba Oub and I a boobaholic.

She got so drunk on milk she woke up in the laundry basket, not knowing how she got there...

And, last but not least, here's what I made in pottery class last week. (Can't show you this week as I didn't have my phone with me. Please try not to be too inconsolable.)

Right, I'm off to write a poem for International Put Your Poem in a Shop Month! It may well be about schools and boobs. But then, aren't all poems?

Enjoy the silence...

2011-11-14T22:45:00.001Z

This blog post is a tribute to John Cage's 1952 composition - 4′33″.

Pictures...

2011-11-03T18:39:00.000Z

So, it's November.

The Diva Baby of Lucan has calmed down a smidge. Not enough for me to reply to emails. Read our book club book. Write anything. Shower.

But, I shan't complain. It turns out she has hidden talents. We had a photo session yesterday - you know the sort of thing, family portrait, all of us looking uncomfortable and forced, captured forever to hang pride of place in the hall (for extra humiliation.) But Diva Baby was a natural! Her first word was practically 'I'mreadyformycloseup'. She turned, looking over her shoulder, eyes popping! If she can avoid the D'Oub snail like metabolism (it's me glands!) and our horror of physical exertion, then she could be a supermodel. But, like, one of those supermodels that goes to Oxford too...

It's been all about the visual arts in the D'Oub household lately...

Myself and the Mr have obviously gone and got notions of being Charles Saatchi and decided what we really needed was a massive art collection. We've been doing with mass produced Ikea prints up till now. I'm not going to slag Ikea prints off or anything, they've done us very well up to now. But I think there comes a time in a persons life when they just have to get something original up there. Having grown up in a house with a mammy who was an artist, whose works covered all our walls, I felt the need for some actual art work.

We had a budget set aside to have the interior of our house painted. Sure Mr Oub could have done it, but I wanted it done while I was young enough to have the eyesight good enough to enjoy it. But, we've gone and spent most of what was earmarked on pictures. They will have to cover up our manky paint job. Maybe Mr Oub will have to do the painting after all.

First up, thanks to the wonderful Titus, we came across the fantastic artwork of the artist Matt Kish. Loved his Moby Dick pictures. Couldn't resist and bought two!

It's a bit blurry, but I think you get the idea.

Framed and at the bottom of the stairs.

So delighted with ourselves and the pictures, we've been keen to find ourselves some more. I came across the artist Nicole Tilley in the Cow's Lane market a few weeks ago...

She does etching thingys - something about copper and wax and stuff... here are the two prints we bought

We haven't had them framed yet - the village framer is our new best friend, we're putting his kids through college at this rate. But soon they will be up on our messy walls to delight all and sundry.

Inspired by all this, we then discovered a little known Lucan artist who we feel has real promise. Even if her kids ask why she gave herself a beard.

Till next time, whenever that may be :)

Update: Just for Titus, I give u the work of Mr D'Oub, professional pumpkin carver!!!

Who am I?

2011-10-18T16:39:00.001+01:00

Okay, okay - feeling a lot less grumpy today - not much has changed as such, but I guess it's not 3am, the time when all problems band together, drink a few quadruple espressos and hiss at you.

I'm sitting here at the kitchen table threatening the children. It's homework time and they're just not in the mood. Hard to blame them. And for some reason they're not quite believing me when I say I will sell them if they don't shush.

And why this luxury, this blogging in the middle of the day?

Because the baby is in jail.

Mr Oub, as he does, got a notion in his head. And decisive, as I dithered, he set up the monstrously huge playpen (aka Babyjail) in our already crowded kitchen. I was all bitter, get it out of my beautiful kitchen like. But then we were all overcome... a bit like when you live beside a motorway and have gotten used to the traffic noise, but then you move and it's all quiet. It was odd. Strange. Baby Oub likes her cage. She shut up for once in her short screechy life. Whatever the bars are saying to her, she likes what she hears. We don't know quite what to do with ourselves. Other than prepare for a possible incarcerated future for our youngest child.

I'm an innocent mon!

So, I sat down to do a bit o' blogging. Horror of horrors, I am discovering that I have misplaced the funny. This post is just not going to get any more rib tickling than this. I dunno. Maybe it is possible to run out of your sense of humour - I may be dour forever mour. Not a great loss to the world of comedy perhaps.

But in the spirit of making people laugh, and it being my birthday week, here are a few old IDs I found recently as Mr Oub and I tried to clean out the study (once again). The study is our little landfill. Feck it in and shut the door. Methane is produced there. Hmm. Okay, maybe that was the kids.

Anyway, Here are some classics.

Mr Oub likes this one. He was getting a little lechy. I was not best pleased. I was all jealous of my previous self and like no, you will not find yourself a time machine and go back and cheat on me with my younger self. Or something...

I remember that beige cardigan. Crazy student me...

And this one is a classic. My journalism class had oh so wisely decided to go out on the batter the night before our pictures were to be taken. I look so rough on this id you could probably use it as sandpaper.

UUrghgghhhhhhh

And here, for no reason at all, is a picture of a trio of swans I made at pottery class last night. Quite.

Byes :)

Hmmm...

2011-10-15T03:41:00.000+01:00

It's nearly three am. There really isn't any point blogging now, cause there's no one around to read it. By the time morning rolls around, this post will most likely have quietly slipped down the blogrolls of the blogosphere, gently tripping off to binary purgatory unnoticed.

And that's ok.

I'm in a little bit of a grump.

Why?

Ah, hard to say... I think I feel that life is in a bit of a transitory phase at the moment. Things are changing. Evolving - will it emerge from it's chrysalis a butterfly or a moth?

Is it that it's my birthday next week? Just shy of the dreaded 4-0. I don't think it's possible I'll be 40 next year. I'm actually17 you know. Have been for years. But at forty, if you're average, life is half over. Jaysus. A bit scary. I need to get a move on. Achieve! Don't I?

Or is it that my 20 year school reunion is on tonight and I'm not going? Couldn't work up the enthusiasm to see a bunch of girls I haven't been arsed to see in twenty years - just cause it's been twenty years since I saw them last...

Or is it that we're looking at secondary schools for the eldest Oub child and suddenly it doesn't feel like playing anymore? Yikes, this is an actual person we have to guide and grow. Where has the cute toddler who said funny things gone? He was far easier than this real, growing, creature who we might fuck up. The responsibility.

And then there is my lovely aunt whom I am very very close to. She is into hospital for open heart surgery on Wednesday. It's bloody scary. And I'm not so much worried that she won't come through it all - she has the best doctors - it's more her having to go through this awful time at all. The fact that she is getting old. It's also seeing the same with my parents. Does one start counting how many years you have left with them?

And when and where and how do you balance these concerns with the reality that there isn't much you can do? That life is life and it'll have it's wicked way with you one way or the other.

(It may come as no surprise to you all that it was just my philosophy course marks that dragged down my over all finals results, leaving me with a 2.2, not a 2.1. Bitter, moi? )

But enough.

It's now half past three and the baba has decided to wake up and she's yelling.

Not much to be said about that.

I'll be tired in the morning, but maybe I'll have left the grump behind.

The People's Republic of Ireland

2011-09-27T14:23:00.002+01:00

So, I should have been updating my blog for the last hour or so, but I was otherwise engaged. I was composing a snitty - yet non-libellous - email to my local political representatives giving out to them for not nominating Senator David Norris for president. Yes, it's all a bit closing the barn door after the horse has bolted - where was my email beforehand promising them all sort of deliciously democratic delights for their vote? The things a girl can do with a mandate could make your eyes water!

But no, I didn't email them beforehand as I just assumed they'd do the right thing and nominate him. I know, am I really that stupid? It appears I am. Really. It's embarrassing. So, now they've all been informed of my disgust (am sure they're just quaking) and I've promised my vote next time to some bloke who thinks Trotsky was David Cameron's more conservative older brother.

(Breaking News!- It appears that Waterford County Council have just done the decent thing and nominated him. Good on ye Waterford CC. That's more like it. )

And the thing is, I'm not even sure I am going to vote for the senator. I really quite like him, I think he'd be a brilliant president, the perfect person for the country right now. But I would like a little clarification on some of the more controversial things he's said. But, without him in the race, then I never will get that clarification and I will not be living in the democracy I thought I was living in.

This country's politicians really sucks sometimes. Hmmm. A lot of the time.

(Breaking news! - Just got a reply to my email from local TD (MP or Congressman for my international readership. Lol) TD says that the councillors "acted in good faith and according to what they thought was the right decision for South Dublin County Council to make". )

Sigh. So it was the right decision. Wow, winning argument! God forbid they give us any actual reasons... oh, hang on - because there are none! No one is going to come out and say they didn't vote for him because he's gay or because they know he's so popular that he'd stop their guy winning the election.

Gah.

But silly naive me for thinking there was any honour in politics. I really must have had a blow to the head recently.

So, come on Dublin City Council, meeting this evening, do the right and democratic thing! Nominate Norris!

BREAKING NEWS! - Yay, Dublin City Council stood firm for democracy and Senator Norris is now on the ballot paper! Hurray for democracy! And I'm sure my day long email flame war with the Mayor of South Dublin County Council had no influence...)

Airfield

2011-08-24T21:58:00.007+01:00

We went to Airfield yesterday. The sun had actually come out from its witness protection program, so we took hasty advantage and legged it over to this lovely working(ish) farm and took in the new piggies, hens, cows and Giant Connect 4. Obviously the Giant Connect 4 is a very rare breed, and possibly only bred in captivity these days. But I must say, it was very friendly and the kids enjoyed playing with it very much. As long as they don't ask to get one of course. I'll have to remind them, a Connect 4 is for life, not just for Christmas ...

Hands up who thinks I'll do a 'Spot the Pigs' gag? Ha!

There was ham in them thar toasties. And nary a qualm raised it's guilty head. Really, this was only minutes after cooing over the new piglets. Ruthless. And I had just killed a wasp with my iPhone. Bloodthirsty, the lot of us.

Big Sister Oub was inspired to dance by the beauty she saw around her. The natural splendor, God's scattered glitter of wildflowers, filled her soul with an unstoppable urge to express the joy it inspired. Either that or she's a little teapot.

How exciting, more pigs. Spotty. And one had an odd looking bottom. As city types, born and bred we debated for a while whether this odd looking bottom was correct pig genitalia or an actual deformity. We decided, kids and I, that surely God had not intended the piggie privates to look quite this startling. So, in all probability it was a slight developmental whoopsie in porcine utero. We didn't hold it against him. Or her.

Exhausted from fighting, they lent on each other, much like when boxers snuggle after a particularly ferocious flurry of thumping.

Big Sister would say 'Cheese' and be looking at the camera and Little Sister would look at her (maybe pondering, cheese? Where??) And then she'd look at me and I'd yell at Big Sister to look back at the camera and she'd look at me and say 'Cheese!' and Little Sister would look away again (Where?? Where? Why do I keep missing this phantom Cheese??!) I gave up after try number 10. By which point everyone was cross and the baby was really quite hungry.

So, all in all a fun day. We tried to trick Mr Oub into thinking we'd wasted the only sunny day this year going to Ikea. Sadly, he believed us that that's where we'd been and wasn't cross at all. Just sadly resigned. Oh well.

Books, books, books.

2011-08-19T12:05:00.005+01:00

I think it's time for the Kindle.

Cause we have a problem.

Mr Oub spent sometime recently putting up five long high capacity shelves. Our books had been living out in the shed for the past few month since we demolished a wall and had no where else to put them. Amazingly the cold and damp didn't destroy them. Odd. But I guess we all knew there was something inherently sinister about chick lit novels.

So, here is a pic of Mr Oub's handy work. And I suspect you see a problem. There is only a teensy bit of space at the top for all the books we expect to acquire during the rest of our lives. And, if I could be arsed to get up off the sofa and stop drinking so much wine, that could be at least forty years from now.

I've tried thinning them out. Rather like the children, I really should dispatch them to a better home, but I just get so sentimental and can't be without any of them. Even when, (again like the children) they're rubbish. (Only kidding Oub kiddies! Honestly. Only one or two of you are rubbish.)

So, perhaps more shelves? Where? The whole bloody house is coming down with the things.

For example -

The livingroom. Of course these generally are only our best books. Our best literary towels for visitors. Books that make us look fierce well read and intellectual. As long as no one inspects the virgins spines we might just pull that off.

Do you like how Mr Oub has colour coded the books for a pleasing aesthetic? It does mean a few potboilers sneak in just for their good looks. But isn't that always the way in life, that good looks will get your farther than you deserve?

You wouldn't believe the dust these collect. Perhaps if we read them once in a while?

So, to upstairs. Any space here? Nope. In the bedroom? Bedrooms are meant to be calm restful spaces with little clutter and few distractions. Hence mine is jammers full. And I'm always tired.

Even the much maligned Oub children have books coming out their ears.

No one should think that this post is some sort of false modesty effort - 'oh woe is me, look at all these books (I am so intellectual!!!! Be impressed!!)' Anyone who was reading VariousCushions blog recently will know I publicly admitted my desperate ignorance of modern classics. I had not only not read any of the books she had listed, but hadn't even heard of many of the authors. If they haven't been name checked in Heat magazine, I'm all adrift.

This post is a cry for help. Whether it's the directions to Book Hoarders Anonymous, or an exhortation to adopt Various' Chinese-like concept of a 'One Shelf' policy (What is with the books/children analogies today?) I need help.

Or I need a Kindle.

If I don't get a Kindle, and in fact one for each member of the family you could be reading about us in the papers soon. 'Nobbled by Novels!', 'Books Bury Brood!', 'The Dangers of Reading - family found under killer mountain of cheap paperbacks.'

I think you, my reader, need to pass around the hat. Get the collection boxes rattling. Six shiny new Kindles, and you could save a life!

You.

Yes YOU, could be a hero!

(I'll have my kindle in the orange leather case. ta.)

Did you hear the one about....

2011-08-06T19:22:00.003+01:00

Because I don't actually have a functioning brain anymore, I had to steal this post from The Telegraph. It is so funny though. Enjoy :)

"I have kleptomania. But when it gets bad, I take something for it."

Ken Dodd

"I’m a hunt saboteur. I go out the night before and shoot the fox."

Tim Vine

"I need cheering up. I lent my friend $8,000 for plastic surgery. Now I don’t know what he looks like.

Emo Philips

"My girlfriend had a phantom pregnancy. Now we have a little baby ghost."

Jimmy Carr

"A man loses his dog, so he puts an ad in the paper. And the ad says, “Here, boy!”

Spike Milligan

"I’m addicted to placebos. I’d give them up, but it wouldn’t make any difference."

Jay Leno

"I saw six men kicking and punching the mother-in-law. My neighbour said, “Aren’t you going to help?” I said, “No, six should be enough.”

Les Dawson

"They laughed when I said I was going to be a comedian. They’re not laughing now."

Bob Monkhouse

"It's easy to distract fat people. It's a piece of cake."

Chris Addison

"These are my principles. If you don't like them, I have others."

Groucho Marx

Growing Concern

2011-07-13T16:25:00.003+01:00

Neglect.

I am a perpetrator of neglect. Of the vegetable kind.

You'll all remember the childish enthusiasm of a year and a bit ago when I gleefully acquired my allotment. Well. What can I say. If there were social workers attached to the care of veggie patches, my little scrap of land would be on an At Risk register and I'd be the subject of a case conference of the carroty kind right about now.

Of course, it's all down to the growing of another kind I was doing last year. That of the Supreme Diva and Overlord of the Universe, aka, Baby Oub. Foolishly I thought once she arrived I'd be free to mind my little green children. But Supreme Diva and Overlord of the Universe demands TOTAL devotion and if I were to leave her side for just one moment, I would have been disappeared, never to be seen again. (Her secret police are ruthless).

That said, we have had a breakthrough. Supreme Diva and Overlord of the Universe is currently locked up in the Hague awaiting trail for Crimes Against Her Mammy, (Or maybe it's not the Hague, it could be her bedroom I'm thinking of.)

(And just in case any social workers are reading this, she's not really locked up. Yes, there are bars. But that's just on her cot.)

I've been sneaking out to the allotment. Sadly someone stole it in the middle of the night and replaced it with a wild uninhabitable wilderness. A wild uninhabitable wilderness that has been on growth hormones. And wants to be in the Guinness Book of Records for the its wildness. It wears a leather jacket, rides a motor bike and menaces old ladies. It drinks too much and has piercings. And by jove, it just doesn't care.

I was considering faking my own death to escape it. But, you know, that's not what a good mother would do. Of course, as we all know, I'm nothing like a good mother, so the faked death is still an option. But. But. Maybe it's redemption I'm after. A chance to show the world, that I can, that I will! There will be beetroot! That can be courgettes! There shall be shallots!!

Come to me my little leafy offspring.

Grow my xylem and phloem children.

Crank up your transpiration stream and osmos the love to your little chlorophyll hearts.

Mama is back and she's got fertilizer!

Food Glorious Food

2011-07-07T23:14:00.003+01:00

I've nothing useful to say for myself.

Really.

But hey, just so you know I'm not dead, here's a poem I wrote as I waited in line at Weight Watchers feeling fat, bolshy and proud.

(It's not really finished, and doesn't really know where it's going. But it's not exactly Heaney, so I don't think anyone will mind...)

Food Glorious Food

We weight our turn
chain gang slumping
getting to the top of the q
mumbles of how our week was.
Rumbled tumbles
Grumbled tummies
Patronised by the middle aged
skinny matron who, she simpers,
was once like us.

Like us fat. Rotund. Chubby
Flabby, flubby, big boned
Big bummed, big untoned dummies.
Cakes ingesters, chocolate investors
Sweetie, treatie, yummy infesters.
coffee slice assassins
cupcake connivers
lowfat survivors
sugar muggers
hydrogenated huggers
sluggish metabolisms inherited from our mothers.
cadbury addicted
haribo afflicted
willing to risk it, for just one more biscuit
Happy to scoffy a bountiful banofee
inhale whole, those divine profiterole
tirismsu? How do you do!

But don't forget our slavery to
our other pal savoury
mash potato, cream
lustful dreams
of rashers and lashers of
buttery yum.
filling our greedy tums with
pasta, chips, crisps
curly fries
in quantities unwise
if its carbohydrate, I can't wait
I really, really like to clear my plate
A shamefaced calorific ingrate.

So, what is my fate, my destiny?
I think we all know it's unlikely to be skinny
Signing peace treaties with diabetes?
Not escaping sore thigh chaffing?
High cholesterol that says it all...
Plus Plus size, no surprise
oh the sugary butterly lies!

So, in summation,
To tell the truth
I think I'll always indulge my
sweety tooth
I'll always choose those chocolate eclairs
even if it means employing a sherpa
for the second floor stairs
Or shame of shame
having to buy two of those Ryanair chairs.

First Prize. For Effort.

2011-06-10T22:02:00.010+01:00

It was Sports Day at Toddler Oub's Montessori school today. And it was reassuring to see that she has inherited the D'Oub family's complete and utter lack of sporting prowess. She was rubbish. Came last in just about everything. Was the only child to actually receive help to complete a race.

As she says herself - 'I can't hop.'

Hopping - Not an Oubby trait.

She lost the egg'n'spoon race because she was so concerned with keeping the egg (aka potato) on the spoon. The two lads she was racing against had reach the finishing line, peeled, cooked and eaten the potato while she was still oh so carefully inching along. And she's the one who looked witheringly at me when I called it the egg'n'spoon race - potato mammy, potato (with added eyes thrown to heaven.)

Definite winner for best plaited pigtails... (Sadly though, not the source of some secret athletic powers.)

And through it all I laughed and laughed and laughed. I laughed so hard I cried. Actual tears rolled from my eyes such was my merriment at watching my little darling. I'm such a supportive mother. But hey, she's three, I've surely got a few years before the real, serious psychological damage is done.

Of course, I could put her dire performance down to her recent bout of chicken pox and the fact that we are just back from a very demanding mini-break up to Belfast. Lots of fun was had by all. We visited the Giant's Causeway. I was told in all seriousness by Second Son how it was created by Finn McCool. This the child who dissected the government's economic policies in one easy step. That said, the government's economics are harder to swallow than any ancient fairy stories and half as credible. Boom, boom.

Son delighting in the natural wonders of the Giant's Causeway

Daughter succeeding much better in the sitting down looking cute race

Littlest daughter looking like Frida Kahlo. Though that hat may have been too mad, even for Frida.

Embarrassing PDA Alert

2011-05-31T13:28:00.005+01:00

So, it was the D'Oubs wedding anniversary yesterday. 8 years of D'Oubby bliss.

We nearly forgot about it.

We were just soooooo busy. Toddler Oub has the chicken pox, Second Son had his communion, the living room wall has come down and new floors, light fixtures, etc have gone up. Baby Oub (ver2.o) is as demanding as ever, though (whisper it!) she is considering sleeping the night.

That said she had a blip on Sunday night. And so, exhausted from Baby being awake alot, we woke yesterday morning not a little cranky. He said something. I was snappish. He said 'Happy Anniversary.' I said, 'Oh yeah.' And then he went to work.

Loves young dream.

As he says himself, it's not so much the 7 year itch, more the 8 year rash.

Hands off, he's taken!

Altogether we've been together twelve years (I think...) so you kinda get used to someone over that length of time. Does his heart palpate when I walk in the room? Maybe, but it's more likely to be the beginnings of coronary health disease. Do I swoon when he returns each evening from work? Er, I probably only swoon from standing up too quickly to nag him about something.

But to be honest, I think that's only natural. I distrust those couples who say they are as passionate now as they were the first day they met. It sounds exhausting! And really, with all that passion, who's taking the time to fill the dishwasher?

I'm not advocating the banishment of passion. Don't get me wrong. We've all enjoyed a soupcon of wild animal rapture in our time. Possibly even more than a soupcon. But isn't that what your twenties are for? And that's not to say one shouldn't make the effort to peer through the domestic fugue and see that quiet IT programmer he once was. And maybe growl a little in his direction, while doing curling cat claw hand gestures, when he's looking particularly good in a suit.

But, you know, I like him better now than I did then. He rubs my smelly feet every evening without complaint. He makes me tea and toast too. Never whinges. He's a brilliant dad. He'll assemble a flat pack piece of furniture at 3am because my family are due the next day and I really, really, want it to be ready. He'll sleep on two pushed together chairs in hospital when I'm so sick after yet another baba and never complain. He will buy me underwear in M&S when I decide from my hospital bed that that's what I need him to do. He puts up with me going on and on and on and on about my sore knees/back/hips. He'll dig the allotment in the snow cause it's what my mad brain decides needs to be done - and he doesn't even like vegetables. Not a word passes his lips when I go out four nights week, requiring him to do the Scout run on his own with all the kids and do dinner and put them all to bed yet again.

Hottie!

Perhaps I'm wrong and we are still passionate about each other.

Maybe it's just a quiet kinda passion.

Love you schmoopy.

Chicks and Babes

2011-05-24T23:04:00.007+01:00

It's just so damn busy round here.

I am reminded of that poem 'Epic' by Patrick Kavanagh, one of my fave poets...

Epic

I have lived in important places, times
When great events were decided : who owned
That half a rood of rock, a no-man's land
Surrounded by our pitchfork-armed claims.

I heard the Duffys shouting "Damn your soul"
And old McCabe stripped to the waist, seen
Step the plot defying blue cast-steel -
"Here is the march along these iron stones."

That was the year of the Munich bother. Which
Was most important ? I inclined
To lose my faith in Ballyrush and Gortin
Till Homer's ghost came whispering to my mind.
He said : I made the Iliad from such
A local row. Gods make their own importance.

Because it's all a go-go round here - Betty from London! Barry from Hawaii! Banking Bailouts! Bedlam!

But what is really concerning me is a Baby and some Blue Tits. And the devil really is in the detail.

Why oh why am I a slave to such a tiny bird and a tiny baby?

I am the supreme commander of the world! Mwwahahaahah! Mwwahahahahahaha!

I have been trying to garden. We have a First Holy Communion on Saturday and family is due round. While I am in general happy to live with a back garden that looks like an abandoned derelict site - only the winos and crack whores missing - I thought this might be a timely time to pick out a few weeds and make a weak effort to pretty the place up. Especially as the gales we had yesterday demolished my ickle green house and so strewn murdered seedlings were added to the general chaotic mix.

I decided to begin with the ~~weed bed~~ flower bed. But for some reason a pair of Blue Tits decided to actually nest this year in the Bird box we mounted on the wall. Obviously the property bubble in the avian world has gone bust too, otherwise I have no idea why these two are slumming it round our way...

Going for 350,000 Euro only three years ago, now yours for a few earthworms and a grub.

But this has created an unexpected problem.

Every time the mammy and daddy want to go into the bird box and feed the babies, they sit on the wall above me, chirping and looking accusingly down at me. Until I get up, walk back a bit and wait. Then they'll go in a feed their babies. Repeat ad nauseum every ten minutes. And I'm the eejit who gets up every ten minutes to let them do it. Probably because I have my own squalling chick of my own. I really empathise too much.

Before! Shameful.

After! Still a bit shit...

So it makes the weeding very slow going. I may have a foot or two cleared by Saturday.

I did get to see the Queen's Chinooks though. (A privilege only previously shared with Prince Philip. Ho, ho.)

A fine pair of choppers

And of course, through all this I have my own little chick who is as insistent as her feathered friends in her demands for attention. Really, it's just my luck. I had three easy peasy kiddies and then, just as I decided to hang up my ovaries, out pops this little diva. Sure, she's adorable and if I ever decide to enter her in illegal baby wrestling she'll make me a fortune (significant weight advantage -but we'd have to be careful she didn't eat her opponents.)

But she has laid waste to my life! No time for blogging! My allotment is divorcing me. Friends pass me in the street with nary a backward glance I am so unfamiliar to them now.

Ah, but methinks I like to complain. And as my man Paddy said 'I have lived in important places, times When great events were decided' - Sure, didn't she smile at me when I got in from the Scout run this evening. Amn't I actually delighted to be able to tell the mammy and daddy Blue Tit apart and listen to their little babies thrive. I have a garden that one day could be a pleasure. And a baby, despite her crazy ways, is, along with her equally crazy siblings, the centre of my world.

Why D'Oub don't get to blog

2011-05-18T22:49:00.003+01:00

Bold baby. Bold.

A Great Feet

2011-04-20T22:53:00.005+01:00

Middle Oub child volunteered in school. To get his feet washed. At mass tomorrow.

Good for him I say. Go middle Oub boy and your willingness to volunteer for anything.

It's the priest I feel sorry for. The smell from middle Oub boy's feet can kill. You think those leaking nuclear power plants in Japan are a problem? They have got nothing on this boy's feet.

"Keep that stinky fecker away from me!! I haven't been immunised yet!"*

Mr Oub thinks I'm refusing to go to the church cause I've hosting book club tomorrow, but no, it's really because I don't want to have to apologise to the families of all those killed and maimed when he removes his toxic spawg coverings. I, of course, have developed an immunity over the years, so I do survive these type of exposure incidents. But it has shortened my life expectancy considerably.

I am constantly amazed that the CIA don't show up at my door, asking to use the child for scientific research for biological weapons.

I turn away tinpot dictators at least twice a week.

Avert your eyes! They can injure even through the medium of binary!

I use his feet to keep the slugs off my potatoes.

His feet are anti-insured for 8 million euro.

The smell has been known to cause amnesia.

Our neighbours have lead lined walls to help protect them.

Nostradamus devoted a whole chapter to their apocalyptic nature.

They make small kittens cry.

So, what I'm basically saying is, if you are within a two hundred mile radius of Lucan tomorrow evening, around about 7pm - I'd stay indoors.

And keep your windows shut.

*Winner of the 'Most Tenuous Use of a Cute Baby Photo In My Blog Yet' award 2011...

Blog Post By A Bored D'Oub

2011-04-06T17:35:00.005+01:00

So, we're having fish fingers for dinner tonight. And frozen mash potatoes. And frozen peas. Heston Blumenthal I ain't.

Wow. Yummy. The lucky Oub family.

Toddler Oub is pretending to fish while sitting on the rocker. I was reprimanded for pretending to eat the pretend fish before she had pretend cooked it. I had to pretend spit it out. I hope I don't get pretend food poisoning.

It was this big. The one that (pretend) got away.

Second son is playing the Wii. Or maybe its the new PS3. I dunno which. And I really don't care. The sun is actually out, and he should really be outside enjoying it. I should be making him go outside and enjoy it. But like the fish fingers, mash and peas, I haven't got the energy. I could pop him under the grill, or in the microwave for a while I guess.

Grunt. Hmmm? Wha'? (Son ignores mother.)

Eldest child is entering hour three of his homework. He's only in forth class, it's not the amount of work that's taking him so long. It's his futile revolt against the concept of homework, and work in general, that keeps him so long at it. It's a lonely battle, and so far not showing many results. The homework hasn't as yet disappeared. But he is dedicated to the cause and will keep fighting the good fight.

And he looks so industrious. He actually started this exercise on May 4th 1988.

Baby Oub (ver2.0) has just woken up. She's been asleep in her car seat for a few hours. Apparently spending too long in their car seats is bad for babies. It's the only place my little darling will stay asleep. See above about healthy fresh food, outside play and helping with homework for my feelings on the subject right now.

Somebody, anybody, call social services...

Mr Oub won't be home for about an hour. If we're lucky. But he may well be reading this blog, so honey, hurry home, I'm slacking again.

Thankfully he likes fish fingers.

Shame there aren't quite enough to go round.

Oh well.

Beastly Bus

2011-04-04T17:01:00.004+01:00

I'm baaaaaaack.

Been busy. Knocking down kitchen walls. Going to Disneyland in Paris. The life of a D'Oub is a whirlwind. But, I felt I should hop on the poetry bus. Gotta keep those poetry muscles moving before they completely atrophy. Of course, am suspicious I'm too late. Cause I've produced another 'I'm-tired-because-of-the-new-baby-but-hey-isn't-she-cute-anyway-poem' What can I say? Titus, the bus driver this week, set us a task listing a bunch of animals, and I still bring it back to babs. It's a talent I guess.

Anyway, here we go. I chose the bush baby as my animal inspiration.

Bush Baby Baby

My little big eyed bush baby bundle
like your namesake noticeably nocturnal
I am sloth like, your soporific mammy
you do realize you've got it totally jammy?
I feed, clothe, bathe, oh you've cut a swathe
through my life
Even Sisyphus woulda worn a puss
with the endless toil
you create
but all you have to do is smile
not even that often, just once in a while
and I'm worse than chocolate in the palm of your hand
I melt like a fool, into a stupid maternal pool
of love and martyred devotion
and you can wake at 5am always and I'll
do what you want
I understand the deal we've got going here
it's pretty clear,
though not very fair
but honestly?
I don't really care 'cause
I illogically love you
my little big eyed bush baby bundle.

Hell No! We Won't Go! (Well, actually, we will go on the Protest Poetry Bus)

2011-03-13T18:31:00.007Z

So, this weeks Poetry Bus task is to write a protest poem. Watercats has set the task, and had asked us to only write four lines. I got so mad writing my poem, that it got a little longer... I also don't think I got the rhythm right *(as requested) but again, I got a little carried away.

Here it is...

Politicians and Bankers Can Kiss My Angry Irish Ass.

The feckers took my money
they spent it on houses and cars
so now I'm stuck in a country that's fucked
and not one of them bastards's behind bars.

They gave the jobs to the boys
they frittered the money away
So now my kids have no future
and the best and brightest can't stay.

So rise up my brothers and sisters!
Lets us roar and scream and shout
Let us tells those puss filled blisters
That we've finally found them all out

We're burning their homes to the ground
we're salting the earth where they live
we're reclaiming this state for the people
And we're not in the damn mood to forgive.

I did actually manage to full fill the brief with my first attempt - only four lines - but I'm not sure if it is strictly protest? But hey, since I wrote it, here it is...

They tell us not to do it
that killing is a crime
but behind the cover of bench and bar
they're doing it all the time.

Well, after all that vitriol and spleen venting I think I need a drink.

(*am aware I, in fact, completely ignored the rhythm, rhyming scheme requested!)

Dawn of the Bed

2011-03-11T23:32:00.005Z

So, Mr Oub is watching some zombie apocalypse tv programme at the moment. I don't like zombies that much - what can I say, I'm a bit undeadist - so I thought I'd post a little something on my blog and avoid the moans of 'bbbbraaaains' and 'ooouuuuuuuugh'.

And everything else Mr Oub has to say for himself.

Boom, boom.

It's Friday night, there really isn't a lot of stuff going on here. I could be out in the pubs of Dublin with a bunch of politico friends of mine. They're made up of people one step removed from the action... wives, cousins, ex-partners of TDs, that sort of thing. The night out was planned as an evening to celebrate the end of the election and an opportunity to point and laugh at the Fianna Failers among us. You can imagine, I am sorry to miss that opportunity.

That said, the zombies onscreen are doing a pretty passable impression of The Fianna Fail party, so I'm not missing that much.

So why am I sitting here on a Friday night eating some marmite toast and drinking decaf tea (rockkkkkkkkkkkk'n'rollllllllllllllllll!) and wittering on to my mighty blog audience of two? (Hi mammy and daddy!)

Because that naughty naughty baby has me even more tired!

'Never!' I hear you cry.

'Not possible!' you shriek.

Yes. Because, you see, she has Ninja Colic. This is no ordinary colic - it doesn't happen reliably in the evening, last for a few hours, drive you mad, then go away until tomorrow. No, this Ninja colic leps out at you when you least expect it! 6am - 'Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!' 11am 'Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! 3pm 'Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah' and then, just to fuck with you, in the evening 'Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!' And never at the same time twice. And it skips some days altogether. You think it's gone, and then, out from behind the curtains it jumps! 'Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!'

All this should really have driven me to the pub, not kept me away.

Hmmm.

Now, you know, seeing that all written down, I'm wondering, why exactly am I at home?

Sigh.

Zombie show is over. Mr Oub has fallen asleep. Baba is doing a passable impression of a good baba asleep on his chest.

We're going door shopping tomorrow.

Be still my beating heart.

Pancake Bus!!

2011-03-07T21:05:00.004Z

So, to the PoetryBus challenge!

We had to write an ode to pancakes in the persona of a poet of our choice... I decided to run with a egg and flour homage to Dorothy Parker.

Pancake

Honey rots teeth;
Nutella equals anaphylaxis;
Syrup too sweet;
Banana too good for us;
Blueberries aren't traditional;
Savoury's a bore;
Chocolate isn't nutritional;
I guess its sugar and lemon once more.

For those foolish enough not to be familiar with the wonderful Ms Parker, this is the poem I am pathetically, inadequately attempting to ape...

'Resume'

Razors pain you; 
Rivers are damp; 
Acids stain you; 
And drugs cause cramp; 
Guns aren't lawful; 
Nooses give; 
Gas smells awful; 
You might as well live. 

Dorothy Parker

Bad Trip

2011-03-01T21:44:00.007Z

Grumpy day today.

I had to take a trip into town. Where once this was a treat - when I was a young slip of a thing - now I am old and curmudgeonly and it's just a pain.

I was picking up passports. Three out of the four monsters needed documentation. I am surprised klaxons didn't sound and red flashing lights didn't spring to life when I submitted their applications... should they be on some international watch list by now?

Thankfully I was able to go into town with only one of the mites in tow, all the rest in school - unlike when I brought the applications in. For reason, now flown from my brain due to post-traumatic stress disorder, I had to go in with Baby Oub (Ver 2.0) and T'Oub when doing the drop. Toddlers love big barren waiting rooms that have no entertainment and a lot of waiting. And babies like to cry for the entire duration of your stay. (As do mammys).

It was horrible. And when I got to the counter? Yes, you've guessed it - they weren't happy with the forms. Cause the eldest Oub child - aged 10 - hadn't signed his name on the form. You know, my signature at ten was most definitely my bond and certainly hasn't change a jot since then. But hey, if they wanted it we would have been more than happy to provide it. Only we were told a parents signature would suffice. Arse anyone? Elbow perhaps??? Gaaaahahahaha.

So, in I had trudged a second time, forms carefully signed by eldest Oub (for heaven's sake he printed his name he so didn't know what a signature is let alone actually have one!) and had to bring in the two youngest again. There was more tears this time - all mine - and more waiting. I was fooled into a false sense of security by the fact that there were only two ahead of me in the Q. Of course what I had failed to realise was that my queue was in fact inhabiting a rip in the space time continuum where time had no meaning and it moved as slowly as a Hollywood actor playing a presidential bodyguard throwing himself in front of an assassins bullet. (About as long as that sentence for example...)

But we got there eventually. They decided to issue me a reprieve and deigned to be happy with the forms I pathetically proffered to them, face damp, eyes blotchy and swollen, snot dripping.

I was to return on the 1st of March and collect them.

This morning.

They perhaps were thinking of the 1st of April. Cause like a bloody fool I expected them to be ready. I arrived, 10am, only one little baba this time, gravy! No one in the queue, extra gravy!! 'Hello mister passport guy!' I said - I even actually smiled at him. "Can I have my passports please?" I beamed.

"Er, they're on a truck right now. Can you come back at 3.30?" he said. Without even the decency to look ashamed. Bastard.

After the shuddering and twitching had stopped I stared at him. I considered yelling. I considered climbing up onto the counter and banging my bare fists against the perspex divide that was the only thing at that moment saving his life.

But in the end, I just said 'No. I cannot come back at 3.30."

They had won, they had finally defeated me.

So, what do you do in these circumstances?

Yes, go off and get yourself a dirty great big fry! I needed coffee and I needed grease. But of course, I don't go to town anymore. I don't know the cafes anymore. So, I trudged, looking to find a suitable establishment. It took a while. And I was pissed and hungry.

Finally I found a place. Should I have been worried I was the only person there? hmm. Should I have been cross that they put me down the back? (It's a buggy segregation) Should I have been concerned that when other people did come into the place they were all slightly rough looking older women? Ah feck it, the coffee was delicious and the fried eggs were done just how I likes 'em.

So, I'm going back in on Friday.

Depending on what happens, you may want to skip this blog till Monday next.

Beep Beep

2011-02-23T23:21:00.001Z

I am on the bus. Everyone else has hopped off at their stop I am so late. It's only me and the drunk who has nodded off at the back.

Here was our prompt.

I went with the amber prompt.

Amber
I am amber, oozing
slowly sloth like
trapping you
my burnished love
to be entombed eternally
in your entirety
in my tenacious heart.

Sofa Poetry Bus!

2011-02-15T22:55:00.005Z

This pic was our poetry bus prompt this week -

Here is my effort...I'm too tired to make it scan properly -you'll have to forgive me. But hey, at least I gave it a go?

Do you come here often?
asked the couch of the settee
"Only when the weathers cold,"
she simpered
"and there's nothing on tv."
"Well,"'lucky little me -
Let me buy you a drink or three
As its not that often I get the chance
to meet such a classy upholstery.
I like your browns and beiges!
I like your shapes and spaces!
I'm think you're the kinda sofa
that one could really hope t'
share a comfy camaraderie.

"Oh you're such a flatterer"
she blushed from root to tip.
hoping he didn't notice
her frays and ragged rips.
"Sure,I've seen some better days
'fore the fade of suns cruel rays
And oh that dog that daily hogged
my sumptuous silk brocade.

But I was a beauty in my time
I rivaled Chesterfield in his prime!"
She paused, then looked up shyly
now quieter, whispering wryly -
"But I succumbed to wear and tear
the bane of every suite and chair
That sees us eventual tossed without thought
Left in places like this to stain, wilt
and eventually to rot.

Me? Yes, I am resigned to my refuse lot."

"Well my dour dear!You're in need of good cheer
"I'm getting you a tot,
no make that a triple, roof lifting shot!
And you'll see that good seating
whose value is fleeting
to those whose home from where they
originally came
will be cherished here
cleaved to our bosom dear
And can see out their days
without cushion, bottom or fear!"

She smiled at his advance
risked a little come hither glance
her spirits lifted
her wood frame, closer, she shifted
and the couch and the settee
unfettered by the needs of humanity
saw out their days
in all kinda of weather
just happy dumped and forgotten
in that field there together.

I wouldn't bother if I was you, it'll only disappoint...

2011-02-15T16:55:00.004Z

brain empty.

nothing to blog about.

oh well.

"Please Daddy, don't make me read Mammy's blog! It's so boring!"

"I know daughter, I know..."

Sleepy Bus

2011-01-31T23:34:00.003Z

I'm on the bus. Sorta. Tried to follow Nanu's prompt. But promptly lost the file with my efforts :( Oh well. All down to sleep deprivation I fear. The tyranny of the baba in our midst. And anyway, every day here is a sleep deprived Ground Hog Day, so I would probably have failed the task anyway! And so, I decided that my offering might as well be on that theme...

Tired

Today was like the day before, the day before
I think
We sink beneath the waves of tired.
mired in those early days
of our needy nefarious newborn.
everything pared, shorn to the minimum,
to the sum total of her survival.
Ruthless in her suppression of the cabal
who agitate for sleep, for peace, for time
No crime on our part goes unpunished
We the rabble who do her bidding
grey skinned, eyes red rimmed with bleary,
hair triggered leery of the twitch,
or moan, or stir that signals her
dominion - no angel here a demon really
We so clear in our desperation to
be free of poo and wee to catch a z
or two
or three
But on it goes, shows no sign of ending
And tomorrow will be like the day before, the day before
I think.

Bolshie Babies

2011-01-28T11:39:00.005Z

I respected my parents when I was a child. Well, okay, maybe 'feared' might be a better word. And adults as a whole received my full quota of respect and deference. Cause, like, that was how we were brought up.

Which gets me to thinking - where did it all go wrong with my own children?

Middle D'Oub child, 8, turned to his father a few days ago (I'm not sure exactly what my husband did to warrant this comment) and said to him 'You know Daddy, you're like Laurel and Hardy, only in one person.'

I'm guessing my howling with laughter at this didn't help with the whole respect and parental awe stuff.

And then what about T'Oub? We were at the paediatrician yesterday for Baby Oub(ver 2.0)'s six week check up. There were jigsaws there to amuse T'Oub. So, the doctor say down to write some info out for me. T'Oub, proffering the jigsaw, says to the doc 'Is it right?' Doctor begins to gently tell T'Oub that she has gotten one of the pieces wrong. But something in T'Oubs tone of voice stops her. T'Oub repeats 'Is it right?' and the doc looks over at me and says 'She knows it's wrong - She's testing me, isn't she!' and I say 'yes.' And shook my head. My toddler, 3, had made a deliberate mistake so she could check if the doctor knew her colours and shapes. Me at 3? I'd have been hiding under the table or something.

Sigh.

Where is the terror of elders which is a corner stone of a sane society? Why are my children so confident? Where am I going wrong?

All tips on how I can break my children's spirits gratefully received.

Bus to Bedlam

2011-01-19T21:11:00.004Z

Well, Toddler Oub fell asleep in Montessori after our 60 minute walk yesterday. Another fine parenting result for Domestic Oubliette! And, I noticed, on my walk home these odd, large vehicles that went by periodically.

Oh yes, buses.

Discovered there is one that goes from our estate to the school. Making toddler walk for 60 minutes Vs five minute bus ride. Go me. I like to think a situation through.

So, we hopped aboard the lovely 67 to Lexlip this morning. Cost a euro and Toddler Oub got to talk with the crazies too, just for added value.

Here's a question - why so many nutters on the bus? Or is it just me? (Not is it me who is a nutter - a debatable point - but is it just me who is always on the bus when completely mad people are on it?) Mr Oub - a country boy who never took a bus in his life - pretended to die of shock when I said we took the bus. He claims I think I'm too posh for public transport. And as I always tell him - I'm not too posh to bus!

It's just the crazies I can't take.

For example - I once had a bloke sit down next to me, in the middle of the day, on a full bus, who proceeded to knock one out. Choked his chicken. Slapped his salami. Etc, etc. Sure I was slimmer back then, and took better care of myself all round. But really. I took my revenge by unexpectedly (we weren't at a stop) getting up, to exit our seat while he was mid jerk, forcing him to stand up. Ha, ha, he had to fumble swiftly to conceal perv junior from the general bus populace.

And the list goes on. Thankfully my encounters with sex fiends are outnumbered by attention from more benign loons. But they're nearly as hard to deal with. How do u get away from Mr Rosary Beads Crack Pot Head when there are ten stops till your destination and you've been too well brought up to just change seats? Yes, sod politeness and change seat...Mr RBCP didn't think of your delicate feelings when he started telling you all about his alien abduction moving holy statue experience at the top of his voice. (Everyone is looking.)

But sometimes you can't change seats. Like today on our two bus rides. Having newBaby Oub in the buggy with us, we had to go in the special buggy space. Which it seems is right next to the special cuckoo fruitcake seat. On my own, sure, I could avoid the horror of making eye contact - that international sign to potty tin foil heads that all you've ever wanted was a chat with them - But no one told the toddler on my knee! Toddlers love demented senseless loons! They speaka da same language!

So, she had a great time sharing war stories with the causalities of sanity on our two bus rides, I fixed a grin. I'm just not made with the more vulnerable in our society in mind. (I like to see myself, in fact, as in need of societies protection.)

Thankfully all the walking we've done in the last three days has made me so sore that even trotting out to the bus tomorrow might be put on hold. Darn. T'Oub can stay home and we can play shopping and cooking ad nauseum ( proto-feminist she ain't). Maybe I'll take the car? Sure it's six weeks on Monday...

The nutters will just have to get by without us.

Walk this way

2011-01-18T00:01:00.008Z

So, this c-section is the gift that just keeps on giving... one is not allowed to drive for six weeks after surgery. Apparently lots of people do drive before this deadline, but between my doctor and my insurance company, I'm not going to be one of them. I'm week five. And of course this week I really, really need to be able to get back in the car. Mr Oub has some off-site shenanigans at work, which, ironically happen to be on-site. So, while he has been helpfully working from home for the past eight weeks, now, just short of the finishing line, he's abandoning me for the office.

You could debate whether I really need to get in the car. The Oub boys can walk to school - they may not get there on time, but they'll get there. It's Toddler Oub whose the problem. Montessori is just that bit far. We tried the walk today. Just as an experiment, to see if I could get her to and from school without the need for the car.

It was quite pleasant initially. We had to go over a big bridge over the dual carriage way, which, when you're three and a half, is lots of fun. And then the walk through he village is quite pleasant. It's all old stone walls and trees, a few thatched pubs, that sort of things.

But I made a mistake. I had to alert Toddler Oub to some dog doo doo, so that she wouldn't walk in it. Hmmm. So, for the rest of the journey home all her conversation consisted of was (at the top of her voice) 'Dog Poo!', 'Stinky Poo!' and, when she spotted what she thought a particularly serious offender 'Look mom! Huge Poo!' And remember, I was walking with a toddler - the pace of which equals that of a tranquilized snail. A snail that would be picked last for sports in school. A snail, whom other snails hilariously nickname 'Speedy'.

So, a walk that I could have done I reckoned in about 30 minutes took us 60. Interspersed only with 'poo!' 'stinky poo!' etc... Well, we did have one distraction. We passed the chipper - I guess the village isn't all scenic thatch and stone - and she was drawn to the pictures of the burgers and chips. So, we got 'Burgers!' and 'chips!' for a while. And she tried to break into the chipper too. With lusty yells of 'burger!', 'chips' she threw herself against the door. And quite frankly I was underwhelmed by their security as a) two minutes more and she'd have been in (I'm not kidding) and b) despite her impressive efforts, no alarm went off.

Anyway, I dragged her away from the grease emporium and we trundled on home. We both collapsed through the door, me having probably done more harm to my recovery than if I'd spent five minutes in the car collecting her. She demanded, and was rewarded with, children's tv. (I'm such a shining example of motherhood, with my junk food addicted, tv watching, dog poo obsessed child...)

I think Ill call a taxi tomorrow.

Snoozing at the back of the Bus

2011-01-10T00:25:00.003Z

Howdy all.

Baba Oub is a diva. Demand, demand, demand. No sleep for D'Oub!! How dare I even consider such a concept.

So, I've hopped on the Poetry Bus in a near catatonic state... This pome may be genius or poo, my poor brain is too mushy to work out which.

The option I chose from this weeks task was to write on the topic of revenge...

The Best Revenge

I'm living well, Oh, say it hurts
or have u forgotten me?
I said, I'M LIVING WELL!
please pay attention.
it doesn't count if you
don't care.

look at how much I've got now
and how awfully nice it is.
Does this not make you sorry?
- am I not the biz?
You know you rather hurt me
really quite a lot
I remember it very clearly
(I was the one in blue - you know,
the girl who was really overwrought?)
So take notice of how much I've moved on
of how my life is oh so swell.
The scars are nicely healed now,
look closely, you can hardly tell.

So,let there be no misapprehension,
It would be too much to bear
I'm doing brilliantly without you
I'm just not sure it counts
if you really just don't care.

Ah cool now my tat tats*

2011-01-07T16:30:00.004Z

Ever breastfed in a cemetery?

Well, on a list of things to do before you die, I can tick that one off.

I went for a stroll yesterday with baba. Seeing as I'm not allowed drive for what feels like forever, I needed to leave the house in some capacity otherwise I was likely to go completely mental. Or, more correctly, even more mental than I already am. That's more mental than any one house can contain.

So, though it was bloody freezing, the winter sun was bright. It was quite refreshing going out, being all gloved up and baba wrapped to within an inch of her life.

I decided to walk down to the graveyard - not my usual choice for recreational outings - but it would have been my lovely, and sorely missed friend, Joan's 70th birthday yesterday. She's been gone a year, and she is missed just as much - more even - than when we lost her in November 09. So, I thought I'd pop down and wish her happy birthday.

Of course, once I got down there baba had a hissy fit meltdown - she wanted to be fed. I could tell by the level of her giving out that she wouldn't last the trip home. There was nothing for it but to feed her there.

The only bench I could find was under some trees. The trees, not too surprisingly were populated by birds. Pooping birds. So, I sat there, dodging the excreting blue tits (and, said Mr Oub when I got home, considering the temperature, probably exposing some blue tits - excuse the vulgarity) and fed the baby.

I couldn't decide if this was some very symbolic thing. Nursing a newborn while reading the inscriptions of those departed. A beautiful reflection on the circle of life (cue Elton John wafting through the trees)

Or whether it just highlighted how pointless everything really is.

(Sleep deprivation and cold boobs does not a cheery disposition make.)

But, overall, I think Joan would have been amused at me, dodging poo, getting my baps out and the general ridiculous of it all. And the thought of her laugh and smile was point enough.

*anyone get the title or was I trying too hard?

Back on the Bus

2010-12-27T13:04:00.003Z

Well, seeing as I'm not allowed to drive for six weeks post c-section (see last post!) I have to take the bus. And seeing as in this weather the only bus risking heading out is the Poetry Bus, I guess I need to renew my frequent travel ticket, and hop aboard!

Now, you'll have to forgive my effort this week, it's not exactly high brow, but hey, baby steps...

This weeks task is to write a poem about the worst present you ever received. See the other passengers here...

Gift

The worst present I ever got
was the one that you forgot
what am I, chucked chopped liver?
It's so hard to be a present giver?
So this Christmas it's a lump of coal
and a dark dank curse upon your soul.

Best Christmas Pressie Ever...

2010-12-24T23:08:00.003Z

Introducing, at 11 days old, the lastest D'Oub creation!

Here's Lily!

Oh but my last post was a challenge to fate. It was a chin jutting, in your face, come and have a go if you think you're hard enough challenge that fate couldn't back down from. So there was vomiting, chest infections, sudden onset of the dreaded Obstetric Cholestasis. There was admittance to hospital. Hints of pre-eclampsia as well. Drugs that made me sleep away a weekend - but thank God asleep I couldn't feel the all over relentless confession inducing itch of the Obstetric Cholestasis.

Then, at only 36 weeks preggers, there were the very bad liver bile acid test results and baby's heart beat going mental on the fetal trace. Within the hour, via emergency c-section, my daughter was born. Brief interlude of enjoying the new arrival was cut short by a bad reaction to the whole procedure. My insides said 'urgh, I don't think so.'

Cue vomiting, while clutching pillow to c-section wound. Cue feeling like dying. Mr Oub sleeping on two pushed together chairs by my bedside as I lay there suffering worse night ever. Wasn't allowed pain killers, food, water. I let them give baby a bottle of formula, breaking the tradition of Oub babies never supping on any milk that isn't 'home made'. The doctors spoke of putting probes down my nose, to my guts, to wake 'em up. I didn't care. But, slowly, over 24 hours and dedicated, brilliant care from brilliant midwives, I made a slow recovery. Phew.

They let me home a week ago. I'm in rag order still. But baba is a dream, and it's Christmas Day tomorrow. So, I am happy.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Doctor D'Oub is in the house...

2010-12-01T23:02:00.003Z

So, you know, maybe I should be making that supreme effort and blogging more. In a matter of weeks, when the ~~latest drain on my life force~~ latest wonderful bundle of joy, arrives, I suspect I'll have even less energy to inform you about the minutiae of my mind.

And even though I'm just coming up on 35 weeks preggers, it could be as little as two weeks before this babs 'arrives'.

Y'see, my dodgy liver appears to be acting up. I'm a carrier of a gene for the liver condition Alpha 1 Anti-Trypsin Deficiency. Thankfully, only having the one defective gene I've been spared this awful condition, but, if my liver is under particular strain, like when I'm pregnant, bad things do happen.

The bad things? My dodgy liver causes a pregnancy condition called Obstetric Cholestasis. (I am all about the scrabble 50 point words today...) What does that mean? It means that my entire body itches. And there is no relief. I was diagnosed with this condition when a doctor in the maternity hospital noticed the deep scabbing wounds I had gouged into my legs with my desperate fingernails.

Nice :)

Unfortunately, this isn't the only downside of the condition. It also increases the risk of stillbirth. Even typing that sentence is enough to freak one out. Moving on.

So, what they do is get the baby out at around 37 weeks. Thankfully, as I grow them big and fat, they have usual emerged at that gestation like a five year old with an obesity problem on Jeremy Kyle.

But, hey, this is me, Domestic Oub, even with all this fun, there has to be an extra little complication? Of course. I would hate to disappoint. Over my four pregnancies I've been trying to accumulate the full 'Most Common Pregnancy Complications' collection. Just like baseball cards or novelty teapots...

So, first off we had pre-exclampsia AND Obsetric Cholestasis, Check! Check! Second time around, a little disappointingly only the Obstetric Cholestasis. Check. Third outing I endured Symphysis Pubis Dysfunction (SPD for short). Check!

I reckoned that this time I just had to come down with Gestational Diabetes. I was convinced. It was one of the most common complications and I hadn't had it yet. I have all the risk factors - family history, old age, plumpness. And, without me even having to say a thing, my doc sent me for the test.

I couldn't believe it when it came back negative. So disappointing. Was this going to be a bog standard, run of the mill pregnancy?? Of course I always had the Obstetric Cholestasis to fall back on, but, y'know, been there, done that.

Well, can you imagine my delight when doc announced a number of weeks ago that babs was breech. In fact, not only was s/he breech, but was actually in a transverse lie position - which obviously, this happening to me, is worse than breech. At least a breech baby can get out the 'ladies special place' (I had to call it something for the kids..) but no sideways baby is getting out normally without a copy of Houdini's Great Escapes.

Or a c-section.

Of course there is time for the little rotter to get off his/her peachy downy ass and rotate! But, what with him/her already measuring big (less space to move!), and a potential 37 week deadline (less time to move!) we could be looking at an untimely plucking from me belly.

Check! Hurray, I've collected a full set.

But I have an appointment with my nice doctor on Monday, and hopefully he'll tell me that this little munchkin has done us all a favour and made friends with my pelvis.

Sadly, then I won't get my 'Most Common Pregnancy Complications' commemorative plaque. Drat.

And I am NOT going again.

I really mean it this time.

Honest.

Well, I never...

2010-11-30T23:06:00.003Z

I have 55 minutes to publish a blog post or I will have gone an entire month without having enlightened the world with my wonderful musings for the first time ever!

Am currently too pregnant to function. We're down to mood lighting around here.

Blogging is, like, waaaaaaaaaaay out of my reach right now.

So, for no reason other than to say I didn't miss November entirely, here is a picture of my three year old daughter making a rude hand gesture.

I'll be back, if my brain is ever located again.

Finally, a solution

2010-10-26T19:23:00.006+01:00

Now, I know my children are brilliant.

I know they have an intellectual sophistication rarely seen in beings so young.

For example...

Toddler Oub has mastered the art of Flash Fiction - verbally of course as she likes to write all things using only the letter 'O', which obvioulsy hampers written communication...

Here is an example of her work -

"Spiders scary. Legs!"

Eldest Oub offspring is galloping ahead in the emotional intelligence stakes.

For example...

His latest catchphrase (when speaking to his father) is 'For gods sake do what she wants, she's pregnant!' - I love the boy.

But possibly the most disturbing/impressive is middle Oub child. It turns out he may be a budding economist.

For example...

We're sitting in the car and I'm torturing myself as I usually do listening to talk radio and the blathering on about the DEFICIT and the BUDGET and the LEECHING MULTI-GENERATION LIFE FORCE DESTROYING ECONOMIC HORROR... I like to take these times to educate the kids on basic economic concepts. I was wondering how much really went in. Cause, really, the topic is obviously right up there with X-Factor and Super Mario for things kids are interested in. Also, I have my doubts about my knowledge/sanity/impartiality when it comes to imparting these things.

But it looks like my vitriol might not have been wasted after all. To quote Middle Child after someone on the radio said they were going to raise taxes...

"I don't think they should raise taxes. They should cut them. Then people would have more money. And there would be more jobs. They'd (the gov)be getting less taxes, but there would be more people paying, so it would all add up."

He's 7.

This is impressive as I suspect my grasp on my times table was probably quite ropey aged 7. I can't imagine I was contemplating economic theory quite yet.

This is scary cause if a 7 year old can grasp theories that appear beyond our glorious leaders we're even more fecked then I previously thought. And I wasn't being very optimistic to begin with.

So, here's the plan.

The D'Oub family are going to stage a Coup.

Unleashed, with a bunch of coke and chocolate in their bellies, the kids can better any army - the Irish interpretation of this concept should crumble in moments. Once installed in government buildings, I shall appoint Toddler Oub as Minister for Propaganda. "It's ok! I help!" will be the slogan to lead a nation out of it's darkest hour.

Eldest Oub child will take responsibility for Health, Education and Social Welfare - he won't be able to actually help anyone, he'll just make everyone feel better with his wide-eyed, misplaced optimism and line in awful knock knock jokes.

And of course Middle Child will be appointed Our Glorious Leader with complete power to do whatever he feels necessary to steer us out of this hideous quagmire of debt and deficit and depression.

And really, will they be any worse than the muppets in there at the moment?

ALL HAIL OUR GLORIOUS SAVIOURS OUB OFFSPRING!!

Baptisms, Wee and Other Stories.

2010-10-17T21:09:00.002+01:00

I've not been posting much.

Too busy. Some good stuff - seeing lots of lovely friends. Some boring stuff - domestic frenetic treadmill. (Roll on the mid-term break)

But today was fun. We had a Christening. Not for us you understand, bump is still firmly in situ and enjoying his/her state of grace. Nope, was baptism of chums baby. I got to be Godmother! Yay!

Now, saying he is a baby is a bit of a stretch. Due to unforeseen circumstances, my chums weren't in a position to get the little guy christened until now, and he's a strapping toddler. I was quite looking forward to seeing how the whole show would go when the object of the exercises wasn't a compliant and oblivious new born.

It didn't disappoint.

With appropriate suspicion, the child eyed up the priests approach with the chrism oil. He looked suitably surprised to have it dabbed on him. But the real fun came when the old water poury bit took place. The priest managed to get water in his eyes. Who here has gotten water in a toddlers eye? What happens? Yes, toddlers go mental. So, child basically wailed for the entirety of the rest of the ceremony and flinched each time Fr came anywhere near him. (Again, some would say and entirely understandable response :)

I spend most of the time trying to remember what my responsibilities were. And hope that no one could see my knickers through my very see through linen trousers. I know that wearing see through trousers to a church ceremony is just asking for trouble, but hey, when you're six months plus pregnant you don't always have alot of choices. And maybe it distracted people from the wailing toddler.

And speaking of toddlers - Toddler Oub out did herself. Obviously unhappy not to be the centre of attention she wet herself a few pews back. Lol! It's funny y'see, cause me being Godmother meant Mr Oub was left to deal with the whole piddle puddle horror all by himself. Of course, I'm not laughing at darling Mr Oub, but it is nice sometime not to be the one who is at the epic-epi-centre of one's children's marauding terror.

But I was a bit distracted knowing there was a wee on the loose behind me somewhere. One doesn't want to let down ones friends by having their christening remembered as the Pee Christening. Thankfully though no one managed to put their handbag into the mess and there was an Aldi straight across the road from the church and Mr Oub manfully managed to nab a few supplies to rectify the whole sorry mess.

And as he said, at least she didn't poo herself.

We must look for the silver lining in all our travails.

So lovely post ceremony party at friends house, Toddler Oub managed to redeem herself by charming everyone with how she cheats at 'Rock, Paper, Scissors'.

Kids were also fed, which saved me a job.

Then home again.

X-factor.

Tea.

Cake.

Sigh.

Bed.

Night night all.

Poetry Bus Happiness

2010-10-04T13:07:00.003+01:00

Okie dokie.

Poor D'Oub has been under the weather a bit the last three or four days. I took to my bed. I reckon it's no coincidence that my illness coincided with 'Black Thursday' last week. My health appears to be inextricably linked to the financial health of the nation. I have a rallied a little by today - though the ripples from the child benefit withdrawal in the UK threatened a fiscal relapse on my part this morning. I'm being stoic. So, worried that I may risk further deterioration to my precarious health, I have decided not to stretch myself and compose a new poem for the poetry bus. The mental energy needed might just be my tipping point. But, here is one what I wrote only a few weeks ago. Needs a little work. It's not quite about happiness - more soppy mushiness - but it makes me happy, so there we go...

Ruby

You are no energy saving light bulb
But a proud old-fashioned kind.
You light up instantly,
no lukewarm waiting.

Your grin feeds a grid
enough to power a nation
Careless, wanton excess!

Melting hearts as fast as
polar icecaps
Our lives flooded, overcome by you.
Only 3 years old, but already
more powerful than the sun.

The D'Oub -Team!

2010-09-29T12:09:00.003+01:00

Ten years ago a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit. These kids promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Lucan underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire...

The D'Oub -Team!

Bus time!

2010-09-27T17:26:00.008+01:00

Look, the Poetry Bus is going to be a five o'clock on a Monday thing for me - I'm just not organised enough to be at the stop on a Sunday.

Okay, now that we've got that clear, here's this weeks challenge. Set by the talented Ms Rachel Fox we were asked to write about a childhood tv/book/comic character. I chose my beloved Mr Benn. And as if by magic the poem appeared...

Should Have Known, You Lived on Festive Road

Oh, Mr Benn!
My favourite among men,
when I was five years old.
I thought you were delish
Despite the fancy dress fetish
And the fact that you were
probably gay.

Complains, strains and automobiles

2010-09-23T09:58:00.005+01:00

Oh so busy.

Summer amnesia made us all forget that come September our lives would be turned upside down. I realise now that I should have been making like a marathon runner and training all summer just so I would be able for the pace once school started up again. (Or at the very least put some heavy investment into a decent selection of amphetamines.)

Gluttons for punishment we have added Cub scouts, Beaver Scouts, Junior Book club, Montessori (for Toddler Oub), and possible cricket to our list of activities. This joins swimming, running and music lessons on our schedule. Feck, I'm exhausted just reading that.

We did drop tennis though. (Didn't think they were going to make my fortune anytime soon with a tennis racket. Potential future earnings are my main criteria for the sports my children are signed up for.)

We're living the suburban middle-class dream. All I need is a cigarette, a pointy bra and a cheating husband and I'd be perfect for the cast of Mad Men.

So, what else is new?

We're getting a new car.

I say 'new' but obviously what with spoiling our offspring with the wealth of activities they do (and will no doubt look back on and resent us for - not enough alone time? exhaustion? burn out at aged 11?) we cannot afford a new car. Nor can we actually afford a good second hand car.

But, seeing as our current lemon has let me down again repeatedly this week (when one has to rely on a neighbour one barely knows to ferry one about the neighbourhood collecting children -my own, you understand, not just unfortunate children who happen to be loitering...) you know it's time to call it a day.

So, we've found a suspiciously cheap six-seater being sold by some dodgy looking bloke. My kind of deal. It arrives on Saturday. It's big enough to accommodate the new arrival when s/he arrives at Chrimbo. I think I'll be delighted if this car is still actually running by then.

Sigh. I best go. I guess I should have a look the speech therapy homework the therapist gave parents last week. Eldest child is doing group sessions for his stammer. Typically though the Oub child is the square peg. A huge part of the therapy is dealing with the child's stress/anxiety to do with the stammering and the vicious circle of stress/stuttering. What does my child answer to the questionnaire they gave them? Question One - How do you feel about your stammer? - Oub child answer - 'I don't care.' Question Two - Does it upset you? Oub child answer - 'See Above'. (he actually wrote, 'see above.' cheeky get...)

Sigh. We'll get there eventually I imagine...

I'm so tired.

I think I'll go back to bed.

Bye

(ps this post was written under extremely trying circumstances. I was made get up and dance by a semi-naked toddler to stoopid primary coloured creatures on children's tv, then she transformed into the Oubasaurus and attempted repeatedly to bite off my nose, and finally settled upon her dog impression where she kept licking my face. It's a tough life. So, if there are any typos, you understand...)

Memes and other fun stuff

2010-09-11T18:14:00.003+01:00

Oh today was such a domestic, excitment-free day. A day that makes single, childless people look and point and laugh in ones direction.

Do you want to know what we did?

Try and stay awake.

1) We had to buy a new tumble dryer. The old one, for some reason decided after being run every day for the past ten years, to suddenly give up. Wimp. And seeing as Ireland has reverted to type, and is raining like the end of days at the moment, (and I have three children so inclined to dirt that it surprises me that social services haven't been round) a dryer is a necessity.

2) I bought a couple a new beakers for Toddler Oub.

3) A new kitchen timer was purchased.

4) We did the grocery shopping. Lidl for the bulk of things, Aldi for all the posh stuff. Tescos is like Harrods to us.

Really, I know, you would love to be swapping lives with me right now.

The highlight of the day though was that I paid a quick visit to TK Maxx. In the craft section I found a four pack of American Craft Thickers for 8.99! Of course, 99.9% of you now are going 'huh?!' But there is that .1% of ye who are going, 'What, a four pack of American Craft Thickers for only 8.99!! You jammy bastard.'

All this was done today with a poor sick Toddler Oub in tow. She woke up last night barking like a circus seal. My mammy sense tingled and I diagnosed a case of the croup. Poor baby. But really, nearly as embarrassing as the wimpy tumble dryer. You expect your kids to pick up more colds etc once they start preschool - but really, she's only been there a week - and for three days of that there were no other children!

But, just so the day won't be a complete waste, I'm going to accept the meme challenge laid down on Titus' blog.

Eight questions to be answered...

1. Why did you start blogging?

Probably as a way of avoiding all the things I should be doing. But I think I felt driven to start blogging by various female newspaper journalist who write regular columns on domestic life. I felt I could do better. Hmmm. Lets just say, two years on the paper editors have yet to sack those writers, and I'm still languishing, unappreciated, in my damp oubliette.

2. If you could travel anywhere in the world with no restriction of costs, where would it be and why?

Can I answer 'Everywhere'? I love to travel, and I find it hard to pick one place over anywhere else. All I ask is that I travel in complete luxury, nothing less than first class and five stars.

3. Did you have a teacher in school that had a great influence on your life? If so, what?

My mother said that if she went to one more parent/teacher meeting where she was told I was 'very quiet' she'd tear her hair out. So, Mrs Quinlan my history teacher gets the nod here, as she was probably the only teacher who could have picked me out of a line up. That said, her name wasn't Mrs Quinlan, I actually can't remember what it was, so in a way, the tables have been turned, and they're all an anonymous irrelevance to me now...

4. If you could spend the day with a famous person, who would it be, and what would you do?

Easy. It would be Eric Cantona. And what would I do? I'd try to snog him. The whole day.

5. Toilet paper – over or under?

This question caused a little uncomfortable confusion over on Titus' blog when she posted it. To answer it clearly, I am a firm believer that OVER is the only way. The true and right path. Toilet roll must be hung, with the sheets hanging over. Anything else offends the natural order of things.

6. Name one thing in your life that you would do over if possible.

I'd actually value my size ten figure and try and hold onto it with a drowning man's desperate clawing, grasping, frantic, manic, crazed, rabid, demented, grappling determination.

7. Tell about your pets – if any.

No pets. Allergic children. Bah.

8. Do you live in a small town or a large town.

We live in a delightful suburb of the largest city in the country! Yes. We're number one! We're number one! In your face Cork!

Now, there you go. Well, to finish my over exciting day I'm off to watch X-Factor and convince Mr Oub to put the kids to bed. Sigh, domestic bliss.

Lessons

2010-09-08T20:17:00.003+01:00

OMG

You know how I said I was exhausted last post?

Well, double that and put a hat on it.

Toddler Oub has started playschool.

Well, except that in a way she hasn't.

Explanation?

Well, she was signed up for a nice little pre-school. Middle Oub child had gone there during his psychotic stage and everyone emerged unscathed (relatively speaking) so we quite like them. So we showed up on Monday. She would have empathised with Patrick Kavanagh's words...

"Oh, Alexander Selkirk knew the plight
Of being king and government and nation.
A road, a mile of kingdom, I am king
Of banks and stones and every blooming thing. "

ie - she was on her tod. Only little monster there.

It was always going to be a small class. Good news. But in a perfect toddler storm, each of her prospective class mate had withdrawn from the class for one perfectly reasonable reason or other.

Sigh.

What do you say to the embarrassed child care workers whom you've know for quite a few years?

Not much. You leave your child there and stomp off in a bad, bad mood.

Could this situation get any worse?

Of course it could!

When I returned the required two and a half hours later - the preschool manager had appeared. No special reason, just it was time for her to show her face. But, of course, this being my life, it was a new manager. A woman who I knew. A woman with whom I had a big problem and hadn't seen in about a year. Perfect.

So, what did I do?

Well, in true Irish style, we both pretended to be delighted to see each other and pretend we hadn't parted on difficult terms! Hurray for denial!

She muttered a few things about the missing classmates, muttered a few things about how she was sure they'd pick up a new one or two soon.

All the while my little darling ran around like a mad thing, obviously delighted to have made out like a posh rich child with their own private tutor, and private classroom, and all the toys in the known universe. Any surprise she had a blast??

So what to do?

Its a toughie.

Well. We brought her for the past three days. I'm not one to make snap decisions.

She's starting somewhere new tomorrow.

What D'Oub Did Next

2010-09-05T19:39:00.007+01:00

D'Oub tired. D'Oub exhausted.

D'Oub is in a near coma.

I doubt there will be a poetry bus contribution this week.

Why so shattered?

Exhibit A

Electric Picnic

I was lucky enough to join my Poetry Diva sisters performing at Electric Picnic on Friday evening. We recited, and forever changed the face of modern poetry with our collective brilliance.

This is the tent we performed in - but that's not actually us. Unless five of us turned into one chick and a bloke with a guitar - that said, our poetry was so brilliant that we may have bent reality and altered the universe for a period.

Two blurry Divas

So, Saturday consisted of nothing much - apart from me going 'meep' alot and heading back to bed. The Picnic was just too much. When I bring my vision to the people, it takes me some time to regather my emotional energies.

Exhibit B

Allotmenting

The poor Allotment hasn't been getting the attention it should - not due to lack of enthusiasm, more life getting in the bloody way. So, today was a big, drizzly, shout at the reluctant kids, fecking weeding, 'dammit are those rat bites on the courgettes?', duty day at the allotment.

The 'Lottie' about a week ago when the weeds had only conquered 95% of the known universe. It's a deceptive picture, as things don't look too bad. But don't be fooled. The weeds had donned their camouflage gear when they saw the camera come out. Bastards.

No picture of the place today, as we were too busy in hand to hand combat with the weeds. But thankfully we did actually get to harvest stuff! Potatoes! Mystery gourds! Puny garlic! Burly mange touts! Gnawed courgettes! A true bounty...

We then released the child slaves, and they ran wild. Feral chidren.

Exhibit C

D'Oub on the Radio!

I was also on the radio AGAIN today! Back, Back, BACK! By popular demand, poor old Various Cushions succumbed to the mass mailings and Internet campaign to feature moi once again. It's tough being this popular - exhausting even! - but hopefully I didn't let my many, many, many fans (hi mum!) down today with my oh so witty show. I am sure, if you were being held hostage today, shackled in an attic, gagged and sedated (the only reason you'd have missed the show of course) Ms Cushions will have it pod casted HERE real soon...

Exhibit D

D'Oub Shows She has No Sense At All...

So, reason four D'Oub is so tired these days and shouldn't really be be gallivanting to music festivals, and radio shows and vegetable allotments...

Well, D'Oub decided there just wasn't enough D'Oubiness to go round, so being the creative sort, she roped in Mr D'Oub (tmi) and as if the world wasn't over populated enough, is in the process of cooking another little D'Oub junior. God help us all.

There endeth the post.

Jeez, and now I feel even more tired.

Goodnight!!!

Late Bus

2010-08-24T19:50:00.002+01:00

A bit late for the bus this week - thought I'd be walking really, I'm so late. But, you know, sometimes you just have to push yourself, run to catch up and take that leap aboard.

This week the bus is been driven by Chiccoreal and the task is to write a poem on the first thing you think or do in the morning. Here's my effort...

Morning

Lying, duvet still my first skin
I contemplate the wardrobe at the
bottom of my bed.
He pollutes my bedroom view
monolithic oak-esque slab
gigantic gormless
looming formless eyesore
A brick shithouse bouncer
Big and basic
guarding tops and trousers
bought for comfort not
for comment.
There's something Soviet
in its ugly utilitarian
mournfulness
and in the last fake night of
curtains and blinds
it reminds me of all that's
futile
and night's febrile thoughts
linger longer
joining me in my
contemplation of our silent lodger
and his stoic silence.
As the chaos clatters from downstairs
I stay still staring at
my morose clothes companion
children fighting, watching tv
in pyjamas with school bells
five minutes soon.
husband long gone or rattle
battling instant coffee into
travel mug, ignoring the
skiving offspring
and still me and my wardrobe
compete our silent duel
who'll blink first.

Must I?

2010-08-13T20:16:00.004+01:00

Haven't posted in a week.

Gah!

Surely I must have something to say?

Er.

Mr Oub's been in Bratislava all week. Had the temerity to text me, telling me that he was all hung over on Thursday. What's that honey, you're feeling a little off as you had too good a time out boozing with your co-workers? I'll get to some sympathy after I finish cleaning the house, minding your children and generally been exhausted from doing everything on my own!

Not bitter, no.

That said, I did have to rummage around a little for my indignation.

Why? 'Cause I am very lazy.

I get quite cross when I have to do more than the bare minimum. Like, with Mr Oub away, the laundry has been quite piling up. And the bin? Needs emptying. And sundry other trifles that would just require that little bit too much for Queen Oub.

I'd much rather sit on my arse.

Would you believe I had to put the kids to bed every night! On my own. Well. Okay, I put Toddler Oub to bed, but the lads Oub were sent by themselves - and sure, so what if I did a deal with them where they were allowed extra time on the WII in return for me not having to read them a story? Is that so bad?

I think I could give Katie Price and Kerry Katona a run for their money in the model mother stakes.

Anyway, Mr Oub will return any minute now, we wait impatiently, and normal service will return.

Hurray! Sofa - you and me got a hot date.

Shallow Pool

2010-08-05T16:55:00.003+01:00

Some of you will remember my previous post where I pondered the worrying similarity between myself and my grandmother. Well, scarier still, it appears that my son and my father are twins, separated by some Quantum Leap stylee temporal rift...

It makes me cross! Why do I go to the bother of introducing new genes to the Oubliette pool, go through nine horrible months of pregnancy - and then don't get me started on the labour - all just to produce a carbon copy of one of us already! I thought we were all God's precious little snowflakes.

Ah, but they are cuties, aren't they :o)

Hop on the Bus, Gus

2010-07-26T10:00:00.004+01:00

It's Monday. Oubliette harmony has been restored as our wandering other half has returned from his epic Odyssey in the US.

We have a poem for the Poetry Bus. This weeks theme - as decided by La Niamh - is 'Confusion'. Quite frankly this left me with a multitude of options. A rich, rich seam in the Oubliesphere.

Just take yesterday for example.

We all trooped into town for a bit of brunch to celebrate himself coming home. We chose a lovely little pancake/crepe place on Dawson street for our eats. As Mr Oub was up ordering, a nice old man asked me if he could sit at our table. Part of my poor little brain whispered to me that this nice old man was in fact a world famous poet, but sadly, the dominant, confused part of my brain won out and I told him to take a hike.

When Mr Oub returned to the table he exclaimed 'Hey, did you see world famous poet Brenden Kennelly?'

Sigh.

Y'know, there had been enough room at the table. He could have sat down. I could have had a fascinating conversation with the man and learnt so much. Instead I sent him packing. He had to sit at a table outside. It was kinda cold in Dublin yesterday. Had I mentioned he was old. And a famous poet?

As I said, there are so many, many areas in my life that I could have looked to for inspiration for this weeks task.

This is what I came up with.

Cartographical Confusion

It's a complete cliche
but I can't find my way
when presented with a map.
I'm completely crap,
trapped in a car,
with it's folded layers upon my lap.
They may as well be scribbles,
those infernal inky dribbles
My ordinance arse!
My little lost elbow!
I just can't follow
we're not happy bedfellows
Just where in the hell is
feckin' Portobello?!
I'll take a wild guess
No, get me a GPS
then there's some hope
of me striving
arriving
at
the
correct,
designated,
confounded,
address.

.

Poo Much Information

2010-07-24T18:05:00.006+01:00

Mr Oub arrives home tomorrow morning. Plane lands at 8am. While he has only actually been away for 8 days - somehow it feels like an eternity. It's sorta like that Star Trek episode where Captain Picard was rendered unconscious by some odd space probe. After which we see him live a whole lifetime on a distant planet - and then he wakes up just 25 minutes later back on the bridge of the Starship Enterprise. I feel like that. I'm just hoping I can wake up any minute now. And if Patrick Stewart happens to be there when I do, all the better.

It's been a tough week.

The kids went mental.

Toddler Oub was especially creative. In fact she really pulled out all the stops last night.

I heard a little voice calling me at around 9.30 last night. I went up to investigate.

Hands up who remembers the dirty protests in the Maze prison during the 1970's? Well, obviously Cbeebees has been putting on some gritty documentaries between Peppa Pig and Dora the Explorer as toddler Oub seemed shockingly well versed on the poo smeared across walls, floors and doors concept (as originated by those smelly IRA inmates...)

Sweet Baby Jesus in his heaven above, how can one child, so small, produce so much poo?? It was EVERYWHERE! If there ever was a time I wanted a space probe to descend and render me unconscious, last night was it.

I grabbed the boys, hot water, anti-bac spray, clothes pegs. We scrubbed poo off the walls. Off the carpet. Off the baby gate. And 45 minutes, and I am not kidding, 45 long, smelly, stinking, germ infested minutes later we finished. Well - we thought we'd finished decontaminating the area when, like Glenn Close leping from the bath, knife in hand, the door swung closed and there, we were confronted by even more poo art. There were tears.

I know, I know. TMI. But hey, it's meant to be healthy to talk when one is traumatised.

Anyway, I will wash, but never be clean again after that experience. I took a photo to guilt trip the hubby when he gets home, and eldest Oub child wrote a written account of events (to be saved until Toddler Oub brings her first boyfriend home.) 7 year old middle child took advantage of the situation to show off his superior vocabulary and declared the entire incident 'ludicrous'.

But, enough.

It's over now. We've Fabrezed everywhere and the windows are all open.

You just might not to visit my house for a few weeks.

Loveless Funny Bus

2010-07-19T16:36:00.004+01:00

Well, it's Monday and that means it Poetry Bus day. A highlight of my week :)

Mr Oub is off in the USA on business - poor him. meh. - and I've been left minding ~~the animals~~ my darling children. I will survive, but I imagine I will be a pale shadow of my former self by the time he returns.

Because of these tremendously trying circumstances, I wasn't sure I would have time to hop on the bus this week. But at the last moment the screaming hordes shut up for five minutes and I was able to convene an emergency meeting with the muse and produce a little offering.

It is Argent who is driving the bus again this week. The task was -

Excursion to the Comedy Store
Now we all know comedy is not easy to do, but I know from past experience that there are some seriously (sic!) funny people out there. Dust off your tickling sticks, put that water-squirting flower in your lapel, strap on your handshake buzzer and let's make with the funny!

Tunnel of (unrequited) Love
We had the slushy Valentine's stuff earlier this year, but it's not always easy to love and not be loved in return. What's it like when that certain special somebody doesn't even know you exist (it's called stalking - Ed). Are they with someone else? Are you jealous? Come and share the bittersweetness with your bus-travelling friends.

I am hoping that I have managed to go on both Poetry Bus journeys this week.

My Unrequited Lover

My love was unrequited.
You just didn't feel the same
But the kisses still got you excited
my conflicted former flame.

Lama Dilemma

2010-07-17T23:28:00.005+01:00

So, I'm watching this documentary on BBC4 on Thursday night called 'The Unmistaken Child'.

Fascinating. It's filmed on the Tibetan - Nepalese border and follows the four year search of a monk called Tenzin Zopa as he trudges the highways and byways searching for the reincarnation of his master Geshe lama Konchog. He enters villages and enquires are to whether there are any young boys aged roughly 12 to 18 months living there. Then he hands out sweets and balloons to any passing child. Swop the red and yellow robes with a black suit and a dog collar and I'd have been getting quite uncomfortable at that stage... but no, this monk's devoted search for his former spiritual master was riveting in its quiet spirituality.

So, eventually, he comes across this mucky chubby little chap. The child takes a fancy to a string of beads that had belonged to the departed lama. This apparently is the first sign that monk Tenzin might have found his guy.

To cut a long story short, they put the toddler through various tests and with the Dalai Lamas blessing, pronounced him to officially be the reincarnation of Geshe lama Konchog. Then, they take him away from his mammy and his daddy and everyone and everywhere he knows. He cried. His mammy cried. This viewer very nearly did too.

The documentary ends at about that point, stressing the fact that he'd settled into the monastery really well and was a happy little chappie.

Feeling the need to learn a little more about all of this, I did a little googling. Which brought me to what I felt was the most interesting bit of all. The reincarnated child has the exact same birthday as my middle son. In fact he was born only 12 hours before him.

Impostor!

So, how come Tenzin Zopa never passed my door, dangling beads and looking meaningfully into my baby's eyes? How was he to know that his old master decided to come back only up the road in Tibet? How about bloody miles away in Holy Lucan, Co. Dublin? My boy would make a great lama! Shave his head, pop him in his robes, sure we'd have Richard Gere and (insert other famous Buddhists name here) round in a flash.

In fact, my child is quite the philosopher.

A deep thinker.

He has his own set of catchphrases (including the unforgettable 'I'm dead' and 'Wah' ) invaluable tools when your line of work causes you to deal with karma, reincarnation and all that other buddisty stuff...

The Real Deal

I think he'd look good with a shaved head.

Yellow is his colour (I'm sure the red would suit him fine too.)

So, Zopa, methinks you got it wrong. Send that impostor back to his village and his mammy before it's too late. I'll be waiting. And so will Lama Charlie.

Bus!!!!

2010-07-12T12:53:00.003+01:00

With my older children dispatched with undue haste to bother their grandparents in the past, sorry, the West, of Ireland, I am free to settle down to write my Poetry Bus effort. I missed last weeks challenge much to my annoyance, so this weeks is a combination. It is about a person, as prompted by Weaver last week, and transcribed upon an object as per Dominic this week - Well, I suspect the remaining child in my care would not appreciate being referred to as an object. And to be honest, when social services find out I've been writing poetry on my toddler, she may not be in my care for much longer...

The picture isn't great, so here is what it says....

Ruby

My pudgy angel,
My red rubric cherubic rhyme
Let the sun shine -
Compete with my love for you
It pales.

Weak

2010-07-04T21:35:00.002+01:00

Busy week.

Kids finished school for the summer. Took them about two minutes to start fighting. Gah. When's September??

At least they had good school reports. In summary, apparently they are both very clever, but have trouble tolerating their mere mortal class mates. Oh well, so what - another pair of computer geeks with poor social skills join the heaving masses, will anyone notice? Doubt it.

Baby Oubliette - whom is going to have to be rechristened Toddler Oubliette real soon as the girl is very nearly three - has this week decided she is a Lion, (or Tiger, she hasn't specified.) It involves her crawling around, meowing, and just when you least expect it, she launches herself at you, as if you are a cowering ickle gazelle. Adding a slightly surreal touch she yells her name mid-pounce, rather than a more accurate roar.

Quite a normal family.

What else happened to us?

Hmmm. A bloke called to the door and offered us two years free tv if we let them dig up the garden. Considering the state of the garden, I wouldn't have cared if he wanted to do it for free... (apparently they're upgrading the network in our area..) It's quite nice to get something for free, this never happens to me.

It happens to Mr Oubliette all the time though. We're getting a free dinner in the new Wagamama's restaurant that is opening up near us soon. Hurrah! Mr Oub, the luckiest man alive wins every draw he ever enters, hence this latest win. I can't wait. The Oub family love Wagamama's. The kids are huge Asian food fans. Gyoza, sushi, edamami, they love the lot of it. Of course the free dinner is just for two, so we're going to have to lie to them. Oh well, no change there then.

Lastly on the exciting week that was with us, I was summoned to the garden, 10.30pm, think it was Thursday, to watch the International Space Station pass overhead. It was actually rather impressive to see it zoom by. And this is high praise from me. I am underwhelmed by space travel. While I understand peoples fascination with it, I can't help trotting out the 'can't we feed all the starving babies in the world first before we go to the moon.' This drives Mr Oub mad. He doesn't care about the starving babies - he's mean like that - he just wants to be an astronaut and bounce about the place up there. (He claims the science used in space stuff is helping man kind, but I dunno, can a starving baby eat a bit of satellite? I think not...)

But enough.

The rest of the week was kids fighting, allotment weeding, and melting in the heat.

This hasn't really been the most exciting post. But as I said a few posts ago, I am just going to write and if it's as dull as I suspect this post has been, then, so be it. Hopefully I will find the magic again. It is out there, I know it!

Anyway, I'm off to try and write a poem for the Poetry Bus tomorrow.

All aboard...

2010-06-28T17:21:00.005+01:00

So, lost in the wilderness as I was, I have been plodding on foot for a while now and not stopping at the Poetry Bus stop.

But, in the spirit of quantity over quality that I have now embraced, I am striding purposefully to the side of the road, I am thrusting my hand out and demanding the bus screech to a halt and let me climb aboard.

I can't claim it's any good, but hey, at least I'm trying :)

This weeks task - set by Don't Feed the Pixies :

"As you may remember I set you all the task of rehabilitating road (or any other) signs that were just lounging about doing nothing. You could either:

1) Follow the sign and write something you saw at the other end
2) Merely imagine what might be at the other end and write about that
3) Find a new use for the word on the sign to explain something that currently has no word"

I decided to run with option one - except for the fact that the sign I had in mind is too far away for me to go and follow just now. We see it every time we head west to the in-laws - it's an ambition of mine to actually visit this town...

I give you...

Bumlin

Oh, tittering townland of Bumlin!
Co. Roscommon's hidden gem.
We snicker like naughty schoolboys
at the Wildean wit of it all.
A moniker of the posterior
How funny!
(How dull our little lives are)
One day I hope to stop, pay a visit
instead of passing, laughing, in the car.

And in other news...

2010-06-26T01:36:00.002+01:00

Hmm.

Still here.

Just with very little to say.

No change really there from the last five squillion blog posts of mine then.

So, why the silence?

No, I haven't fallen over again recently.

I have complete creative block. Not just the writers kind. There is nothing creative at all emanating from the Domestic Oub direction.

No doodles while I'm on the phone.

No tra-la-las in the shower.

No post modern existentialist mime while waiting for the bus.

What to do?

I tried being patient. I tried enticing the muse with a trail of jelly tots and a box propped on a stick.

No joy.

So, quite frankly, the plan now is to force it.

Hence this post.

I have nothing to say worth reading, but gosh darn it, I'm going to post this anyway.

Wish me luck.

Oh, don't worry, sure, no, I'm fine...

2010-05-26T10:56:00.011+01:00

Well, I want to say thank you to Dead Acorn.

The only one who began to wonder where I was.

I could have been the all-you-can eat buffet for kitty and not one of you would have noticed? What is the point of having a blog if the world isn't hanging on ones every word? I really thought I was so utterly important that my unexplained absence might have caused at least a few ripples. Were you not all utterly BEREFT without my witty and philosophical musings?? Oh woe is me.

We give out when our American cousins do their whole moral world police thing, but hey, who was looking out for me? Who asked where I was? Yes, the Yank!

I am utterly wounded.

Crying into my keyboard.

Okay, okay, so some of you would have known I was away in sunny Spain for a little break.

Hmmm, and maybe a few of you were aware when I got back that I was a little under the weather and not up to much, esp blogging.

And yes, a handful of ye would have been communicating with me via email and therefore would have been aware that I wasn't in fact dead.

But still!

Ahem.

So, Dead Acorn, next time I'm off out of town, I'm FedExing you my spare key, contact numbers etc. I'm sure you won't mind popping round to water the plants etc. You seem a reliable sort. I'm going to also put you down as my In Case of Emergency number, and if I have to make any unscheduled hospital stops, I hope you're ok with it if I put you down as my Next of Kin? I just like the cut of your jib...

Okay, so festering bitterness aside, what else has been happening in the wonderful world of Oub?

Well, I fell over again.

I mean really... We all remember the epic falling into a hedge of a few weeks ago. Well yesterday I didn't even have the comfort of a soft hedgy landing. There I was, having picked the kids up from school, pottering back to the car. The pavement was only slightly uneven. My ankle decided to get all attention seeking and went out from under me. I want down quicker than a cheap whore with a pressing drug problem.

Of course there was a traffic jam right beside me, watching as I provided such delightful prat fall inflight entertainment. Sigh. It was made all the worse by the fact that I was holding Baby Oubliettes hand at the time of tumble and managed to bring her down with me. How thoughtful of me. Oh, it was all in slow mo. I tried painfully to get to my feet, while beside me baby, flat out, cried in the gravel. Mother of the Year, I'm a shoo in.

Thankfully, Baby Oubliette was swapped in the maternity ward with a bionic facsimile. She has the reflexes of a cyborg. Despite falling over with the regularity of most toddlers, she never hits her head. It's a marvel to behold. No matter what speed, surface, obstacle, when she falls, her little arms, and impressive neck muscles always prevent her head making bloody damaging contact with any surface. And if you knew how big the Oubliette heads are you'd be doubly impressed. I once actually witnessed her falling backwards off a kitchen chair, ending up flat on her back on the hard tiled floor - but still she managed to keep her head from crushing contact. She's my hero.

But this doesn't actually stop her from crying. Fair enough.

So, I'm getting to my feet, taking in the rips in my trousers and the blood oozing from my arthritic knees... I'm gradually managing to get to the baby and check her circuits are still functioning. And what happens? Eldest Oubliette child saunters past me.

Middle child had already run, wild and carefree to the car - which was a down the road, round the corner and parked behind the butchers.

But eldest child had been behind me when I decided to become closer acquainted with the pavement. And then he was along side me. And then he was past me. Did he cast a glance in my direction? Say 'Mother dearest, you appear to have taken a little tumble, let me help you up.' Did he even point and laugh at his prostrate and mortified mammy?

Nope! Nothing!

He actually didn't notice. Despite the fact that my hitting the ground may have cause a small earthquake and a bit of a tsunami in the nearby weir. The fact that I threw up a dust cloud nearly as bad as Mount EEellfgjghytjdsjurutuy. Flights were cancelled in nearby Weston airport for at least an hour after my fall.

Nope! Nothing!

Of course, I can't really blame him. He's inherited this virulent obliviousness from his father. His father who famously slept through his childhood home going on fire and the arrival of a fire engine to his house etc...

But, after all this drama, you'll be glad to hear I made it home okay in the end. A few self pitying emails to hubby later and I felt a little better. I now have the scabby knees of a five year old, and one useless pair of shredded trousers. But I am alive. Not seriously injured.

Not that you lot would care.

Unique?

2010-04-29T17:18:00.008+01:00

I like to think of myself as a unique little snowflake, like no other.

''Of course you are', cry all. (And 'Thank God', they mutter too.)

But I noticed, when reviewing the photos I took up at the allotment the other day that one in particular reminded me of someone...

aaaaaaaaaaNana OubaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaOub

Really, it's just me with better hair.

It makes me come over all Calvinistic (and I'm talking the religion here, not the And Hobbes variety...) Is my life under my control? Do I have free will? Or am I just a genetic copy destined to trot along a predestined path??

My Nana had two boys and a girl.

Check.

She was prone to a bit of the pudge.

Check.

She was by all accounts a bit barmy.

Check.

Noticing a pattern?

Disturbing!

Then again, my maternal grandfather was a vegetable growing writer. So maybe I'm fixating on the wrong grandparent.

And thankfully I don't have his bald spot. (Just yet at least.)

Poetry Bus Haiku - Sorry TFE

2010-04-26T17:24:00.002+01:00

We were tasked with writing about either loneliness, or family skeletons for this weeks Poetry Bus ride. I went with the family fun. I've kept it brief, gone with the haiku - apologies to our honoured progenitor whom we all know detests this over used form. Sorry dude.

Family Skeleton Haiku

I get quite worried
that it will be me who they
never talk about.

Hedge 1 - Oub 0

2010-04-25T19:36:00.012+01:00

I fell with great force into a hedge yesterday.

Think the bastard child of 'You've Been Framed' and 'Jackass'. I missed my footing, tumbled in mortifying slow motion, life flashing before my eyes, into the aforementioned hedge. This hedge surrounds the entrance to an expensive and lifestylee Garden Centre, so loads of beautifully turned out ladies-who-lunch looked on in horror as I cannonballed into the shrubbery.

You'd be surprised at the amount of damage you can do, landing in a hedge. I am black and blue, head to foot. And that's just my dignity. Morto. And I can tell you, it's bloody difficult to carry off a 'I, like, so meant to do that' walk of shame when your foot is throbbing and your shoulder is aching. And you find out later that you have half the foliage in your hair. (Kind husband picked it out.)

Though, all things considered, as the eldest Oubliette child said, 'At least the hedge was there...'

So, what do you do the day after you've suffered such a devastating injury? Yes, go up to your allotment and do four continuous hours hard labour. I am a stranger to good sense. But you see, we are taking a little trip abroad very soon, a bit of sun and rest, volcanic ash permitting, and I must leave my beloved plot in good condition.

The sun shone! Hurray!

Then it rained. Boo!

Then there was thunder. (I decided that holding a hoe at this point might be a bad idea.)

An actual steam train went by. That was very cool.

Then I had a cup of tea.

Flask-tastic

Yes, I did get a little snap happy with my camera phone as I waited for a particularly heavy down pour to ease. I wonder what the bloke in the next plot thought I was doing in my shed as my phone made very loud camera shutter noises...

But there has been some good news this weekend - The potatoes are growing!! Oh, I could faint from excitement...

So, now I sit here on the sofa, Mr Oub is running around putting the children to bed and cooking the dinner. It hurts a bit to type, but I carry on as I know my public is always desperate to hear my news. I only hope now that I won't be too sore to hail and hop on the Poetry Bus tomorrow...

Holy Poetry Bus, Batman!

2010-04-19T18:02:00.004+01:00

You know - I don't think this is what Pure Fiction was looking for at all when they set this weeks Poetry Bus challenge. But sadly, I am about as deep as a puddle, so creating a work of spiritual depth is tragically beyond me.

But hey, at least it's not blasphemous... I don't think...

Foot

God has taken up residence
in my right little toe.
I know that this is the case
'cos Satan told me so.
I'm not sure what he's doing there
or how long he plans to stay
(Lucifer was a little fuzzy on the facts
what can I say?)
But I'm happy that he is interested,
has chosen to take a role
in the problems of my little piggies
and my troubled sole.

Last Bus...

2010-04-13T19:45:00.003+01:00

As usual, I'm late for the bus. But, I've made it eventually...

I came up with this poem while trying to get the whole number 5, then number 67, multiplied by the hours of sleep I'd had, divided by my real age... Thanks Niamh, my brain hurts...

Plastic Vows

Upstairs on the 66b
languid and lazy i gazed
a sign snagged my eye
It said - 'Plastic Wedding.'

I immediately imagined polymer nuptials
virgin Tina Tupperware betrothed
to studly Graham Guttering
A spluttering Reverend Bob Bakelite officiating
Polystyrene people sitting in pews
At the back,brooding Peter Polypropylene rues
the day he let that cute little lunchbox go

Vending cups confetti, tossed in the air
injection moulding -
the bridal bouquet Tina is holding.
the reception banquet a spread of inedible play food
plastic covered seats making every guests shuffle sound rude
wedding favours, in sandwich bags
(OK! magazine there to photograph the really plastic WAGs)

Tina and Graham, off hand in hand
wedded bliss, first kiss
A wipe clean wedding waltzing to the kazoo band.

(Of course it's a shame
that the sign really said
Plastic Welding instead.)

Tardy

2010-03-30T14:16:00.005+01:00

I'm late posting my Monday poem - what can I say, I was feeling under the weather yesterday and was far too busy feeling sorry for myself to put up a poem. But sure, better late than never as they say.

This weeks task was to write a poem based on our favourite word.

My favourite word is 'Vehicular'. What can I say? I just love saying it. Try it. But it must be out loud. Feel how the word grabs hold of your entire mouth and makes you work to say it. Great stuff.

But really, a poem based on this word, not necessarily the most exciting. Or I was just being lazy. Okay, I was just being lazy. I am quite sure one could compose quite the epic using this wonderful word.

Instead I went for a word I really like a lot. 'Firkle'. How could you not like that word? If you're unfamiliar with this word, it's belongs to the same world as Niamh B's 'guddle'. It does have a generic meaning to look/search but it's generally used by those who grow potatoes. It describes the process where one sticks ones hands in the muck and feels up the growing potatoes to see if they are big enough to be harvested. It all sounds rather rude.

So, to the poem.

(email me for the poem!)

Total Feckin' Post...

2010-03-24T20:32:00.004Z

Who thought this educating children was a good idea?

There was I, innocently ~~wishing misfortune on all those picked for publication over me~~ supportively reading my blog chums (- henceforth to be known as blums -) posts, when my eldest child starts reading over my shoulder... 'What's that?' he said, squinting, puzzling - 'totalfeckin'eejit'? He tried it again and realised what it said.

When you're nine, there is nothing funnier than swearing.

I had an entire afternoon of the nine year old, and then of course, the seven year old yelling 'Total Feckin' Eeejit!' and then collapsing in giggles. Thank God the baby has speech delay or we'd have been in real trouble. She just joined in the hysterical giggles.

It was eldest sons first bit of news when Mr Oubliette came home.

"Hi Daddy."

"Hi son."

"Guess what Daddy?"

"What son?"

"Mammy knows someone called Total Fucking Eejit!" (Yes, it had become 'Fucking eejit' by then.)

Sigh.

Keep them ignorant I say.

On further news, it may have become clear to some people that I might not have managed to get my genius amazing mindblowingly brilliant work into a publication (or two!) this week. Of course, being me, I am used to rejection. And, you know, I don't really mind if there is a delay in my complete supreme talent being recognised. It's just the other people doing well I don't like. Makes me bitter. Worse than a lemon. Everyone must fail. Okay, now that that's clear, I'll move on.

Just don't expect my congratulations to sound sincere.

I Hate Poem

2010-03-22T14:16:00.005Z

So, I'm on board with TFE's Monday poem. He requested that we wrote a protest poem. I know that such a poem really should be a dignified affair, highlighting injustice, righting wrongs etc... but mine is just a hate filled rant. What can I say? I've got issues.

And just for my international reader's enjoyment of the below poem - an explanation - Twink, (aka Adele King) is an Irish 'entertainer'. She's remarkably annoying. Though the leaked phone message she left on her ex-husband answering machine a few years ago was quite amusing. (click here for the famous - Zip up your mickey)

Okay, let the unpleasantness begin..

I HATE

I hate litter, I hate graffiti,
I hate the ancient bust of Queen Nefertiti
Tenuous rhymes in protest poems
mobile charges when one roams
All inspire spiteful moans.
Politicians, bankers, those infectious cankers
(I bet you thought I'd say wankers)

But I do try to be original
as I spew my hate filled rant.
What else do I think is really pants?
Can't feel the love for annoying teens
Demeans me to say it -
but I've got reams of revulsion just for them.
I scorn all those born after me.

I have an abhorrence for Josie Lawrence,
(Her real name's Wendy, did you know?)
A big aversion to the Cherry Coke version
of that delicious sugary drink.

I think that I could happily murder Twink
Tie a stone around her neck, watch her sink.
Hmmm...Maybe I've just crossed a line
in this mucky malevolent rhyme
I'll reprieve Ms Adele King - as long as she
promises not to sing.
Or act. Or ever go again on TV.
On these conditions I'll set her free.

Rain and traffic jams
Mussels and stinky clams
in fact shellfish of any sort
really get my goat.
Caught short, much too fat,
people who say 'apartment' instead of 'flat'.
Long hair, Truth or Dare,
the incorrect classification of the Koala as a bear.
Rare blood types, laddering tights
toddlers with gnashers who are inclined to bites
Make the steam come out my ears
shortens my life by many years.

What else annoys me, let me see
Reality programs, boring telly
(but not that one with the songs - Glee
for some reason this show really appeals to me.)

This is a protest ditty
railing against all that's crap and shitty
which seems to be quite a lot
a melting pot of this and that
random tat that invades my brain
give me pain, a grey existential nimbus of
psychic rain.

I seem to have resentment, for contentment
Thankful for the rancor of my black heart.
Perhaps I should go back to the beginning
When it was good to be winning, not spinning
webs built from bile, spun out a mile a minute.

Okay, I'll be happy from now on.
As the French say, it'll all be 'bon'.
But just before I change my ways,
there is just one thing I want to say.

I've always inexplicably hated guitarist Phil Lynott.

The End

2010-03-11T21:49:00.006Z

This is a day that I didn't think would happen.

The seas may have turned red and crows flown backward and other such prophecy stylee happenings.

Uh huh.

120,000 words plus 2.

That 'plus 2'?

- THE END

If these insane ramblings are not quite clear - (is that a contradiction in terms? Surely all insane ramblings are incoherent, if they weren't they wouldn't be mad etc...)

Well, yes, I have finally finished my novel!! Yay! Woohooo.

Ticker tape!

Young soldiers kissing blushing young women in the streets!

Old men crying, saying 'I remember when this happened in 1905. I was a little boy. I never thought I'd live to see it happen again!"

Two headed cats are born!

Doves are released into the air!

Children are given the day off school!

Now the redraft. Sigh.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Poetry Train

2010-03-08T17:29:00.006Z

Here we are. TFE's latest task was a poem inspired by/including etc a Train.

Here is my effort. I can't decide whether its really quite brilliant or not.

Ah, it's brilliant, who am I kidding???

I give you...

Plot 426

You must stay at the gate, 'no dogs allowed'
Glowery growling you can wait.
While I embrace this lingering Eden,
a green golden Eldorado
I know relief, relief amid the muck
simplicity in stones
A primal imprint that speaks of this
forgotten past, a time
when this just was.
Bare branches sleepy stretch
scribbles against the sky
holding spring close for us,
A pheasant, speckled startled darts
Rabbits, rampant, here are kings,
supplicant squirrels their loyal squires.
And chugachuga the trains passes
peeping through the hedge, Mesmer's edge,
I want to wave at those inside
enslaved to 9 and 5
To say 'come join me' here where
I smile. Press pause for the while.
And chugachugachuga you pass
leaving me behind, happy
with dirty nails and calm
turning phototropic new disciple of Ra
Ready to preach.
Content.
Born again.

Rocking Baba..

2010-02-23T19:53:00.004Z

We were at a funeral this morning.

Thankfully it wasn't really one of those sad funerals - not meaning to sound flippant you understand - but the dearly departed was 105 years of age. That's about as good as it gets I reckon. I hadn't actually met her, she lived next door and wasn't really leaving the house much in the last year or so, since we moved in next door actually. These two facts may be related.

But, it sounded like she had a pretty good life, and we were happy to pay our respects.

I say we - I'm referring to me and Baby Oubliette. And I think Baby Oub wasn't really taking in the solemnity of the occasion. I think I was paying my respects and she was thinking about how boring it was in this big, cold building.

This became apparent when, clear as a bell, as the centenarian's son-in-law was delivering a touching eulogy, she sang out, word (and note) perfect -

'We will, we will, Rock you!"

Baby Oub like all the Oub offspring (in their day) suffers from speech delay. (I guess I shouldn't put them in front of the telly, with soothers and not talk to them ever. It may not help.)

Why-oh-why did she choose this moment to find her voice? To embarrass me of course. She may be only two and a half, but she's got that one down pat.

Monday Poem!

2010-02-22T14:49:00.003Z

It doesn't scan, and the rhyming's rubbish - but I've got to pick the kids up from school, and then take them to swimming lessons and then take them to football. I've run out of time. So, here it is anyway, TFE's poem...

Pockets

Evidence of snuffles, tuffles of tissues
clouds of cottony snottingly mush
ten thousand receipts, crumpled
to a rumpled mercantile origami.
A swim cap, a crayon, commando crumbs
waiting to stage attacks under nails of
fingers and thumbs.
Argos pen pilfered - casual thievery, up the slievery.
small celibate change, a lonely English ten pee
left on deposit, kept in the closet
liberated for beggars if they look suitably sad
I think you'll agree its a colourful melee,
but hardly room for my hands in the crush.

Eieio

2010-02-20T00:27:00.003Z

It's a bunch of muck now, but fingers crossed, with a bit of luck it'll be green and bountiful come the summer.

(Look how well the shadow and 7 year old boy seeds are doing already.)

Yay! Go Allotment!

Lent 0 - Domestic Oubliette 1

2010-02-17T20:35:00.003Z

I spent the afternoon snoozing on the sofa. Is that bad? I told the kids not to disturb me, so as a consequence they woke me up every five minutes.

Is it a good thing to doze while your children potter about? I must say I always think of Uiscebots story of burning the house down when he was a young chap anytime I take a little 'Mammy Break'. But hey, look how well Uisce turned out. I've probably not got much to worry about, when you think about it...really..

I have the sniffles you see. And I didn't sleep too well last night. And I've been out every second night for the past week. My poor delicate constitution can only take so much. A little sleep was all that stood between me and a 'leave the nine year old in charge of his little brother and sister and jumping on a flight to somewhere warm' tabloid storm.

And, shame of shames, we had pizza tonight. As heathen hubby said - 'On the first day of Lent? That's not very good.' Methinks he needs to check the definition of non-believer in the dictionary. Lent isn't like some alternative to Weight Watchers, or AA, handy and all that it is, what with its last hurrah on Pancake Tuesday and its 40 day plan...

But, I was just tooooooooo tired to get off the sofa and cook.

So, I'm sitting here, drinking some beer, eating some yummy dark chocolate and SWEARING I'll start again with my Lenten cause, tomorrow.

As long as I get a good nights sleep, that is. Otherwise anything could happen.

Poetry Diva's Tonight!

2010-02-15T17:08:00.004Z

The Poetry Diva's are back tonight - at the Glór sessions, downstairs in the International.

Problematically, I am reading my 'brilliant' poetry with two actual fantastic poets.

I am having a crisis of confidence. Its not attractive, nor pretty.

And just in case you're wondering, this is a blatant attempt to get you all to leave comments telling me how AMAZING I am at de pomes.

Just call me Farmer Oub

2010-02-10T16:57:00.006Z

Oh my God, oh my God, am soooooooooooooooooooooooo excited!!! Yay! oooh!

While the dotted line has as yet to be signed, I can confirm, that by Sunday, I should be the proud renter of an Allotment!!!!

Where I was pretty hopeful last post, I have now had the indepth conversation with the bloke who owns the field, and we are Go! Go! Go! (When I say 'conversation' it was mainly me speaking gibberish and him trying hard to isolate anything sensible he could reply to.)

OMG - Now I feel under pressure - it's already mid-February, I gotta get planting!!!!!

What shall I grow? Will I manage all the digging or will Mr Oubliette be forced, against his sedentary will to join the dig for victory? Will I hate it after two minutes? Am I quite ridiculous to be taking this on with my arthritic joints? Or will the joy of it lift my beleaguered spirits? Will all the wholesome outdoorsiness of it bring a glow back to my checks and help shift a few pudgy pounds from my comfortable frame?

Will I be eating tomato chutney till I'm more tomato than human? Will friends and acquaintance run from me, fearing a 'gift' of yet more misshapen mottled veg?

Oh, the possibilities!!

See it here first!

2010-02-08T22:20:00.002Z

Apparently Steven Spielberg was given a film camera as a kid. Now he is a very, very rich man.

My children were given the Animatazz animation software thingy (google it) from Santa this year. We are very hopeful that the below YouTube clip is the very first step on their path to greatness (and immense riches.)

Make sure you look for the sophisticated deep subtext of this piece...

Allotted

2010-02-05T10:47:00.003Z

I am like, so excited! I actually couldn't sleep last night.

What has brought on this Christmas Eve stylee madness??

I got an email yesterday evening. From a guy who rents allotments.

I. May. Be. Able. To. Rent. One.

ARGJF?Ohkdkweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Waving arms and guttural noises ala Animal from the Muppets!

I'm just so excited.

I may have mentioned that.

I am not yet guaranteed one of these parcels of muck. I have to talk to the guy and see if it's what I'm after etc, etc...

But I was up till 2am researching miniature sheds - (more expensive then you'd think). And my head was full of potatoes (no change there says everyone) and cabbage and mange touts...

My teenaged self would be mortified. Practically wetting my pants with excitement over a veggie patch. Teenaged Domestic Oub is cringing in the corner - while applying an extra layer of eyeliner and listening to The Cure.

You know. I suspect 20s Domestic Oub would be a little embarrassed too. Lounging drunkenly in the snug, Guinness in hand, shaking her head sadly - 'I'll never be that uncool when I'm old' she says to herself.

But you know - that has got to be one of the advantaged of nearing forty, not really giving a damn any longer.

Hurray for Sprouts! And old age!

oh jeez, I'm nearly forty....

Mass Hysteria

2010-02-01T11:59:00.007Z

No one likes going to Mass on Sundays - its dull. There, I've said it. I'll sit here and wait for the Cock to crow. (I just had to google that reference, to make sure it was a Cock that crowed and not some other bird. I think there are few things as terrifying as innocently typing 'cock' into google...)

But we go. We're a pragmatic family. The kids whinge and the confirmed heathen husband looks for any excuse not to go. He got lucky yesterday, Baby Oub woke up and seemed rather not her usual rambunctious self. They got a pass to stay at home.

But recently, he hasn't been so quick to look to stay at home in his holey pyjamas... because we discovered something... There is a lovely parish centre just beside our church. And they have a little cafe inside. The homemade scones they sell there are the best I've ever eaten. AND.... They are free on Sundays! Oh yes. They don't actually make you prove you've just emerged from Mass to take advantage of the delicious fare, but we do have some morals...

There is one other high point to Mass attendance in our locale. It is the priest who says the 12.15 mass. It used to be The Lovely Fr Joe. A very interesting man. You could listen to a sermon from him and not want to a) gnaw your leg off from boredom b) throw rotten fruit in disgust at the horrific recent history of the Catholic Church in Ireland. But The Lovely Fr Joe got moved on. Like a holy vagrant he's been booted off to the next parish. I think. Anyway, he may as well be departed to his blessed eternal reward for all the differences to us. Because we've been left with Fr Tenuous. Or Fr Trendy Tenuous Pop Culture Reference, to give him his full name.

I had high hopes for him. When he took over from The Lovely Fr Joe, he brought a bit of moon rock with him for his sermon. 'Hmm, I though. Well done for making an effort, this could be interesting.' Sadly I cannot tell you what this sermon was about as roughly thirty seconds later I was in a coma.

Mass Dodging God Doubter Mr Oubliette had his first experience with Fr Tenuous at the 5.30 Christmas Eve mass. Mr Oub looked at me perplexed as Fr Tenuous held up a talking Homer Simpson doll to the mike. The priest made Homer talk, and then tenuously parlayed the 'loving' relationship between Marge and Homer into some sort of sermon about family, or something. I'm not sure as I struggled to remain conscious for as long as I could, but the inevitable happened soon enough.

It was with great amusement that I listened to the start of his sermon a few weeks ago when he mentioned going to the movie to see Avatar. The relationship that this had to his comment on the gospel is lost to me at this stage, but I did have fun rushing home to tell my Bound for Hell for his Disbelieving Ways husband.

I was ready for him this week. I sat forward - what would be our 'in' to the word of God this week??? Of course, as hubbie was at home minding the above mentioned sick baby he missed this weeks Tenuous pop culture reference... I made him guess...

Want to know?

'The Wire' - yes, that gritty, violent cop show. I think I snorted as the words escaped his mouth. It was like - 'they are foul mouthed in 'The Wire', but Gods words are nice...'

I feel a little mean now, being all sneary about this well meaning man of God. Sure, isn't he only doing his best? In fact it's not very Christian of me, is it?

Oh well. I guess I'll be keeping Mr Oubliette company for eternity after all...

Poetry Bus!

2010-01-29T21:13:00.002Z

Hurray, hurray the Poetry Bus is back.

Sadly, my poetry brain has atrophied in its absence... but, if rumours are to be believed, and the literary route is back, and the Poetry Bus will be passing by regularly, maybe there is hope that I can recapture my former glorious heights...

Anyway, on the theme 'Red Car', here is my latest effort...

Red Car

his car was red.
i kiss whispered in his ear.
i was his, i had the fear
he knew it.
his love like bleach
excruciating
leaving nothing
but a washed out stain
his car was red
and i sat next to him
whispered in his ear
I was his.

Abandon All Hope

2010-01-25T10:40:00.004Z

I've always felt that when Cromwell suggested 'to Hell or to Connaught!' he was uttering a tautology of sorts.

Ah, hahaha, I amuse myself.

Apologies to all Connaughites.

I've just returned from visiting the in-laws in Mayo this weekend you see. And of course I'm not suggesting that my in-laws are minions of the Dark Lord. Heavens no. Nor am I suggesting that the winding roads of the rural Ballygobeelzebub remind me of the circles of hell. No.

I just don't travel well. Nor does Baby Oubliette. She's a champion sleeper. I'm that mam at toddler groups smugly crowing about how she slept right through the night from a day old and how she still takes ten naps a day blah blah blah. Those haggard husks of sleep deprive women hate me...

But in Mayo, Baby Oub has to sleep in the ancestral cot. I'm not kidding. My children have all had a spin in the cot their very own father slept in. Impressive. But unsurprisingly, this cot has seen better days. It creaks and generally isn't up to the princess and the pea standard Baby Oub is now used to.

Invariably, she wakes up in the middle of the night. And this is a baby who doesn't wake up in the middle of the night, so she doesn't know what to do. First she cries. I try to hush her as we're in someone else's house and God forbid we disturbed anyone! Well, okay, I'm not quite so concerned about that. Its more the memory of the first time one of my children woke up in the middle of the night when visiting the in-laws and I was nearly flattened by my mother-in-law in the middle of the night as she rushed to attend to my child.

So, I picked up the little munchkin, and in a technicolour example of the triumph of hope over experience, take her into the bed with us. Sigh. As I said she just doesn't know what to do when woken up - so she lies down to go to sleep with us. But a minute later, moves to another spot. Then two minutes later moves again. Continue for two hours. They're using this technique quite successfully in Guantanamo I believe.

I eventually, at 6 am, chucked her back into the crib/relic and despite a few screeches of protest, she gave up the struggle and went back to sleep.

This has happened every time we have visited the west in the past year.

Bad enough I'm not in my own home. Bad enough my children are being spoilt to within an inch of their lives (oh, the beatings that have to happen once we get to Dublin to remind the children they are not little emperors). Bad enough I have to hear about what happened to Maura, you know Maura? She lives over behind the Kelly's, married to Joe McMurphy? She worked with Aine? You know Aine? She's married to your cousin Jack O'Malley? Bad enough that its raining. Bad enough that...

But I spend the entire visit exhausted and grumpy as hell. It's not my best look.

I just know that when we leave, they tut and shake their heads. 'Why couldn't he have married a nice country girl?'

Worst bit of all?

I never did find out what Maura did. You know Maura?She lives over behind the Kelly's, married to Joe McMurphy?
She worked with Aine?
You know Aine?
She's married to your
cousin Jack
O'Malley?...........................

Wow! Milestone!

2010-01-22T19:24:00.001Z

This is my 101st blog post.

I do hope its memorable.

Oh well.

Schadenfreude

2010-01-08T23:37:00.005Z

Schadenfreude

This is a good meaty sounding word. I always had trouble though, remembering exactly what it meant. For some reason, it would never stick in my head.

Then along came Iris Robinson and I'll never have to struggle with this one again.

As Baby Oubliette likes to say, while pointing a finger, 'Ha, ha! Ha, ha!"

Of course, this isn't very Christian of me. But then again, I don't think her comparing homosexuality to pedophilia was particularly Christian. Of course, her committing adultery is most definitely mentioned in the Big Guys big book of rules. I think she'll find it at number seven.

And the boy was just 19 - barely legal. Nuff said.

Snow Fun Anymore..

2010-01-07T16:30:00.004Z

I have become an enforced agoraphobic. I have not left the house in days. I trundled out at the start of the week, and was regretting it in seconds. But turning back would have been nearly as dangerous. I have not ventured out since. Supplies are running low. Soon I will have to kill, butcher and serve up Mr Oubliette for food. Thankfully he's got a bit of flesh on his bones, so it should see us to the end of the cold snap.

The school is closed. I was like an OCD sufferer last night, repeatedly clicking refresh on the browser, waiting for the schools name to be added to the list on the RTE website. At about 11 o'clock it finally appeared. What could have been the delay? The school is at the bottom of a hill. A hill that doesn't get much exposure to sun. The only nearby carpark is at the top of steps that don't get any sun. And once you get to the school, its at the bottom of a long sloping drive. What could have made the principal wait so long to make the call? As no brianers go, this is as brain free as the Celebrity Big Brother house...

That said, I shouldn't criticise CBB. It is one of the bright spots in my dreary snowbound life at the moment. Well, no it isn't actually. I'm willing it to be. Every bloody year its on, and I don't watch it. Then some celebrity goes mental, best car crash tv in years, and I'm playing catch up.

So, I decided to watch from the start this year.

Snoozefest.

Oh well.

Anyway, to wrap up today, here are some pics from my snowy suburban oubliette...

Only the snow could make the horrible 1970s houses look pretty

Eldest Oubliette child unimpressed with taking a direct snow ball hit

Middle Oubliette child really quite happy with his aim...

Youngest Oubliette child, wistful for the day when she can catch the other two feckers.

Happy New Year

2010-01-01T00:31:00.001Z

Happy New Year
To you all
in the blogosphere.

TFE Poetry Pressie

2009-12-23T22:58:00.004Z

Yay! Total Feckin' Eejit's poetry fun is Back! Back! Back!

Christmas themed... here is my contribution.

Mr Creosote's Christmas

Predatory Pringles mingle with tipsy tins of Roses.
Roast potatoes dip delightedly into bowls of keys,
Selecting salacious selection boxes,
disappearing together to dark corners.

Sprouts pout wallflowers unwanted, get their coats and go.
Mince pies laugh as they leave
cleaving brandy butter to their bosoms.
Trifles tickle tousle with the Christmas pud -
wanton lovers devouring each other, unconcerned.

The turkey and ham, wriggle giggle gravily writhe,
beckoning the mash for a threesome.
The Christmas cake hunts the chocolate orange
for a bit of rough.
But the citric circle is occupied elsewhere,
climatic orgasmic with a coquettish chocolate kimberley.

Lonely, a sad After Eight lazily masturbates.

In the cloakroom, icing and marzipan plan
to run away together, once the night is over.
Upstairs in the back bedroom the whipped cream teases the stuffing
tied with tinsel on the duvet, ecstatically prostate.

Oh fucking hell, its the end of Christmas day
I can't believe all I've ate.

My Weak Week...

2009-12-17T16:43:00.004Z

I appear to blog once a week. Either a Wednesday or a Thursday.

It takes a week for me to find something to say. And it's debatable whether what I've said was even worth it sometimes.

So, what did this week hold for Oubliette's of the Domestic kind?

Well, I didn't win that competition I was shortlisted for. Obviously my story was far, far, far too good. But it's that cosy blanket of superiority that keeps me warm at night. Sure the winner is out there somewhere, probably rolling naked on a bed over, under and around their winnings. But, they are deluded. They, as well as the judges, don't know that my story was better than theirs, and should have won. When, like a ego crushing blow, the truth dawns, I will be expecting a full written apology and any winnings that can be salvaged from the naked tumblings to be forwarded to me.

What else did I do?

Mr Oubliette and I saw Eddie Izzard at The Point on Monday ( I will not call it the *2) It was about the forth time we'd seen the comic genius. Sadly, we may have overdosed on the Izzard magic and while we enjoyed ourselves, and he was funny, we just weren't loosing control of our bladders as we once would have.. oh well. I had to console myself with onion rings and a 'bacon big boy' from Eddie Rockets afterwards.

Yes, the 'bacon big boy' is as deliciously vile as it sounds. It was worth the vicious assault by my weight watchers leader afterwards. As I drifted out of consciousness as one more blow from the electronic scales rained down on me, I licked my lips and muttered 'bacon'...

The Lovely Lucan Creative Writers had their annual Christmas shindig as well since I last blogged. It was a wonderful evening - visit Becketts in Leixlip, its a gem. We managed to peer pressure Various into drinking - cause she couldn't be in our gang if she wasn't like, cool, and like, drinking - but despite being in the pub till 2 am (well, the stragglers at any rate) it didn't feel quite as mad as previous years. Are we all getting old? Or was the fun just concentrated? Condensed? If you had added water, perhaps we'd still be partying now.

I should go. Junior Oubliette wants to spray fake snow on the windows. And who am I to stop him?

Till next Wed/Thurs.

Things Domestic Oubliette Learnt since she last posted yesterday...

2009-12-10T16:32:00.003Z

1) Don't go out for a few drinks with writing buddy and leave hubby alone with baking Christmas Cake.

2) Don't forget that the recipe you're using to bake your cake was written long before fan assisted ovens were even thought of.

3) Don't cry when it burns.

4) Don't go on a crusade over the little things in your child life.

5) When they want you to drop it - sometimes its just right to drop it.

6) Don't stay up watching 'There's Something About Mary' till after midnight. (No matter how funny it is.)

7)Sometime missing your writing targets isn't such a bad thing. Maybe the 900 words you came up with instead of the 4000 you were meant to, could be the best 900 words ever.

8) Sometimes, even if you didn't get slaughtered in a budget doesn't mean it was an okay budget.

9) Though, sometimes things just aren't fair.

10) There is one instance of the phrase 'domestic oubliette' other than my blog on the world wide web. There are no new ideas.

Shortlists, Christmas Cakes, Budget Cuts and Chapters to Write. (I've a lot on my mind today)

2009-12-09T11:28:00.006Z

A lot on my mind.

I should have baked the Christmas cake last October like all the true domestic goddesses. Come Christmas day, my cake will crumble like a Fianna Fail politician in the face of a public service union. 'A bit immature' my mother will say, and I'll want to make like the cake and stamp my foot and storm off to my bedroom.

But, regardless, once I put down this laptop, off I'll trot to my kitchen and start the long, laborious process...

It'll take my mind off this afternoons budget though. 'Everyone' begrudgingly admits that Lenihan is the cleverest of the bunch of them (Not hard that said - my Christmas cake will have more brains than at least 96.7% of FFers.) I wonder what joys this budget will contain - it appears most of it has been leaked. Do hope there are no major surprises. Of course, I wouldn't say no if it contained a provision for all women, say, aged 37, and with an O in their names to get a brand new car. I think this would be a great initiative. We all know that women, aged 37 and with an 'O' in their names are big shoppers, and so, a new car would get them to the shops more often and therefore stimulate the economy. Phew. Goodness. I'm a great economic thinker. Who knew.

I wonder if my eggs are at room temperature yet? (No snickering at the back there.)

Can't start the cake till the eggs are warm.

Can't start till I've blogged either.

Why oh why don't I just buy a bloody cake? Its not as if anyone eats it round here...

So, what else has camped in my brain and is refusing to leave?

Ah, yes, was delighted to receive an email yesterday informing me of a shortlisting for a story wot I wrote for the 'Stop the Clocks' competition that one of the libraries was running there a few months ago. Various had received an email about her shortlisting agessssssssssssss ago, so I was despondent. Down. Drowning in feelings of wretchedness and worthlessness. I hadn't even gotten an acknowledgement of my entry! But, low, and behold. A pretty little email in my inbox yesterday informing me that I was shortlisted after all! Hurrah!

But the scales tipped once more - I won't be able to go on the night to find out who (me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me) has won :( I will have to rely on my arch rival MsV Cushions to let me know what happens... Can she be trusted? I think we all know the answer to that one...

Anyways. I best go.

Because not only do I have a cake to bake (which will take all day, I am not kidding, it is an epic undertaking), a budget to watch, and shortlisting glory to wallow in, but I am meeting writing chum tonight and AS USUAL I have precious little written. 400 words to be precises. Gah. Said I would have 4000. Oh well. So, let see if I can set some targets.

100 words before I collect the kids from school (remember, I have a cake to bake!)

1600 while I watch the budget.

800 After tea, and before chum arrives.

That'd be 2500 written today. Not ideal, but a damn sight better than nothing.

Okay. Must go.

Update:Forgot to get greaseproof paper - have to make a run to the shops. No writing going to be done before lunch :(

International put your Poem in a Shop Month - The Bandwagon Begins!

2009-12-03T13:05:00.005Z

Well, I'm nothing if not a follower! Not so great with the original ideas, but not too bad at slavishly following someones else initiative.

Well, MsVarious, there are now TWO poems in shops as of a hour ago. I was pottering about in my fave place - The Orchard Garden Centre and Cafe on the Celbridge road, and I thought - I gotta put a poem in a shop. Of course, the problem was I didn't have a poem. So, over a large Americano, and as the baby poured chocolate milk over herself I penned this instantly forgettable poem...

Nonchalant gnomes, propagation domes,
Homes and Gardens beautiful
Bonsai, Birch, Gerbera, Poinsettia
Cushions, throws, aspirational a-plethora
Coffees and cakes among the shrubs, hoses and rakes
Feed our hunger and thirst.

Outside these high walls, recession calls
But, goddamn, they've got to catch me first.

So, I lurked like a giddy flasher, attempting the oh-so-casual positioning my poem. I felt like I was about to dump toxic waste on a kids playground, the urge not to litter is so strong. But, as Various says, I am adding to the cultural enrichment of our world... ahem. (All comparisons of my poem to toxic waste will be instantly deleted!)

And here's the proof!

Hurray for "International put your Poem in a Shop Month"!

And the results are in!!!!!

2009-11-26T17:01:00.003Z

Well, I'm not going to try to bluff this one out anymore.

Indeed my dear old friend Dave let the drunken partying cat out of the bag. I have of course been to London, many times, and have partied my once little ass of there...

1) I have bowed to the Emperor of Japan.

When I was twelve the then Crown Prince, and now Emperor, Akihito and his wife visited Ireland. His wife had been educated by Sacred Heart nuns, so quite fancied visiting a Sacred Heart school here in Ireland. I was educated by Sacred Heart nuns... I think you can fill in the gaps...

2) My mother drew pictures for Bosco.

Check out the last episode on Volume 2 of the Bosco dvd for my mothers wonderful illustrations :)

3) My cousin is a High Court judge.

The Hon. Mr Justice J Quirke. First cousin once removed or something... he wouldn't know me from Adam, but I am hoping when my deep dark criminal activities are uncovered I'll come up before dear old Cuz.

4) The most senior Garda in Ireland is my neighbour.

He is.

5) I had a letter condemning the death penalty published in the Irish Times.

Back when I used to give a damn about humanity. Now I say, kill everyone. Wonder would the Times print that one?

6) I am married to a Larry Gogan's Just A Minute quiz yearly finalist.

Has this got to a 'so uncool it's cool' point yet? He got a sodastream out of it...

7) I've never been to London, England.

Mr Oubliette came up with the lie. Honestly. Methinks his talents lie with useless trivia. I guess the questions just didn't suit me...

8) I have taken an overdose.

I was two and a half, and they used to make aspirin that tasted like orange tic-tacs. Stomach-pumping-tastic.

9) I have been proposed to twice by men wanting to escape different oppressive communist regimes.

The Cuban one was a doctor and all! What was I thinking turning him down? He could have learned to love me... Ahem, sorry Mr Oubliette - am so glad it didn't work out, where would I be without my Larry Gogan love kitten...

10)When I was three I told jokes about God.

Why is God in heaven?

Because he's stuck with glue!

Really, its a brilliant piece of wit. I should have been a stand up.

Odd One Out! (Yes, me too!)

2009-11-26T00:35:00.005Z

I'm most intrigued by this latest craze sweeping blogland.

Ten facts about yourself. One of which is false. Can you guess which one??

Here are my ten - which one is nonsense?

1) I have bowed to the Emperor of Japan.

2) My mother drew pictures for Bosco.

3) My cousin is a High Court judge.

4) The most senior Garda in Ireland is my neighbour.

5) I had a letter condemning the death penalty published in the Irish Times.

6) I am married to a Larry Gogan's Just A Minute quiz yearly finalist.

7) I've never been to London, England.

8) I have taken an overdose.

9) I have been proposed to twice by men wanting to escape different oppressive communist regimes.

10)When I was three I told jokes about God.

I should be doing something else

2009-11-25T10:56:00.005Z

I'm blogging as usual because I should be doing something else. Anything else. The baby is in her pyjamas still and it is 11 am. I, you'll be glad to hear, am dressed.

The TV is on - children's chirpy chirpy smiley smiley smack them all in the gob telly. We watch too much telly in this house. When I refused to put it on the other day, the baby checked the scart cables to see if that was why it wouldn't come on. I am serious. I was part proud. Part shamed.

So, here specifically is what I 'm avoiding

1) Dressing baby.
2) Writing my novel.

I have my Millionaire Authors Club meeting tonight. Its been about three weeks since we last met and I haven't written a word. And, yet, with the clock ticking Poe-like, I'm still not putting finger to keyboard. And I only have two chapters left of my epic boooook. You'd think I'd put everyone out of their misery and just finished the horrid thing.

But no, I procrastinate still.

Here's a haiku about my problem. But that said I'm feeling too lazy to even google the rules of haiku so its probably not really even a proper one. I could just call it a very short poem?

120,000 words
inertia seeps
no book deal for me.

Sigh. Even the telly is boring baby now - she's rolling on the floor humming to herself. Sorta like the mad polar bears in Dublin zoo who used to just walk up and down and up and down, swaying gently, insanely.

Okay. baby steps.

700 words before one o'clock. Break. Coffee, lunch etc. Pick up elder Oubliette spawn. 700 words while they chillax after their tough day at school. Feed and shout at the children till about 6pm. Then 700 words before 8 o'clock when I must depart for M.A.C. That would have the chapter finished.

I can do it!

Perhaps.

Update: 1000 words done by 1 o'clock! We're ahead of schedule. Time for coffee.

Update 2: 1500 by dinner time...

Update 3: 2600 words by 8 o'clock! Hurrah! And chapter finished!

Drama Queen

2009-11-13T14:10:00.002Z

Our wonderful friend Joan left us yesterday. We all knew she was unwell, but no one expected to lose her so suddenly. Without her, we won't laugh as heartily again. Without her, we won't face life with quite so much courage. Without her, our world has lost it most vibrant colours. We miss you and love you Drama Queen.

X-Factor and the meaning of life

2009-11-12T13:53:00.004Z

Apparently Jeward went to the same school as the Oubliette boys.

The Oubliette boys are thrilled with this information as they are possibly the twins biggest fans. There are tense and difficult arguments in the Oubliette household about the merits of performance versus talent. The kids come down on the side of spectacle, I say, in the end, its got to be about the talent. And Mr Oubliette tears out what little hair is left, tears streaming down his face, wailing and gnashing of teeth begging not to be made watch any more of this rubbish.

Middle philosophical child has decided one thing though that we can all agree upon. He reckons Simon Cowell is unlikely to get into heaven.

The gospel message a few weeks ago - the old rich man, eye of a needle story - made a big impression on him. He felt torn recently when I told him Consultants, of the medical kind, make a lot of money. He thought about it for a while, then decided that as they spend their time helping people, even though they are paid lots of money, they may still get to their eternal reward.

Older, megalomaniac Oubliette son - ironically utterly corrupted by his communion money - has been noticeably silent on the topic.

Anyway, with this recession, there is little fear of this become a problem for the Oubliettes anytime soon.

Brrrr....

2009-11-03T12:16:00.002Z

I'm bloody freezing. Mr Oubliette has man flu. Baby Oubliette is master classing tantrums.

And with no Poetry Bus to force me to write, I'm not creating anything.

Other than resentment.

I need to go to the shops. With man-flu victim at home, I can do this without the company of crazy baby diva. But, it's only the heat from the (now fixed) laptop battery that's keeping me warm. If I throw off my electronic hot water bottle, then I'll freeze solid. And that's before I even leave the house.

Truly, I have a difficult life.

And maybe I'll even shop unwisely if I ever get to the shops because I'm feeling cold. I might buy chocolate. And cake. And biscuits. My body crying out for the energy they'd provide, to warm me up. Ruin the diet that's only about three hours old.

Disaster.

Any tips on how I can resolve this incredibly awful dilemma will be gratefully received.

Laptop RIP

2009-10-23T13:31:00.003+01:00

Ill laptops - its a theme. First poor Various Cushion suffered the demise of her laptop - now in a case of laptop swine flu, my one has fallen over.

How am I posting, you may ask?

Well, techy Mr Oubliette has worked it so that I get a few minutes on the machine before it dies again. And what am I doing while I have these precious few minutes? Replying to emails that are backing up? No. Doing some writing of the great Irish novel? No.

Instead I am blogging and getting my fix of celeb gossip. Cause, like I'll fall apart if I don't know what John and Edward are getting up to right now!! (Of course I don't need an internet connection to know what they're doing - they're being deluded yet strangely entertaining 24/7 I suspect.)

But there you go.

I should attempt the Everest that is my email now. Wish me luck.

And if you hear a loud bang coming from the west part of Dublin - that'll be the laptop going again.

Worst of times, Best of times

2009-10-19T23:55:00.003+01:00

It was one of those days.

I woke up with a headache. Its just going to be a struggle when you greet the day with a thumping jackhammer in your head.

Also, my alarm didn't go off, so the kids were late to school.

They then came home from school with a note saying a pupil has come down with swine flu.

I opened the car door too quickly and bashed my head (yes, that really helped with the headache.)

The wan behind the desk told me that the kids were filed under Tuesday for their swimming lessons and the Monday was all booked up, despite the fact they've been coming to swimming on a Monday for a year. Oh yeah, and this was somehow my fault.

I was too tired to get into town tonight to see the wonderful David Mohan and Colm Keegan read at the Glór sessions.

Hubby was v late home from work (yet another crisis!)

The wine ran out.

I have given up coffee.

The baby turned on the hot tap when I wasn't looking when she was having her bath. Could have scalded herself and I'd have had no one to blame but myself.

I had no inspiration for TFE's poetry bus. I was left winded and gasping for breath as it pulled away from the stop without me.

Of course, I shouldn't be such a misery guts! I should look at it this way...

I have a head - and though it hurts sometime, its something many people would be very happy to have (For example, many victims of the French Revolution.)

I have three lovely children. They have a school to go to. (This gives me free time to go to cafes and meet lovely friends! Hi DramaQueen! Hi DublinDave! Hi Weir Cafe!)

My children (as yet) do not have swine flu.

I bashed my bonce while going to a cafe to meet lovely friends (Hi DramaQueen! Hi DublinDave! Hi WeirCafe!)

Does it really matter whether swimming lessons are on a Monday or a Tuesday? I'm still down nearly 200 quid and the land lubbers are still rubbish at it, no matter what the day.

So, I missed one Glór session - at least I didn't have have my hair fondled by an odd old bloke who I will then have to run into in the butchers the next day...

Early hubby, or late hubby - does it really matter, in the end, he came home, made me a cup of tea and put the kids to bed.

Wine is bad for me.

Coffee is bad for me.

At least the baby didn't scald herself.

I think TFE will manage just fine without my genius for just this once.

There we go. So, like a cheap chick lit novel its all worked out for everyone in the end, and I think its fair to say, we've all grown as people.

C'mon Tuesday, do your worst. Or best, I should say.

Only three Chapters to go...

2009-10-14T23:23:00.002+01:00

Ah life, so busy.

Am just back in after meeting my book writing partner tonight. As avid readers of my blog (all mythical masses of you) will know, I meet weekly(ish) with said partner in an atmosphere of mutual support, encouragement and threat, in an attempt to finish our books. He has abandoned one book after 60/80k words and is now on a new one. Brave man! I on the other hand, am limping pathetically through the longest gestation for a simple light and frothy book ever. I've hit about 110k words now myself, which I am delighted and amazed with, and have only 12k left before a first draft is accomplished.

Then the redraft.

Then the dumping in the bin and the wailing and gnashing of teeth at the wasted years.

(Then hopefully the retrieval from the bin, the sending to a publisher, the discovery as amazing new Irish writing talent and then the millions of euro rolling in.)

Can't wait.

Monday Poem

2009-10-12T18:00:00.004+01:00

Here we go with TFE's last minute challenge... The pic below is the one I used...

Us.

Grey gathers overhead.
the first drops, drip.
Our very own private hurricane.

Ravenous gales rush the kitchen
A twister kicks and smashes like a skinheaded yob
through our living room
The eye of the storm sits quietly on our bed.

I run for cover under a table,
but you dance, waltz, foxtrot, jive with the storm.
Exhausted, eventually, it leaves.
It always does.

And after, we pick up the pieces,
wooden splinters stabbing our palms
glass shards embedding in our knees
rats and stagnant filthy water squelch underfoot.

You smile and say its great
You feel alive
I nod, damp and sore.