This morning my alarm clock went off after a frightful and disturbed night. In the half light I managed to bat it under the bed and out of reach, causing terrible cussing on all fours, as I tried to retrieve it with a coat hanger!
Why not let it ring until it stops... a) I can't stand the noise and b) knowing my luck it will be flat for tomorrow and not wake us. The emergency second alarm clock which is supposed to save me from this, has mysteriously gone! He says he has not seen it and knows nothing about it.
We have had some DREADFUL squabbling about alarm clocks for years now. . Every so often he comes marching back into the house looking very pleased clutching a radio alarm clock which has either come from FreeCycle or a jumble sale. I seethe at them on sight. and then confiscate them immediately, as otherwise instead of him doing reports - quite some effort is put into programming yet another crap item, with different times to go off, and various music to come on. However where we live it is so windy and remote that we have many little mini power cuts. This makes sure that antiquated radio alarm clocks installed in our bedroom by him, that nobody wants anymore - end up going off at various times during the night, and certainly not at the right time to ensure anybody actually catching the school bus. Also I suffer from hypothyroid sleep fuss amongst other things. So being woken at the wrong time is frightful.
Of course all his phones and lap tops or pads or anything that could be used is banned from the bedroom, as they don't get turned off and have in the past gone off at awful times with special torturing alarms or just noisy emails or texts coming in. Sleeping with the rubber camping mallet next to my pillow ready to see them all off after various incidents finally worked for those.. although they will creep back again should I not pay attention.
The other morning with full flare up of everything going on, and no brain power whatsoever, I was attempting to do an on line grocery shop, and write instructions for my absence re one child not going with me to London for medical appointments - and also trying to pack. The state of my fog filled pea brain is not marvelous currently
With 10 minutes ticking until local bus departure to train station, my husband thrust a new telephone under my nose and proceeded to tell me about all the new alarms he had installed on it AGAIN!
. Phones are also a slightly sore point currently... our old ones which are not supposed to ring, but do - , (four of those), then the four new ones also ring, and then some other ones connected to his business with the same ring tones go off, and then we won't go into how many different mobiles he is currently using, and then my own phone which of course I ignore.
The only thing I managed not to forget about the latest lecture on useful alarms was how pleased he was to have set up the new phones to wake us at the same time..as my week-day alarm clock, - and how it could be de activated at the week-ends.
. He has already had a test run on this, last week... I was deeply suspicious and feisty about it...and went to bed on Friday night in huff... sure enough 6.35 am on Saturday I was woken by a jarring and hideous electronic ring tone from the new phone, which became more bearable after I had lobbed it out of the bedroom window. We are now back to my clock again... and I shall buy several of them; However I know he will have to torture me one more time with this... rubber mallet here I come.
To contrast all this indoor Mr and Mrs Fuss he has been entertaining the local trawler men who watch him regularly row across the estuary to work, (I donate heavily to the local life boat fund), and they decide whether he needs to be rescued from tidal surges or strong currents. The last few days were no exception... At dusk the other evening he found that he was rowing nowhere near home, but seemed to be being sucked out to sea at quite a pace - and was duly chased after by some swarthy bearded men who saved him motoring off on the wind and tide to Holland. Apparently the first thing he said was... I know you will tell her and she will write about it... to right titter shriek etc. Out boats don't have names, just our phone numbers. people are always bringing it back and the oars Apart from one which i believe was last seen in bits being used at a beach bbq to start a fire having been trounced on the rocks one evening.
The next day he went whisking off to do some busking in town and talk about global warming.. I did hint that his clothing was rather alarming. Having left me behind in bed, he then rang and admitted that he was feeling most feral and trampy, but having a great time being blokey with his mates including one with a double base. He had left wearing a jumper with so many holes, it gave the illusion of having perhaps been ravaged by some sort of super globally warmed and enhanced moth plague, let alone the trousers with pockets hanging off with dangling belt loops - and boots caked in the latest application of estuary slime. He did lots of cheering at my daughter and her mates doing their own busking and according to her was very hilarious and over excited.
I have had a mixed time of late my ailments are currently out of hand... but my flight is booked to go and try LDN in Glasgow...and I have just returned from a very successful trip to London to hospital - appointment sharing with my daughter, having infiltrated a teenage clinic, it has taken years off me, being allowed in there. I wore my special new taming ladies bottoms jeans.. ie supposed to make it smaller, much perkier and generally twenty years younger according to how I interpreted the adverts.. as my daughter said before I bought. them... Yes Mum a pair of placebo jeans for your bottom.
I think I have worked out how they achieve the toning effect, having rushed to get my train trussed up like Christmas turkey in a fake fur coat... I became aware as I humped various over flowing bags onto the train, (loaded with food parcels for my son who did leave home six years ago), but of course I still fret over... that something awful was jabbing into my backside... the prickling and scratching caused me to fidget quite violently all the way to London, where it transpired that I was still wearing all the staples and labels. So I think that localized exercise was supposed to do the trick.
We both stayed with my friend Dithers.. who announced in a tirade of fuss when we were on route - that I was not to worry about the fact that her double bed had fully collapsed and to not notice large quantities of wooden slats resembling fire wood festooned over the entire flat. This being the final phase to eradicate a male lodger who had taken up temporary residence as she looked after her father...he had been there six months, covered her walls in seductive lady nudes, which he then left there four months after his departure, causing immense confusion to any possible dates she brought around for tea, after she moved back in again.
His insistence that he had to install his own bed, and not just swap mattresses has taken a year to resolve since his departure. His kind offer to re install his own bed up the road and bring hers back from Eltham, was accepted gratefully by Dithers, but he left swiftly having not put back a single screw or nail. Her sudden descent one night, from quite a height after some unfamiliar creaking and groaning clutching her hot water bottle as the bed imploded on itself, has left her for now sleeping on the floor. Apparently she has employed an ex lodger of mine from when I lived in London, to come and repair the situation and to take on a number of other jobs. I could list the various disasters he caused on two sides of an A4 sheet just from when he resided with me. I feel the urge to go straight back to London and spectate in case I miss anything. Disasters involving him, are still discussed at dinner twenty years down the line.. now there is another story or two!
One child is at school today, and the other one tucked up in bed, I have discovered the delightful art of Christmas shopping on line, whilst in bed. However there is a down side, the postman is so sulky and devoid of all humour. and this will trigger loads of parcels arriving. .. He remains po faced even during the most challenging situations... if I saw a woman of a certain ahem cough middle age - walking on her bottom up and down her hall on the floor, in that 1980's exercise style, so popular years back for toning bottoms - whilst I was delivering letters, i would have hysterics, myself, but there is no accounting for other people's lack of humour.
Mary F x
