Twiglet and a Relaxing Bath...

What can a Twiglet possibly have to do with a relaxing bath, you may well wonder to yourselves. Well let me explain that the Twiglet in question is, in fact, a border terrier dog. She, for she is most assuredly female as the logic that she employs during her antic will attest, was just a pup at the time of the tale that I bring for your amusement today. Border terriers, or Border 'Terrors' as their owners often refer to them affectionately as, are loyal, affectionate and downright scampish in character, for the uninitiated amongst you. They are brave, wise, kind and have a stubborn streak like not other breed of dog that I have ever encountered. Twiglet, like any puppy, had an enquiring mind and always wanted company, to be part of the pack, if you will. 

So what does this have to do with a relaxing bath you may well wonder?

Allow me to set the scene…

A Sunday afternoon in late January, I was preparing a roast dinner as is usual and timing is everything with a roast dinner. I have a routine whereby I like to get it to a stage where the potatoes go in, a timer is set, I slip into a hot bath and the other half takes on 'potato duty' which basically just involves basting the spuds and popping them back into the oven and resetting the timer by which time I'm finished in the bathroom and ready for kitchen duty once more. It makes him feel as if he has helped me cook the Sunday roast (he hasn't) but more importantly, it gives me time for a bath. On the Sunday I am describing, I had pushed the boat out bath wise. It was not long after christmas and I had received some Jo Malone smellies which needed my full attention. I also had a beautiful and expensive scented candle that I thought that I would light for the first time.  So here was my haven, heavenly scented water, flickering candlelight, a mug of herbal tea (yes I'm a lightweight, it should have been wine) and Paul O' Grady on the radio (guilty pleasure revealed). I slid into the bath, it was hot hot hot and I felt the aches and pains just fall away, bliss. I lay back in the water and dunked a new fluffy flannel and put the steaming cloth across my face and allowed myself to relax completely.

Have you ever listened to Paul O' Grady on a Sunday?  His show is very formulaic and all the more comforting for it. Every week there are certain things like 'lost theme tunes', 'classic triples' and at the time he also did a slot where listeners wrote in to ask him to remember their dead pets. It was a real tear jerker and always guaranteed to make his voice crack a little. He doesn't seem to do it so much these days. I refreshed my face cloth with more steaming water and settled back as Paul launched into this particular week's 'Dead Pet' slot. It was the usual mix of dogs and cats and his voice cracking when all of a sudden Sploomp!!!  The wind was knocked out of me and as I inhaled my own flannel, I made an extraordinary noise of shock and disbelief. I snatched the flannel away from my face to find Twiglet sitting neatly on my rather wobbly stomach and realising her predicament and the large volume of water that she now found herself sitting in, with typical female logic she set about trying to drink her way out of it. Whatever strangulated noise that I had made when inhaling my flannel as the air had been rudely pushed out of me by trajectory of a flying puppy landing on my flabby belly. had elicited the response of my family invading my sanctuary and they were now in the bathroom hooting with laughter at the scene before them. Twiglet, god love her, must have drunk her own body weight in bathwater in an attempt to make it go away.  She was duly removed, and I was left to continue my now wet dog scented bath in peace. I didn't enjoy it very much...

Twiglet

Slack Bladder… The Curse of a Middle Aged Diva

I am, as I have already intimated, a woman 'of a certain age' and I think it is fair to say that nature (and repeated surgery - another time) are taking their toll and leave me in the shade nowadays. where once I was a beautiful bloom, if only I had had the sense and confidence to realise that, I am now that faded rose that will drop it's petals if you dare to touch it. Oh don't get me wrong, I can still be made to resemble beauty, so long as the lighting is kind and you do not come too close, but it is definitely a faded beauty these days.  Well I suppose the same could be said for my body parts and functions too and in particular my bladder which seems to have its own rhythm and screams for release whenever it sees fit. Now! No, not when it is convenient for you to stop and use a facility but now, right this minute now!! I am forced into wearing 'lady nappies' and I cannot tell you the amount of humiliation that this fills me with. I mean for Gods sake what has happened to me? Really? Half a lifetime and I'm reduced to a lady nappy for those moments for when I simply cannot control my geriatric bladder?  Where has the wild tequila swigging amazonian who swore that she would rather die than grow old disappeared to? Please bring her back because, God knows, I miss her and I simply do not recognise this semi-incontinent wreck who seems to be inhabiting her space and stares back from the mirror before me.

I digress - the day in question was a fairly typical day. I had taken my daughter to see the doctor and was taking on to school when the 'caught short' urge struck. Now my brain had to judge whether I could make it to the end of my journey and use a proper convenience or not. Or not came the rapid answer, and so as I was driving along a leafy country lane I started to scan and scout for a suitable place  at which to stop the car. I kept slowing down to survey each spot to see whether I would be overlooked, and as each location was despatched as unsuitable, the urgency grew. I could help but notice that the radio was with deafening irony now blasting out the Weather Girls 'Its raining Men'

"Tonight for the first time, right about half past ten, for the first time in history its gonna start raining…"

"Its going to start raining something!" screams my bloody bladder!

And there it is, the perfect spot. A lay-by to the right of a the road beside a crossroads and to the left a large ploughed field surrounded by a hedge. Perfect and in the nick of time and I pull over before I reach the "absolutely soaking wet" parody of the Weather Girls. My daughter eyes me with faint disgust but is resigned to the vagaries of her mother's temperamental bladder by now and I see in her eyes a silent note never to become her mother, not ever! Watch carefully young lady, for here be monsters, whether you like it or not…

I cross the road quickly and duck into the field. It really is the perfect location, a loo with a view, I note smugly as I hurry across the rough clods towards the hedge. It's rough scrub, piles of sticks and bracken growing. I pick a spot and with a quick check around I undo my jeans and drop down to… well surely detail at this point is quite unnecessary, you get the picture, when out of the corner of my eye I see a movement. I snap my head around and see a black snake rearing up to strike just about 2 ft away from me!

"Dear Fucking God you Bastard what the Fucking Fuck?!" ...is roughly what I thought as I simultaneously leapt and redressed in the nanosecond before it struck out. Now just how a disabled middle aged crouching woman who was desperate to wee managed to move faster than… well faster than a racing snake is truly beyond logic but thankfully that is what happened. I did manage to get a damn good look at the snake which meant that I was later able to identify it as a Black Adder, only the rarest snake in the whole of the UK! Lucky old me, not. Have I mentioned I have a snake phobia? No? Well I do, and I still had an overwhelming urge to pee and a heart thumping fear of a hidden snake foe. My life is such fun sometimes, the dilemmas. I did the only sensible thing left and went into the middle of the field not caring who could see me. 

There is no dignity to Black Adder Slack Bladder

Being Lost

I am blessed with many things in life. A beautiful daughter who amazes me every day and frankly leaves me wondering how I ever managed to produce such a marvel (even when I am forced to pick up so many dirty clothes before I can even see carpet in her bedroom!) The wonder of this shiny little being (ok teenangster) with her life and it's infinite possibilities stretching out before her gladdens my weary cynical old heart. I digress, this and other blessings aside, a sense of direction is something that I am simply not in possession of.

I am not entirely useless though, oh no, I can read a map, quite well as it happens although I do appear to have reached that point in life when the print appears to have been made to an irritatingly small scale to be read effectively only by the very young or those clutching those magnifiers which are advertised in the rather annoying plethora of excess of supplementary magazines that accompany the weekend newspapers nowadays *shakes fist*.  No I will not succumb to one of those! So to sum up, I get lost quite a lot. I have learnt to think creatively about this conundrum and I would like to impart the wisdom that I have gained from having to live with this frustrating annoyance. 

When you find yourself 'lost', it is most important to tell yourself that you are not, in fact, 'lost', you are instead providing yourself with an opportunity to see things that you would otherwise have missed.

There - it really is that simple. I have seen so many exciting things that I would have otherwise have missed that I have come to consider being lost as a really quite exciting thing sometimes, actually something to be embraced. I have seen boxing hares, swooping sparrow hawks, frolicking foxes, well you get the picture. I have come across picnic spots that I've managed to later revisit, with a picnic! I've stumbled across rare plants and secret stashes of chanterelle mushrooms (I couldn't possibly tell you where they were…no really, I can't bloody well remember!) In a more urban setting I've seen amazing architecture and been able to marvel about how on earth they could have built such a complex design without the benefit of modern machines and mourn the loss of such skilled workers.  I've observed people and their elaborate rituals as they go about the daily grind, so revealing and quite distracting from the pressing problem of being lost. 

So all in all it's all about adjusting your attitude to the situation - I think there may be a lesson there that could be relevant to the rest of my life if only I could extrapolate the meaning… This ability probably irritates the hell out of my family and friends but I feel it adds to my inability to be able to navigate my way out of a paper bag. I actually actively seek it out nowadays by deliberately taking little lanes which are unknown to me.  I urge you to try it, to see the things that you may otherwise miss, you just never know what it is that you may see along the way.

. 

Its Been a Long Long Time...

Well it has been a very long time since I created this blog with the intention of posting regularly, however life has a ubiquitous way of taking over and that is exactly what has happened to this rather sorry middle aged blogger whose intentions were good. I suppose that my report might read, 

"Must try harder."

 Having spent a little time with this blog today, and having given it a little facelift ~ What the hell made me choose purple as a background colour?! Was I on drugs? Actually yes I was…prescription ones - no doubt a post will eventually enlighten you ~ I do intend to write a post a little more often, after all, I still have so many amusing stories that I need to tell to you  Situations that I have found myself in where my internal shit magnet has been switched to high and extraordinary things have happened that really you just simply couldn't make up.  

I will try to dress these snippets up in entertaining language and present them to you for your delight or horror or just complete disbelief, depending on the story. I may become distracted along the way by some little gem which I feel that I must share with you, so do bear with me if you find yourself reading this. Feel free to comment, but do remember that you are not contractually obliged to read anything that you find here or linked to @woozlehound on Twitter, I would like to think that you are here out of your own free will.

So to conclude, I am back in the house/room/whatever and my faculties appear to be intact. Well hurrah for that and anyone reading this, welcome to the mad and increasingly menopausal phase of life that I now find myself living. Things are good for Woozle - and I hope that I am not making rash promises that I cannot keep when I promise to entertain you with tales from a miscreant life.

Bonked by a Bullock

Today I thought I would regale you with an amusing tale from a long long time ago. I spent most of my years of growing up at an all girls boarding school. When I did come home for the holidays, I would disappear up to a local farm, where, in exchange for extremely hard work, I was allowed to ride some rather lovely horses. My favourite horse was Goose. She was part thorough bred and part Irish Draught with fine feathers around the fetlocks. She was a grey mare (white for the uninitiated) maybe the original Grey Goose - or perhaps not.

The lady that I worked for was a tough taskmaster and my duties were not confined to the stables, and the farm had an eclectic assortment of other animals. There were a few cows, some geese, ducks and arising from the cows at one time a shed with some young bullocks in it. The bullocks were always a little lively and in their shed they had two areas, one for sleeping which was on deep litter (layered straw that was allowed to accumulate) making the low roof rather low if you were tall, as I am, when you were trying to tie in a fresh hay net filled with the sweet smell of summer. The other area was much larger and allowed the bullocks to move about freely and before anyone gets upset, the bullocks were only kept in during the coldest spells of weather. I used to wash down and sweep the bare floored area first. 'then I would go into their 'bedroom' clearing out the most prolific amounts of poop, before scattering some lovely fresh straw. Then I would refresh the water, and the last job was tying in a freshly filled hay net.

On this particular day, I was just finishing and performing my final task with the bullocks, tying in the hay net. Due to the floor level, I had to stoop slightly and all of a sudden I felt this crushing weight! Slightly stunned I then noticed a hoof over each shoulder. Half a ton of young bullock was doing his best to shag me! Although this is extremely funny, I was actually in quite a dangerous position. I knew if I went down I was in danger of being trampled by a sexually aroused bullock. Fortunately, I was able to heft him off and escape. 

I was pretty shaken but even I exploded with laughter as I was checked over and hoof shaped bruises were found on my shoulders! I wonder - is there anyone else out there with a similar tale? Somehow I doubt it.

Falklands Veteran - My Friend Bill

Yesterday I bumped into my friend Bill. We often cross paths in our favourite coffee haunt sharing a love of decent coffee and talking endlessly about food - a lovely topic for conversation with much to both agree and disagree about. Bill won't mind me describing him as a giant of a man, I am sure, as he stands at about 6'10" which is, I'm sure you will agree, pretty tall. Bill is an ex-service man and yesterday showed me some pictures of him proudly standing guard outside Buckingham Palace wearing a Bearskin. Apparently he was a little over 8 foot tall with the bearskin on! He served mainly with the Scots Guards.

I noticed that he was not quite himself yesterday and being a pretty direct sort of person I ventured,

"Whats up Bill? You seem a little sad today" He replied that it was a bad time of the year for him. I  realised it must be an anniversary of some kind and asked if it was someone special that he was remembering. He hesitated and I apologised and said how tactless I must seem, perhaps we should talk about food again. He replied that no, it was alright, he felt comfortable talking to me. 

He started to talk in a soft Scottish burr, he is a giant but the phrase 'Gentle Giant' could easily have been tailor made for Bill, "Tomorrow (today) is the anniversary of the Sir Galahad and the Sir Tristram being fired upon in Bluff Cove during the Falklands conflict."

His eyes are down and he is making no movement apart from the constant rubbing of his fingers with his thumbs. I feel the need to fill the silence; "Were you on one of the ships?"

"No - I was about 300 metres away and watched in impotent horror"

"That must have been very traumatic for you" I venture.

"You can't imagine it - The noise, then the silence as you are deafened by the noise, the chaos, the smoke, then the noise comes back, the screaming, the horrific screaming of dying men wanting their mothers. Bodies, bits of bodies, the sea on fire, the smell of fuel. the smell of fuel burning, the smell of bodies burning...."

I need to bring him back to the hear and now I realise as his eyes are watery and his hands are shaking.

"Bill. Bill? Its ok" He looks up at me and the shutters to the pain slowly roll back down. He smiles at me and says, "You probably think I'm stupid" he looks down again.

"No Bill, I think you are an incredibly brave man." I put my hand on his for a moment and give him a smile, and for a brief second we both have a view into each others soul. Then we laugh it off and normality is resumed. 

Conversation about food is soon resumed and all is good, but something has has changed. We all need a mask to wear, to hide behind, to keep the demons at bay. Never judge the book by the cover they say and in Bill's case that saying has never been truer. I hope that he doesn't find today to painful alone with his memories, or indeed anyone else who may have been at Bluff Cove on that dreadful day on June 8th 1982. 

Our conversation was far more in depth and covered much more ground than I have written here, but I feel that it would be an invasion of privacy to write any more. We need to look after our servicemen. They risk everything for us, sometimes at the whim of stupid politicians as in more recent times (my opinion). Bill survived the Falklands and no less than five tours of Northern Ireland. I'd say that was something he should be allowed to be proud of.

Issues

I've started this new blog and then not posted for ages, not an auspicious start I must confess. Must try harder you may think, or flaky not worth bothering with, unfollow, another lonely nutter. I have been having a few technical issues lately which I am glad to say, I can stop ignoring and confess that I now know that I am not alone! It would appear that Apple have some sort of compatibility issues when connecting to people's home routers. Up until very recently I believed that it was only me and that clearly I was doing something technically incompetent to have this on/off internet connection. I went as far as changing my router in the mistaken belief that this dastardly box of much magic must be the cause of all my suffering with 'now you see me now you don't' internet. I installed it correctly and went around the house changing all network devices to this new magical box of tricks.

Of course the Sony computer and the two dells completely and impeccably behaved themselves with a faster and trouble free connection. All Apple gadgets on the other hand behaved like sulky children dragging their petulant feet and cranking into network life on an occasional whim. After searching the internet (using the Sony computer) I found forums discussing this and it would appear that I am not alone in this problem. Obviously Apple want to optimise the updates that they supply to the latest bits of kit but how about your loyal customers who own slightly older gadgets like iPhones that are not the 5 and iPads that are not the latest generation? Hmm? Come on Apple, pull your core out and fix this before we collectively throw our appliances against the walls and swap them for android ones instead.

I now know that I am not a total technophobe but I also know that I am pissed off!