Tolerate My Child Day

Clueless Wonder One has offered our house up to two of his friends for four days. I’m good with that. I have and will continue to happily take in other people’s offspring in the hope that should the need arise the same will be granted to Clueless.

We did entertain The Lost German, who we found out later was more a passing acquaintance. The Lost German ate two loaves of bread a day, sat around and watched hours and hours of SpongeBob. I wouldn’t have minded if he were seven, but at nineteen, I thought this a tad odd. Now, I don’t mind a bit of Mr. Square Pants and Patrick and look for the hidden gems that used to fly over my kids heads.

The reason I am a bit cranky with Clueless are his friends are arriving on Super bowl Sunday at 3pm. The chances of them clearing Customs and stuffing their massive backpacks in my jaunty car and getting in and out of LAX in half an hour is slim even if we had a time machine.

Faux Gordon Ramsay will be in the kitchen cooking up a billion tequila and lime chicken wings and checking that the beer is icy. His advice to Clueless will be ‘Give them our address – they can catch a cab, because I’m not moving off the couch.’ He’ll make good on his word. I shall have to press out the indents on Monday.

But it’s football I hear you cry. True. Since the mighty Buffalo Bills are not there this year, (such a travesty), I’m picking the Broncos because Peyton and I share an awesome last name. The fake Gordon Ramsay is a bit in love with Cam Newton, so he’s going for the Panthers. But the real reason I’m mad is I’ll miss some of the commercials and the buildup. The Super bowl has the best commercials ever and the best buildup to any sporting event (okay tied with the showjumping or the Eventing final at the Olympics).

The lost puppy on the Budweiser commercial still makes me cry.  

So I’ll be tolerating my child, picking up his bread-eating friends and if I don’t make it back before Mr. Mars hits the stage at the halftime show I will cry like a seven-year-old denied SpongeBob.

Go Broncos. 

Here's a little of the puppy magic. 

https://youtu.be/EM8azoZjI4U

Fun Fact Fiday

Sloths only go the bathroom once a week. I bet they don't take the paper with them...

Successfully Ageing? Ummmm No!

Bondi Beach 

G’Day!

Today our greeting comes from Australia who are celebrating their national day today. 

My local paper runs a large advertisement which puzzles me:

'Come and join our Successful Ageing Seminar'

What if you’re not successful? Is there a pass grade? If you fail is it lights out?

Wiki Commons courtesy of Incry

Me?  I'm fighting the ageing process one ‘miracle’ promise at a time.

I have bathroom drawers brimming with products guaranteed to turn back the clock, erase those lines and bring back once luminous skin. (I'm not sure my skin was ever luminous, but I live in hope). I’ll slather that stuff on for a week, a year, as long as it takes. I’ll stare hopefully at those lines imagining them being ironed out. (Honestly, if they made an iron for faces, that sucker would be winging its way to my door).

My clearly clueless wonder husband, sighs heavily when yet another miracle jar sits proudly next to his contribution to the bathroom counter- deodorant.  He asks in a bewildered voice why I bother because to him I’m lovely. Keep those rose colored glasses on Clueless. 

Zipping up and down the aisles of my local pharmacy, I'm struck by the tiny section dedicated to male moisturizers when women have triple-decked shelves dedicated to fighting the first signs of ageing. 

Is it mostly women fighting ageing? Is there a secret men’s club out there? - Clueless assured me there isn’t.  Is it programmed into our genes? Are we influenced by advertising? Are we worried about being replaced? Clueless looked a tad too excited at that thought.

I will keep searching for the ‘Turn Back Time’ miracle cream because hope and luminous skin are fabulous things.

Am I along in my quest? 

Is there such a thing as a miracle cream?

What are your thoughts on ageing?

Fun Fact Friday

Sea otters hold hands when they sleep to keep from drifting apart.

Ahhhhhhhhh.

Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

One Food. Choose. Now!

The grunty teen and I were conversing - me in English and The Grunter in a series of caveman grunts I have yet to decipher because I have girly bits so I’ll never understand.

We were talking/grunting about food, more specifically what we would have for dinner. Head Clueless Wonder - the budding Gordon Ramsay was whooping it up in Sydney. 

Courtesy of Kevin Trotman Flickr Commons

The Grunter was unhappy I wouldn’t be serving sausages swimming in cheese. I explained that I couldn’t because I’d signed an online eradicate scurvy petition when he was born and every meal had to contain a green vegetable or fruit.

There we stood like duelists at dawn.

Courtesy of Doug Gelster Flickr Commons

We used to play this game when The Grunter was little and squishy and, well seemed to like me a whole lot more. If he could choose one thing to eat for the rest of your life what would it be? With nothing to lose I asked what he’d eat.

Grunter: “Sausages.”

Responsible parent: “Salad (a total lie, but I was going for the higher moral ground here, and to underscore the whole scurvy issue.)

Grunter: “A green apple.”

Responsible Parent: “Peanut butter.”I can and do stand in the kitchen and spoon that goodness right into my mouth. While I prefer crunchy I will take smooth.

Grunter: “Can, I make dinner?”

Responsible Parent: “Sure.” Shocked and deeply suspicious, I had the Thai restaurant down the road on speed dial.

Twenty minutes later, The Grunter and I sat at the table. On his plate was a partially burnt sausage covered in bbq sauce, a slice of cheese and half an apple. On mine was a handful of scattered lettuce, a single wonkily cut cherry tomato and the other half of the apple covered in peanut butter.

Courtesy of Glenn3095 Flickr Commons

Best meal of the week.

If you could only eat one food for the rest of your life what would it be? I think you can guess mine.

Does anyone know where I can purchase a manual on understanding grunty teen boys?

Why I'm never giving up the dream of size SMALL.

Nestled in my bedroom drawers behind the sweatpants and the ‘roomy’ jeans lie a pair of black jodhpurs. Every time we move house or country the Jod’s come. The Jod’s are family.When I open the drawer and run my hands lovingly over the black fabric, I am letting myself live the dream a little longer.

You see the Jod’s have one magical letter. The ‘S’ on the tag. That ‘S’ represents hope. Hope that one day my small self with fit those suckers. If you looked at me you’d say “Those Jod’s were quite a few cream donuts ago, just quietly.” Why, yes, yes they were. The Jod’s were a time when I could run without causing damage to the pavement. The Jod’s were pre-kids when I could party on tequila and feast on cheese-puffs (something I still do because they’re cheese puffs and I am their slave). The Jod’s were a time before I worked out (kind of) at home, instead of hitting the gym and being mistaken for the janitorial staff. (Apparently you don’t wear your Buffalo Bills T-shirt (with pride) and a pair of quietly unattractive bike shorts, but instead wear matching lycra in cute prints.)

The Jod’s represent hope. Hope that one day, barring disease they will slip on with ease. Hope that one day I will finish the Paleo/Atkins/South Bay/Tomato Soup/Orange Juice/Fig and Bacon/Boysenberry ice-cream and cheese puffs diet (okay, I made the last one up). Until then I’m hanging onto the Jod’s, because they give me hope, and if you can’t hope then my world got a bit smaller (but not my butt) and sadder.

What about you? Is there a piece of clothing you hold onto?  

The Art of Being Consistent or in my case Horribly Inconsistent

The Art of Being Consistent or in my case Horribly Inconsistent

I stand in front of you with a confession. I am hopeless at social media. I don’t mean to be, I really don’t. I aspire to be that fun and funky friend who writes witty and scintillating posts that I’ll whip up and post, frequently.

Oh how I wish I was witty or scintillating. I am depressingly neither.

Between working full time proofing death certificates (I take my job seriously. The typo of ‘Gunshot wood to head’ will not go out on my watch. No. No.)  I arrive home and catch sight of myself in the mirror and whisper “Whoa. I seriously need to run four marathons a week.” Just quietly, I still need to learn how to run.

Luckily I don’t cook because I live with a Gordon’s Ramsay wannabe, so while he’s throwing a hissy in the kitchen and swearing at an orange, I open the laptop and work on Bound to the Bounty Hunter which is taking longer to birth than the universe.

Today, at last, I would be seated at my computer spitting out witty and scintillating posts and not  watching ‘animals that shouldn’t be best friends but are’ videos, to confirm there is good in the world. Well, stun me into silence when Clueless Wonder Two looked at me with hope and sparkle in his eyes (very rarely directed at me since he became a grunty teen) and asked if we could sit down and watch the ‘best program on the Teev’. Joy filled my heart. Clueless was into The Young and the Restless? I plopped down to discuss the Abbot/Newman rivalry and his thoughts. Oh, the excitement. Was he Team Abbot or Team Newman?      

Six hours later, I now know that to kill a zombie you have to stab them or shoot them in the head. Good to know for future reference.  Clueless and I had bonding time which is rare here at Casa Manning. However, Sophie and Harlan in Bound to the Bounty Hunter and still the equivalent of Pluto regaining his planet card.

I apologize for not posting enough. It isn’t because I’m not thinking of you because I am. I aspire to post more often and I will even if it is to post a lion and a baby zebra who are now besties, or hot dudes who look like Vikings,  or how Pluto’s doing on getting his planet card back.

I do try and find you on Facebook and like your posts. You inspire and humble me. And I thank you.

I remain your hopelessly useless friend,

Hayson