Lollipox and Poison

The world has gone completely mad. No, I’m not talking about the Eurozone crisis. I was reading the paper this afternoon over a bowl of soup and a roll, when two articles I read jumped out at me, slapped me round the face with their utter lunacy, and irritated me for the rest of the day.

Ridiculous Article Number 1

Some genius in America has come up with an idea to help parents who are keen for their precious little ones to catch chicken pox at an early age in the belief that it’s less serious when caught young. No, it’s not parties where people are invited to mingle with pox-ridden children in the hope that they catch it too - apparently these are already quite common place. No, it’s one giant American step further than that. She is selling ‘lollipox’ on the internet. Catchy name hey? Well these little beauties are certinaly ‘catchy’ – they’re  lollies that have been licked by a pox-infected minor. Yes, you heard me correctly. Oh and not only is she selling germ-covered lollies, she’s charging about £30 a pop!! Speechless!

Ridiculous Article Number 2

A certain lady who writes for a well-known paper has a column in which she regularly rants, raves and ridicules people. Today, she turned her wrath on women. Or more specifically, women who have the audacity to take maternity leave or have days off sick.  Firstly she vents about receiving an out of office reply with a maternity leave message with a list of alternative contacts. Then, she raves about some poor contact of hers who has been off unwell for a few days. Now, what really got my goat about this was that after explaining the scenario, she went on to say “I just don’t understand the lack of work ethic in young women today”. Er, hang on a sec, isn’t that a bit of a dramatic leap?? She then ends this poisonous article by concluding “if ever I employ a woman again, I’ll make jolly sure she’ll have already gone through the menopause”. Great, well that’s a wonderfully rational comment isn’t it? And so helpful for women everywhere who work their arses off every day competing with men in the workplace. Oh by the way,  did I mention that the journalist who wrote this recently admitted to trying to trick her partners into getting her pregnant when she was younger.  She failed. But maybe her articles would have been more pleasant had she succeeded.

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Birthdays, Ageing and Rambling

Well hello there, it’s been a while hasn’t it. But listen it’s not you, it’s me. No really. You see it’s been busier than usual in our house recently; one step down from full-on chaos really. But what event could possibly have been more important than blogging I hear you cry. Well, it was Toddler-Not-So-Tiny-Temper’s 3^rd birthday last week. Yes, she’s 3 years old! Who can believe it? In my head I like to think I look young enough to have a sibling of 3 as opposed to a child of 3, but obviously I don’t - the signs that I’ve aged somewhat have become rather apparent recently:

1)      I haven’t been id’d whilst buying session-sized bottles of wine for years

2)     A white van slowed down to a stop next to me as I was loading the car and instead of wolf whistling, shouting out a cheeky comment or giving me a saucy wink,  the builder-type inside asked me where I got my clever swivel-child seat from ‘as the missus has knackered her back you see’

3)     When I stop frowning, my lines are still there

4)     I hear myself repeating phrases my mother used to say: “Have you washed your hands darling? You have. Ok,  well let me smell the soap on them then”

5)     I couldn’t hear what a friend was saying in a busy bar recently and found myself doing the ‘grandpa’ hand cup around the ear. Why do they have the music on so loudly in these places nowadays anyway?

6)     I use the word ‘nowadays’

7)     Flicking through a clothing catalogue, it wasn’t the chic wrap tops or sexy fitted dresses that excited me, it was the oh-so-cosy cashmere bed socks

8)     My knees click when I crouch down

And the final sign: I ramble off the point with ease and frequency. You see I started this post to tell you about Toddler-Not-So-Tiny-Temper’s 3^rd birthday – the wasp sting in the morning, the excitement of Legoland, the 3-day winter sick bug, the new bike, the lovely party etc but I appear to have wandered off into a list of the signs of ageing. Hey ho, I’ll have to tell you about the birthday another time. Until then…..

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Cheering on National Chocolate Week!

Hooray, yippee, it’s National Chocolate Week this week!!! Ha-ha, who knew such a glorious week existed? And how have I, a hardened chocoholic, never known about this before?? Now we are all aware of it, let’s do our very best to make up for the Monday we missed and scoff ourselves silly for the rest of this week.

In honour of this occasion, I have compiled a few thoughts on what life would be like if we did not have the wonder that is chocolate:

1)      Dunking biscuits would be significantly less satisfying

2)     We would never have a break, or be able to work, rest and play, or take it easy, and what would the Ambassador spoil us with?

3)     We’d have to suffer longer hangovers without the mighty Mars Bar at our side

4)     An 99 ice cream would just be a 98, or a 9 or a 1 or something

5)     They would be no Milk Tray man

6)     I would be insufferable (yes, I’m big enough to admit it)

7)     We women would lose our wonderful curves and we’d basically be hairless men with no bottoms or boobs to speak of

8)     We’d have nothing to bribe our children with

9)     Profiteroles would be rubbish

10)  So would Jaffa Cakes

So in summary, all hail the fabulous chocolate. Life is so much better with it around!

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Ditch the Car and Bring on The Bike

No, I’ve not gone all green and save-the-worldy; I’ve got enough day-to-day concerns to be dealt with before I can worry about what may happen to the world if I keep using my secret stash of 100 watt light bulbs and having luxuriously deep baths. It’s just that I’ve fallen out of love with driving lately. I am a loud and proud Skoda driver (the Yeti, it’s ace!) but a couple of recent occurrences have taken away the fun of the open road.

1) I have now hit 9 penalty points on my licence for speeding. Oh come on, don’t get tut-tutty with me. All high-speed offences were conducted safely away from schools, zebra crossings and old ladies.

2) My car insurance went up ASTRONOMICALLY as a result. You’d have thought I’d just admitted to moonlighting as a get-away driver the amount they want me to pay.

3) I was half a minute longer than planned in a café in my small, local town and was slapped with a £50 parking fine (£25 if I send the money in the next 3 minutes). Whose bright idea was it to give parking wardens a bonus scheme??

4) When parking in a residential street recently for Toddler-Not-So-Tiny-Temper’s swimming lesson, I had a run-in with the local busybody. Before I had even put the hand brake on, I was confronted by a furious old bat who had tweaked her net curtain as I arrived and scurried straight out. She banged on my window and told me that by parking there (in a perfectly legal spot), I was going to make it hard for her to turn into her drive (which, unless she drives a Challenger 2 tank was not clearly not true). Before I could even draw breath, she had promised to take photos and send them to the council. She was so aggressive that it got my hackles up, and I told her to take all the photos she desired and send them to the Prime Minister for all I cared, and then flounced off.

Where once I was foot-down and fancy free in my super speed machine, I am now driving like bloody Mary Poppins, keeping religiously to the speed limit, not daring to park in car parks, or on residential roads, or to overtake, or to even think about unwrapping a sweet whilst in the car for fear of what may happen. On a daily basis I have to put up with tail-gaters, light-flashers and flipping-me-the-finger-drivers as I cruise carefully at 30 miles per hour, hands on the wheel in the ten-to-two position as taught, and frankly I’ve had enough.  So, I’ve ditched the car and unearthed instead my rusty steed. I’ve removed the resident spiders, fitted the child seat, and am now a fully fledged cyclist (albeit not in Lycra). Yes, it’s 2 wheels for me from now on. Toddler-Not-So-Tiny-Temper loves it, there is no way that I could ever be accused of speeding even going downhill and with a favourable wind behind me, and by next summer I’ll have a beach body to die for. Ting-ting!

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Working Mum's Fantabulous Rent-A-Sibling Service

Toddler-Not-So-Tiny-Temper fell in love last weekend. Friends came to stay with their adorable children Girl (aged 8) and Boy (aged 11) and within minutes she was totally smitten. She flirted with Boy, giggled with Girl, had a grass fight in the newly-mown field over the road and didn’t stop laughing all weekend. Never mind the 5-8 year age gap, they all had a ball. When it came to bedtime, Toddler-Not-So-Tiny-Temper insisted on holding Girl’s hand whilst having her teeth brushed and it was Girl that was called upon for the last goodnight kiss.

Whilst this hero-worship was lovely to see, it also had an astounding side effect. From the time they arrived to the moment they left, Toddler-Not-So-Tiny-Temper was a whole new girl. She was well-mannered, and didn’t fuss about putting on her coat/going to the loo/not having another biscuit. We had no tantrums, no tears, she truly was a girl transformed! If she had continued that behaviour, I would have been forced to change her name to Toddler-Ray-of-Sunshine! She was glorious. Now don’t get me wrong, she is lovely anyway, but there’s normally a toddler fuss at some point in the day. Not so last weekend. She couldn’t have behaved better; it was as if Super Nanny had arrived and waved her magic wand over her.

With the children all happily playing, we had the novelty of reading the papers all the way through uninterrupted, starting a conversation and not missing any of it, and drinking wine in the afternoon without grubby toddler fingers trying to dip in and taste some. Ah, I thought, if only she had older siblings our weekends would be like this all the time. And then came the light-bulb moment – Rent-A-Sibling. It’s genius! One family have bored school-agers and another family has testing toddlers. Mix and match and you’ve got the perfect scenario! You heard it hear first, Working Mum’s Fantabulous Rent-A-Sibling Service. What are you waiting for? Sign your children up now!

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Whisper Words of Wisdom

A child psychologist I met at a recent wedding told me that all a child really needs in life is self-confidence and the knowledge that they have a loving, stable home. No expensive education, posh holidays, funky gizmos and gadgets; as long as they have the top two, they will succeed and be happy as they grow and develop.

Fine, you say, I can give my child that. A loving family? Tick. But how do you really give your child unlimited confidence? Coo enthusiastically over their finger-paintings? Marvel at their play-dough prowess? Applaud wildly at their recitation of Incy Wincy spider? Will that work? Is it enough?

Well I’m not taking any chances. No, I’ve come up with another way. I plan to harness the power of sleep and positive messages. Now, I have to confess at this stage that I tried something similar for my A levels many moons ago with an old walkman and a recording of French vocab. It failed dismally. Still, it can do no harm to try.  So this is what I’m doing; every night when I go up to bed, I creep into Toddler-Not-So-Tiny-Temper’s room, smooth her ruffled hair and whisper sweet nothings to her – how much she is loved, how special she is, how lucky we are to have her, what a fantastic mother she has (ahem!!)….. Anyway, the idea is that all this goodness will seep into the very core of her whilst she sleeps, and will help develop a healthy sense of self.

Will this work? Who knows! But I’ll keep you posted……

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Welcome, Welcome

Hello and welcome to misroc&babyroc and Officer Mummy. Very nice to see you here. Any tips on dealing with inquisitive toddlers greatly appreciated!! x