Tube games

On the occasional days where Steve and I journey into work together on the Northern Line (like this morning) I like to play one of several little games to amuse myself during the 5 stop ride.

When we get on the tube, we’re normally in a morning fuzzy headed mood, and neither of us are particularly animated. In fact, you’d be hard pushed to even place us as a couple given the lack of communication. Steve will sit and whizz through his blackberry, saving up a back log of messages to send when he hits ground level. I’ll listen to some inappropriate rap music and feel young again for 10 minutes and we happily ignore each other. This is all well and good and none of our commuting compadres have any clue that we’re a couple.

The fun bit comes when it’s time for either Steve or I to get off. What we have honed to a fine art is the practice of the dramatic goodbye kiss. This comes out of the blue, and is delivered without any chat, just a lunge coupled with a full blown smacker on the lips and then…gone.

The look of surprise on people’s faces is priceless as they try and work out whether I’ve just been assaulted and they should be chasing after Steve, or whether they’ve witnessed love at first sight. Responses have ranged from ‘Do you know him?’, to jaws hitting the floor and general disgust at such an overt PDA.

The other extremely childish thing I enjoy doing is the copy game. This only really works when we end up in seats directly opposite each other and involves- you guessed it- me copying everything Steve does. Try it. I guarantee within a couple of minutes you’ll both be in hysterics crying with laughter, either that or one of you will have a black eye (this was the inevitable outcome when I used to play the copy game with my big brother- and on one occasion a nose bleed). It’s brilliant as fellow tube passengers can’t help but cotton on and have a giggle as well.

Lets face it, everyone with a sibling played the copy game at some point in their lives, so why not at 29 years old, during rush hour?

How about we all try doing it with a stranger on our next public transport journey and collate all of the reactions?*

*the author of this blog is not liable in any way shape or form for any grievous bodily harm inflicted as a result of the copy game, play at your own risk.

Home alone.

It’s very unusual for me to face the prospect of a weekend entirely without plans. I guess this is the complacency/luxury of having a boyfriend or girlfriend- you can put very little (or no) thought into what you might do whilst safe in the assumption that you can do nothing with your someone by your side.

This weekend Steve is venturing up to Leeds to spend some quality time with his newly single best friend Rob. I imagine their weekend will consist of plentiful beer drinking, high brow sporting discussions and a handful of ogling thrown in for good measure. I on the other hand got to mid week and suddenly panicked that I had nothing to do, and all my friends seem to be heading off somewhere or other. Eeek.

You may have gathered, being left on my own for more than 2 hours is about as palatable as a 30 day old prawn recovered from a dustbin on a very sticky hot day. I’m the kind of person who if left alone for more than 24 hours would probably end up rocking back and forth and staring blankly at the wall. It’s torturous. Don’t get me wrong, a rare evening on the sofa doing nails or hair is bliss but only if basking in the aftermath of some serious socialising. Two nights of nothing on the trot and I start to feel like a social outcast, any more and I fear I’d lose the power to communicate. I’d become one of those forest people, crawling on all fours, howling and cocking my leg. Shudder.

Thankfully tonight, I’m armed with a hangover so all I’m going to manage is a couple of drinks and then some serious sofa time watching trashy re-runs which normally wouldn’t be tolerated. Perhaps Steve going away isn’t so bad after all.

What’s the betting it all gets extremely out of hand whilst I’m away from his watchful eye and nurturing hand…

Wibble.

I have a special word for when things aren’t quite right with the world- I’m sure I’m not the only one to use it, but it’s a special Ali word in my mind.

Sometimes you can’t put your finger on what’s wrong. Sometimes there’s nothing really wrong, you just get this sense of impending doom, or a niggling worry, or a feeling that something just isn’t quite right. You wake up and you have something and, at the very same time, nothing on your mind. If you try and reason with the feeling, you get nowhere. It’s a continuous loop of inexplicable feelings.

I call this: Wibble.

Some days when I wake up and Steve looks at me and he just knows I’m having a wibble. He says, ‘Are you feeling wibbly?’ and invariably I say, ‘Yes.’

Wibbles are easily curable with very simple remedies of attention, cuddles and squeezes. You never really know why a wibble came, and you are never really aware of it leaving. It’s a day release lodger in your mind. When it goes you’re not sad to see it leave, in fact, you’re rather pleased and you hope it won’t come back again at any time soon.

My mum was very familiar when the concept of wibbles when she was suffering with depression. In fact her Community Psychiatric Nurse Stella posted her a plan with what to do on a normal day, and then what to do on a ‘wibbly’ day. The wibbly day meant a massive downscaling of effort- staying in, listening to radio, gentle walks, chats on the phone, you get the idea. The non-wibbly day would mean trips out with friends, shopping, trip to a museum etc.

I think I ought to apply this same concept on myself. Wibbly days should be met with introverted behaviour, reading, listening to my ipod and not being overly chatty. Keeping your head down and trying to go unnoticed is the easiest way to cope with a wibble in the absence of cuddle therapy.

In case you hadn’t guessed, I’m having a wibbley wobble today, but it’s ok. I have notified the powers that be and cuddles are on hand to be despatched this evening, along with some hard core snuggling.

Good bye my unwelcome friend, I bid you farewell.

The Birthday brat

Tonight is the beginning of the birthday festivities, or 'ali-day' as I call it.

There's a special song I sing to Steve on my birthday

'It's Ali, Ali-day
Do what I want
And do what I say
On Ali Ali-day
I always get my way'

You get the picture, basically, I'm a brat. It only really works on this one day of the year, the rest I'd be told very squarely to fuck right off by everyone, most of all Steve.

This year I have excelled myself in the birthday stakes. Tonight I'm being taken to my favourite restaurant Chez Bruce which you'll all have heard me bang on about a fair amount before. Tomorrow night I'm out with my housemates for a couple of drinks around Belsize and then off to see my mum for dinner out on Saturday night (much to S's disgust as he's missing football AND rugby- but, I reminded him of the poem above so he knows he's got no choice).

Then we've got the joint birthday party coming up, followed by 2 1/2 weeks in Thailand diving. And in hindsight somewhat cheekily I also asked for a present- this lovely handbag.

Sometimes when I get told I'm demanding and high maintenance I get genuinely offended. At those times I must remember to look back and re-read this post.

I am extremely lucky. And I know that what matters more than all of this is being loved, having wonderful friends, being happy and being made to laugh and in those respects I'm blessed.

I wonder if I could get away with asking for a matching wallet?

Health test- the update

Quick health update:

I was made to sit through an hour of post-health-test-analysis in the pub on Friday night with Steve.

Frickin’ BUPA had thankfully printed out a 30 page report detailing precise statistics for lung capacity, cholesterol, white blood cell count, diabetes, weight, BMI blah blah blah, each page more painstaking than the last.

Working in insurance seems to have increased Steve’s boredom threshold so he took great delight in talking me through every page. Thank goodness, because if we hadn’t had the report to pore over, we would have had nothing to discuss. Ahem.

Turns out Steve’s been given the all clear and is spot on in terms of his health (ok, ok, his fitness is above average, but you’d expect that from a marathon runner) which is really lovely, BUT I could barely hide my disappointment at the lack of prostate examination. The doctor told Steve that this wasn’t checked in men until they are over 45 so I have to wait almost 16 years til he gets the probing.

As a result of the health report examination (and the resultant need to down wine) I ended up being slaughtered by the time we sat down for dinner at the new overpriced Gaucho Grill in Butlers Wharf. I had a £31 piece of fillet steak which I promptly puked up the second we walked in the door at Clapham. What a bloody waste….when will I ever learn? In the morning it crossed my mind that if I’d have made it to the back garden the small family of urban foxes would have had quite a treat.

The following day after just 2 hours of sleep I traipsed my sorry hungover arse down to Brighton for a dinner out at Murasaki and general frolics for Jonathan’s birthday. As ever, the food was perfect, and just kept coming and coming. Thankfully I managed to keep a lid on my behaviour and apart from the usual potty mouth I didn’t disgrace myself at all (I don’t recollect….well, apart from some hideous photos).

I met Anne So’s lovely other half Richard who was very impressive with his two-pea-chopstick-challenge, and the lovely Siobhan who I fell in love with the second she finished a glass of champagne and proceeded to smash her glass on the floor nonchalantly and with more than a hint of ‘russian’ness. Hurrah.

All in all the weekend was a booze fuelled social extravaganza (hence my addled brain and sub standard posting today…..I’ll be back on form tomorrow, honest).

The great health test.

This morning is a morning of hospitals, but thankfully not for me.

Various friends and family are trotting off to different pongy corridored venues around the country to be poked, prodded, lubed up, anaesthetised, shaved and generally humiliated. I’m not going to go into details as certain friends wouldn’t appreciate their inner workings being discussed with the wider world, but I’ll let you in on one of them which I think is quite amusing.

As part of his ‘I’m a very important vice president’ act, Steve qualifies for some top notch insurance cover. Presumably because someone who works so hard is more likely to suffer from stress, high blood pressure, be at higher risk from heart problems, depression, anxiety etc. Joy!

Getting this cover involves going for a 3 hour, top to bottom, thorough health check where he’ll have his chest shaved for an ECG, have to jog on a treadmill for a mile to monitor heart rate and vital organs, have cholesterol levels taken, blood pressure, heart rate, the list goes on.

This of course is a great opportunity to be given a clean bill of health- as I’m always someone who worries about the possibility of things which could be wrong, but go unknown, lingering away.

To add to the list of 50 tests which Steve is being subjected to, I’ve asked him whether they can do a couple more, just for good measure:

1) Test his hearing

I’m convinced his ears are blocked, or somehow damaged. His stock response to every single thing I say is ‘Ey?’. If the test comes back clear I’ll know that it’s merely a case of him attempting to block out some of the white noise that is my incessant jibber jabber and I’ll then have a god given right to get really fed up when he’s not listening

2) Test him for adult onset diabetes

One of the symptoms of which is a continuous urge to go for a wee. CONTINUOUSLY. Until now I’d tried to put this down to OCD behaviour, but whilst they are testing, they might as well tick this one off the list. It might make for a better nights kip if they uncover anything.

3) Test his horrendous short term memory recall.

It’s atrocious. He’ll ask how my day went, listen to the answer, and then ask me again 3 minutes later. But maybe this is related to number 1) in that either he’s not listening, or he suffers from a terrible ear affliction, OR, he simply isn't interested. Not possible.

I’m secretly hoping one of the tests he has to have involves him having a finger poked up his bottom to check out his prostate gland- does that make me a sicko, or merely someone who is a great believer in the phrase, ‘what goes around, comes around’.

Chocolate porn

As a women, when you receive a giant bar of chocolate it stirs up a whole raft of emotions. Excitement, anticipation, greed with a little fear and distrust thrown in for good measure.

Last night upon return from Geneva, Steve pulled the biggest Toblerone I've ever seen out of his duty free bag like a rabbit from a hat- only much better. He then gave it to me as a gift.

She twinkled and shone at us from her mantelpiece vantage point, surveying the lessor mortals in the room, pondering her wonder and the likely destruction her mere presence could create.

At some point in the evening I caught Steve looking wistfully at her, as if she were a curvaceous lady in revealing bright red lace underwear and he casually asked me whether I was going to put her in the freezer.

"Why would I do that? I hate cold chocolate" I responded.

"No reason, I just thought you might" He answered.

"I was thinking about taking the chocolate to work, and then home to share with the girls" I countered, feeling more than a little put out that he clearly had made designs on my bar.

"It wasn't meant for you and your work colleagues" he snapped.

"Oh, so it wasn't meant for me?" I asked and waited for the reply.

"I didn't mean that, I meant I hadn't bought it for your work colleagues."

"Well it's a gift for me, so surely I can do what I want with it, and I choose to take it to work and then home."

"Fine."

"Fine."

In hindsight of course I realise this was very greedy and I ought to have agreed to put a small amount of the bar in the freezer for Steve and I would take the rest. But this is what happens when you're in the presence of 'my precious'.

This morning I gently took her from the mantelpiece and placed her in my bag. She peeked out in a provocative fashion, just enough to glimmer and catch the eye of passers turning a few heads as I strolled towards the underground.

In the tube I worried incessantly about whether she was comfortable or whether we were pushing the boundaries of her ideal conditions, 'cool and dark'. She made it though, and barely broke a sweat on her gleaming golden wrappers.

Once in the safety of the office I unveiled her. Riddled with a maternal protectiveness when people saw her and wanted to touch her, I had to suppress an urge to shout 'Stand BACK'.

Before I knew it, we had hit 11am and with a cup of steaming tea on my desk I caught her looking at me and she seemed to say, 'I'm ready." I peeled back the wrapping and exposed her mountainous nougatey peaks. She didn't succumb easily to my gentle pressure and demanded more force so I placed my clammy hands on her soft surface and snapped away a giant piece.

Cramming her into my mouth, I felt her soften and succumb to me, melting into a chocolaty oblivion with only the tough nutty bits remaining as proof of her existence.

I'll never forget you little piece of heaven from Geneva.

However, If I have to eat another piece of you I might be sick, so I'll let Natalie devour the rest.

All the gear, no idea.

Winter sun beckons, and this year, we’re going to nail another one of those ‘really ought to visit’ places as a diver, Ko Tao.

When this holiday was first dreamt up, we fancied ourselves as fly-by-the-seat-of-our-pants youngsters, visiting Trailfinders (in the City, perhaps first giveaway that we were clearly not cut out for such shenanigans) and booking flights only. Steve told me about the wonders of the cheap beach huts, charming in a locust infested way, and only a hop, skip and a jump away from the sea front. Here we would mingle seamlessly with the locals, save money, and be at one with the spirit of the island. We’d arrive, we’d book. Lovely.

You might say therefore that I was a little surprised when a somewhat overworked and overstressed Steve announced that he’d been thinking about it and he quite fancied pre-booking somewhere, and not just any-old-where, but that he would rather like a swimming pool.

Not an over the top demand, but this soon became, ‘it must have a pool bar’ then ‘it must have several pool bars and a restaurant’ and eventually we found ourselves booking the deluxe suite at a tiny little luxury resort built by local architects into the edge of a cliff with an eternity pool designed quite brilliantly to give a seamless expanse of water. Pool then sea…..and you can’t see where one ends and the other begins. Have a look.

A far cry from the ‘locust infested local spur of the moment book when we arrive hut’, but I guess as you get older it gets tougher to take these kind of gambles with your hard earned holiday time- and of course, I’m more than happy to go along for the ride.

Anyway, this has spurred on my excitement about how long it is until I get to be at one with the fishies again….only 4 weeks away. I’ve opted for all my presents to be diving related so I’ll be the classic, ‘all the gear, no idea’ diver. But I’ll look good. Earlier today I placed an order for a black wetsuit and matching fins and when the person in the shop said, ‘we’ve only got those fins in turquoise and white, will that be ok?’ I shuddered at the thought of the clashing and said I’d rather wait until the sleek black ones were delivered. I might be 30 metres under water, but it’s no excuse to look a mess.

Joseph- wowzers

I’m in love. Really, totally and 100% head over heels in love. And it’s not with Steve, it’s with another man. He goes by the name of Lee Mead, otherwise known as the leading man in the latest production of Joseph at the Adelphi Theatre.

Of course I realise this is unutterably pathetic, childish and ridiculous, but when he appeared behind the transparent screen in a cloud of dreamy fog my heart skipped a beat. I don’t think I was the only one either judging by the roar of the crowd when he appeared. Who says theatre can’t appeal to the masses, with lyrics like:

‘all those things you saw in your pyjamas, were a long range forecast for your farmers’

and

‘his astounding clothing took the biscuit, quite the smoothest person in the district’

It's no wonder Rice and Lloyd-Webber are now and have been for many years milking this little winner. So, it goes without saying that the show was amazing. Of course it wouldn’t be an Ali and Steve night out if something awful hadn’t happened, so don’t worry, I’m pleased to report it did.

With 15 minutes to go until curtains up I was waiting outside Oxford Circus and Steve was wending his way on the tube. The Adelphi theatre is only 2 minutes around the corner, so not to worry. We’ve got plenty of time. Except for that the Adelphi Theatre isn’t. The Palladium theatre is however, and if we were going to see ‘The Sound of Music’ we’d have been fine. So with 10 minutes til curtains up we start trying to hail a cab to take us over to the Strand. Unsurprisingly, there aren’t any. It’s rush hour. The traffic is bumper to bumper and the lights in the cabs are well and truly unlit. I start to lose my temper and say to Steve that he really ought to have checked where the theatre was, given that he’d booked the tickets and arranged the evening. He said (amidst what I felt to be a gratuitous use of the word f**k off ‘off’) that given he’d done everything else, it wouldn’t have been too much to ask for me to have checked where the theatre was. I fumed. He fumed. I told him ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t get let in now, you know theatres aren’t usually very accommodating with people coming in late and disturbing everyone.’

We arrived at 7.10pm. Got ushered to our seats at break neck speed, got tutted at by a few old biddies behind us, one of whom muttered venomously, ‘great now I can’t see a thing’- yes, because now you have a HUGE, viewing blocking 5ft 4inch fairly dinky person in your way. Someone give the poor lady a f**king refund. OR, give her a filthy, ground shuddering look to stop her in her tracks, which is what I did.

Thank goodness Lee came on stage at that precise moment to ease the tension, and in a Quentin Tarantino style loop that’s where I started. Swoon. I for one feel that if loin clothes were all the rage again women everywhere would find selecting a perfect partner a whole lot easier.

Post op

Well, I guess the fact I'm typing this is proof that I'm ok, live and kicking and apart from being pretty sore and extremely pissed off I can't give my boyfriend the welcome home he deserves, I'm fine.

Here's what I learnt today:

1) The smell of burning flesh is the most disgusting, wretch inducing smell I've ever experienced. I'm not sure if the fact it was my own flesh made it even worse, or a little better. All I know is Steve's crunched up nose said it all.

2) All you need for a calm and drama free 'procedure' is for your Doctor to be kind, gentle and inject a little humour as well as a little local anaesthetic. My doctor told me that I was about to lose all my dignity (something I'm pretty natural at without being in hospital). He then unveiled my stirruped legs and promptly said, 'oh, haven't you got pretty pink nails' to which Steve replied that I'd done them especially. I hadn't. Honestly.

3) Be prepared! It's a bloody good motto, so next time you see a do-gooder scout or cub give them a high five. If you know to expect a burning sensation, a large cold speculum, or a painful needle then you don't feel half as violated when it happens. Doesn't stop it hurting though.

4) Don't be startled when someone sticks a large patch on your arm, you ask what it's for and you get told it's to earth you so you don't get electrocuted. Just feel pleased that someone has thought of this on your behalf.

5) Take someone with a strong stomach who loves you unconditionally. This way no matter what happens they won't really bat an eye lid. This time I was a 'brave soldier' which made me feel proud and 12 years old all at the same time. As a result I also got lovely perfume, some hot pink Havianas and some uber cool boardies for my next diving trip.....knarly dude!

And finally,

6) Be thankful for all the people you love who took the time to send you texts and give you hugs and say all the right things, even if when you tell them it went fine they reply with:

'Damn. I was hoping for a bit more drama'.

Pre op.

Okay, so we all know (because I've been so bloody self indulgent about it) that I'm going into hospital this morning for my operation. I say operation, when minor procedure might be more apt, but it sounds far too American for my liking. So operation it is.

Think drama, think men in masks rushing around shouting 'clear', think techy looking machines making ominous bleeps and whirring noises. And then forget all that, because the only think you really need to know about my operation when it comes to quite how degrading it is, is.....stirrups.
Men will be picturing a porn film with some kind of riding theme set in a hospital together with tightly fitting jodpers and black boots and nurses with pert breasts, tight dresses and sparkly white teeth.

Girls will be shaking their heads in recognition of the humilation and vulnerability that goes hand in hand with this monstrous creation which much surely have been devised by some sadistic man by the name of Clause Von Torturestein.

In essence this really isn't a very pleasant experience. Of course us women know our damage limitation off by heart so to avoid making a bad situation really bloody awful, we wear a dress or skirt (which- for the boys- means you can at least cover your cellulite and stretch marks whilst your lady garden is on display and on a wide screen TV close up to boot). Marvellous.

So onto how I'm feeling about this morning. The only way I can describe it is that I feel as nervous as I did the morning I sat my maths GCSE. My hands are shaking, my heart is beating so fast it feels like it might dislodge and pop out of my mouth and I can't type for toffee, or spell (but you knew that anyway). So all in the all, the mental preparation for calm and measured reasoning in order to banish anxiety.....no hope.

Liklihood of massive drama queen attack- 'fair to good' (who am I trying to kid, if I were racing in a the grand national I'd be odds on favourite), so best make that 'certain to absolutely inevitable'.

The good thing is that Steve has landed and is on a train on his way to face up to his boyfriendly duties, the bad thing is that I'm so nervous I'm not going to be able to show him how pleased I am to see him without the use of tears.

I know it'll be fine. A million people face much worse things all the time. The thing is, when it's you facing something, no matter how small, and no matter how often you put it into perspective, it's still yours to face.

God I wish I had a stunt body double.

Taking a LEEP of faith

Things have been a little slack around these parts of late, but maybe it’s just the case that I’ve been saving all my energy for my best ever yet blog posting (and of course waiting for the grand unveiling of my sparkly new design).

I guess I’ll have to let you be the judge of that.

So then, quick re-cap. Steve flies to Australia for just over 2 weeks this afternoon. Last night I headed over to his for a fancy night out at our favourite restaurant, Chez Bruce, but the day’s events had taken their toll.

Yesterday morning I was busily typing away at my desk when my mobile phone started singing to me. It was not, for a change, one of the many repeated mistake calls from Dan, but an intriguing ‘unknown’ number. A posh voice asked me to confirm my name and then he introduced himself as my consultant, Dr Disney (this name has not been changed for comedic effect, it really is his name). We spoke about my results and he told me that he wanted me to come in for some treatment and that this treatment would be LEEP- currently the most common for cervical changes of the sort I have, CIN 3, or cervical cancer stage 0 if you will (so barely even begun).

LEEP involves passing an electrically charged loop over the lesion and effectively cutting it clean from inside you. It takes place under a local anaesthetic. This piece of skin is then used diagnostically to check to see if the cells have got any worse or whether they are happy they got all the nastiness. LEEP is 85-90% effective and can be repeated once if it’s not. After that you’ll be pretty much void of any cervix, so if you fell pregnant you’d need to have a C section. And if that doesn’t work then its hysterectomy time, partial or total, depending on your situation. But on the bright side, that’s a 90% chance I’m going to be absolutely fine.

Being Ali and being hyper neurotic, I of course had to research every dubious and ill-formed article and US chatroom and I sat and read whilst my heart sank and I felt gradually more nauseous. Talk of miscarriages, infertility, horror stories about the agony of the treatment etc etc. At this point I started to think that perhaps I ought to have insisted on having a general anaesthetic.

I left work feeling wobbly and probably even a little bit wibbly and headed to Steve’s pondering on my way whether this treatment would provoke a similar response as the last, i.e fainting and seizure. I literally turned the corner of the street saw out of the corner of my eye a red flash and realised that there was a girl lying on the floor, frothing at the mouth and have an epileptic seizure. Irony of ironies. If there is a god, I don’t know if this was a warning, or a ‘stop being so f*king self indulgent you pathetic cow!’.

Being first at the scene I went into my now fairly finely honed ER routine (don’t want to make myself sound like a freak but this is the 3rd time this year I’ve been the first at the scene of an accident and had to call 999, I swear they are a friends and family number). I phoned the ambulance, I checked her pulse, I held her head as still as I could but didn’t restrict her fitting, I checked her heart beat and I did other very important things like stroking her hair and her hands softly in case somehow she could feel reassured by my presence. I knew from the research that I had done after my recent fit that people aren’t at risk from tongue swallowing, so I didn’t force her into the recovery position. I even checked her wallet for her name and kept saying her name over and over, ‘Philippa’ ‘Philippa’ as she lapsed in and out of consciousness, glassy eyed and fixed pupils.

Ambulance arrived in no more than 5 minutes time, by which point Philippa had quite a little crowd and had come too enough to tell me she suffered from epilepsy and had frequent seizures. In a verging no out of body experience, I told the ambulance driver, ‘This is Philippa, she suffers from epilepsy. She has had a seizure lasting 2-3 minutes with full body shaking and foaming at the mouth. She had fixed unresponsive pupils for at least 2 minutes after the seizure ended’. It was at that point I realised that I watch far too much bad hospital drama.

I saw her into the ambulance, wished her luck and went on my way, feeling more than slightly freaked out.

3 hours at home, pondering over the day and waiting for Steve to get back from work so we could go out for dinner. Waiting, waiting, worrying, pacing, waiting. Worrying, waiting. Steve gets home and I’ve managed to work myself up into such a pickle that he gives me a big hug and tells me everything will be fine and I can feel myself go all stiff inside. I’m angry, but I’m not sure why. I suppose I’m angry that this is all still dragging on and I can’t see an end in sight. I’m angry that he’s leaving for Australia tomorrow and I’m going to be left pondering this horrible treatment on my own. I’m angry that our lovely evening has been spoilt because I’m feeling too upset and wobbly to enjoy a fancy dinner, and I’m refusing point blank to just say those simple words. I’m terrified.

After several attempts at cuddles, reassuring words and eye contact Steve picks up the phone, calls the restaurant and cancels the booking whilst squeezing my hand firmly. My resolve crumbles and I start to have a damn good cry and it all floods out. I feel like if someone put a little camera inside me what they would see if something black, rotten and mouldy and worst of all, dead. I am scared that if things don’t go to plan, we might never get to have children together. I ask him how he’d feel if I couldn’t have his children. He tells me that we’d just get lots of dogs instead and I cry harder. He tells me I’m being silly (of course!) and not to assume the worst. This treatment will work and in 6 months I’ll be fine. I fall asleep in a snotty mess and when I wake up, Steve’s just coming home from Tescos with a big bunch of lovely flowers and all the ingredients for spaghetti bolognaise. He pours me a glass of white wine, gets me one of his cosy hoodies and sits me down whilst he cooks, yawning quietly all the while.

We eat and sit in silence and then we hold hands tightly.

And all the fanciest things in the world could never match the calm feeling I get sitting with my Steve in quiet contemplation.

It’ll be ok.

Back from hols....with a bump

Being back from holiday is awful, it’s doubly awful when you have to change your gloating facebook profile from ‘ha de ha, in your faces, I’m going on holiday to, ‘I’m back and I’m peeling and miserable’.

We had a really lovely time and I have come back happy, but sporting a rather embarrassing holiday injury- a large bruise which spans the entire right cheek of my bottom. This was acquired at Benidorm water park, a collection of terrifying water slides, most of which I would have thought were stupidly tame in my youth, but now they scare the living daylights out of me.

One of them, ‘la cresta’ (yes, I should have known) was a near vertical lunge in a two seater double ‘ring’. The incline was so steep you almost felt like you were going to flip over forwards, then you went hurtling down the slide out on to an upwards sloping ski slope type affair and then backwards at high speed over various bumps until being spewed into the water pool at the bottom (minus bikini top every time).

I went on this godforsaken thing 3 times, each time the heart palpitations got worse and the final time I could barely breath I was so scared. Spurred on by Steve to ‘have fun’, off we went. Unfortunatly for me, I was badly prepared for the ride and my bottom was not elevated on the double ring, but resting on the slide. It proceeded to be hammered, torn, bashed and ripped (some people might find that erotic but I can assure you, it wasn’t) until the bottom where I limped away clutching my right cheek close to tears. It wasn’t until we got home when Steve pointed out I look like I’ve been spanked from here to timbucktoo…ouch.

What else to tell…well, the alcoholic sister and crack head didn’t make it over to Spain whilst we were there, which was a great shame. Of course it meant we were able to drink to our heart’s content….hooray.

Steve and I took the jeep out for a couple of days to explore the local area, and despite the use of a tom tom, we managed to get horribly lost and of course have a barny (this I feel is excusable as all couples have barneys when in cars, even Sam and Gavin). The argument came to a head with me getting out of the car which Steve had screeched to the side of the road and storming off down some dust track in 38 degrees heat.

Thankfully I found a nice friendly tree to have a damn good sulk under and ignored Steve’s shouts that he was going to drive off and leave me. Which of course, he did! It wasn’t til he’d driven off that I realised I had no phone, no money, no idea where I was, and appeared to be sitting on a rather large red ants nest. Brilliant. Luckily for me, 15 minutes later a lovely air conditioned Mercedes containing Steve’s mum’s boyfriend pulled up by the side of the road and the window went down to reveal ‘Jingle Jangle’ John, who simply said ‘get in the car Ali’ so I did (with my best petulant teenagers scowl on my face) and we drove home in silence. When we got there Steve called me an idiot, John told me off for wandering off in that kind of heat without any water and I had to go and ‘have a lie down’. I secretly quite enjoyed behaving like such a big old kid, but I mustn’t make a habit of it.

Back down to earth with a big old bump, reality check of my hugely increased weight- 1 stone over the last year- and I’m now a fully paid up member of my gym and a weekly regular at the aqua conditioning class where I do gentle bouncing around and leg wobbles in a pool full of pregnant people- (got to build up slowly- last time I went bonkers with 60 lengths I did my neck in!).

Whilst away I got the results of my tests, or so I thought. The lovely Lindsey texted me to say that I had a normal result, which was strange as on the day of my examination they said that I was certain to need treatment. I phoned the clinic today and it turned out that the result they sent through was a load a old tosh and not related to my biopsy at all (they took a smear without me knowing basically, the results of which were fine). This doesn’t necessarily mean the other results will be fine though, so the consultant is writing to me about that today…fingers crossed that’s all clear as well.

Enough about lady gardens…and enough rambling. Over and out! (Dan, Dave- how’s the big re-design going?)

Isle of Wight

I think my lack of postings goes someway to explaining just how good the festival was. And if you could see me, my comedy tan lines would certainly demonstrate how warm and sunny it was for the entire weekend (except for the morning we left which was strangely overcast and cloudy- when does that ever happen I ask you?!).

My bags would tell you a story about my lack of sleep, and my big grin would go some way to hinting at the happy memories I now have in my memory bank.

A quick rundown as I’m so tired I can barely type (almost 30, 2 hours sleep per night in a damp tent on a rubbish air bed which was all lumpy, right next to a massive group of ‘youths’ who stayed up all night every night strumming on their guitars, and somehow managed to sustain sleep past 6.30am in a tent which, after sunrise, promptly soared to horribly uncomfortable temperatures!)

Rolling Stones- excellent. Jagger has got amazing sex appeal for a man of his age, and those hips sure can wiggle. Also, he seems devoid of the usual 40-50 something paunch which effects many men (and some much younger!). My favourite song….I can’t get no (satisfaction), a brilliant live rendition, perfectly sung and complemented by some fairly naff staging technology which propelled the whole band forward on a 100 foot extendable section of the stage so that all the audience, from front to practically the middle, were able to get at spitting distance from the great legends. Steve was so drunk he created a 10 metre square area around him because he kept falling over and treading on people’s toes. Infact, most of the time, I was secretly giving him a little push as he was teetering on the edge and went down very easily like a sack of proverbial shite and it kept me amused. Also, he made the heinous error of attempting to enter the 3 day old urinals area wearing flip flops and I don’t even need to begin to describe what happened, suffice to say that there were much oozing of raw sewage involved.

In fact, Steve provided a whole array of entertainment throughout the weekend- getting some brilliant panda eye burn marks from his Pradas- serves him right for wearing such big poser shades, and last but most certainly not least his response to our friend Rob’s question ‘What’s the funniest outfit you’ve ever worn’ where he proceeded to describe an outfit which consisted of faux leather trousers and high heels….(his REAL words) cue many many hours of howling, and crying so much I ended up with stomach cramps and an upset tummy. Just when we thought he couldn’t possibly get any more entertaining, he told us he had saved up for 6 months when he was 11 to buy a bespoke, Michael Jackson ‘Thriller’ red leather jacket, complete with the shoulder pads. We made him do a moonwalk in the tent which consisted of him walking backwards pulling a stupid face. What an absolute wally….god love him. That is what happens when you don’t have a male role model in your life and are surrounded by women for most of your life. I guess….

We had a couple of minor run-ins with the police when one of our group was taken away for questioning when the sniffer dog sat squarely by his side and looked up at him (what I thought was lovingly…it turned out it was dog-accusingly). He was out 30 minutes later, light of some pot, and having had to pull his pants down and kneel over so that the police could see if he had anything up his bottom. Lovely! He didn’t by the way….well, nothing untoward anyway.

All in all, lovely time. I did feel a little bit old, not helped by the aforementioned youths in the plot next door describing our group as ‘really cool, but VERY old’….little did they know I was attempting sleep some 2 foot away and cursing them with every swearword in the book. Cheeky sods! They were about to go to ‘uni’ (tossers) so I suppose we were a decade older, but whats a year or ten between revellers?

Oh, and the other amazing thing…Morrisey cancelled, (no great shame, horrible miserable man, with awful hair) and was replaced in the line up by…..the RED ARROWS! They were so fabulous, and I felt like I was about 10 years old, all teary eyed and full of pride (don’t ask why I have no idea!). They did some amazing stunts, some coloured smoke type things, and some low level fly-bys where it looked like they were inches away from each other….the whole festival craned their necks for 30 minutes and did the statutory ohhing and ahhing. We were even given a live link radio link up to ‘Red One’ the top flying guy, who gave us a countdown to when they were going to appear in the sky. It was one of those moments when you looked at all the boys and realised they were all re-living some child-like want to become an ‘arrow’.

Happy days! I didn’t really manage to properly embrace the ming, and did have a proper wash down every day, plus hair wash and make-up and lovely smocky type dresses….look low maintenance hippy chick even if you’re quite clearly not- that’s the key!

Photos to follow when I can locate them from other people…promise xx

Sod the DIY, it's date night....

So, tonight I’m ditching the paintbrushes, bidding a fond farewell to the varnish, taking a step away from the steamer and spending an evening with my lovely boyfriend. Yes it’s Thursday so that means DATE night. A night spent exchanging sweet nothings, cuddling up on sofas, watching films, eating out somewhere fancy and generally enjoying each other’s company. I really ought to be cracking on with the DIY but a girl has her limits and my brown varnish hands and paint splattered hands and legs have pretty much finished me off.

Given the *limited success of previous date nights, I’m kind of hoping that this one goes smoothly, and I think adding the whole ‘I miss you because I don’t live with you anymore’ element might be a sweetener. We shall see I suppose.

Tomorrow is Epsom ladies day. I’m not going of course as I’m neither a horse lover or a lady, but Steve is. He’s taking a posse of tarted up brokers and will spend the day getting hammered on champagne, talking about insurance (YAWN) and generally being smooth (ish). I’ve come to the conclusion that he used up his charm and smoothness in the line of duty at work which is why most times when he sees me he can barely crack a smile! Or maybe it’s me…..probably the latter. I’m sure this means that by Monday I’ll have a whole host of amusing tales from my weekend.

I think tomorrow night I’m going to campaign that Lindsey and I should go and explore Hampstead and Primrose hill and see which minor celebs we can spot. We’ve already spotted a few in our local…well Lindsey has.

Over and out for now, Ali xx

La cash machina

Date night last night was a roaring success in many ways and a damp squib in others. The place we went to dinner, El Rincon Latino on Clapham Manor Road was very good…we over ordered tapas, ate far too much garlic and drank too much wine which led to come inevitable bickering, the topic of which was far too disgusting to share on a blog, but Sam and Lindsey (and no doubt whoever I’m out with tonight- sorry lads) will hear about it when we meet up next week and it’ll give them a damn good laugh…..no doubt Gavin will have something to say on the matter as well.

Anyway, the obvious highlight of the evening was the fact that we didn’t actually have to pay for our dinner. Well that’s not strictly true, but we did leave without paying. Basically at the end of dinner when we asked for the bill we were told that the not very trusty Barclays machine was not working and that we’d have to pay by cheque, or we could ‘run to the nearest cash point ten minutes away’. Two problems- it’s not 1994 anymore, and I actually have never ever carried a chequebook with me in my life. Infact, even in 1997 my friend Jo used to pay with a cheque book and guarantee card when we went shopping and we’d practically be spat at everytime. 2nd problem- run to a cashpoint with a belly full of tapas and wine…I think NOT!

Anyway, Steve being Steve, one of these, ‘I know my rights people’ he told them that under no circumstances would we be getting cash out for them and that it was their issue if the machine didn’t work and we shouldn’t be put out as a result of it. They stood firm and said we would ‘Need to go and get money out if we wanted to leave’ and Steve gave them his business card (very ‘professional as the card in question had been doodled on!) and told them to phone him tomorrow and he’d pay over the phone and we left. Quickly. I ran actually, and we leapt into a cab pronto.

I wonder if we caused a revolt as at the time when we made our statement, and dash for freedom they were holding about 40 diners hostage.

Bonjour. Je suis in Paris

Oui, je suis dans Paris....and do you know what is doing my head in, I want to write lots of funny stories but it isnt a qwerty keyboard; so aint no good at all for a touch typer who doesnt look at her keys......painful. Its taking me ten minutes per line.

Got to Paris fine after an early start. Steve has booked us into the resturant where Sex and the City was filmed called Kong tonight for dinner. Proper posing spot. The Time Out guide says...wear lots of labels and expect to be scrutinised! Hmmmmm, I hope the food is good. At least there will be loads to look at and laugh at....including le grand bill by the sound of it!

My GCSE french is doing me proud......un verre du vin, and prenez le premier rue a guache...hooray! Spelling is shite as ever though.

I gave in and wrote Dan V a text message today to tell him its time he started realising when hes onto a good thing and not to think about our time together with sugar coated glasses as it was the worst year of my life. I think thats fairly clear. Time to sleep off lunchtime Sancerre and then hit le tower eiffel.

Right off to eat an awesome looking tart aux framboise.

Wedding...shocker.

***NEWSFLASH***

More for my personal ‘release’ than because anyone’s at all interested, but I’ve just spoken to Steve and it seems there’s been a ‘dramatic’ change of events.

Well, drama might be overselling it somewhat, but basically, Steve spoke to his mum, who’s spoken to Lara and it seems that the concept of staying clean for a year before getting married has gone right out of the window….in that they are getting married….in August, this year.

Steve’s mum, as you’d expect, has booked a flight to come over and try and dissuade her from going through with it. Considering they’ve been hammered pretty much since the minute they landed, they aren’t in the best frame of mind to be making such a decision, and equally, clearly aren’t going to help each other with their addictions. He’s obviously only with her for her money and was hankering to get a ring on her finger the second he got wind of how much she’s worth. And unfortunately, she’s too naïve and silly to see through it and question that he doesn’t appear to have her best interests at heart.

So, the dilemma we face is that if she goes through with it, do we go? Do we attend this (I hate to say it, but) mockery of a wedding, between two people who have known each other 5 months and spent most of that inebriated or threatening to kill one another, or running away with each others credit cards, or getting arrested. I don’t want to stand and hear them repeat vows which are meaningless, and try as I might I can’t see this as anything other than an additional complication in the grand scheme of Lara’s life. She’s always been desperate for a man in her life, and she wants children, but she needs to face facts that until she’s a little bit better, she’s simply not in the position to be a part of a positive, constructive relationship. Clinging to this in the vain hope that it will work out is deluded. Am I being mean? I just feel angry that once more, through her lack of thought and reason, she’s causing more worry and heartache to her long suffering family.

Grrrrrr.

It's a cute infestation...honest!

Last night I went out and it's fair to say I got a leeeeeetle bit drunk.

I arrived home to find Steve in his suit in the kitchen, clasping a burger, (so I knew he was similarly tanked) and Andrew, his lodger, in his bed gear. They were both staring at the kitchen floor in silence. At first I thought maybe they were in the midst of an arguement but it turns out, the reason they were stood there is because Andrew had spotted a mouse.

To be honest, I'm not an overly squeamish girl, and mice don't upset me in the slightest. Unless they are eating my food, which is never a good thing for anyone to do, man or beast. I told them that all we had to do was move all of the food in the bottom cupboards up to the top ones, give them a decent bleach/clean, and then get some little mice traps to catch the cute little blighters. Steve looked at me with big drunk sad eyes and asked what we'd do with them when we caught them, and, noting his distress, I told him we'd release them in small nuclear family groups (how do you sex mice? ) onto the common where they could frolic and play and mate and eat cheese to their hearts content.

So we discussed the options of catching them. Andrew said that these days, traps don’t necessarily contain poison but instead entice them into a little box with some cheese like in the cartoons (a ‘mouse house’ if you will). Alternatively you can get ones with super sticky sheets of paper which they literally stick to. I’m not a fan of this idea as for me it’s like making a mice live out a nightmare. You know the ones when something awful is happening and you try and run, and can’t. I’m not putting them through that. At least with ‘the little box’ you can put something cosy in there so that after they eat the cheese they can have a little snooze before their release.

I can tell what’s going to happen. We’re going to end up with Milly, Molly, Martin, Melvin, Morris, Mini and Morticia the mice, with their own room in the flat. It’ll be mouse friendly, with a bed made of cheese and lots of tiny brushes for whisker grooming, and tiny wheels to spin around for exercise and, well, you get the picture.

And then we can just open the flat up as a nature reserve and people can come and marvel at the moths and the mice and all of nature’s wonderful creatures. Ah-men.

My family.

It has to be said, family visits for me aren’t like what I imagine other people’s family visits to be. Mine are sedate and tense and often a little bit forced. As much as I love to see and spend time with my family, when I leave, I always feel a slight sense of relief and the funny thing is, I suspect they do also. Does anyone else have this? My friend Anita always has a blast with her parents when they go away…well, always might be a tad of an exaggeration, but they often sit up drinking together, exchanging stories and having a chuckle (as long as pre-marital sex isn’t mentioned, or politics).

With my lot, I suppose most of this boils down to the fact that my parents and my family in general simply aren’t that chilled out. In fact, my mum looks like a rabbit caught in the headlamps most of the time, with little flushed cheeks and a terrified glint in her eye. This means that when we talk I often avoid looking her in the eye not because I’m feeling guilty, but because with mum, I can see behind the little tight forced smiles and pursed lips and clammy hands and see someone struggling terribly with mental illness. And if I look her in the eye, well, I might just burst into tears.

So, the net result of time with my parents is a mixture of sadness…it’s quite tough to get your head around parents who yo-yo between togetherness and separation every few months, and worry, that things just aren’t as they should be. On the upside, mum and dad are at the moment, travelling to the Isles of Scilly together for mum’s 60th bday treat, and so I suppose that’s a massive positive. I just hope things can continue on an even keel for a while.

The family visit pretty much dominated the entire weekend, but Steve and I had a nice evening together last night…me watching Thelma and Louise in bed and him in an entirely separate room watching the football highlights. I think I have finally grasped the concept of cohabitation…space. This is going to be a steep learning curve for us as for the next month, I have officially moved in- yes my season ticket has expired, I’m skint and I hate going on the trains. I’m allergic to them now. This means I have an Ali drawer in the cupboard, plus about 6 inches of space inside the wardrobe and room in the shoe rack for a couple of pairs of shoes (into which I have fitted 7 pairs). It also means I have to be a good and dutiful girlfriend as I’m staying rent free, which opens me up for all kinds of violations and unfair demands….I’ll keep you posted.

I was highly amused to see over on Jonathan’s blog, news of the evening we all spent at the snapper. He claims to have some photos of me and Anita (well, claims isn’t really true, he has got them I’ve seen them) looking like ‘Harridans’ which to be fair is probably a little too kind. We look like hags. Go on J, publish them, lets have a damn good laugh at my expense…if you can’t do that, then what’s the point! I know I’m gorgeous, sometimes, not in the morning, or in photos, or during/after exercise, or in my summer clothes, or most of the time.