Paddling Fool

As soon as the temperature breasts above fifteen degrees my children begin to demand that 'the paddling pool be brought out'.
I had managed to put them off for a couple of weeks but last bank holiday weekend I ran out of excuses and beat a path to the back of my cobweb filled shed in search of the thing.

Every year I purchase a new paddling pool and every year the kids somehow puncture it within a couple of days.Barbie has such sharp fingers these days or perhaps my sons Samurai sword wielding Lego men are the culprits.

I manage to unearth the paddling pool but then cannot locate the electric pump. This is essential unless you have two or three hours of spare time which you don't mind spending with your mouth clamped to the questionably hygienic valves of the paddling pool. Gasping and drooling in equal measure whilst your children demand to know (to the nearest second) when the paddling pool will be ready.

I look everywhere for the pump. I always leave it on the same shelf but it's not there. I look on all the other shelves, in all the cupboards. In the end (in desperation) I remove every item in the shed and lay it all in the garden.

No pump.

My wife wanders over and leisurely informs me that she moved the pump into the house last year and it is still in a cupboard.

I swear quietly under my breath so she can't hear me. I put everything back in the shed and go and get the pump. After an hour or so trying to locate it in the sheds musty corners, I now resemble some sort of sweaty, dust and cobweb covered maniac.

I manage to fill the thing with water, boil multiple kettles so that the temperature does not immediately strip the skin from ones legs upon entry and finally release my children to frolic.

That was about two weeks ago. My children frolicked for about two hours and then returned to the house complaining of cold and proceeded to make every available seat and surface damp.
The next day the weather turned cold and blowy again but the paddling pool remained.

It just sits there now, slowly filling with muddy rain water and glowering at me from the bottom of the garden.
'Come and empty me and put me away' it seems to mock, ' you know that it will take frikking ages and that as soon as you have done it, the sun will come out and you will have to go through all the rigmarole of getting me out again'.

I have decided that I will just leave it out there for the moment, at least it gives me an excuse not to mow the lawn (and will kill a big patch of grass making it look awful when I eventually have to move it).
Don't even get me started on the frikking lawn!

Weak Chin

My wife insisted last night that my beard is making me look old beyond my years & demanded that I take swift action.
Dutifully I went up to the bathroom and gave it an almost terminal trimming.
I felt quite sad to see it go. I have been cultivating a bushier than usual 'Stroker' over the winter months as it gives me something to do with my fingers when I'm not doodling and (I thought) makes me look cool. I quite enjoy grooming it into interesting horns and shapes with the shower gel during my morning ablutions. Not to mention the simple joy of stroking it slowly whilst people at work talk to me (second only to slightly raising one eyebrow).
But ... sacrifices must be made for the ones we love so there is nothing for it but to give this face sheep a shearing.
I looked at the (more grey than brown) ball of little hairs that I had collected in the middle of a magazine centre spread with a sense of loss. Perhaps I could secretly stash the beard hair in a matchbox somewhere and take it out to look at every now and then to remind me of the beard that once was? I am actually really bad for stuff like this. I kept my old dreadlocks in a plastic bag at my parents house for years after I cut them off and I already have an old pill bottle with all my children's milk teeth in.
No, it's a slightly creepy and disgusting idea. I swallowed my sense of loss and chucked the estranged beard hair into the bathroom bin.

But looking at my face in the mirror with my new 'compact beard', I couldn't help but feel that my chin looked wrong. Without it's mighty cone of manly hair, my chin looks weak and tiny. My face looks badly designed. Like when you play around too much with the character creation menu in a video game and end up with a hero who looks as if their face was sat on when they were a child.

I have to walk around and live my life with this chin...oh God...what am I going to do?
I console myself with the old adage that ' the difference between a bad haircut and a good haircut is about three days' and decide to try and avoid contact with people until it has grown out a bit.
I can probably get away with talking behind my hand and wearing really high polo neck shirts for a while.

Signs & Portents - Happy Nightmares

So ok...this business sells beds and somehow decided that 'Happy Nightmares' was an appropriate name for the business. This is a terrible name for a bed company.
I suspect that they originally wanted to call it 'Sweet Dreams.co.uk' or ' HappySlumbers.co.uk' but quickly found that these domain names were already taken and so ended up casting around for some vaguely sleep related domain name that was still available.

There should really have been a 'proofing stage' at some point here. Some one should have stopped this persons passion project in it's tracks before things go past the point of no return.
I imagine that the conversation might have gone something like this:
- John: So I hear you are setting up a mattress company online Bob. What are you thinking of calling it?

Bob: Well I wanted a name that conveys that we sell beds that will give you a really good nights sleep & I've come up with the perfect name.'Happy nightmares .co.uk'

John: er 'Happy Nightmares' that's what you're going with is it?

Bob: yeah...it says it all 'Happy Nightmares' we can do like a logo with a ghost on our delivery vans and stationary and everything.

John: um, yeah. The thing is that, well, I think you may have missed a bit of a problem there mate.
Bob: really...what do you mean?

John: Well, nightmares...you know. Happy Nightmares. Don't you think that's a bit of an oxymoron?
You're not going to be happy if you're having a nightmare are you. You're going to be waking up in a cold sweat f*#$ing terrified and gasping for air. Is that really the impression that you want to give potential customers when they think about your brand.

Bob: no no...you've got it all wrong. 'Happy nightmares', its a fun subversion of an accepted concept. People are going to love it. It's playful.

John: I've got to say I think you are wrong on this one. You are just going to make people feel creepy. Especially if you put a ghost on the livery. 'Purchase our beds and ensure that you have your sleep nightly disturbed by visions of bloody horsemen galloping through fiery slaughter and death. Our mattresses come with waterproof sheets as they will have you pissing yourself with fear' I just can't see nightmares being a good USP for your business model.

Bob: oh dear...I can start to see what you mean. I never thought of it like that. What on earth am I going to do. I'm already down two grand on the domain name and stationary orders. Oh no. What a nightmare situation.

John: well....what about re branding and selling to a niche market who would appreciate the disturbing connotations.

Bob: you don't mean?

John: Yes...that's right. Goths and Emo's. Those weirdo's will lap it up and probably pay extra into the bargain. Just dress all your staff up like vampires and have a Halloween launch event.

Bob: you're an amazing friend John. You've saved my business!

note pad doodle

I doodled this guy during a long governance meeting this month. Not very happy with how he turned out but I like the shoes!

World Book Doh

So this is the third year in a row that my children have had to take decorated potatoes to school for world book day. I struggle to see the connection personally but, apparently nothing celebrates literary endeavour so much as a badly decorated legume.
The idea is that you decorate the spud to look like a character from a children's book. And so we all move forward together, ships against the current etc.

Now my problem with this is that my children are very small with under developed fine motor skills. Asking them to decorate anything to look like anything is a tall order. This inevitably leads to a situation where my wife and I complete the homework projects for our five and seven year olds so that they do not have to shamefacedly carry their own crappy efforts into school. All the other children's parents have completed their children's homework assignments so that, if any actual children attempted the projects, the results of their labours would only look hopelessly bad by comparison.

Now I don't want my children to be bullied for having inferiorly painted vegetable produce and so I do what any good parent must and break out my paint set.
This is where the rot starts to set in.
You see I used to be quite a dab hand at model making and painting (thank you Warhammer fantasy Battle  for my wasted teenage years and possible lead poisoning). So I end up getting much to involved in the Spuddington Bear model that I am working on. To the degree that I will not allow my children to touch or go near it in case they mess up the miniature suitcase and jar of marmalade that I have lovingly crafted from rigid wall insulation and glue.

When the spud does not achieve a worthy place in the competition, I am more annoyed than my children! After a few years of this, I am understandably pissed off and refuse to lend my genius to the projects anymore. This means that my poor wife was brandishing a paintbrush at 6am in an effort to make a packet of baby potatoes resemble the very hungry caterpillar (second prize by the way!).

Schools, please stop this ridiculous charade. Parents are busy people. We do not have time to paint potatoes or manufacture scale models of Buckingham Palace or scratch build a stethoscope from a balloon and some double sided tape. (This is all genuine crap that we have had to do for homework).
Make a rule that parents are not allowed to support in homework and stop setting small children ridiculous projects that they are clearly incapable of completing.
Accept the rubbish that they bring for what it is. Slightly less valuable than when it was destined for the recycling bin. Stop expecting anything vaguely good.

Otherwise I swear that next world book day I will just magic marker a smiley face on a potato and write a sign next to it saying that it is Mary Poppins. Hey maybe I could stick a cocktail umberella in it too...Maybe some sort of carpet bag...hmmm, I could probably make that if I cut the toe off of an old sock and then use something to make the handle...


OH DAMN!!!

A Turd In the Hand

Picture the scene: an idyllic Brazilian beach. The sun is shining, my children play in the shallow warm surf as hundreds of people parade along the coast for miles in each direction. The tide is out and it's about a kilometre or so back up to the busy kiosks, bins and shops at the top.
Then, disaster strikes! My two year old girl somehow manages to deposit a huge turd into the surf at our feet. I am immediately forced to make a split second decision. Do I ignore the offending fudge monkey (perhaps sweep it out into the waves with an innocent flick of my flip flops), or do I swiftly take ownership of it as any good parent would and clean up the beech? The bins are miles away and there is no option to bury the horrid thing without risking it being dug up again immediately by gulls or other children. To add insult to injury, 'turdenstein' appears to be fairly buoyant. It just keeps floating there in the shallows staring up at me like a tiny brown lilo.

Unfortunately in my moments of frozen indecision, other people have started to notice & remark upon my daughters latest creation. The decision has been taken out of my hands (or rather into my hands).
I manfully reach down and grab the offending item like the responsible parent that I am. But this is just the beginning of my problems. I now face the long lonely walk back up the beach to where the bins/drains etc. are. And the beach is packed out. Umbrella shaded sun worshippers, people selling beer, sweet corn and even one Brazilian maniac who has set up a full meat barbeque on his push bike. He is making his red hot fatty way along the strip selling kebab skewers of un named meat to holiday makers and locals alike.

Many people make eye contact with me as I stride up towards the bins. I return their gaze with what I hope is a reassuringly firm nod which says,
'Yes I am clearly a gringo. Yes this is a ripe  turd that I am clutching in my hand. No this is not something that British people traditionally bring to the beach. No, I am not interested in purchasing an ice cream or coconut from you at this moment in time'.

I finally make it to the palm shaded salvation of the bin area but it is also packed with people. Now the hot embarrassment as I have to wait in line to use the bins without people noticing what I am trying to surreptitiously dispose of.
Eventually I make it and manage to hide the massive douche under a Cornetto wrapper. I wash my hands under the outdoor tap and walk back to my family at the waters edge with my neck burning in shame as much as with the hot afternoon sun.

Ewwwww.....

Since having children, I have been pissed on, thrown up on, kicked in the balls almost daily at times and (on one occasion) hit so hard by my infant son with a metal torch that I almost passed out.
But the time with the turd on holiday is my absolute no holds barred worst experience to date.
What is yours?

Trying to Understand Cars

My car has developed a bumpy wobble at the back.
I have been in denial about it for a month or so. I keep telling myself that the state of the roads in Hertfordshire is just getting worse and worse but the wobble is now so bad that it feels as if I am driving across a dirt track in Africa.

I become stupidly superstitious. I pray and ask God to send angels and take the wobble away but God is silent on the subject. It's as if He expects me to use my own initiative and sort it out rather than blindly using prayer as some kind of metaphysical 'slot machine'.

After another couple of weeks I realise that God is not going to send angels to fix my car in the night and start to really worry about the wobble.
In my mind the potential issues that may be causing it become more and more ludicrously expensive.
I know very little about cars.
I mean, I understand that forward motion is not achieved by a team of hobgoblins under the hood engaging in black magik but, at some level I remain very superstitious about them. I don't really understand what makes them go. They seem to me to be capricious and fantastic creatures which require a delicate balance of incantations and superstitious rituals in order to work .

In the end (when the wobble is so bad that I am too embarrassed to take passengers) I crack and visit a local garage. I am immediately intimidated by the overall clad denizen behind the desk. He is clearly a 'real man' who understands which end of a wrench to hold and doesn't need to look up what type of engine oil to buy in shops.
To offset my embarrassment at the wobble situation, I quickly fall into what I mentally refer to as my 'talking to mechanics' manner. This involves trying to appear competent in regards to vehicular maintenance (whilst probably betraying my total lack of understanding).

'Yeah mate, I'm not sure whats going on with it. It's developed a bit of a wobble in the rear lately. I'm thinking it's maybe the tracking or the Schubert pin. Maybe the drive train is off flange or something'.

He follows me outside and looks at the rear wheels for the briefest of moments.
'Yeah, that's probably the issue' he grins, pointing at the state of the tread on my rear tyres.
I must confess that I had not paid overmuch attention to them recently. Again, this is an area of quiet denial for me (similar to my approach to banking and my blind spot when it comes to the fact that the bin requires emptying).

The tyres are in such an advanced state of wear that I can in fact see the wire sticking through them.
There is no option available other than to throw myself at the garages mercy and ask for immediate new tyres.
Although the situation made me look like a prize plum in front of the 'real men' at the garage. It did serve to give them all a good laugh (I could see them laughing and pointing at my knackered tyres through the glass) & the car is now 'sans wobble'.

Hopefully this will pacify the car into good behaviour for a good while yet. I am currently avoiding looking too hard at my reflection in shop windows when driving at night as have a sneaky suspicion that one of my headlight bulbs needs replacing.

Oh Father, please send now thy angels in this thy child's time of darkness...