RATTLE TAT

noise cancellation

Look what I found (thanks to Gadjets and Gizmos blog)! Yes, a Graphic Equalizer t-shirt. And it works! It's supposed to be for clubbers, but I would suggest it's equally useful as a garment to control rowdy kids. Pop it over their heads, and sell it to them as an anger gage - when the noise hits red, it's off to bed. Who am I kidding. Going to bed early will be a small price to pay for seeing just how long you can keep the LED flashing in the red zone. Maybe it needs simple modification - I'm thinking decibel-triggered chloroform. Nice idea, anyway.  

caterpillar girl

This is not my usual verbose post. Just a rare moment of aaaaahhhhh when I saw this. Stuff memories of reading to my kids, it takes me back to my own childhood. Now there's a sign of literary longevity!

 

(Today's Google logo)

moxie's the mum

Here's a woman who isn't all fluffy bunnies but does have parenting confidence.

I hate her.

I think she's brilliant.

Why can't I be this cool?

moxie

i pooped again

Following last weekend's kids party faux pas, I trumped it this weekend

I turned up at the swimming pool party venue, having psyched myself to confront the intollerable chlorinated fog with gynaecological grin and good humour - I had to be extra polite as, although I had a present in hand, I hadn't actually brought my daughter. She wasn't feeling well, but I'd forgotten to phone the boy's mum and let her know; as usual I'd left it till the last minute and felt that a personal appearance and an offering of a brightly wrapped present might sooth the unfortunate no-show.

The face began to ache after I'd grinned myself round several parties, and it soon began to dawn on me that something was amiss. Wrong pool, perhaps?

I called home to ask my partner to confirm the invitation details. "It was yesterday, you numpty". He put the phone down. I can't blame him. It's rather typical of me.

I've had enough of being disorganised. Whereas once I played it as a sign of my freedom, off-the-leashity and general creative mayhem, it's now getting plain inconvenient. And a little embarrassing.

So I found this site. www.organised-mum.com/ www.organised-mum.com.au

It's got LIFE BOOKS, and MENU PLANNERS, and other committment-listers that can be consulted AT A GLANCE. It's what I need. Exactly what I need.

I CAN"T DO IT.

I can't do the magnetic family organiser. It looks too much like a star-chart (happy face every time you're a good mummy), and besides, the magnets will fall off, the ink will leak and I'll throw it in the bin and waste good money I could have spent on apology flowers for the next mum I offend.

Actually it's a terrific idea, if you're a lists person. But if you're a lists person you're unlikely, really, to need a family planner. You'll already be the proud owner of a diary that regularly checked, or perhaps you'll have already made your own chart using ruler, pencil and colour codes. If you're not a lists person, then, like diaries, it'll start with good intentions and fail to ever be of any use after the first week because you've forgotten to look at it.

Stick it on the fridge, dummy!

Yes, I could stick it on the fridge, along with the parent-teacher interview notices and 19 forms that require my signature that should have gone back to school in my daughter's bag three weeks ago.

But I approach the fridge with one thing in mind - food - and nothing will distract me from my mission, even if it does have stabilo boss highlights and hilarious novelty magnet pinning it to the door.

Visibility isn't the key. I need rewiring.

Please, if you have any solutions less drastic than labotomy, I await your consul.

Now, where did I put my pants?.....

whoopee do

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7884829.stm

For Comic Relief's Red Nose day the scatalogically-obsessed Brits are putting on a Whoopee Cusion concert.

What a wonderful idea. Since becoming a mother I have rediscovered the sheer silliness of the 'fart noise', rejoiced in replicating it (orally) with my children and watching them fall about and promptly fart involuntarily due to their hysteria.

Besides, it's a terrific addition to any musical score. The reverberance, the resonance, the force and pelt - the 1812 could have done with it, the William Tell would certainly have benefited from its staccato-ed peps and Swan Lake would be more pallatable for the odd bit of light, er, relief. 

And if it gets a kid interested in proper music - not the noxious gas of manufactured crap - then all the better. You could educate and flatulate: introduce them to Wolfpong Amadeus, Johanne Sebastian Parp and Rachmaniguff.

The new arrangement for Trumpet Voluntary promises to be a hit. 

 

unchained maladies

I've been too wrung out today to bolster this starter-blog with wit and wisdom (it's my excuse and I'm sticking to it). Yesterday I had a delightful gastro-bug - I won't go into the details - and last night, around 10pm Ben began to show signs of it. We finally got to sleep at 5am this morning. Suffice to say, having woken up with head-cold to boot, I'm buggered.

There is nothing - NOTHING - more distressing than looking after a sick child when really you'd rather you and your imploding head were left alone to beat each other up in privacy. But there was an upside to this.

I couldn't look at a computer screen, my head hurt so much. All I could do was lie on the floor and occasionally heave a listless arm towards Ben, lying next to me, in an attempt at soothing his fevered brow. I often thwacked him in the nose instead, but the sentiment was there.

Matilda, who hasn't been affected by any ailment - and annoyingly bouyant as ever - noticed, however, that when I inhaled with some force, my swollen stuffy nose gave out a clear trumpet sound; we worked out by doing Do-a-Deer, that it was probably D Flat. This was hysterical and she forced me to do it again and again.

After some more sniffling we also realised that we could change key. And while Matilda conducted with enthusiasm I bellowed home a few big ones while Ben contributed, when he could, with a whinge or a fart. All in all it was a triumph of sinus, arse and mind, a trio con brio; and what's more, without even trying I was playing with my children.

Success, I think you'll agree. Playing passive active. 

But I really hope I'm better tomorrow... Pass the tissues. 

 

are you a dummy?

As Mrs Merton once said: I love a mass debate!

In exploring further the unprovoked spat (as in spit, not baby oysters) of the child-free columnist, I came across this choice, patronising piece by columnist for The Guardian, Rachel Cooke, who says we're all boring and smug. 

I'm upset because my name is Rachel and I quite like the name and assume other Rachels must be nice, too, apart from, perhaps Mussolinis wife... (is that DUMMY enough for you Ms Cooke?)

The Dummy Mummy Decade

Read Evan Maloney's amusing response here

And I had to have a go, too, a Polly Vernon's piece. To read it go here

I'm aware that we must appear dull to child-free women who have time to broaden their horizons and stretch their brains; and they're very smug about their brains. But why aren't they writing like Amis, composing like Max Steiner, sculpting like Moore or travelling round the world like Palin -why aren't they doing something incredible useful, instead of picking on women twice their size? I find it all a bit odd.

Debate encouraged. Please comment!

 

 

 

 

jade goody (nee baddy)

Read Meredith Blake's brilliant summarisation of the short life and dimes of Jade Goody 

If you don't know Jade Goody then here's the low down: mouthy reality british tv 'star' whose ignorance found her fame, fortune and an unfortunate falling out with cultural sensitives. She's now dying of cervical cancer and has become a hero. Everyone loves a good death, don't they?

I think I have lots to say on this, but I'll return later. Mainly to comment on her cashing in on her death for the sake of her two kids. And also to link back to my feature on why death is just the beginning

another paranoid android

From Ananova.com
Japan Invents Mini-me Robots
Robotics firm Little Island claim they can create a tiny likeness of anyone - even replicating the sound of their voice. Customers place their £1,500 order and simply submit a photo of the person they'd like their new toy to resemble. Six months later, and their very own Mini-Me will turn up on their doorstep. The dolls can be taught to sound like the customer via an in-built microphone, a computer and voice recognition software. The robots, which are created in a technology centre just north of Tokyo, are equipped with 80 gigabytes of storage and a webcam. The advanced version can even download the latest news and weather and then read back the reports - in your voice.

To see a picture go here

As you'll notice, these Mini-Mes are not flatteringly Apple-slick or arty garden ornament robot-a-likes. They look like Muppets.  

I already have two Mini-Mes; and with their puppy-fat features and large eyes, they’re not too far removed from the Jim Henson identi-kit. They may not look like me (in fact, they're so similar to their father you'd wonder if I had anything to do with it), but never the less I'm aware that they are mine. And they make lots of noise. I can't hear myself think most of the time. I don't need any more noise source in the house. Let alone from a small Muppetty robot that looks like me.

What is that all about? I find it creepy. Why would you? Why would you want a less-clumsy, more precise, unrattleable miniature you sitting on your kitchen counter? To remind you you're human? To keep you company? Me, myself and I-am-a-robot... I don’t even let the kids sit on the surfaces...

As for the aesthetics – well, I avoid mirrors and the sound of my own voice drives me crazy; its bleating ineffectiveness when disciplining the kids invariably means, after they've ignored me, I'm left alone, honking out orders in a tone that sounds increasingly tinny. Do I really need an echo - and from a Muppet who also reminds you in a killer-comedy kind-of-way that your nose really is out of proportion to your face...?

I don’t want to hear me or see me. And if I want groovy weather updates, I'll have them delivered in someone else's voice, thanks. Preferably one with soothing tones, like Stephen Fry. Or someone more dithering than myself, to make me feel as if I've got more of a grip on life. Wood Allen, perhaps.

Mind you, after another sleepless night, I think there’s only room for one paranoid android in our house and that’s me.

boy marries dog

Did you hear about this?

Apparently a - no, read it for yourself:

Indo Asian News Service
"Bhubaneswar, Feb. 18: In a bizarre instance of superstition, a two-year-old boy was “married” to a dog, to “ward off evil spirits”, a media report said today. According to Oriya web portal Odisha.com, the “marriage” ritual was performed on Monday evening by Munda tribals of Patarapur village in the coastal Jajpur district, some 130 km from here. The groom, Sagula, was brought in a flower-decked rickshaw by the family of the bridegroom amid bursting of fire crackers, to the village temple. He tied the knot with the dog as the priest chanted hymns, the report said. The ceremony was followed by a feast for at least 150 villagers. “We did this to ward off evil spirits as a tooth was growing from Sagulu’s upper gum and in our community we consider this as a bad omen,” the child’s father, Mr Sanarumala Singh, was quoted as saying. “The bride spent just one night here. Not inside the room, but on the verandah,” he clarified. There are numerous instances of such “weddings” in rural Orissa where literacy rates are low."

The bride spent the night on the verandah... love it! (And after she'd gone and had her dew claws done, an' all).

I'm not one to poo-poo superstition (what a load of baloney!) but marrying a boy to a dog for having a tooth that, and correct me if I'm wrong, is growing where it ought to grow? In which case can I marry off my husband to a pretty sow for having hairy ears? Should I do the decent thing by packing my bags and leaving for the mountains in seach of a decent goat that will have me (I've recently spotted chin whiskers...urgh)?

I suppose with the boy being just two years old, he thinks he's getting a pet. And although marrying it might seem like a crazy idea, it might just work! Let's work backwards: the divorce would be easy.

"No, you keep the bone, I insist. The chippendale? Sure, you marked it your territory the day you got here..."

Affairs would be simple. 

"Don't look at me with those eyes. I didn't do anything! If you have a problem tell me now. Nothing? Good, now let me get some sleep."

Comfortingly, those little irritations wouldn't be so different from a same-beast marriage.

"I'm sleeping in the spare room again. Why? Because you keep doing that thing with your leg. Are you dreaming about chasing playboy bunnies again?"

But what's the most important thing in a marriage? Companionship, of course. And dogs are man's best friend, although little help with crossword clues. 

If I was convinced my little boy would be savaged by toothsome beasts unless he shacked up with a sheepdog (no mutt for my kids, thank you), they'd have my blessing. I like dogs (my husband detests them) so it would be a sneaky way of acquiring one. Look at it this way, darling. We haven't lost a son, we've gained a bitch! And besides, Ben loves dogs. It's all he wants, he says. He won't ask for anything else ever ever again if we get him a dog. Done deal.

How cruel to even think of denying your son a normal wife! He'd live. And with little boys' tendency to grow big and testoseroney, it's the dog I'm more worried about. Sleep on the verandah as long as you can, dear.

pure poetry. nothing else

In response to my maudlin essay When Death Is Just The Beginning I was sent this poem.

Remember by Christina Rossetti. 1830-94.

Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you plann'd:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.

It's lovely sentiment, isn't it? But it isn't mine, and what's worse, it only acts to advertise my own whimpering fear based on a world that rotates without me in it. How revolting! Rossetti is far too level-headed. Or else it's poetic licence. Forget and smile, kiddies, sure, but no Happy Meal until you've wept your little hearts out first!

I also came across this in my literary scouring of the subject (bring out your dead! bring out your dead!): Dead Philosophers - this book explores Cicero's suggestion that 'to philosophise is to learn how to die'. Sounds interesting, although in the name of safety I suggest a quick thumb through with restricted contemplation, followed by a life-saving dose of Desperate Housewives.

For the record I do, obviously, want my children to outlive me. But thank you for the poem.

 

gwyneth's home-made goop

www.goop.com

I have just come across GOOP. Yeah, I know. I'm always late. But now I've found it I can't help commenting on it. The beauty of its design, the simplicity of presentation, the pureness of its 'philosophy'. It's enough to make me vomit. But not this time.

I'm normally the first person to shoot down a mother superior who flaunts not only her coping abilities, but the 'extras' free of charge. Extras being karmic coolness, enthusiasm and organisation skills. But there's something about Gwyneth I like. And although the tagline - 'nourish the inner aspect' - sounds like a Zen readymeal, I do like her site. 

For one, there are no sweeping pinks or Farrow & Ball wallpapers or swatches of the same shade sweetly echoing through its pages; there are no overly apple-pied pictures of children; there are no blow-by-blow accounts of the pains of celebrity motherhood... Gwyneth is just giving an insight into what she likes. If you're going to call that self-centred then you're going to have to stop looking at blogs, because unless a blog is discussing tax returns or grouting, chances are it's a big trip.

But back to beautifully composed Gwyneth and her beautifully composed site, Goop.

This quote featured on www.blog.macleans.ca

"Why the notoriously private 36-year-old is trying to reinvent herself as a 21st-century Mrs. Beeton is a mystery. For all of its breezy openness, Goop is shrouded in secrecy. The number of subscribers is unknown. When a reporter from the New York Observer went to the address listed on the website, there was no Goop office and a security guard couldn’t find any record of it on the computer. Paltrow’s spokesman, Stephen Huvane, didn’t respond to Maclean’s phone calls or emails. The most logical explanation for Goop is that Paltrow figured she could make some serious money by capitalizing on her celebrity—and style-setting image. On the TV program Popular, which aired nearly a decade ago, high school girls talked about wanting to be “like Gwyneth.” Maybe, she figured, the same demographic, now mothers, still do."

Who cares? If Gwyneth is making money from a online extension of her sellable personality, it's none of our business. Spin-offs happen all the time: Friends made Joey, Oprah made a brand as did the Beckhams, and Nigella the journalist found she could make more money if she put down her pen and picked up a dollop of marscapone on her finger - all of this, not to provide us with added-value entertainment, you know. A simple website that looks a simple pleasures aint' so bad.

What's more, Goop is cute. It's cuter that I could ever be. I don't care what I wear and if I make something with the kids it's invariably an egg box crocodile, but I like to think maybe, one day, when I get more sleep, when I lose some weight, when I have redeveloped my larger-than-lifeness, I'll be enviably in control and enigmatic again. I'll be Goop.

And anyway, celebrity role models were never supposed to be imitated were they, just leered at from gutter level; and that's something reflex celebrity-panners need to digest.

For once, I won't take bitterness. I'll order Goop of the day.

 

flat daddies

flat daddies

This has been around for a while, but I came across it again in my 'ooh interesting' dossier of parenting info, and I had to share it with you. You may have seen it before, in which case yawn and try another blog. If you haven't read on....

It's FLAT DADDIES. Not dads who need a pick-me-up, not dads who've had an unfortunate encounter with a bitumen roller, not dads who can't sing in key - no, flat daddies: 2D, flat, cardboard or canvas fathers.

Before you thrust your hand in the air and shout '2D dads! Tell me something new', I'm not getting personal. Besides, all of us can feel like the third dimension's quit on us, especially when you've been up with your 4D kids all night (height, depth and volume (x2)).

These daddies are literally flat, life-size photographic images of parents who are serving in the military, away from home. You can get a flat daddy (or mummy/mommy) for your kids, or you can give them to someone else as a present.

I have two problems with this.

If someone were to give my kids a flat-me (you know, if I suddenly made it big and was obliged to do a world publicity tour) what could I expect when I get back? Perhaps barely an 'alright, mum' if flat-me had been around, being me, making me seem like I'd never left.

Or worse, what if it was disappointment? What if flat-mummy was better than the real one? After all, she'd always be smiling, she'd always let the kids climb on her, she'd listen for hours to their accounts of that morning's Scooby Dooby-Do triple bill plot-lines without plugging her ears and shouting 'go away'! A flat-me could be propped anywhere; I'd be at the door waiting for them when they came home from school, rather at the computer, where they usually find me, prod me, groan and give up. A flat-me could respond in a non-negative way to demands like 'stay with me while I sleep'. A flat-me could be a vast improvement. I can see that.

I understand, for families who don't see one of their main carers for months on end, a flat-pack parent is better than a vacuum. Daddies and mummies could be at the breakfast table every morning, grinning as the cornflakes pinged off their flat noses, ears and chins. They'd just keep on grinning. And here's my second problem. Yes, they're being heroes (I'm not entering into debate on this, I can only get so opinionated) - they're doing a tough job. But eternally frozen in a picture of a perfect parent, with ever-lasting humour and perpetual tolerance?.... They're being put on a pedestal, being made heroes of the household. It's cruel. Cruel to the returning parent who, knackered from weeks on patrol just needs a bit of space to deflate without having to fill the happy flat shoes of his or her fill-in; and cruel to the parent left behind as cop-flakking bad cop to the flattering good flat cop.

I have a solution. The Flat Daddies accessory kit. Comes with sleeping face, rage face, preoccupied face and 'nothing's wrong but don't come near me' face. Ah hell, why not go the whole hog. For nothing extra, the audio kit. Snore, grunt, groan, roar and fart (that's unique to the Flat-ulent Daddies range).

I like the idea. I like it alot. Especially if, while flat-daddy's keeping the kids company in the tv room, flat-Johnny Depp's standing to attention elsewhere. But seriously, what's wrong with a photo?

running filthy rings

 

Space junk

I got sent this link today. Click on it and you’ll find an alarming picture of debris – junk and satellites – orbiting the earth, creating a man-made ‘ring’. What’s to blame? Consumerism, capitalism and our burning desire to go forward, more quickly.

It got me thinking a little bit about small-scale junk. Family junk. And in a way it's not so different - in fact, it's all connected.

Let’s say children are the consumers and parents are the service providers. And the ‘consumer ring’ is plastic bits and pieces – from two-buck bargain basements, nothing-over-a-pound shops and, of course, fast-food children’s meals with a happy-go-lucky-dip marketing campaign. Unless you’re Amish or a resolved, galvanised or consistent parent, or a parent from a culture as yet unaffected by fiddly plastic bits, it’s probable that your family  household will have its own orbiting junk. It enters the domestic atmosphere and then gets moved from one cupboard to another, circulating the various storage solutions in the house until finally ejected and then, most probably, it will enter the big picture – either creating an impenetrable ring under the crust of the earth or adding to a poisonous one in the atmosphere.

But it’s not the fault of the children. Like any consumer they’ve been conditioned into wanting more than they need by big companies wanting big cashola, regardless of what the price to earth and beyond is. And we allow it, because as parents we, too, are greed buckets. Not for money, but for time. We are greedy for time. And plastic toys, while depleting oil supplies, momentarily stem constant demands from bored or attention-hungry kids and give us time - to think, shop, work, whatever. I’m guilty. Guilty as a charge of swatting away the kids’ wants with the big stick of bribe. I can’t buy them a puppy dog or bike every time (or ever, actually), so I scoot into the cheapy cheapy shops and buy them unrecyclable trinkets that fascinate them for all of a yawn and then end up orbiting our house. But it means that I can gain a minute here are there, go forward more quickly, advance, move to the next thing in the day’s itinerary. A small step for mum-kind. And it’s so wrong. We need fewer things on the agenda so that we can reward kids with play-time, not decay-time.

I know that I cram too much into life. I want to be a novelist, I have to make up excuses why I’m not (very time-consuming), and I have to do the paid stuff and I want to chat on Facebook and play Scrabble till my eyes bleed, drink a bit of wine, flick through a cookery book (though I rarely do anything that could be called 'cooking') – and then be a parent. And compared with most, I’m on holiday. But looking at this picture and the obvious role I, as a quick-solution parent play in its implication makes me feel queasy. We have to stop buying the kids junk! Stop filling their party bags with two-cent whistles and water-squirters which break in a second, stop calling scrappy toys ‘treats’, stop pacifying at the cost of the environment. We have to put up with their moans, get some discipline back and make time for them. Because while they’re effectively latch-key kids in a consumer’s paradise, they’ll be running rings around us. I’ll be making the change – just as soon as I have time...