belgianwaffle

Archives for December 2006

Clearly, our receptionist had been at the gingerbread.


Posted in: Princess

Email from a good friend describing a telephone call to our house:

Princess: Hellooo?

Me: Is that the Princess?

Her (delighted): Yes!! It is!!
Me: Is Mummy there, Princess?

Her: Emm, yes. Who are you?

Friend tells the Princess her name.

Her: What? I don’t know that name…(mumble, sings a little)

Me: I’m a friend of Mummy’s. Is she there? Can you get her?

M: I don’t knoooow.
Me(trying new approach): Is Daddy there?

Her: I don’t know. Bye.

She hung up in boredom at around that point. But she sounds very like you when she says hello.

The very thoughtful and suspicious way in which she said she didn’t know that name was rather disturbing (no, that name is not on our records, do you have a file number?)I see a future as a visa officer in the Dept of Justice…or the Indian Embassy perhaps.

Can we add some more Spring, Mr. Hardy?


Posted in: Reading etc.

When I was last at home in Cork, I picked up a second-hand poetry anthology which I keep by my bed. It was originally owned by a 14 year old girl who has annotated the poems which she had to learn for school. The poems are divided up by theme. In the section on seasons, there is a poem by Thomas Hardy, “Weathers”. I feel it’s fair to say that Thomas Hardy is not the most obscure of poets, he pretty much says what he means.

The first stanza of “Weathers” goes as follows:

This is the weather the cuckoo likes,
And so do I;
When showers betumble the chestnut spikes,
And nestlings fly;
And the little brown nightingale bills his best,
And they sit outside at ‘The Traveller’s Rest,’
And maids come forth sprig-muslin drest,
And citizens dream of the south and west,
And so do I.

Beside this in rounded, firm handwriting, our student has written the word “Spring”. Indeed.

What happened to you?


Posted in: Siblings, Youngest Child

My sister is here for the weekend. She’s visiting from India. It’s the first time I’ve seen her since April. So, you know how it is, I wanted to make a good impression. This must be why the gods saw fit to bless me with conjunctivitis in both eyes. They were hideously bloodshot but, on the plus side that wasn’t very visible because my eyes were mostly obscured by under eye puffiness. The icing on the cake came when Michael decided to head butt me in the eye, thereby giving my right eye puffiness a range of exciting colours. We had a number of Christmas parties this weekend where the first inevitable question was what happened to you? Even the beggars outside the church asked me what happened to me. Alas.

In other sister news, she brought an avalanche of presents, cooked us dinner, minded our children and was generally wonderful. Ah, the joys of outsourcing our childcare to India. She’s finally growing to love India despite her best efforts and, to my utter amazement, she’s thinking of buying a flat near Chandigarh.

She also brought a number of brochures to explain what she does to our mother when she goes on to Cork. These were a source of immense amusement. My sister works for a well-known company that makes a well-know confectionary item which I am sure you have all tasted; let’s pretend it’s called Yummy. She is in charge of a project to bring a particular computer system to the Indian branches of Yummy.  This is how the project logo is described in the newsletter:

“The logo has the colors of the Indian flag (orange, white and green). These are arranged like 3 rivers meeting the Yummy globe. Sangam is a Sanskrit word and signifies the confulence of three most sacred river in India – The holy Ganges, the Ymuna and the mythical Saraswati. This is represented in the logo. Sangam not only signifies the meeting of holy rivers, it also signifies the meeting of millions of people, of ideas and of ancient wisdom.

Sangam also marks the confulence of Yummy India with the rest of the Yummy world, binding the two organisations together with the same culture, processes, policies or in one single religion viz the Yummy way. By virtue of this great objective, this project assumes the same paramount importance for the Yummy world as Sangam for Hindus and hence the title.”

If you ask me, that’s hoping for a lot from sweeties.

And finally, I forgot to mention, my third blogging anniversary passed earlier in the month. Who’d have thought I had the staying power? This must make me a blogging grandmother.

Curmudgeonly


Posted in: Reading etc.

A while ago, the fair Dooce was assailed by her many nice middle class readers for laughing at the concept of free range chicken soup. At this point, I would like to remark that I am not in favour of hurting animals, I would like them to lead full happy lives right up to the moment they killed painlessly for me to eat. I sound like I’m being sarcastic, but I’m not.

What struck me forcibly about this is the superior tones that people like to employ when reprimanding on this topic. I regard them as fellow travellers with the green lobby. Yes, I would like to save the planet, really. No, I am not going to stop sending Christmas cards or wrapping Christmas presents because it’s more sustainable. Nor am I going to give my children Christmas presents of goats in Africa or artificial limbs for amputees. It’s not that I don’t think these are good causes, I just don’t think they are good Christmas presents. Dear God, to hear people’s reactions I might as well be advocating the reinstatement of the death penalty. When I drive to work, I get reproving looks. Only the fact that I have two small children to deliver to the creche, saves me from complete disgrace. And sometimes, when I leave the room, I let the light on, oh yes I do.

Do you remember the 1980s (those born since 1983 need not respond) when greens were all people with socks and sandals? Well, now they’ve all been proved right. The London intelligensia love green issues. They fill the papers with it. UK government policy is full of it. EU policy is full of it. Al Gore made a wildly successful film about it. And boy are the environmental lobby (increasingly, I concede, beginning to look like everybody except me, George Bush and a couple of Texas oil billionaires) condescending in victory. They’re always offering patronising tips to the less enlightened like “make sure that you always use all the ink in your biro; if everyone did this then the ice caps wouldn’t be melting”.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to wrap my Christmas presents.

Lousy


Posted in: Family

We travelled back to Ireland yesterday and the journey was utterly hideous.  Huge queues in Brussels airport meant that we were still edging through security at the moment our flight was due to take off.  The Princess was difficult, casting herself on the ground sobbing thus creating the very real risk that we would lose our place in the mob or queue.  Mr. Waffle was grinding his teeth and the boys were howling.  When we got to security, we had this liquid in plastic bags business and we had to fold the buggy and put it through the machine and I had to take off my boots (stupid footwear choice).  Ah yes, the war on tourism, continues.

Safely through security we legged it to our flight, me carrying herself, Mr. Waffle pushing the boys and our mountain of handluggage.  Once on the plane (yay!), the flight was full without a single empty seat.  We were sitting in 3A, 3B and accross the aisle 3D.  We can’t sit together as there are only 4 oxygen masks for every three seats.  I asked the matronly immaculately dressed woman in 3C whether she would like to sit by the window “No, I prefer the aisle and I’ve already had to move to accommodate you”.  Not entirely sure why this should be the case but it meant that we had this large cranky lady sitting in the middle of our family group.  At one level I sympathise, but would it have killed her to have smiled?  For the duration of the flight, I had to keep Michael and the Princess from disturbing her (near impossible) and Mr. Waffle and I had to keep passing supplies across her, which she clearly enjoyed immensely.  If it hadn’t been for a lovely woman in the row behind distracting Michael and the Princess with the odd game of peekaboo, I might have lost my life.

While I was balefully contemplating the large newspaper reading, perfectly coiffed, mohair clad, ray of sunshine at the end of the row, something caught my eye.  Dear God in heaven, oh yes, those were enormous lice wending their merry way up and down the Princess’s fringe.  My immediate comfort was the knowledge that they were very likely to be attracted to the large mohair lady.

The flight finally ended and the mohair lady turned to the Princess and said “you were such a good little girl on the flight, would you like this?” and gave her an enormous gingerbread heart and I felt so mean for judging her and also for probably giving her lice for Christmas.

We are now holed up with my marvellous in-laws for the Christmas season.  It is babysitting heaven here.  And following a full inspection of the Princess’s head which was teeming with life, we have bought anti-lice shampoo (“Lice n’ easy”) and a fine tooth comb.  I also regret to report that adults do get head lice.

I would like to wish you all a safe journey, if you are travelling, and a wonderful and louse free Christmas.  You know that they only like clean hair, don’t you?

Louse update


Posted in: Family, Mr. Waffle, Princess

Mr. Waffle pulled 18 dead bodies from the Princess’s head yesterday.  This is the third application of the patented remedy. They love her.  It’s mutual.  On Christmas morning, she asked anxiously  “will there be presents for the little animals that live in my hair?”  Alas, no.  Just death and destruction.  Lice get very little of the Christmas spirit.  My sister-in-law the publishing exec who has glossy hair reaching well below her shoulders was a little alarmed to find the Princess poking and peering at it and only mildly relieved to hear her highness announce “I’m looking for animals in your hair but I can’t find any”.
On Christmas morning, with considerable effort, we managed to get the whole family to mass.  Mr. Waffle looked round dolefully and said “I know these people, they look like me, they sound like me and I know what they’re thinking, they’re my tribe; I can just never afford to live near them”.  Since you ask, yes, the Dublin housing market continues buoyant.  The children’s mass also presented the spectacle of a number of kiddies on the altar whose birthdays were in December.  Girls too; I’m sure the pope would be appalled, if he knew.  The priest asked “what’s your name?” “Jack” said the scion of the middle classes. “And when’s your birthday?”, he continued “I don’t know” said Jack who obviously hasn’t been hothoused as much as other candidates.  The next child did a little better, his name was Adam.  “And when’s your birthday?” asked the priest. “I was born tomorrow” said Adam proudly.  Do you think they all got lice for their birthdays?