The things people say

Generally members of the public are fairly polite. They don't pass comment on personal things and tend to err on the side of pleasant when they do comment. Also, they don't usually speak to total strangers just because they can.

Unless you're pregnant or have just had a baby on which case it is deemed entirely appropriate for strangers to comment on your age/size/bump/number of children and subsequently comment on your baby as to whether they think they are big/small/the right or wrong gender. My daughter was a month early and so it was obligatory to comment on her smallness. More than one person asked me on all seriousness if she was in fact a doll.

Medical conditions are apparently a free for all generally. Nothing seems to be quite as hilarious as an eye patch. Tee her, eye injuries are such a laugh. Pirate jokes are always welcome. How about a stookie, or crutches, or other visible malady? Clearly anyone would want to discuss their medical history with total strangers.

We have a dog; he is a greyhound, a large greyhound at that, and yes, he's a big dog. He comes on the school run occasionally and almost every child who claps eyes on him comments on his size. Which is fine. What is weird is adults saying to me in a slightly disapproving manner that he's so big. Or they say to him "aren't you a big boy?" to which he responds with a hopeful sniff for a treat and not much else, being, as he is, a dog.

I'm not sure how people in the public eye cope with open questions being asked by everyone of them.   It's appalling the way people cast assumptions about people and why they are single, or childless, or why they dared to go to the post office without wearing full makeup.

Having said all that, I do worry about that which I don't say, but which may be written all over my face due to what I am thinking.  You don't actually know exactly what your face is giving away. What shows on your face when someone is wearing way too much perfume and you're breathing it in?  When you see someone and are racking your brain to remember who you know that wears glasses just like them? Or your desperately trying to remember their name or even how you know them? When someone says or does something pretty innocuous but that happens to be a pet peeve (like bad grammar, for example)? When it is really important you don't offend someone but they say something actually awful?

I think this may be another ex smoker thing. When you are smoking your face has something to do. When left to its own devices, your face can get you into a whole heap of trouble.

Of course for some people, they just blurt out what occurs to them. I suppose they don't have to worry  about such trivialities as being misunderstood or inadvertently doing anything.

It's that time again

Woo. Autumn has officially started, yesterday in fact.

This makes me happy. It makes me happy every year as we rid ourselves of  the insect-fest that is late summer and the utterly insane declaration of "it's an Indian Summer" every time the sun shines for more than ten minutes on any day after the official Last Barbeque of the Year has taken place. And of course that is coupled with the perpetual moan of having to put the heating on due to the half a degree drop of the ambient internal temperature.

On that topic, I do embrace the onset of winter slightly more favourably in our nice brand new double  glazed, un-drafty house. The last three winters were spent in a drafty, cold, damp, untouched-for-a-full-century Victorian upper flat, which really tested my love of the cold. It turns out I don't actually love being properly cold. I have a lower room temperature tolerance of 19 degrees, it seems, and while it is nice to be able to wear smashing jumpers, it isn't nice to have to wear several at once, at all times.  This is a house so cold you have to take a few layers off when you go outside.

But still, here we are.

Turns out the first day of Autumn, which I'd never heard being considered before yesterday, is the autumnal equinox. Which in turn transpires to be, not a crazy and arbitrary Pagan thing, but in fact the time when the equator is bang in line with the sun. So everywhere has the same length of day. Just at different times according to when they are on the planet. There's another day, very very soon, I think it's September 25th, where the hours of daylight and night are equal, and that is called the equilux in a very satisfying instance of nomenclature.

This is a GREAT time of year. Halloween is coming, I have new boots that I'm able to wear without my feet melting, and it's almost time to forget about brushing my hair altogether as I can wear a hat without looking totally mad.

(That last bit does depend rather on the choice of hat)

I have agreed with Little Miss Christmas that we won't start the Christmas countdown until Halloween is over. Luckily she loves Halloween. We're all set. We're pretty much having a party. It's
Very Exciting and nobody will expect a barbecue. Woohoo.

Of course, Strictly has started, and that's the official start of the countdown to counting down to Christmas...

Superbat

So, I've watched the first 51 minutes of Superman vs Batman and given up due to the super slow internet and its inability to keep streaming.

  

Gah. I seriously never, ever imagined I'd miss Virgin.

Anyway. Thoughts. I should probably call it Dawn of Justice, but I can remember when Star Wars was just called Star Wars. That's not all that relevant. (harsh, imaginary reader, harsh)

Turns out Superman is better than Batman. Who'd have thought it? I always argued that Batman was superior due to his being just a man instead of relying on superpowers, but when held up against Superman, his lack of superpowers just make him seem a bit dweeby.

It isn't just aesthetics. 

No, it isn't.

Henry Cavill being so very very very attractive versus Ben Affleck being kind of meh is utterly not the point.

Ahem.

.

I'm sure there's a story there? We've just discovered that the second thinnest woman on earth is Diana Prince. (Well, her name popped up on the phone screen when I was trying to convince it to keep streaming, I don't think we should know that yet). But still, Wonder Woman. That's awesome. She's awesome. Where does she fit in? Why don't I remember anything about any of them? Should I have been watching all the Marvel/Avengers/whatever films and keeping up? 

And then we got a little spinning circle, and so the viewing ended and has now been replaced by Match of the Day.

I am a little concerned that my long lived devotion to Batman is waning (or Wayning perhaps). Since Batman, the Tim Burton one, came out and I watched it at the cinema three times, my adoration of Batman has been pure and complete. But now there's a few things that I Don't Like.

Well, Ben Affleck would be one. But there's a few things that go along with utterly irrational fears (no, I don't know what will happen if my feet are exposed in bed but I'm not risking it) that have turned up in this film so far. Two things actually.

The first was the branding. No no no. That's creepy. That's one of the things that make me inexplicably and bizarrely frightened of Zorro. (Yes, really). And the second is the utterly terrifying face on the new bat suit,

(picture taken from Cinema Blend but I believe it was first tweeted by Zack Snyder)

How menacing is the face on that? Very Anonymous and very scary.

So, tomorrow will hopefully see the viewing of the remaining 100 minutes (no, even the lure of Henry Cavill's torso isn't enough to try and watch it at silly o' clock). I do hope to emerge without an actual fear of Batman. I was shattered to discover that Jason Donovan is actually hideously awful, despite harbouring a major crush on him for 22 years. It will be a little galling to discover that all my devotions of 1989 were errors of judgement.

For the record, I have to hate Amy Adams. She got to be an actual Disney Princess. She got to act with the Muppets. And she gets to a) be Lois Lane and b) kiss Henry Cavill. Too much for one girl, sorry,

***disclaimer*** I don't know what the man thing is. I appear to be on heat. Obviously I usually hardly notice them. La la la,

Hey. Zorro wasn't ever anything to do with Marvel was he...?

Motherhood

I've been a mother for nearly 11 years. I still have this worry at the back of my mind that somebody sometime will show up and say that they are terribly sorry, there's been an awful mistake and that there is no way someone as incompetent as me should be in charge of small humans.

Of course, that doesn't stop me considering myself a world expert on all aspects of parenting, Obviously.

Anyways. That's not the point, and yes, I do occasionally have one.

(you know, you are extremely cheeky for someone that doesn't exist)

Motherhood isn't quite how I envisaged it.

Yes, I do go into the bathroom, being the only room with a lock, lock the door and sit and surf the net on my phone.

I have been known to sit and utterly ignore screams of agony and obvious battering of one child by another. In my defence, it is usually very obvious when they are being total drama queens and when there is actually a need for intervention. I have rather surprised my hypochondriac self how un-panicky I am about the children. No, sorry, there are no parts of you falling off, nor do you have a temperature, you are fine to go to school. Do not tell a living soul that you've been sick, or they'll invoke the 48 hour punishment for parents who don't keep their children in full health.

One of my finer moments was telling my daughter in no uncertain terms that she would not be getting fed at all that evening, or indeed the rest of the week, due to her inability to behave in Marks and Spencer, While in Marks and Spencer. In full earshot of her nursery teacher and deputy head of the primary school.

There is no end to what can be made out of a cardboard box and/or paper plates. I've made dishwashers, cookers, fridges, cars, dragons, castles, pizzas, volcanoes, shops, signs, football goals, houses, dolls furniture, rockets, and many other things. Sellotape is a parent's best friend.

I can lie so easily to my children. It helps before they can read, because you can inform them that they are too young for anything you don't want them to do, or similar. When they learn to read, and worse, access Google, then they can verify things and lies become harder.

Sometimes I look at my children and feel utter contentment. The love I have for them washes over me and I just gaze at them, marvelling on the good fortune of having them. Only ever when they are asleep however.. Be it holding a sleeping newborn, or gazing from the doorway upon a snoozing ten year old, there's nothing so appealing as your beautiful babies fast asleep. Having said that, I think that I've had similar thoughts about their father. People are so nice when they are asleep, it's no wonder that I'm a night owl.

It's a well documented fact that going to the supermarket alone is something special when you are a parent. What people fail to mention is that going to the dentist, or a smear test, or anything else you can't take children to, is also a rare treat. Oh, you're running half an hour late? That's just fine. No, really it is. Look at me, sitting quietly, reading a book. Nobody is speaking to me at all. Nobody wants to know what flavour February is, nor does anyone require me to referee a boxing match, It is bliss.

There is no denying that it is wonderful. But it isn't quite how you imagine it.

Hello there

So you found me. Say hello please, I've been waiting for you.