UK Saffa goes all Bridget Jones

Today was my bi-annual Bridget Jones day. It’s the day for me when everything that can go wrong will go wrong.

The first clue that I wasn’t destined to have a nice day was waking up with a snort due to an entire night of blocked nose and headache. There is nothing that says sexy mama, like a snort in the morning. Undeterred I decided to drag my shattered body out of bed with the conviction that if I just freshen up, get dressed and slap a bit of make up on, then all shall be right with the world. Lil Fella did not agree.

‘Come on little buddy,’ I croaked, ‘It’s wake up time!’

‘No it’s not,’ mumbled Lil Fella from under the pillow, ‘it’s still early. Dad just left.’

‘Sweetness, that was two hours ago.’ I informed him whipping off the duvet.

‘No it wasn’t’ he insisted. Clearly this was going nowhere. I had no energy to deal with this and left the room. ‘I’m getting ready,’ I said on the way out, ‘I recommend you do the same.’

The second clue came when I looked out the window. Actually clue  number two was much more sneaky than that. I was looking out to check the weather. After peering out for a minute I concluded that yes it was damp but there was no rain to be had and therefore Uggs and woolies were the way to go. By now I was feeling dreadful and decided I needed clothes that would hug me as I went along. So with me dressed and Lil Fella reluctantly ready, I put my best foot forward, out the door and straight into a downpour. Blast it.

But never fear, for I have in my home the Biggest Brolley In London. No need to change out of my comfy clothes when we have an umbrella the size of a small car. So we attempted to leave again, this time under the Brolley and ready for anything. Almost. After kissing the wee lad and sending him on his merry way down to school, I made my way down to the station. It was about this time that the Biggest Blast of Wind in London decided to take on the Biggest Brolley in London and for a split second I thought I was about to go all Mary Poppins, and fly through the air. No such luck. The Brolley took a hammering, and in the space of a second, it flipped inside out and then the world went dark. It took me some time to realise that it had collapsed on me. What a dork! I was wrapped in buckled brolley and still walking, well stumbling, well bashing into things. I blame the blocked nose and lack of sleep, but logic eventually kicked in and I ran back home and dumped the thing in the hallway. I needed a hat. A wooley one would have to do.

Attempt number three at leaving the house and now, the weather sees that I am without brolley, and chucks it down even more. I gave up at this point and trudged through the rain and off towards the station. Along the way I realised that my boots were soaked through, my hat was even more soaked through, and just for giggles, I discovered a hole in my glove.

But the day was not yet finished. I got to work and although heavily dosed up to the hilt with various snot busting medication, still I had issues. This slowly progressed throughout the day and by 5pm it was clear to me that this was no allergy I was dealing with.  Mercifully Big Daddy, being sensitive to my plight of patheticness, offered to pick up Lil Fella from daycare and insisted that I go straight home and get into bed.

And the final clue that this was indeed the bi-annual Bridget Jones day? Well technically I would’ve posted this about an hour ago, but due to some technical glitch that has never happened before on my blog, and I doubt will ever happen again. I lost the entire of my first draft of this… So there you have it. One wet, cold, snotty, klutzy, painful, blocked, exhausting day.

UK Saffa over and out………

A message from your driver

Attention please: due to the bad weather which we are never prepared for despite the fact it’s rubbish half the year, a leaf has attempted to commit suicide by flinging itself onto the tube tracks. This means that the big metal beast you are traveling on will have to stop and wait for said leaf to be removed before we can continue on our way.

In the meantime please feel free to squash as many people on as you can and enjoy each others soggy wet smell.

Also I would just like to point out that if you are late and frustrated please feel free to tut as loudly as you like as we believe once the appropriate level of unified tut is achieved all your woes will disappear.

Finally, I would like to remind everyone that in the rush hour please allow an extra half hour travel time to make sure you are prepared for any other abstract event that may occur such as random driver hugging, spontaneous nudity or unexpected platform disappearance.

Thank you.

The Lil law of attraction

Both my lads are still sound asleep and I have been up for 3 hours now. I’m tempted to take the hamsters out of their cages just to have some movement in the house. We have 2 of them. One we bought for Lil Fella for his birthday. He is the most loved pet in the world. Cute. He has been named Darwin. Cute. About a week later Lil Fella announced that Darwin needed a wife. Ah. No thanks dear, one is enough and I am so not paying out for another one just yet with the cage and the food, and the bedding and the ball and the not-to-mention where are you going to fit it and the potential for babies… Absolutely categorically no! Darwin is to be a hamster monk.

I was at work and my iPhone started belting out ‘I’m on Fiiiiire’. I forgot to put it on vibrate so my super funky ring tone was belting out for the office to bop along to. *blush*

“hello?”

“Hello, Mrs UK_Saffa?” my son’s head mistress said tentatively..

“Oh hello,” I said, keeping it light, while my heart sank.

I should explain that I get a fair number of calls from Lil Fella’s school. Lil Fella is a creative soul and also has a hazy view of where the line of authority is in school. From climbing on the roof, to just randomly walking out of class because he’s just had a flash of inspiration, it’s safe to say I am very familiar with the primary school staff. However there are 2 types of calls. There is the first kind which comes from any other member of staff usually to inform of some high jinx, such as my boy while swinging from the roof, had a tumble and is now missing a knee, or that he has systematically influenced every member of the class to stage a protest on the unjust amount of homework, or to tell me he has indeed shown a flash of brilliance and reinvented the jet pack, however he is now flying over the school field, and could I come tell him to get down. These are calls I like, they amuse me. I show just the right amount of serious before hanging up and laughing myself stupid.

Oh but then we have the call from the head mistress. I have had enough meetings with her to know that she is rather fond of Lil Fella but she is the pillar of strictness and he is not to know that! In any case, she indulges him his transgressions, and only gets involved when she can’t ignore it.

“I don’t mean to alarm you,” she starts (I am now alarmed), “Lil Fella is fine but it appears he has smuggled his hamster into school.” Oh, blast it. Really? I take it this is a bad thing?

“Ah,” I said, “Are you sure it’s his? I am pretty sure there was no hamster with us when we left the house this morning..” Ah, hell – did he smuggle it in his pocket? Am I really that dopey in the morning that I don’t realise that there is a living creature in his clothes… “…perhaps, it belongs to someone else?”

“Well you see, I think that it did belong to someone else and Lil Fella has somehow acquired ownership of it…”

As it turned out, there was a cleaner at the college down the road who was giving this thing away to a good home. Oh blast! Some flea invested, diseased rodent is now in the care of my 10 year old son. I made an arrangement to pick up the animal and impress upon my child the seriousness of taking pets to school (Actually to be honest I wanted to leave it there). So off I went to pick up the rat, and his newly acquired pet.

On arrival I decided to use this opportunity to see what Lil Fella would tell me of his own accord.

“Hi Mum,” he smiled gorgeously at me and came over to give me a hug. Angel. Sneaky Angel. “How was your day?” Ever so polite. Angel. Very Sneaky Angel.

“Hello boy,” I smiled back. “How was YOUR day? Did anything INTERESTING happen today?”

“Nah, not really,” This boy is gifted! Not a trace of guilt or anything on the face. Perfect execution of dialogue. Perfect flawless performance. I want to kick him! Let’s play this one out then.

“Oh really?” I say seemingly confused, “I had a call today from your head mistress…”

Sheepish Angel. “Oh yes, there was this one tiny thing…”

I went into indignant mother I-feel-a-lecture-coming-on mode “Lil Fella, what were you thinking and blah blah blah… don’t know where it’s been..you don’t even know if it’s a boy or a girl… blah blah blah…and then you were actually going to try and HIDE IT FROM ME!!”

Chastised Angel. “I’m so sorry, but it needed a home, it didn’t have one. It was so sad and scared and I just wanted to make sure it was ok. I’m really REALLY sorry.”

Evil cold-hearted Mother..”Fine, but you don’t touch it! Not until we check it out. DO YOU GET ME!”

“Yes Mum. Thank you Mum. Sorry Mum.” I have melted. I am putty.

The next morning we went down to the pet shop, discovered it was a girl and Lil Fella happily declared her to be Darwin’s wife, I bought it the cage and the food, and the bedding and the ball… And Jemima now has a good home living happily in his room.