belgianwaffle

A trip to the doctor


Posted in: Princess

In we went. The doctor tells me that toddlers are prone to constipation.  Attentive readers will be aware that this is a problem for the Princess at the moment.  It’s a classic thing for her age.  Superb.  He drew diagrams, he chatted, he asked me to prepare an Excel table for our next appointment (he’s obsessed with Excel and its potential).  Throughout this the Princess sobbed convulsively and clung to me pathetically.  When she discovered that he planned to examine her, she nearly choked with rage and distress.  It was all a bit grim.   Anyhow, you’ll be delighted to hear that she thinks the medicine prescribed is delicious and all is improving, so we may not have to go for a scan after all.  Mr. Waffle and I have been debating whose fault this situation might be.
Me: “Well, I’m not anally retentive.”
Him: “Well, whose sister was toilet trained at 9 months?”

1-1 at the moment.

Comments
Friar Tuck

on 07 February 2005 at 17:03

This too shall pass.
on 12 February 2005 at 15:41

Pog, no, no, my sister is the one who was toilet trained at nine months. FT unworthy!

poggle

on 14 February 2005 at 11:39

Oops. Sorry. I got that the wrong way round, huh? Just don’t tell him, okay?

belgianwaffle

on 16 February 2005 at 21:34

Too late, I fear.

Sarcophagic sonnet


Posted in: Reading etc.

“I gaze upon thy paled face
Soon to be entombed in somnolence divine,
O that the knobbed fingers of Death did ever embrace thy soule
And caress thy beauteous form to nature!
I cannot strew thy grave with fragrant petals,
O my love.
For thou encoffin’d and embalmed
In satin shrouds are not to me beloved”

If you’re good, I’ll give you another verse next week. Or would you prefer a couple of lines from “I breathe Byron”?

Comments
Friar Tuck

on 05 February 2005 at 17:46

That’s very, ummm, sonnetty.

belgianwaffle

on 06 February 2005 at 20:26

ChaOtic, too much effort…
FT, um, yes.

poggle

on 07 February 2005 at 16:21

I especially like the ‘knobbed fingers of death’.
And ‘thy paled face’- oooh – new word!
The sentiment is wonderful – ‘I don’t love you now you’re dead’.
More, please.

belgianwaffle

on 12 February 2005 at 15:42

Well, we’ll see…

The war cry of the bureaucrat


Posted in: Mr. Waffle

What do we want?

Reasonable change within an acceptable legal framework as negotiated and agreed by all parties.

When do we want it?

In a reasonable timeframe as appropriate going forward.

Comments
poggle

on 02 February 2005 at 11:25

Catchy ….

Friar Tuck

on 02 February 2005 at 17:42

You’d need a lawyer’s lung power for that.

belgianwaffle

on 05 February 2005 at 14:57

I’m glad you all like it. FT, I presume that’s a compliment.

menace

on 08 February 2005 at 19:53

Ha ha. Recall Gordon Brown’s budget soundbite during the heyday of the Spice Girls:I’ll tell you what I want, what I really, really want: measured, sustainable growth.

poggle

on 09 February 2005 at 11:28

Oh lord – I’d forgotten about that. Cringemaking, wasn’t it?

belgianwaffle

on 12 February 2005 at 15:40

Menace, pog, never heard it – exceptional. Thank you.

Belgian colour supplements


Posted in: Belgium, Reading etc.

Le Soir had a sex supplement on Saturday. I ask you. In colour.

I was perusing an article and asked my loving spouse “What does “partouze” mean?

An orgy. I actually had to look it up.

You mean you didn’t know?

No.

And you are talking to our daughter in French, how will she ever learn proper French, if you don’t know the word for orgy?

(Pause) I’ll leave that for you to decide.

And then there was an interview with Claire, parisienne, who throws orgies. She is described as being, and I quote “adepte du ‘night fucking at home'”.

Me: Isn’t it odd given the variety of French vocabulary in relation to sex that they use an English expression?

Mr. Waffle: I am sure that even as we speak the Académie française is working on an appropriate translation.

Comments
Bobble

on 01 February 2005 at 23:47

I am sure they are Mr & Mrs Waffle. After all the dreaded e-word had to be got rid of (email).

dmts

on 02 February 2005 at 08:44

I love that.

poggle

on 02 February 2005 at 11:25

Well, farque me!

Friar Tuck

on 02 February 2005 at 17:47

Gaaa! My eyes, my eyes!
But seriously, in Italy I saw a whole section of jeans labeled “F**king Jeans”. I wondered why you need special jeans for that activity?

lauren35

on 02 February 2005 at 21:31

as opposed to ‘day f***ing’ then?

Bobble

on 02 February 2005 at 23:25

Italians unlike the dear French are lazy buggers (speaking as one myself). We just add an Italian article and you have a suitable word. Lo Shopping, Il Weekend, Lo Sport, Il Cinema, Il Bar. Easy.

belgianwaffle

on 05 February 2005 at 14:53

Beth, you are so right, there’s a reason why you Americans rule the world.
Bobble, you have to admire the Italians delightful indifference to this kind of thing.
HJB, we aim to please.
Pog, I doubt that’s what the academie will go for.
Lauren, you have this in Paris also?
FT, sorry…

Belgian Disharmony


Posted in: Belgium

Have I mentioned that it is the 175th anniversary of the foundation of the Belgian state? To celebrate this, let me tell you a little anecdote which gives a flavour of life among the linguistically fractious Belgians. During the week I met my friend the orchestra director for lunch. She used to do policing in Albania but she turned to orchestra directing when work there dried up – now there’s a woman with a second string to her bow (no pun intended, she plays the French horn, since you ask).

Anyhow, her orchestra has been doing a bit of work for the conservatoire – helping them out with their conducting exams. The session is run like a real rehearsal and the student conducts, stops, offers advice and suggestions and conducts some more. The conservatoire used to use the Belgian National Orchestra for this important work but they found my friend’s orchestra more satisfactory. Picture the following scene, if you will. Nervous student conducts BNO. Pauses and makes comments on playing. Trumpeter raises his hand and asks coldly “Can you repeat that in Flemish please?” You can see why the poor students might be put off.

Sick again, eh?


Posted in: Princess, Reading etc.

Herself has a cough. We were all up all night. She is very sorry for herself and keeps saying “poor me, poor mite, cough, cough”. She has also observed “Mummy sick, Daddy sick”. Yes, we’re all coughing. This morning while I had my shower, Mr. Waffle minded her. I came out to find him curled up in a ball on the floor beside the playpen wherein the Princess sat poking him and saying imperiously “plasticene”. We’re all tired too.Nothing daunted, the Princess and I went off to mass (“church ‘n Jesus ‘n Mary ‘n Joseph”). On our way there, we passed the synagogue. There is always a policeman with a machine gun across the road from the synagogue but today, the place was crawling with police and plain clothes types with things stuck in their ears. I asked a policewoman who was fiddling with the strap on her submachine gun what was going on. Apparently there was a special service for the 60th anniversary of the holocaust. Is it not a bit depressing that 60 years after the holocaust the Jewish community in Belgium needs half the Brussels police force out to protect them when going to the synagogue?

And while we’re on the subject, I note that the Irish President said something spectacularly stupid when speaking of the holocaust (which is not all like her). I quote from that organ of record, the Irish Examiner “Speaking on RTɒs Morning Ireland programme on Thursday, ahead of attending the Auschwitz remembrance ceremony in Poland, Mrs McAleese said “They [the Nazis] gave to their children an irrational hatred of Jews in the same way that people in Northern Ireland transmitted to their children an irrational and outrageous hatred, for example, of Catholics.” ”

Oh good grief. She has at least had the good sense to abjectly apologise.

Comments
poggleon 31 January 2005 at 11:46

I must add that, in my view extremely rarely for a politician, she did sound genuinely contrite.