The OTHER Milestones

Life is full of milestones, some good, some bad.

There are individual milestones: first bra, first kiss, first kiss with a Toga waiter from a Roman themed restaurant (okay, maybe that one was just me), first operation to remove an ingrown toenail (me again?).

Then there are family milestones: first anniversary, first child, child's first day at school, child's first vomit in the car. Some of them we acknowledge within the family; many we celebrate with others (obviously not the vomit one).

But what about the milestones we don't talk about? The ones we experience, notice, but don't share?

Or at least you don't. I, clearly, do. For example:

• The day you stop thinking 'I get to spend the rest of my life with him!' and start thinking 'I have to spend the rest of my life with him!'
• The day your toddler learns to say 'no'.
• The day your toddler learns to demand 'chocolate!'
• The day you say 'Not tonight, honey, I'm too tired'.
• The day your husband says 'Not tonight, honey, I'm too tired'.
• The day your son discovers what happens to his penis when he plays with it.
• The day your daughter discovers her 'tiny, tiny penis'.
• The day you start looking at your husband's penis with the sole thought of vasectomising it.
• The day your son asks you where babies come from.
• The day your children demand to let them see you 'make a baby'.
• The first time your child sleeps out and you cry.
• The first time your child sleeps out and you celebrate.
• The first time you realise you have vomit on your shirt.
• The first time you realise you have vomit on your shirt and don't bother to wipe it off.

The 40th Birthday (Hairy Yeasty Toenail) Poem

This is most of a 40th birthday poem for a dear friend of mine, whose defining qualities are
a) being incredibly nice
b) getting thrush a lot
c) not waxing or trimming her toenails regularly, and
d) having tons of sex with her husband (when she's not in the throes of b)).

I started by talking about how gorgeous and slim she is.

She says she eats a lot
but I am sure that's just bravado.
The only thing I see her eat
is toast and avocado.

Her lips and eyes are stunning
and she has the flattest tum.
Her hair is long and flowing
all the way to her firm bum.

She throws her clothes together
and she always looks amazing
spending money that her husband earns
when working hard at glazing.

Despite her wondrous beauty though
she is of course still flawed,
though her minor imperfections
will not make her less adored.

She sometimes feels unwell
and I don't want to make her blush
but whenever she takes medicine
she gets quite shocking thrush.

Of course, this can come as relief.
At least she gets respite
from the amorous advances
that come at her every night.

Not only does she suffer
from a very itchy snatch
but she often lets her underarms
grow to a thick, long thatch.

Her leg hairs also get so lengthy
she could almost plait them.
Months pass before she makes time to
let her beautician at them.

Her toenails too can get so long
she looks just like an elf.
It makes me feel crazed with desire
to cut them off myself.

To her dear husband Henry
she's a truly lovely wife.
Through good times and... well.. more good times
they've never come to strife.

She married him when she was twelve.
She's never had an ex.
And yet they still spend half their lives
in bed and having sex.

She can't say no to anyone
and nothing is too taxing.
The only thing that she rejects
is trimming nails and waxing.

She goes to quite tremendous lengths
for friends who are in need,
and with a friend like me
that happens frequently indeed.

We wish you Happy Birthday
and a very happy year.
Despite leg hair and freakish nails
we hold you very dear.

(with thanks to @sharpestpencil and @sheepsclothing for their inspiration for a couple of rhymes)

Favourite Photo

The lovely Amanda from LPlates (via Chantelle from fatmumslim) tapped me on the shoulder in a new photo tag thingy:
I love how every photo tells a story. I want to know what is your favourite photo of yourself. So share the photo, share the story and then tag three other people. I want to see photos and stories all around the blogosphere.
SO, here is mine:

This is me, pregnant and debauched, in Mycanos.
It's not evident from the photo, but I am totally high on drugs. Caffeine, to be precise. Though I abstained from all caffeine for the first 6 months of my pregnancy, the coffee in Europe was so superlatively good that I couldn't resist.
The effects on my pregnant body were immediate and extreme. I bounced around the gorgeous isle of Mycanos like a cumbersome Eveready Bunny, climbing hills and paddling in the clear blue waters, until I crashed at the end of each day in a heap with my varicose veins throbbing, my lovely (and very temporarily) big boobs aching, and my head spinning.
Sitting on the table is Chicken. The older kids asked us to take Chicken on our holiday, and to photograph his journey as he travelled with us.
Travelling must have suited Chicken, because, miraculously, he grew around 5 inches during the trip. We told the kids it was due to all the fabulous pasta and souvlaki. They never figured out that the original Chicken got lost somewhere on the flight from Australia, to be replaced in a panic at the nearest souvenir shop as we arrived in Venice.
God knows how we found a toy poultry in the heart of canal territory. Travelling is, indeed, a strange and wondrous thing.
I tag:
http://thepomegranateblog.wordpress.com/
http://mummy-time.blogspot.com/
http://melsthoughtsdujour.blogspot.com/

Blocked & UnFollowed - The Pain Of A Lonely Tweep

Writing online requires a thick skin. You put it out there, and you hope people respond well. If they do, you feel like the popular girl in school. If they don't, well.... you get hideous, fall-on-the-bed-in-a-foetal-position-quivering flashbacks to when you weren't.

When I began posting on Twitter I followed some interesting people, some of whom kindly followed me back. These people included the comedian Dave Hughes, who thrilled me to bits when he followed me too. After all, if Dave Hughes found me Follow-Worthy, then I must be worth something, right?

WRONG.

Turns out, Dave Hughes follows EVERYONE who follows him; he's just a totally inclusive kind of guy. Which is lovely, really. But it kind of devalued his particular following of me, if you know what I mean.

Still, it's better to have found love, and realised it's a little diluted, than never to have found love at all. There are plenty of people who have failed to follow me, despite my onslaught of desperately witty and pithy posts. I'm like the girl knocking pitifully on the door of the party, except that no-one can hear, because the music is turned up so loud inside.

It's bad enough when people I don't know don't follow me. When people I do know don't follow me, it's like rubbing salt into the wound. My own BROTHER-IN-LAW, for example, refuses to follow me, despite me following his posts since he's been online. I mean, what's with that? Even if he finds me painfully boring, surely familial loyalty would give me even a paltry Pity Follow? But no.

Still , at least all my brother-in-law has done to me is Not Follow. Yesterday, to continue the party metaphor, I actually got TURNED AWAY FROM THE DOOR. Yes, I attempted to follow an interesting looking person on Twitter and found they had blocked me. So offensive and noxious was I, that this person had decided to ban me from reading their posts. I guess they were concerned I'd.... Um... Well, actually I really don't know what I might have done had I been let loose to read their posts. But clearly something very, very awful.

So not only did I then feel like the unpopular girl in school, I felt like the paranoid unpopular girl in school, who knows someone doesn't like her, but has no idea why. Am I not pretty enough? (Possible, but my Twitter photo is a really good picture, taken from a careful angle.) Is my heart too broken? (Well, now it certainly is.) Do I cry too much? Am I too outspoken? (Sorry, couldn't think of anymore questions so I had to borrow from Kasey Chambers.)

Still, whatever the questions, I know the answer. I'm starting my own party. The food may be bad, and the music lame, but you're all invited, and I'm not blocking anyone.

Except, maybe, my brother-in-law...

Simon Says Sex

Wednesday nights are great for my husband and I. It's the night I get to watch The Mentalist, and the night my husband gets lucky.

My husband isn't particularly keen on The Mentalist, but he's always delighted when it's on. Because The Mentalist stars my ultimate fantasy man, Simon Baker. And when the show is over, and Simon doesn't magically come knocking at my door, I have to do something with all that pent up sexual energy. And my husband is there... and he is very willing to oblige. And did I mention he is there?

I love a good fantasy. For a while before I got together with my husband, he was my fantasy man. Thing is, after 11 years of marriage, he's in my reality just a little too much to be in my fantasies all the time too. Hence Simon.

I've had other fantasy men at different points (Mr Big from Sex & The City, Dr McDreamy from Grey's Anatomy, Joey Perrone from Young Talent Time) but Simon fits my current needs nicely. He's gorgeous, Australian (so conceivably could end up down the road one day), a father (so conceivably could end up down the road with his kids, who could start a conversation with mine) and married to someone with three children (so conceivably wouldn't object to a woman with post-breastfeeding boobs and pelvic floor issues). And did I mention he's gorgeous?

Fantasies can be fabulous for marital sex. After all, no matter how hot your partner is, after years of living with them they're unlikely to make you tingle every time you brush past them on the way to the kitchen. (If they did, you'd probably be dead of a heart attack by now.)

And celebrities are far better (and safer) fodder for fantasy than real people. Real people are generally totally disappointing, and if they're not - if they really are worthy of our desire and dreams - then far too dangerous to be fantasizing about. I mean, I have no problem with my husband thinking lewd thoughts of Angelina, but lewd thoughts about one of my friends, or the girl who sits next to him at work? More of a problem.

So bring on The Mentalist and Wednesday night sex.

And if I don't want sex, I have to make sure my husband isn't watching Nigella Bites. Gets him the mood first time, every time.

My hubby and I.
Just spicing things up a bit.

By Popular Demand...

Since joining twitter, I have been inundated with requests to start a blog (using 'inundated with requests' in the sense of 'suggested by a couple of kind people who could sense my low self esteem over the internet').
This was, as you can imagine, a tremendous ego boost to me. Rarely in my day to day life do I get such validation of my worth (using 'such' in the case of 'well, any, really'). The men in my family are, after all, not ones for bestowing unnecessary praise. The closest my husband will get to telling me I look nice is when I ask 'Do I look nice?' and he responds in the affirmative (usually with his eyes still on 'Mad Men'). It's not that he doesn't think I look nice, it's just that he doesn't quite get why he should tell me. It's like reminding me that I have two ears, or a full set of teeth, or that freakish scar on my left ring finger that makes it look like a bum. In his mind, I should know he knows that by now, right?
My son, on the other hand, is less about withholding praise and more about offering constructive criticism. From the time he was four or five he would offer such advice as 'Mum, perhaps you would like to put on a bra?' (more than a little demoralising considering that, most of the time, I was wearing a bra). He also offers helpful cooking suggestions, for example, "This burger is disgusting, Mum. You need to try to make it taste more like McDonald's. Then maybe I'd eat it."
Of course, to be fair, I still have my girls to help me feel good about myself. Little Boo at only 18 months of age isn't a great deal of help, having learnt 'Bad Mummy' (and it's counterparts 'Shit Mummy' and 'Bum Mummy' from her brother), but she does fling herself at me with a scream of joy after a short separation, which is very rewarding indeed. (Sadly, when her father is around, I may as well be a piece of wall, but we can't have too much positive reinforcement).
And her sister is full of praise for me, assuring me I'm beautiful, wonderful and The Best Mummy In The World on a daily basis. Thing is, though, Pinkela tells EVERYONE they're beautiful, wonderful, and The Best Mummy/ Friend/ Teacher/ Grandparent/ McDonad's cashier in the world, so it's not quite as rare and special as it might sound. But better than Bum Mummy, nonetheless.
So thank you to all who have encouraged me to begin blogging, and I hope to reward your faith in me.
Oh, and for those desperate to see, here's a pic of the bum finger. Bum Mummy indeed.