Monthly Archives: April 2016

Who wouldn’t want a Wacky Wedding?

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The story that grabbed most of my attention this week was the Pastafarian wedding. This was held in New Zealand, at the church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. The wedding was conducted on a pirate ship with guests and groom in full pirate regalia and the bride sported some groovy headgear featuring a colander.

This is impressive. Not only has the couple flouted tradition and stuck a finger up to the fantasy of organised religion but the wedding has been sanctioned by the New Zealand government to boot! From what I can gather, Pastafarians believe that one may as well have faith in a deity that formed the Earth from pasta and meatballs as one that accepts the dead coming back to life or getting seventeen virgins for becoming a martyr.

I would think this couple stands a very good chance of having a prolonged and happy married life which, as we old marrieds know is enhanced by retaining as much of a sense of fun as possible and lacing the union with a healthy dash of cynicism.

Husband has his own theory on the subject of weddings and marriage [from observation rather than any rigorous scientific study]. It is that there is a direct correlation between amount of money spent on ‘The Day’ and duration of marriage. This is to say that more money=less years of matrimonial bliss. This may come some way towards explaining why the cost of our own nuptials amounted to the princely sum of thirty five pounds [exactly the price of the marriage license]. We rose, dressed [in clean, but previously worn] outfits, drove to the register office, met the two friends who’d been coerced into witnessing and did the deed.

The meeting with the [somewhat bemused] registrar was a little tricky due to his producing a small cushion for us to deposit the rings. Husband [pre-Husband at this time] looked bewildered and told him we didn’t have any rings. I feel I showed great presence of mind at this point by offering to use the ring I’d used for my first wedding. This isn’t as bad as it sounds because it had been my paternal grandmother’s ring and although I’d used it for my first marriage I had simply transferred it to the other hand when all turned to ratchet. It had only, now to be returned to my ring finger. The ceremony lasted all of fifteen minutes then we were off across the road to the pub, where my friend unveiled the secret objects she’d been carrying in a supermarket carrier bag-a cake plus a carving knife.

We returned home, married, to prepare for a proper knees-up that evening. It just happened to be my birthday. In spite of spending the princely sum of thirty five pounds we have managed to stay married-for a whole thirteen years-not the accumulation many of our peers have amassed but creditable for ‘second-time-rounders’.

Baths, Bowls and Bogs

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You can have too much choice in life. We are in the throes of browsing for bathroom parts. In the showroom there is a plethora of porcelain, sparkling white and clamouring to be purchased. Whereas in the seventies the choice would have been all about colour-Pampas? Whisper Peach? Avocado? These days it is the shape you must consider. Take basins. There is a trend for bowl-shaped basins perched on top of dinky cupboards-sometimes ‘his ‘n hers’. It prompts a vision of the morning ablutions, a harassed couple; he is shaving, flicking flecks of foam with abandon as she applies her lipstick-a recipe for a squabble. No. We are opting for an old favourite here-plain, rounded basin on a white pedestal. It is also the cheapest. This is no accident.

Toilets, then. As a very young child in rural Wiltshire I’d make my way out of the house and up the garden towards the run that accommodated the hen house where there was a rustic, timber shed with a rickety door. Inside was a bench in which two holes had been made, one larger and one child-sized. It allowed a child and an adult to sit in companionable contemplation whilst performing their bodily functions. A thick wad of cut newspaper hung suspended on a string from a nail in the wall. This, together with a tin bath in front of the fire in the kitchen is what constituted our bathroom facilities. At night there was an ornate chamber pot tucked discreetly under my bed to avoid hazardous, dark forays down the garden. I wonder what the constructor of the garden privy would think if they were to wander around a bathroom showroom today.

Now most of us in the developed world at least, are lucky enough not to have to walk outside to an old shed with a wooden seat to do the necessary. Not so in many countries where an outside privy would be considered and un-dreamt of luxury; the only option being an open field. Years of camping holidays taught me that there are worse things than having to nip behind a bush  to relieve oneself although most camp sites now have glorious, tiled, heated blocks-often with piped [no pun meant] music to boot. One flower-adorned, Swiss chalet style building in Germany’s Black Forest sports a dog shower that would put most people’s bathrooms to shame and the children’s bathing option is a masterpiece of tiled, underwater cavern complete with mermaids and sea creatures.

Back in the showroom we ponder wall-mounted, square-ish, close-coupled or bog [no pun] standard? We select the standard. It is the cheapest. This is no accident. On to the taps, where an array of designs awaits, including the standard. Toilet seats? It’s tricky. The seat shape must match the toilet shape. The French avoid this problem by having no seats. You can’t complain, since many of their toilets are still the ‘squatty’ kind-that is- square porcelain trays with central holes and places for your feet. I think I’ll be a man next time…

 

 

Apologies to Blondie…

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Owing to a number of factors [of which regular readers of this blog will be aware] I have had to use up precious hours of the life-hours I no longer have enough of-by waiting on the telephone. Gas installers, electricity providers, telephone companies, ex-electricity providers, tax inspectors, on line ‘help’ communities-these are some of the faceless establishments whose musical miscellanies it has been my misfortune to have to endure.

I am now a connoisseur regarding ‘waiting-on-the-telephone’ musical selections. Soon-to-be ex Electricity providers ‘Scottish and Southern’s’ offering is not to my taste, consisting of about six tracks which rotate in a monotonous loop of rapping, heavy metal and Bryan Adams. Eon, who are about to be the new provider at least have a non-abrasive classical offering.

To achieve the point at which you must listen to this dross you will have undergone a process involving selecting options. The options begin with the ‘main menu’. There may be five, six or more options on the main menu. By the time option number five is described I have forgotten options one, two, three and four. Since ‘what was that again?’ is not one of the options I try a random number which may or may not be ‘to speak to a human being’. Once I have selected the human being number I am on hold once more with Bryan Adams et al.

By now the carpal tunnel symptoms in my wrist has begun to show displeasure at being held in such a position by playing dead. My brain reels in sympathy and since I am sitting at the PC I begin a single handed round of Freecell Solitaire which sucks me in so that when, half an hour or so later a proper human voice asks me how they can help I have totally forgotten who I called, what I called about, or even that I called at all. It is tempting, at this point to ask the voice why my solitaire game has been rudely interrupted.

This is the point where the human explains you have got through to the wrong department, that they cannot help you, that you need to ring such-and-such a number; or if they are kindly they may even put you through to the department you may [or may not] need. Once you have gone through the musical diversion, the options menu and the lottery of a selection process again you have the joy of explaining the problem, going through your details, telling the voice your date of birth, postcode, name of your first dog and bra size all over again.

After several days I begin to feel that the loss of life hours is irrelevant, owing to a gradual seepage of desire to exist. They have worn me down. I fully understand the meaning of ‘soul-destroying’. This is how organisations, corporations and companies keep us, the masses under their control. ‘Your call may be monitored for training purposes’ intones the robotic responder and I wonder how much training is involved in making everyone’s life a drudgery. They keep me ha-aaanging on the te-e-lepho-one…

A Moving Story

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In a week that was nothing if not instructive there have been winners and losers. Before I explain I should warn anyone who is without a strong constitution or nerves of tungsten that if you are contemplating any kind of house move you should reconsider.

I have lived in the same house for about twenty years. This is long-extremely so for me, since I have documented before the many, many times I moved up until arriving here, to this house which, it must be said has had everything [or if it didn’t to begin with it does now]. Alas the house became too large to house two people and needed a new, sprawling family who would love it as we do. This has taken two years; so long that we quite forgot that we were selling it and the trauma of having done so is profound.

Still, it is done. Someone new is to reside here and we must de-camp. And here is the problem; there is nowhere to go! There is not a villa, a cottage, a bothy or even a hovel that excites us enough to call it a home.

While we ponder this conundrum we set about distributing the house contents to the world-or at least those who are interested in any of it. This is where the delights of EBAY provide an unending thrill and surprises abound in the throngs of people who are interested enough to want to buy the plethora of tat we have advertised.

For some reason, as time progresses towards leaving we become increasingly gung-ho and uncaring about ‘stuff’, casting our belongings to the wind as if we were emigrants to a desert island. There are several pages of items for sale, prompting a deluge of questions-‘what is the height of it?’ [the dimensions are in the description], ‘what is the buy-it-now price?’ [as it states-there is none], ‘can I post it?’ [NO-hence the well-known phrase, ‘local collection only].

Items get sold. They get collected. Gaps appear around the house, flattened areas of carpet the only sign that something was there. An entire room becomes empty. There is a slight echo-and billowing motes of dust circulating in the light. A tower of boxes starts to rise, then another. People come to view things-then want to see other things. It feels like living in The Old Curiosity Shop’.

At intervals I stop to shred another pile of redundant documents, seeing the narrative of our lives metamorphosing into hamster bedding before my eyes. Does it reduce us, this casting off of possessions? It shouldn’t. We are not composed of personal effects.

More spaces appear as items disappear. It begins to look less like home. This is EBAY’s way of accustoming us to the impending departure. The corner where my tall, luxuriant palm sat is particularly barren, somehow, although the purchaser of this beautiful plant was delighted and will no doubt treasure and enjoy it as I did. Ho hum…