belgianwaffle

Mr. Waffle

Weekend


Posted in: Belgium, Family, Mr. Waffle

On Sunday morning we went to Mr. Waffle’s god-daughter’s first communion.  She is half-Italian, half-Scottish but her first communion was all Italian.  It is very odd to be in Italy in Belgium.  We were all dressed up in our best clothes (suits ties, dresses, high heels, new shoes) but you always feel under-dressed beside well-dressed Italians.  The service was lovely and I did think it would be nice to go to mass in a church like this where there was a real sense of community.  I was also quite impressed by the robes the communicants wore (sort of like junior monks in white or as her mother put it, klu klux klan).  In Ireland, little girls dress up like miniature brides (as I did with great delight in my day) in expensive white dresses and I feel that it undermines the spirituality of the occasion and also leads to quite extraordinary expense (see how middle aged I am?).   We went back to the first communicant’s house for brunch after mass and I was most impressed to see that not only had her Italian grandparents come from Rome along with her aunt and uncle and three cousins aged 3,2 and 9 months but also her Scottish grandparents from Lewis which is a long way from Brussels and also pretty darn Protestant.  And it was the middle of the lambing season too (the communicant’s grandfather having spent a satisfactory career in Glasgow as a dentist retired with his wife to the island where he was brought up and bought a sheep farm – impressed?).  In our ex-pat Brussels world, we don’t often go to family celebrations as families are so scattered and there was something really lovely about this occasion.  Also, the sun shone.

In the afternoon we went to my friend A’s house.  He is a consultant by day and training to be a chef by night and was having a “mad hatter’s tea party”.  We arrived to a house filled with canapés and afternoon tea delights.  We had obeyed my friend’s instructions and turned up in costume: the king and queen of hearts, Alice and no prizes for guessing who got to be stereotyped as Tweedledum and Tweedledee.  It was all very pleasant having scones with jam and clotted cream in the sun while the children negotiated the dizzyingly dangerous excitements of a bachelor pad (spiral stairs with open banisters! kitchen appliances at just the right height for little fingers! building materials in a side passage! balcony with parapet at knee height!).

I feel our social life has reached new heights.

Mr. Waffle’s quotes of the week


Posted in: Mr. Waffle

The meeting of the logistics committee was suspended for an ad hoc emergency session of the vomit committee.
On having to abandon our discussion on what was happening during the following week to deal with Daniel getting sick.

Sure, as long as it’s fair trade recycled non-bleach eco-cotton.
On being told by his eco-terrorist wife that she would like one of these.

I have to struggle against terrible prejudice.
On being told by the Princess’s teacher that for her majesty’s birthday, his wife should make a smallish cake for the class. He makes the cakes here.

Ah excellent, competency based child-rearing; this will stand her in good stead, if the current interview fad lasts – tell me, what did you do to achieve the result described.

On being told about an interesting article (via this entertaining blog) which says that we should be specific in the praise we give our children, e.g. not you played really well but that was a great pass you made in the second half that led to a goal.

Stalking


Posted in: Mr. Waffle, Reading etc.

So, you know Dooce (and, as I once memorably read somewhere, if you don’t, you’re my mother, so please call me, I want to talk to you). Well, I read Dooce and once I got a reply to an email from her and I kept it in my inbox for ages even though I normally delete email so fast that I find myself rooting around in deleted items for flight confirmations. I’ve never been a fan of anyone before (no interest in musicians, no particular interest in authors, only their output, little interest in the private lives of actors or other random famous people), but I am now. It is disconcerting.

Anyhow, a while ago, she said that she had seen herself as one of the five top bloggers in the Observer and she was pleased. I deduced that, what with living in Salt Lake City and that, she did not have a copy of the Observer in her sweaty little paw as I did. So, I decided to send her my copy of the Observer magazine in an attempt to win her heart. This is the kind of thing fans do.

Mr. Waffle and I went to the post office together (the family that posts together stays together or something like that). We had the following conversation.

Mr. Waffle: What’s this?

Me (embarrassed): It’s the Observer for Dooce [insert explanation re bloggers article] – she said she was interested.

Him : That’s nice, she emailed and asked if you’d post it and you’re sending it to her.

Me (failing to explain that I’ve only ever had the one email and, in fact, this is an entirely unsolicited and, perhaps, slightly creepy act of goodwill); Mmm.

Post office lady weighing the envelope: That will be 9 euros.

Me and him (yelping): 9 Euros!

Post office lady (apologetically): It’s a non-standard size.

Him: Could we sellotape over the edge?

Her: Well, you used to be able to do that but now they don’t accept that, it’s the European norm.

Me: Could we buy a standard size envelope here?

Her (apologetically) : No, the envelopes we have on sale are not standard European size.[I am not making this up].

My lovely husband: Feck it, we’ll send it anyway, go on, I’ll pay for it.

All I can say is, I hope that when I find out her address and we go to visit her in Salt Lake City, she will put us all up. Do you think that she’s scared?

Mr. Waffle’s quotes of the week


Posted in: Mr. Waffle

They must be very excited in the Canaries.

On being told by his wife that the Spanish government plans that all major Spanish cities would be only two hours by rail from Madrid and that no place in the country would be more than an hour by rail from a major city (information which she had on the authority of the 22 year old trainee who clearly hadn’t thought it through either).

Not only have you endorsed this weird new religion, but you’ve made her its high priestess.

On discovering that despite the fact that the Easter bunny never came to Cork or Dublin, he is now a feature of our lives brought home by the Princess from school and necessitating a panicked run to the video shop to buy up egg shaped sweets at 10.30 pm on Easter Saturday.

I guess, [pause] I mean, I suppose.

On being asked whether he thinks our daughter has started speaking in an American accent because we let her watch too much television.

There’s never a good time to start toilet training but I would have thought 3,000 metres up in the Alps would be a particularly bad time.

On being told by his loving wife that we really must start toilet training Michael now as he goes into the bathroom and takes off his nappy when he wants to do a wee. Have I mentioned that we’re going skiing tomorrow for a week?  There will be no blogging until we get back unless all the snow melts. How much are we looking forward to the 6 hour train ride?  Yes, that much.

Being an expatriate


Posted in: Belgium, Mr. Waffle, Princess

Me: We have a new government, I heard it on the radio on the way home.

Him: We who?

Me: We Belgium.  And there’s a woman Minister for Foreign Affairs, Karen something or other.

Him: Karel De Gucht?

Me: Yes, that’s it.

Him: He’s a man and he’s the one who was Minister for Foreign Affairs before.

In other news, the Princess and all her little friends wore their pyjamas to school yesterday and got dressed and had breakfast in the classroom. It was the best thing ever.

Hubris


Posted in: Mr. Waffle

I am constantly in search of presents for Mr. Waffle because he is difficult to buy for and Christmas and birthdays come round every year with monotonous regularity.

A couple of months ago, I saw that he had cut out from the paper a book review so, stealthily, I went to the bookshop and ordered the book.   I paid for it, I had it gift wrapped and I stashed it in the bottom of the wardrobe.

A short time ago, we were going through our piles of stuff on the desk and I innocently picked up the review and said: “ooh what’s this?”

“It’s a review of a book set in Brussels and I thought it looked interesting” he said.  Cue much inner glee and outward indifference on my part.  “But you can throw it out, I looked at some sample pages of the book on the internet and it’s really dull”.

He got it today anyway and expressed suitable (but, presumably, utterly feigned) enthusiasm.

It probably wouldn’t be so bad, if he didn’t keep buying me perfect presents.