the schlong good friday

It was lovely to see so many people from far and wide at the stables open day. Soon after we arrived I saw a couple of Londoners who were exchanging the traditional southern greeting: ‘What are you looking at?!’ said the first. ‘Are you talking to me you slag?!' replied the other. It’s so good to be reminded of home, I thought, as they beat each other to a pulp behind the manure pile. The warm memories that welled up inside me made me quite forget the cold north wind that whistled around my breeches. My daughter Tilly interupted my homesick reverie however. ‘Crikey, that’s enormous!’ she exclaimed, running over to a big horse in the corner of the yard, and she wasn’t pointing at his tail. ‘Like Fabio’, giggled Milly. ‘What kind of horse horse is he?’ Tilly asked the stable lass. ‘he’s a stud, my dear’, said the girl helpfully. My daughters giggled. ‘Like Fabio!’ ‘Does he run in races?’ asked Milly. ‘No’ said the girl, ‘his job is to be special friends with the ladies when they get a bit frisky’. My daughters looked at each other in feigned solemnity. ‘Not like Fabio then…’ they both said together, and started giggling again. I sighed.

‘Where is your father and his secretary anyway?’ I asked the children. ‘Fabio is over at that stall and Daddy has gone to look for some lunch’, said Milly. Suddenly I saw a familiar figure in the distance, Rupert? Could it really be him, taming that new young filly, breaking her spirit and making her bend to his will? No, It couldn’t be and he didn’t seem to notice me. I wandered over to see what Fabio was buying at the riding gear stall. ‘Have you got this in his size?’ he said, holding something up and pointing to my husband. The lady behind the stall looked slightly annoyed. ‘We don’t have that in men’s sizes dear’, she explained. ‘Ha!’ said Fabio, so you won’t sell this to me, Well!’, exclaimed Fabio with huff, ‘you are only refusing to sell me this because he is a not a woman!’ ‘No dear’, replied the lady, ‘because he is not a horse dear’. I was just going to ask Fabio if he should perhaps try Soho or the internet but then my husband appeared. ‘OK chaps, lunch is here!’ he cried. ‘You’d never have thought that new macrobiotic organic place in Islington would have opened a northern franchise, but look at this; carrots and straw; cutting edge cuisine guys! Rilly must really be having an influence around here!’

Finally, after a long day, I was at last lying in bed sharing that longed for peaceful moment with my much missed husband. ‘You couldn’t get me a glass of water could you dear?’ I asked him softly. ‘Oh’, he moaned, ‘it’s cold, Fabio, get Rilly a glass of water’. Fabio groaned. ‘You won’t even get your wife a glass of water? What a terrible husband you are sometimes!’ he said. ‘Shhhhush!’ I told them both, 'you’ll wake the baby’. ‘Mummy’, said Milly, ‘can Fabio fetch a hot water bottle if he’s going downstairs?’ ‘And for me too!’ said Tilly, ‘Milly’s feet are like ice! Why do we all have to sleep in the same bed anyway mummy?’ ‘Because it will sell more copies of my book in America dear’, I explained, exasperated at my daughters evident naivety in the US rural downshifting memoir market. Just then the baby began to cry, some doubtless unspeakable polish phrases began to emmanate from the au pair, and the peaceful bank holiday I’d hoped for seemed to disappear in a crash before my eyes. I just grabbed my Catherine Cooksons (and no, actually that isn’t cockney slang) and fled downstairs to my laptop, and my book, and…but what was this, a message on my voicemail. ‘Air Hellair Rilly, Rupert here, don’t think I didn’t see you earlier, what! I just thought…’ I put the phone down, No, I couldn’t. ‘Mummy the baby’s been sick!’ cried Tilly down the stairs. I looked at the clock; 2 AM, I shouted back up the stairs: ‘Milly, Tilly, get dressed darlings, riding lessons this morning!’

smells like teen sheepdip

A sleepy little head emerged from beneath the covers and sleepy little eyes opened to greet me. ‘Mummy’ said their sleepy owner, my daughter Milly, sleepily, ‘Yes dear?’ I smiled. ‘Is it Saturday?’ she whispered. ‘yes dear’, I nodded, smiling. ‘Well just f**k off then will you mummy’ she said and disappeared back under the duvet. I pulled the covers back and she glared at me ‘You need to get up dear, you’ve got your first riding lesson today, remember’. Milly sighed. ‘But why do we need to learn to ride Mummy?’ she asked. ‘Because you two haven’t done anything entertaining for this blog for ages and if you don’t start performing for the readers then I’ll give you both to Madonna for adoption. We live in the north now remember and she’s on the look out for third world children like you’. There was another groan. ‘But Mummy, we have to go to school all week, can’t we have a lie in at the weekend?’ she asked. ‘Well!’ I snapped, ‘and what do you think I do all week then?!’ I was quite annoyed now. She looked perplexed and thought about the question for some time. ‘Actually, mummy’, she began, ‘what do you do all week?’ I was quite indignant now. ‘Well, for a start I, erm, and then I have to, err, you know, umm, and then there’s all the, ahhh, errr, to do as well!’ I had had enough of this. ‘I want you and your sister ready to go to the stables in half an hour or else I’ll ring wife in the north and swap you both for her children. Let’s see if she can write amusing stories about family life when she only has you two to work with!’ ‘Will you come with us to the lesson Mummy?’ asked Milly. ‘I will be along later dear’, I said, ‘but first I have to see a man about a sheep.’ ‘what about a sheep?’ asked Milly. ‘Well’, I explained, ‘He’s going to chop off all the sheep’s fur so I can write about it on the blog’. Milly thought for a moment. ‘What’s his name Mummy?’ she asked. ‘Alan’ I said. She thought some more. ‘So he told you his name was Alan the Shearer then, mummy?’ ‘Yes dear, what’s so strange about that? Actually his friend will be there too.’ ‘And what did his friend tell you was his name, mummy? Asked Milly. ‘Hmm, let me think, Freddy I think he said, Freddy the Shepherd.’ ‘Mummy’, Milly began, ‘you know you said you wanted to reach out and get to the heart of the North East?’ ‘Yes dear?’ I replied. Milly sighed and raised her eyebrows ‘Keep working on it mummy, You've got a way to go yet I think’, she said, looking very wise for her years, and then she pulled the duvet over her head and began pretending to snore very loudly. I don't think Milly takes me seriously sometimes, sigh, in fact I bet she doesn't even know that you can vote every day untill the 13th June in the blogpower awards.