Douche Bonnet

Regular readers will already know this, but habitual lurkers (you know who you are; my counter's been collecting stats about you) or newbies looking for 'my left boob' (still the most-searched for item on this site) may not yet know that my sense of humour really is rather juvenile.

Whilst my French is limited to hello, goodbye, thank you and an ever-increasing range of charades that I'm prepared to act out in front of perplexed strangers, it is still the word 'douche' that never fails to amuse.

It was 'Jovial Douche' shower gel last year that saw me giving it to all of our house guests and, of late, it's been the Bonnet de Douches that's been snaffled from every hotel we've stayed in.

Shower caps, yes; but Douche Bonnets....?!  How can I not snigger at that and then, pondering my recent whinge about feeling grumpy and stumped, not take up PlasMan's idea to "Tell me - and the world - what YOU think is rubbish - and why."

Sapphire regularly accuses me of being overly judgmental of teenagers and of laughing too loudly at drunk uncles falling over in 'You've Been Framed' wedding clips, so it seems right to have myself feature as the first Douche Bonnet in the hopes that on a semi-regular basis my knickers will get twisted up enough to write about other people/trends/issues/behaviours that also require a public session under the scornful shower cap.

As such, I'm telling the world that I'm rubbish (or slightly, as even my bruised ego is aware that some good points are to be found) at being ........ not jealous.

This is a tough one to admit to, but jealousy is only ever evident to me after I've had a rant, been a bit bitchy, made a snarky comment (usually to Love Chunks or Sapphire) and then, seeing their slightly disapproving reaction(s), realise that it's all down to being more than just a tad envious.

Blogging is the issue that highlights my worthiness to be the first to don the Douche Bonnet.  A bugbear of mine concerns comments.  I'll admit that my knowledge of blog etiquette is minimal, but if someone is generous enough to take the time to read and then add a comment to my blog, I'll click on their link to see if they also have a blog and comment on one of their recent articles as an acknowledgement.  Then, if their blog is one that appeals to me, I'll add them to my regular reading list and keep on visiting and commenting.  After all, what blogger/writer, doesn't enjoy feedback?  Comments are, in my minuscule, jealous mind, the way of spreading the love back and forth and is the reason why I feel mightily pissed off when my comments are either never returned or even responded to, especially if the blogger is directly answering other commenters. My inner Douche Bonnet begins to inflate with annoyance.  Bloggers want comments, so surely they should do the same for others...?

So, when a blogger (and friend) recently announced via another form of media that they've revamped their long-forgotten blog and now want everyone to 'like' them and recommend their site to all their friends so that they can attach some advertising and make some money, my Douche Bonnet fogged up even further with an unattractive combination of 'who the hell do they think they are' and 'what do you think I've been trying to do for seven years' with a side order of 'so you think you can achieve what three billion of us already out there can't?'

The bonnet blew up bigger still when my elephant memory reminded me that the revamped blogger hadn't left a comment on mine in years....!

"You read far too much into things," says Love Chunks, not looking up from his iPad.

"It's hardly a life or death situation, is it, Mum," snorts Sapphire, packing her school things.

They're both right.  I deserve to be publicly exposed as the inaugural designated Douche Bonnet and learn to get over it and not blame my irrational envy on being in week three of a six week self-imposed no-sugar detox un-fun abstinence experience.  Either that or find out the hard way how difficult it is to remove both my head - and the now-desecrated Douche Bonnet - from out of my arse.

The chaos of chairs

Much like marriage, apartment living is a continual exercise in consideration and compromise.

We apparently have multi-storey living arrangements a far lot easier than the average Swiss person in that we have our own washing machine and therefore escape the dreaded laundry room timetable.  Friends on much higher salaries than ours are unable to go out on Monday nights because it is when their allotted two hours are given to use the washer and dryers.  The judges' decision is final and no further correspondence will be entered into, such is the difficulty in trying to nab a Saturday afternoon slot.  Someone has to die and have their next-of-kin tracked down, bribed and shagged to have any chance of being able to change the time you have been given.  (While we were in Spain, our house and dog-sitter said the highlight for her was being able to wash her clothes when she felt like it - such small pleasures)

For those of us with washing machines, life is relatively carefree as long as we don't use them before 8 am or after 9 pm and never on Sundays.  The Sunday restriction is regularly flouted by me - surely it's OK to do something other than stay utterly still and silent from, say, 10 am to 4 pm?  Doesn't that allow sufficient time for a sleep in or pre-work wind down? So far, no neighbour to the left, right, up or below has taken offence at my rest day rejection.

With our dog now fully embraced by our concierge, The Fratman, and able to leap into the lift doors and accompany elderly couples to their floor (and back down to me) with joy and safety, we figure that the block is pretty used to the noisy Australians who like to yell 'Tea is READY' instead of walk the fifteen metre dog leg to the bedroom area.

However, there is a big booger still dangling from the symbolic nostril that is upper-level etiquette: our balcony.

When it rains, the water simply gathers into small pools, eventually turning into one rather shallow swimming area when they join up.  The drain may be set in the far corner but the undulating slope of the tiles means that it rarely gets wet.  Instead, the water is eventually dried up by the sun or soaked up by my ugg boots; whatever happens first.

Unfortunately, it is not just worn woollen footwear and solar power that is removing the water - it is also seeping through the balcony and starting to stain the ceiling and upper walls of the apartment directly below us.  The neighbours (to be referred to as the Seventh Floor Fusspots from hereon) are understandably annoyed by this and have asked the land agent to contact the owner of our apartment to fix the problem.

With Swiss efficiency meaning that the plumber rings to apologise if he's going to be ten minutes late, I assumed that the balcony repair work would be relatively easy.

But no. In the past eight weeks, I've had no less than ten separate visits of men arriving with clipboards to
a) have a smoke and fling the butt over the edge of the flower boxes down into the garden that no human is allowed to enter;
b) point to the drainage hole and hold some intense discussions about it;
c) jump up and down on the tiles; and
d) tell me 'We fix. Later. Fratman will call you.'

TEN TIMES.  Unless they somehow scrape off a thick layer of cement and slope the entire balcony surface towards the drain or knock the entire edifice off and build a new one from scratch, it is not clear what quick job they can do to prevent the Seventh Floor Fusspots from continuing to complain.  Put in a blue pool liner perhaps?

Mrs Fusspot has usually been friendly to me whenever we've crossed paths by the mailboxes or in the lift, but the frustration of no action and her presumably still-ugly brown-stained walls are starting to fester beyond  annoyance at the owner and towards the renter.  Me, in other words.

Witnessing her pretending not to see me as she struggled into the four person lift with myself as the only other person present was a little too much, so I applied my cheery 'Hello' that often gets unfriendly dog walkers to respond when we pass by every single day.

She grunted.  I tried again. "Look, I'm sorry that there seems to be no improvement on the balcony for you.  I've had ten lots of men come up to look at it, but not one of them has returned to do anything.  Is there anything I can do to help it happen quicker for you?"

"Yes," she hissed, causing me to step back a little in surprise.  Even her drop pearl earrings were swinging erratically. "You can stop scraping your chairs on the floor."

"Oh, sorry.  We have those felt dot things on the bottom of the legs---"

"It's NOT ENOUGH. You scrape them all the time and we need you to stop."

We had arrived at her floor and she swept out to my, "Sure, I'll speak to my family about it...."

Arriving back upstairs, I realised that our six dining chairs are all on carpet.  An IKEA job that has soaked up a few of Milly's left-inside-too-long butt nuggets, an infinity of dropped bread crumbs and more spilled wine than what had remained in the glasses they were originally poured into.  The rug now had several extra layers that not only prevented the chairs from scraping, but also provided recording studio-quality sound-proofing and a large, aromatic area for the dog to ram her nose into for a lick and a sniff if the kitchen floor is too clean.

It was hard not to laugh.  If this complex was in Australia (say, Flemington), housing this many people it would be a madhouse of noise.  Two hundred residents would mean that simple Aussie-related maths would see at least two out-of-control parties, several domestic incidents, a visit from the ambos, stolen wheelie bins, hard rubbish put out seven months too early, hills hoists pulled over, cars being keyed and Eminem on level eleven during work hours.  And we'd be pretty accepting of all that....

I saw The Chair Scraping Shrew again the following day.  "Good morning Mrs Fusspot.  We've had a think about what you told us and realise that it's not us who are scraping the floors.  It must be people on either side or on the ninth floor, as we have carpet under our chairs."

She stopped unlocking her mailbox and gave me a skeptical look. "No, you are wrong, it is you.  You have chairs in your kitchen."

"No, we don't, actually.  Our kitchen has a fixed bench in it and no chairs."

The fact that I dared to question her statement and profess knowledge of my own kitchen still did not convince her.  She shook her head. "I think you are mistaken. Your kitchen chairs scrape all day."

All day....?  When I'm home, I'm usually in the study - with a different apartment underneath me - blobbed out in a rollerball office chair and never on the dining setting. I felt my mouth form into the universal sign of increased annoyance - the cat's arse pucker.  "Look, Mrs Fusspot, you're more than welcome to come on up and see for yourself."

"That won't be necessary. All you need to do is stop the scraping."

It was then that I decided forget about visiting the bootmaker's in Petit Saconnex.  Not because he doesn't do a good job in re-heeling my beloved black boots, but because I was going to ask him to apply a layer of special rubbery stuff that would stop the 'clop clop clop' sound of my brand new boots (black again, of course) when I walked across the parquetry floor boards not covered by rugs.

Sod her.  Milly's nails can get longer AND the double spin cycle will be selected on Sunday.

A place in this world

Sapphire and I have had a few very intriguing discussions lately about bullying.

As she sees it, the school bullying program is about as useful as wearing a leather jumpsuit to a French squat toilet. "All it does it tell kids that they're nowhere near as bad as the examples shown," she says.

She tells me that the examples include kids writing 'Why don't you kill yourself' in SMS messages or 'Die, bitch' on Facebook pages or pushing and shoving kids against lockers.  These produce a collective eye roll amongst the compulsory viewing audience as they're too dramatic and vastly unrepresentative of what really goes on.

When I mention the book 'Queen Bees and Wannabes' by Rosalind Wiseman that we've both read, she again shakes her head. "Even when they discuss the way girls exclude or spread rumours, we're given some standard photo from the 1990s with a really exaggerated set up of three girls talking behind their hands and pointing at a fourth girl standing sadly in the foreground," she says. "It just doesn't happen like that."

"What happens is nasty sniggering instead of genuine laughing, leaving a girl terrified about walking into class with hostile eyes on her as she passes.  How can they pinpoint that kind of almost invisible bullying?"

Sapphire just can't see the jealousy and refuses to let me explain it to her, instead now talking about a wider form of bullying which seems to be freely permitted by us all.

She is a fan of Taylor Swift, admiring not only her songs (and the fact that either writes or co-writes them all), but also her looks (she is a teenage girl, after all) and the fact that she makes mistakes but isn't stupid. "She hasn't been beaten up and gone back to the bloke who did it; she hasn't got gun tatts all over her body; hasn't posed nude or been 'caught' on instagram, hasn't made a sex tape or put up photos of herself smoking dope."

It's old news media-wise now, but I felt really disappointed to read that Tina Fey, who I really admire, and her buddy Amy Poehler (who I've yet to see in anything - that's how out of touch I am) took pot shots at Taylor during their recent hosting of the Golden Globes.

"And yet, Mum," Sapphire says, jabbing her finger in the air to emphasise the matter, "Tina Fey wrote 'Mean Girls' the movie and said that she based it on Rosalind Wiseman's book but still thinks she can make jokes about someone's personal life when it isn't true."  Fair point. 

Taylor Swift herself confirmed that when she said in this month's Vanity Fair, "If you want some big revelation, since 2010 I have dated exactly two people (Conor Kennedy and Harry Styles)..... the fact that there are slide shows of a dozen guys that I either hugged on the red carpet or met for lunch or wrote a song with, it's just kind of ridiculous."

I tell Sapphire that it reminds me of a quote attributed to Jennifer Aniston a few years ago when she described seeing her confused face splashed on the covers of some magazines with the typical headline, 'Distraught Jen's baby woes' or some-such.  She commented that she remembered that particular day because of the t-shirt she had on and realised that the paparazzi had snapped her at the precise moment she'd left her agent's office and had forgotten just where the hell she'd left her car.  Sapphire smiled at this.

Naturally, the quote that has since been over-used as a Swift-bashing quickie came up.  "Katie Couric is one of my favorite people because she said to me she heard a quote that she loved that said, 'there's a special place in hell for women who don't help other women'."  This actually originated from former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, but why would all the online and paper mags want to tell readers that when they can say that Ms Swift is a humourless whinger instead?

Later in the interview, Swift was asked if she was 'boy crazy' and I wondered how hard she had to fight to stifle the urge to punch the questioner because it is highly doubtful they would have asked the same question of same-aged blokes Nicholas Hoult or Daniel Radcliffe; or of her previous paramours Taylor Lautner, Jake Gyllenhal, John Mayer or Harry Styles. It's not a question but an insult, yet she said, "For a female to write about her feelings, and then be portrayed as some clingy, insane, desperate girlfriend in need of making you marry her and have kids with her, I think that's taking something that potentially should be celebrated - a woman writing about her feelings in a confessional way.... twisting it into something that is frankly a little sexist."

I hope you really heard and understood that, Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, but your answers suggest not.













Poehler's first remark about the comment was flippant. "Aw, I feel bad if she was upset. I am a feminist, and she is a young and talented girl. That being said, I do agree I am going to hell. But for other reasons. Mostly boring tax stuff."  Not good enough, Ms Poehler: you should have just apologised and tried to remember how you felt and acted between the ages of fifteen and twenty three and not brushed it off with an easy gag.  The photos found in your yearbook above suggest not just that you lived in the time of bouffant fringes but that you were also a cheerleader, so perhaps being in the cool crowd means that you really don't understand what bullying is.

And Tina Fey? "I did not see that one coming.  It was a joke.  It was a light hearted joke."  Uh-huh and that's the kind of bullying that Sapphire is worried about. The 'can't you take a joke?', the 'it wasn't meant to be taken personally' and the 'stop being a drama queen' that is some of the most subtle and damaging form of female bullying and I'm glad that my thirteen year old can see it and name it.

Here's Ms Fey on the far right of the photograph below.  I'm sure that she may not have always found the hilarity in someone commenting about her personal life - or lack thereof - when this was taken.

These cheap digs at people who are damned by the media if they try to defend themselves carries on to girls who see it, laugh at it and consider it their right to do it as well. "My friends all make comments about what a slut Taylor Swift is, Mum, and how all she does is write songs about her ex-boyfriends, but none of them own any of her albums or have listened to anything other than her singles," Sapphire points out. "She writes about a lot of issues."

All I can do is hope that Sapph understands that insults and nastiness are often used to hide insecurity, envy and laziness.  Yes, laziness. Why bother to work hard, or try something different or stick your neck out when it's simpler to knock other people down?

The fallout of such behaviour and results also severely obscures the respect that is felt by a much larger group of other people.  If Neil Young is happy to describe Swift as a 'great writer' - "I like listening to her...and watching her respond to all the attacks. I like the way she's defining herself so I keep my eye on it," and Dolly Parton says she is "extremely impressed with her, especially in her song writing .... the depth of her. She's got the qualities that could last a long time," and Stevie Nicks says that Taylor writes "songs that make the whole world sing, like Neil Diamond or Elton John and .... reminds me of me in a lot of ways. Swift's 'Today was a fairytale' has "stayed in my heart forever," then there are a lot of really good people out there too.  

So, Sapphire, take comfort too that Alicia Keys, Kelly Clarkson, Lady Gaga, Lena Dunham and Ryan Adams also think that she's worth praising instead of attacking.  Having the highest selling first week album in a decade for 'Red' aint too shabby either.

Bullying is easy. It takes little thought, makes the person feel better about themselves and costs nothing.  It's just a damn shame that negative comments seem to have more power than positive ones.  Let your actions do the talking, my darling daughter, and I'll share with my readers the lyrics to one of your favourite Taylor Swift songs:

The Best Day

I'm five years old
It's getting cold
I've got my big coat on
I hear your laugh
And look up smiling at you
I run and run
Past the pumpkin patch
And the tractor rides
Look now -- the sky is gold
I hug your legs and fall asleep
On the way home
I don't know why all the trees change in the fall
I know you're not scared of anything at all
Don't know if Snow White's house is near or far away
But I know I had the best day
With you today
I'm thirteen now
And don't know how my friends
Could be so mean
I come home crying and you hold me tight and grab the keys
And we drive and drive
Until we've found a town
Far enough away
And we talk and window-shop
Until I've forgotten all their names
I don't know who I'm gonna talk to
Now at school
I know I'm laughing on the car ride home with you
Don't know how long it's gonna take to feel okay
But I know I had the best day
With you today
I have an excellent father
His strength is making me stronger
God smiles on my little brother
Inside and out
He's better than I am
I grew up in a pretty house
And I had space to run
And I had the best days with you
There is a video
I found from back when I was three
You set up a paint set in the kitchen
And you're talking to me
It's the age of princesses and pirate ships
And the seven dwarfs
Daddy's smart
And you're the prettiest lady in the whole wide world
Now I know why all the trees change in the fall
I know you were on my side
Even when I was wrong
And I love you for giving me your eyes
Staying back and watching me shine
And I didn't know if you knew
So I'm taking this chance to say
That I had the best day
With you today

I can see why you like it, dear Sapph.

60,411

So November Knob-head activities have come to a close.  It was satisfying to vomit out the required number of words for NaNoWriMo before realising that at least another 30K will be needed to finish the first draft and have the story make some form of sense. Of course, this was the whole intention - get us procrastinators committed for a month and then, if/when we hit fifty thou', we'll be in for the long haul. Clever thinking.

Milly sat at my feet the entire time acting as mute inspiration, delivery man sniffer and wet-nosed break time alarm clock. She's been recited to, sung at and even had her opinion sought on alternative paragraph endings and descriptions.  I'm pleased to report that her work has been outstanding and she's quite simply the best Personal Assistant a writer could wish for (excepting the fragrant farts, of course. Then again, she could rightfully direct the same complaint back at me).

The 60,000 words were completed at a time when Sapphire's stomach issues had not only re-emerged but also joined forces with her 'plumbing at the front'.  No-one likes placing their feet into stirrups and having a man approach with a cotton bud and what looks like an oversized creme brulee gas torch but when you're thirteen years old, tired, sick and scared it gets beyond funny. "So Mum, how's your day going so far," she said quietly, trying her best to get her mind off things. "Can you hold my hand please?"  At least two days off school per week has become the norm but we thank modern technology, school website log ins and mates with mobiles for keeping her up to date with assignments and still in sight of good grades.

However with lingering illness, puberty, fluctuating friendships and a truck-load of pre-report card homework to do, she's been forced into the first row seat riding the rollercoaster of grumpiness, apologies, resentment, frustration, amusement, challenges, stomach aches, affection, anger, sulkiness and gratitude.  Love Chunks and I sometimes want to hand our own tickets back to the booth at different times but, together, we're a pretty formidable - and empathetic - force.

My endlessly busted Achilles is minor in comparison but still makes my invisible tail droop at not being able to do my favourite form of exercise combined with sweaty singing and idea generating.  As my stupid old woman muscle heals at snail-on-a-glacier pace, the treadmill has done a sterling job of getting bed sheets and towels dry, being so close to the window and radiator. Shame about the dog hairs and dust bunnies forming on the belt though.

Seeing some butt-numbing numbers flash up on the scales at a friend's place was an unpleasant reminder that an alternative form of exercise needed to be sought.  At forty four and with new (and desperately unwanted) age spots arriving on my face every week, swimming was the most obvious choice despite snow approaching and me already with several old winter layers to be removed.  Three times a week has since seen me reluctantly trudge in the freezing wind half a kilometre downhill to the pool, get undressed in a semi-open change room where male workers wander through at will and plonk myself into water that is far colder than you'd expect a heated pool to be.

It is here, whilst splashing up and down the lanes - right side here in Switzerland, by the way, not the left - that chapter ideas emerge, chlorinated and vibrant, ready for use. Hindsight flowers behind foggy goggles and offers decent alternatives in my reactions to Sapphire's tribulations; and Love Chunks' face appears on the bottom of the pool, smiling kindly at me.

It is also here that I discover rage.  Rage is new to me, as I'm the, 'Oh let the guy in, it's just another three seconds of our lives' forgiving old soul when it comes to cars.  Beeping horns are also alien to me and as long as I get that obligatory 'thank you' wave, life behind the wheel is calm and uneventful.  The swimming lane provides a direct contradiction.

Unlike pools in Australia that are usually marked, 'Slow,' 'Medium' and 'Fast' with about two lanes for each speed, Geneva has just two lanes. One is marked with a green tortoise and the other with a red hare; a rather cute solution for swimmers with potentially little or no understanding of French.  I'm egotistical enough to select the Hare lane as years of running have given me an endurance level that allows me to swim laps without stopping. Fat old girls can float, y'see. I was never particularly fast in Oz but always consistent, yet here in Switzerland, I'm a female Ian Thorpe without the fashion or the flipper feet.  I leave middle aged Canadian blokes and skinny French ladies in my wake, lapping them over and over again.  No rage yet, just overheated pride and vanity.

Lapping is fine, as long as there are six or less people in the Hare lane.  When there is more, and some clod decides to wind down by doing the backstroke or the breast stroke, my irritation awakes.  No-one, apart from Olympic athletes, can swim the back or breast stroke faster than freestyle which means that they no longer belong in the Hare Lane and should duck under the barrier and do their barely-floating version of a hungover frog in the Tortoise Lane.  Irritation rises to anger when I have to overtake the hairy-backed old guy lazily attempting back stroke and have his overly long fingernails scrape my sides whilst doing so.

Rage finally appears when I've overtaken the third bloody breast stroking bozo and we touch the end of the lane at the same time and he doesn't take one single second to notice that I've thrashed the water to foam whilst making up three quarters of a lap and want to take off in front of him.  No, this non-submersible turd ends up kicking me in the face as I try to get around him and not smack into the blind backstroker coming from the opposite direction.

The only thing stopping me from strangling these inconsiderate imbeciles with the cords of their speedos or pulling back goggle straps a metre before letting it sting their faces is the counting.

Numbers. Order. Routine.

I dare not waste too much mental energy on these public pool pinheads or I'll risk forgetting how many laps I've swum.  Fourteen, Fourteen, Fourteen, is the chant until I reach the end. Fifteen, fifteen, fifte ----- oh for pharksake why does he think that swimming with a foam peanut between his knees means he'll be quick enough for the fast lane ---- bugger. Was it fifteen or thirteen...?  If in doubt, don't cheat. Thirteen, thirteen, thirteen, thir----- maybe I'll swim over the TOP of that stupid back stroking bonehead instead of around her....

When forty is finally counted, I hoik my dripping bulk out via the pool steps and do my best to saunter back to the change rooms, walking in slo-mo for coolness but really to avoid slipping on the tiles.  When I'm safely in the unlockable, saloon door individual cubicle, I slump down on the wet bench seat in exhaustion.

Three loads of washing to drape around the house, two specialist appointments to arrange for Sapphire, winter tyres to put on the car, a thrice-postponed lunch date and then, the writing.  Love Chunks' face appears in front of me again as I find the hill back home rather hard going.

Milly greets me at the door, full of joy as usual and as we go downstairs for a walk, my smile returns.

I'm so lucky to be here and will do my damnedest to make the most of it.

17,022

I'm a little over seventeen thousand words into the NaNoWriMo thing now and have realised that the IKEA office chair we bought a year ago for less than fifty francs is about as comfortable as being folded in a suitcase for long periods.  The back refuses to lean straight, so I end up impersonating a 'less than' sign by the end of the day.

I'm now forty four years old and, in addition to IKEA-acquired back pain was forced to celebrate my birthday a helluva lot earlier than I would have liked thanks to the very uncharacteristic behaviour of the Swiss couple living upstairs from us.

They had a loud party.  At this time last year, Guilliame left a prominent note about his upcoming party sticky taped in each lift, entry door and a copy in everybody's mail box.  Whatever carousing occurred, it occurred without us hearing a thing.

This year, however, they had different plans. No notice but lots of noise.  My guess was that they'd eaten (and drank, clearly) out somewhere and, in the forgivingly warm fug of fondue and booze decided to invite everyone back to their place to continue on.

At midnight, I was driven to the living room.  Not by the party (although the girls could have done me a favour by kicking off their heels. Parquetry floors become painful percussion instruments when stilettos are clacking on them), but by Love Chunks.

He was due to leave for the US the following morning and, perhaps to ease my sadness at his absence on my birthday, his ENT system decided to put on a snoring performance not heard - or suffered - for at least a decade.  No amount of whispered threats, loud sighs or sharp pokes in the back to turn the hell over made a shred of difference to the Angry Elephant Bellowing at a Whipper Snipper sounds he was emitting.

In the living room, the party was kicking on.  Midnight was fine, but at 2am the scraping chairs, loud laughs, screeching giggles and singing Happy Birthday (in English) for the tenth time was officially being classed by my bloodshot eyes as inconsiderate.

My book was fascinating, but not to the extent of blocking out the noise from LC or upstairs.

Then the doof doof started. At 2:30am.  It was high time to grab the front door key and take some action.  

Ratta tatta tatta went my knuckles on his wooden door.  Guilliame opened it to see me with sticky hair, ugg boots and dog breath.  "I've had enough mate. Turn the music off and please be quiet."

'Mate' slipped in from god knows where.  Guilliame was torn - he looked over his shoulder at the chaotic hilarity occurring in his dining room and back at the exhausted old bag in a brown dressing gown standing angrily in front of him.  "Sorry," he said quickly, shutting the door in my face.

Back downstairs, it was a relief to hear the music end.  The chair scraping, yelling and parquetry percussion continued until well after 3am.

Love Chunks' alarm went off at six.  Drowsily, he whispered, "Happy Birthday, love," before turning on the shower.  Milly heard the waking sounds from her bed in Sapphire's room and trotted in to nudge me. "Yeah yeah, I'll take you down for a whizzer."

Passing through the lobby, my aching eyes spied the intercom by the entry door.  

BSSSSSSSST BSSSSSSSST BSSSSSSSST!!  I hammered Guilliame's button to the world-recognised rhythm of 'Do Me A Favour: Drop Dead!" before scooting outside.  If his intercom was anything like ours, it would have drilled through his hungover subconscious and scared the crap out of him.  His heart would have required at least ten minutes of deep breathing and checking the fish eye peep hole to get back to less than a hundred beats per minute again.  Good.

As for blame, he would have had neighbours upstairs, downstairs and to the left and to the right to consider as angry intercom-abusing arse wipes.

For good measure, I went BSSSSSSSST BSSSSSSSST BSSSSSSSST!! on the way back upstairs.

..... was that wrong?

Blubbering in my birthday suit

The phone rings just as I am about to turn on the shower tap.

Naked, I dash out of the bathroom to answer it. We don't have an answering machine and it could be one of eighteen agencies/employers/UN departments/email contacts/referrals/freelance company/tutoring firms I've recently applied at with a job offer.

Nope, it's Carol. "How's Milly going, Kath?"

Carol and John very kindly looked after 'ol furry face while we were in Luxembourg. Having left their beloved fifteen year old pound pooch back in Australia with their grown up daughters, they were keen to have access to a dog for a while again.

Milly was given full run of their house, taken on the bus, on outings to Chillon Castle and Nyon and enjoyed lots of walks and attention. You couldn’t find two nicer people to leave your dog with – she had just as good a holiday as we did.

Therefore it was merely bad luck and unfair timing that Milly developed a bladder infection and no matter how many times I tried to reassure Carol, she was acutely apologetic. “It’s OK, Carol. Milly is likely to have had it before you looked after her. She’s happy and she’s eating, so it can’t be too hard on her.”

And it isn’t, really. Her basket, mattress, covers and blankets seem to rather effectively impersonate a Carefree advertisement because of their ability to ‘draw away moisture’ so she can ease her creaking body out of the bed and not be aware of the gallon of wee soaking through to the floor.

Or the carpet.

Or the puddle on the kitchen tiles that Sapphire slips in barefoot.

The apartment is festooned in just-washed dog clothes, making me marvel at how much gear a twelve kilogram animal requires. There’s a frequent lapping sound in the background as she drains her two water bowls before sitting on some enormous white dog toilet-training mats, her nose clearly dry.

Milly’s eyes widened in alarm when the vet took her temperature yesterday. The reading showed that she had a slight fever and a yellow puddle was left on the stainless steel examination table for emphasis.

The vet retaliated by injecting her twice in the back of the neck: firstly with an anti-inflammatory and then an antibiotic. With Milly’s paws back on the floor and a bill for 400 CHF in my shaking hand, he also gave me some liquid medicine that I was to syringe down her throat twice a day. “And please phone me tomorrow and tell me what her temperature is.”

My shock at the bill was temporarily forgotten. “Er, how am I supposed to do that?”

He grinned, enjoying my discomfort. “You have a thermometer, don’t you?”

“Well yes, but it’s for Sapphire and----“

“You can clean it afterwards,” he interrupted, laughing. “And yes, you slip it into her anus and not her mouth.”

“Uh huh,” I smiled in apparent agreement and said goodbye with absolutely no intention of doing that to Milly. I’m already in awe of how well she stands being probed, bled and injected without complaint, staring at me as if to say, ‘well you seem to be OK with this, so I trust you,’ so there was no way that I was going to be the one to do those kinds of things to her.

Four hundred francs. Straight onto the credit card and three weeks of hard-won freelance writing income gone quicker than free beer on a Friday.

The days’ mail wasn’t much better: a further 5750 CHF (on top of the several thousand we’d already paid) from the hospital for Sapphire’s stomach treatments late last year, 250 for a blood test done by the GP and a bill for 1000 CHF from the school to ‘reserve’ her place for next year. A thousand francs to type a kids’ name into an Excel spreadsheet.....?

I added them to the ‘Bills Due’ pile that was starting to buckle the solitary little paper clip holding them together and put them on the top of the printer. They’d just have to wait.

Emails were due to be read – what was going on in the Gillard V Rudd stoush? Did my folks have any preferences for holiday bookings when they arrived here? What were those LOLdogs up to?

Oh. Despite fulfilling all of the selection criteria and the manager agreeing several months ago that I’d be ideal for the job, they’d ‘omitted’ to inform me that, due my husband already working in their organisation, they were not permitted to offer me work. Not even from-home, two hours a week.

Same goes for a role in a different section to LC’s, editing a newsletter for roughly four hours a week. An enormous conflict of interest apparently.

UN vacancies now. Part time jobs are rarer than a supermodel with a sandwich and most require overseas travel for a third of that time. How does Burkina Faso, Mogadishu or Basra sound?   But today there was a part time job – an admin assistant on the lowest of the lowest classification level, two days a week – perfect! 

Maybe.  I would have to demonstrate a ‘thorough understanding of UN administrative procedures (via an examination) and have at least five years experience working in the UN. English and French are the two working languages, with priority given to applicants who also have German and Spanish/Arabic/Russian as a fourth language.’ Oh, right. 

Wait – wait – someone saw my freelance advert and wants me to edit their research report!

I then spent an hour reading through the ‘how to’ documentation and the attached Literature Review chapter before deciding that yes, I can do this and do it well. It’s obviously a PhD thesis and a very, very poorly-written one. He says on Skype, “I’ll pay you for an hour to see how you do, and then, if I’m happy, we’ll set up a contract for another ten hours.”

Fine by me. The hour is measured by the freelance website time-tracking device so he can see that I’m working solidly; mostly with ‘track changes’ on.

I waited for Skype to burp itself on again. ‘Oh,’ he wrote in an email ten minutes later. ‘I really like your editing, but I actually wanted you to write some stuff for me, you know, fill in the gaps so that it’s not so patchy.’

No wonder he cowardly emailed me instead of speaking to me directly. My response: ‘Peter, dearest, it’s YOU who supposedly read all of those articles and are now summarising your learnings and findings, not ME. There is no possible way I can write linking sentences or expand on studies, theses or books I’ve never read.’ I wanted to end with, ‘Unless I can share your doctorate with you?’

No response back, except the one automatically generated by the freelance company exactly three minutes later. ‘Your contract with Cheater BoyXYZ is now terminated. Total payment earned: 18USD.’

So he even went so far, as my ‘employer’, to deduct two bucks from an already bargain price.


...............“Kath? Kath are you still there?” Carol sounded concerned.

I started to blubber. “Carol, I’m sorry for crying on the phone but apart from prostitution or nannying, I don’t know what else to try to earn a few bucks here and even when I did apply for a nanny job looking after two small boys for a ten hour day, she only wanted to pay me thirteen francs an hour so that she could do her diplomat-level job." 

Milly nudged my leg. With her bladder infection rampant, I didn’t dare risk fobbing her off any longer. Besides, I’d run out of dry towels. “Gotta go Carol, Milly needs a trip to the Dog Forest downstairs.”

I de-nuded myself, grabbed The Fratman-Approved apartment-friendly kit of Wellington boots and towel and took her downstairs to relieve herself. We entered the bike storage room afterwards for me to wipe her feet clean and to change out of my boots as well as dump some papers into the communal recycling bin.

Zzzzzzziiiiiiip –ooooh, the edge of the squashed cornflakes box scornfully slashed a cut across my palm. It wasn’t particularly deep but blood dripped freely. “Damn!”

And this has happened before and it’ll happen again but I bent down to unclip Milly’s lead and give her ears a scratch at the exact moment she leapt up to sneak a slurp across my nose so that CRA-A-A-CK, her rock hard head smacked into my nose.

“Poo Bum Bugger Shit Fart!” I screamed, staggering blindly about the room in pain before getting my trousers caught on the mudguard of a bicycle.

When sight was restored, it was a gruesome scene that appeared before me. Blood spatters all over the floor, the edge of the skip, the plastic bag holding my boots and Milly’s lead. Had Dexter snuck in to visit?

It’s amazing what two wet wipes can do and, fifteen minutes later, we exited the bike storage room.

On our way to the lift I saw The Fratman pushing his wheelie bucket and mop across the foyer. “Bonjour Monsieur,” I called out cheerily, idly wondering why he didn’t respond with his usual “Tres Bien” at the sight of my boots-in-a-bag and Milly’s foot towel. He seemed in a real hurry.

Back upstairs, I put off having a shower before compulsively checking my emails again.

Good news at last. No, not kids to tutor, an article to research, paper to edit or administrative work to undertake but our spare car parking spot was now officially rented to a neighbour.

I had to laugh at the absurdity of a ‘win’ that required no work or skill of my own, yet roughly equated to two hours of freelance writing. Then I had to wipe the keyboard clean - my cut was still oozing slightly.

I laughed again in the bathroom when I saw my blood-smeared face in the mirror and realised why The Fratman scuttled off so quickly...... Perhaps he does deserve a bottle of plonk or a tip this coming Christmas after all – if we can afford it!

Tapping out a tantrum

I've met a few inspirational people in the past couple of weeks and despite their differences in age, humour, interests and circumstance, a theme has emerged: give yourself permission to say 'no'.

So I've decided to say 'no' to formally learning French. There. It's out, finally: like a satisfying session on the toilet, it's a big load off.

Before arriving in French-speaking Switzerland, I bought a couple of DVDs, two textbooks and researched online. There was no way that I was going to be a 'Garcon? Garcon? Geez you can't get good local help here' kind of harridan. Au contraire; I was going to immerse myself, blend in, be at one with the language, culture and people. Learn and absorb, gather and grow; suck it and see.

But plans and assumptions are like market-stall underpants - they disappear up your butt when you least expect it. Once Sapphire started school and our holiday tutor selfishly returned to her law studies in English, my French learning ended.

Then Sapphire got sick and I missed the two-second window to enrol in the UN French courses for 'epouses' for the 'bargain' cost of 800 francs. When the new year arrived my attentions were on snow skiing, holidaying, eating, drinking, socialising and dallying with The Fratman, all thoughts of learning online for an hour every day crumpled up into a smaller ball than the screwed up foil on a family-sized block of Cailler chocolate.

Getting some new freelance writing gigs has also filled up the tiny space left in my brain for active thought or expansion. When I'm out walking Milly and thinking up different ways to describe farts, French people and bread rolls, how can there possibly be enough remaining mental energy to remember the seven different ways to say 'I am, you are, we are, they are', let alone describe what the people depicted in the 'I am, you are, we are, they are' scenarios are actually doing?

Which brings me to yesterday. The plumbing firm finally arrived to check out the pong in Sapphire's bathroom and the leaky kitchen sink. "We 'ave found one who speaks Anglaise," Monsieur Steiner told me over the phone. I thanked him effusively which always tends to help. Exceeding gratefulness makes even the most stern-looking Swiss person thaw themselves out to crank out a vague, smug smile.

I was ready. On Love Chunks' iPad I had written a thoroughly absorbing and accurate account of what we'd done to clean the pipes/combat the bathroom smells and where the leak was occurring in the sink.

"Bonjour Monsieur! Parlez vous Anglais?"
"Non."

Oh. Bugger.

I showed him the iPad, noting that stale BO, cigarettes and cheese seemed to be at war under his coat. He grunted to indicate that he'd finished reading and I pointed to the kitchen.

This is when I knew that he must be The Fratman's cousin. He rabbited on and on in French, despite me saying, "Je suis desolee, je suis Australien," over again, smiling, hoping he'd see that I wasn't trying to be rude or obstructive. All my previous gestures and charades were studiously being ignored.

In frustration he shook the tap, speaking louder. I decided to speak even louder - in English - back to him. "NO, THERE'S A LEAK UNDER THE SINK........ Oh wait, let me get the iPad and we'll talk that way............"

When I entered the kitchen with LC's black magical tablet in my hands a few moments later, Ponce Pants the Plumber rolled his eyes and sighed, muttering something quite lengthy that I knew was something about wasting his time, me being an ignorant idiot and him with his fish-finger sized-digits meant that there'd be no way he'd be able to type anything other an 'asd' when he only wanted the 's'.

At his rather obvious impertinence, I decided to keep talking in English, knowing that he didn't understand, "Yeah well I'm sorry this is an inconvenience for you, but you read my explanation; I pointed out where the pipe is loose and yes, it's annoying that you have to wipe your hands on your pants before trying to type something for me, but that seems to be life for us both at the moment, doesn't it....."

Tappita tappita tappita I went, my anger increasing my typing speed.

He read it and sighed, placing the iPad on top of the stove hot plates and slowly s-l-o-w-l-y picked out the letters. 'The tap is loose is not your pipe.'

Tappita tappita tappita 'The tap might be loose also but the pipe is leaky too - take a look at how it can pop open - it has done this already and water has leaked all over the floor'

Still he made no move to bend down and peer under the sink. Trying to calm down, I ruffled Milly's ears as she stood by and sniffed at the Ponce Pants' pungent work boots. 'I will order new tap. We call you.'

"But what about the leak?" I said this out loud, before Tappita tappita tappita, this time adding several exclamation marks after the question.

'We call you.' He put the iPad down, indicating that he no longer wanted to use it. "La bains?"

Ah yes, Sapphire's bathroom. Tappita tappita tappita - long story about the terrible odour, the steps we'd taken to use drain cleaner, water flushing, keep things clean.

"Le bidet?"

"Oui. Nous laver le bidet." Tappita tappita tappita - Yes, we flush the bidet regularly because we know that when we don't use it the water can sit there and start to smell very bad.

He shook his head. "Vous devez toujours l'eau de rinçage dans le bidet."

What? I handed him the iPad. He shook his head.

It was my turn to sigh. "Look buddy, I don't understand what you're saying; I've waited three weeks for an appointment to be made and most mornings Sapphire is afraid to open her mouth to clean her teeth in case the aroma jumps in and makes her vomit, so please use the iPad." I thrust it at him again. I swear he was typing even slower this time, just to make me sweat. 'You need to clean the bidet.'

Tappita tappita tappita - 'But I told you that we DO clean the bidet - regularly! I flush it with water all the time!' My furious fingers were flying and Ponce Pants noted my speed with a tiny skerrick of admiration.

Raising both hands up in the world-recognised, 'Ok, whatever you say, lady' gesture, he set to work in the bathroom. I huffed off into the study and Tappita tappita tappita-ed on some freelance stuff. Sounds of monkey wrenches on tiles, running water and Milly's paws on the floor rang out as she oscillated between her Angry Alpha Female and Ponce Pants.

An hour later he stood at my doorway, grunting. 'Termini.'

I brushed past him and swept into her bathroom. The pong had gone!

"Merci! Tres bien! Merci monsieur!" My smile and gratitude were genuine.

He pointed to the base of the toilet and then to the iPad. Yes, he wanted to use it. 'Toilet base is loose. See if this is OK and if not, I come back.'

I nodded. "OK, thank you."

He nodded in response and typed again. 'And back with new kitchen tap.'

"Oui."



The leaky pipe can wait. Sapphire can use her bathroom again; the basin under the sink pipe manages to catch most of the drips and Ponce Pants smiled at me before he left.

Pretend that You....

Lea from Health With Happiness has young children who love to play. Bung in some dress-up opportunities and they're like pigs in mud with the sessions invariably kicking off with the timeless phrase 'Pretend that you...'

It got me wondering what it would be like for adults to play that game. Steady on - in a non-sexual context. What would you answer to 'Pretend that you...?'

Here's a few of mine:

Slapped Tony Abbott in the face. Repeatedly, using Andrew Bolt as the weapon.

Ran in high heels without pain.

Could wear high heels without pain.

Had pets that never shed hair or, at the very least, could operate and regularly use the vacuum cleaner.

Fell asleep the second my head hit the pillow instead of three long and sweaty, fretful and restless hours later with two sessions groping around in the dark for wee trips at 3am and 5am.

Owned taps that weren't flick mixers and therefore didn't burst open and splash in and out of the cup at supersonic speed, leaving my face and shirtfront completely soaked.

Didn't need to fart the second I sit down with someone trying to interview them for an article and seem professional and in control (of persona and gas emittance).

Ate my entire body weight in chocolate and saw it reduce my fat ratio, increase my stamina and improve my intelligence levels.

Could instantly (and without ruining the environment) 'zap' and make disappear every single item of litter I laid my eyes on. Same goes for so-called 'celebrity' columnists and radio hosts.

Had visible eyebrows and lashes longer than a chicken's.

Spent the day in Parliament as the ultimate dictator removing HECS, restrictions on who can marry; bank fees other than interest, payments to private schools, stamp duty and ridiculously high retirement pensions for politicians.

Found jeans that fit me around the thighs and the waist.

Owned dishes that put themselves in and out of the dishwasher and clothes that knew how to wash, dry, iron, fold and return to the drawers and wardrobes. Had a best-selling and also critically-acclaimed novel published.

Actually wrote a novel.

Waved a wand (the fantasy equivalent of a legally-bound restraining order) and removed Sapphire's bully. And the bully's mother.

Figured out how to resolve an argument with Sapphire without first fighting the competing demons of rage, shame, humiliation and sorrow - all tightly woven in love, pride and concern.

Worked out how to let things roll off my back and not coil right through to the marrow.

Surface Skid Marks

In the space of twenty four hours, I've realised just how many 'masks' or surface appearances one person can assume.

Just before dinner last night, Milly and I were Litter Ninja-ing along busy Mt Alexander Road. I've had a beer can and 'LOSER' hurled at me before, but yesterday I was called a "slut."

Now my grasp of modern vernacular is about as cutting edge as my music choices but since when is a 41 year old woman, clad in baggy jeans, a man's jacket and accompanied by a friendly orange dog, a Slut? Do nymphos and females of flexible morality now earn their stripes by wielding a pair of barbeque tongs on their own garbage-strewn streets?

No matter. Later that evening, as we enjoyed our big bowls of spicy noodles ala Love Chunks in front of 'Australia's Funniest Home Videos', my graceless persona was one of finding eye-watering hilarity at seeing evidence of anyone - from toddlers to old ladies - publicly humiliating themselves in the most indignified of ways. An old chick slips onto some rocks: side splitting. A kid falls off a swing and plops into the mud: pants-wettingly funny.

My Bad Samaritan side is not unnoticed by Sapphire and Love Chunks who - out of the corner of my eye - I could see trading lifted eye brows and shared shame at my hoots of laughter. I honestly wish my reaction was a different one and I normally avoid watching the infernal show, because despite my best efforts at self-control, my hard-won maturity, kindness and empathy flies out the window.

This morning we were getting ready to go on a protest march. As you do on a rainy Sunday in winter. "Sapphire," I said gently, over our crumpets, "before we leave I want you to put on your extra thick jacket because it'll be freezing outside." She nodded with the added air of 'stop hassling me' that always makes me count to ten and remind myself again of her good points.

Later on, she'd cleaned her teeth and announced that she was ready. "Sapph, you need to get your jacket," I pointed out. Milly was put outside, the back doors locked and the umbrellas found. "Where's your jacket?"

That's when Sapphire's sigh and accompanying eye roll saw me change from Relaxed Kath to Malevolent Mother. "GET YOUR JACKET ON RIGHT NOW BEFORE YOU FIND YOUR iPOD FRISBEED OVER THE ROOFTOPS!"

As we walked to the tram, I cooled down, Love Chunks chatted about seeing a movie after the protest march and Sapphire's warm hand reached for my colder one. No grudges are held if I can help it and I leaned in to kiss her hair. "Stop it, Mum."

During the march, I was The Embarassing Weirdo. Most commonly found on public transport, but sometimes in slightly further-flung areas like LaTrobe Street in the rain, always doing her best to make her own flesh and blood blush. "Mum, stop talking to that smelly old guy over there - you don't even know him!"

"Muuuuuuum, saying the chant in a hillbilly accent was funny the first three times, but not now."

"Dad, can't you get Mum to stop pinching me?"

After the march we saw 'Robin Hood' at the cinema. We were sure that Sapphire, a veteran of the Star Wars and Lord of the Rings Trilogy would be able to handle anything the M rating threw up. Just to be sure, I became the living embodiment of Parental Guidance.
"King Richard isn't really a goodie in this version because he's made his army fight and kill for ten years and made his own country very poor," I whispered.

"I know, Mum."

"Marian needs to pretend that Robin is her husband or she could lose her land to the Sheriff."

"I know, Mum.

"Those young boys are running amok because they're orphans."

"Shoosh Mum!"

Several hours later, we hopped off the tram and arrived home. Love Chunks busied himself with preparing the roast beef, Sapphire went outside to cuddle the rabbit and Milly and I went for a walk.

Passing by the school I saw three boys, aged around thirteen. One had climbed onto the roof of the transportable used by the builders currently installing new science labs. The other two boys were handing him full cans of Pepsi Max. There were three boxes at their feet.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU BOYS DOING?"

They froze. Red head in glasses jumped from the building. "Nothing, sorry."

I looked over the adjoining basketball court, already littered with around thirty crushed cans. "Let me ask you again. WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU DOING?"

They huddled together. "Um, we were just chucking these cans and----"

"Pick them up. NOW!" I yelled.

I was furious. Several times a week I pick up papers, litter and the smashed bottles and cans of Friday night bogans, but I'd never seen these gormless goons before. Instinctively, despite being outnumbered three-to-one, I felt safe. And strong. And red rage angry. None of them looked like 'bad news' to me, just stupid little boys with nothing better to do.

They scurried around, collecting the cans. I'm afraid to say that I started to relish the Angry Old Vigilante role and carried it further. I held up my mobile phone. "I've taken photos of you three and hey - I KNOW you, don't I?" I said, pointing at the tallest.

"Um, yes...."

"You live near here don't you? And you too?"

"Ye-e-e-e-s," they chorused, looking at their feet.

"Do any of you go to school here?" I knew none of them did, because I'm pretty familiar with all of the kids who walk past our house.

"No, but we know lots of kids who do," chubby boy said, trying to smile.

"Well what gives you idiots the right to think that their school is worth vandalising?"

Still they didn't move to escape or to tell me to bugger off. My voice got louder. Liar Lady mode then switched on. "I know where you and you live and I work for both the council and the police station so you'd better collect your stuff and go back home."

They nodded and as Milly and I turned to head off into the other direction, my mind changed. I decided to follow them.

Sure enough, they'd just done a lap of the block next door to get out of the Mean Old Bag's sight. "HEY! YOU BOYS! I've notified the school and they've assured me that the surveillance cameras are working and will have captured your activities, so unless you want me to take this further, TAKE YOUR CANS AND RUBBISH STRAIGHT HOME!"

They immediately turned on their heels ninety degrees and walked faster. Milly and I kept following, she enjoying the trotting pace immensely. When we were only only twenty metres behind them I dialled my mobile and said loudly, "Yes, I've taken a few photos of them and know where two of them live..... Yep, sure...... So, do you want me to lodge a report?..... Uh huh...... Yep, I've got the details, thanks."

Having left that ridiculous lie on my own answering machine, I saw the boys shuffle further and further away, shoulders hunched. My heart was beating as hard as it does on the treadmill and to hide my stupidly jubilant face I bent down to ruffle Milly's ears.

"Well, furry face, it's time for this old slut to pick up some rubbish."