Frank Sinatra’s slow, melodic version of Send in the Clowns’ played through the living room stereo speakers as we closed the front door on another day of guests at half past midnight on Saturday night. We were finishing up a little earlier than we had done at the previous housewarming but certainly didn’t feel any less tired.
It was the family’s turn to visit and from three o’clock that afternoon we’d had everyone from the Kerrs and the Taylors, to the Symingtons and the Leckies, not to mention the Reids and the McGarvas. The food had been demolished, the beer nearly all drunk, the wine bottles finished, the irn-bru and diet cokes swigged and the caffeine swilled, not to mention a bottle of the finest Arran Malt Whiskey with accompanying cheese and biscuits which more than a few people partook in, a gift to the buffet from my Uncle Jim from his new abode on the ‘geologist’s paradise’ (not to mention the golfer’s paradise, the camper’s paradise and the whiskey drinkers’). A text arrived in the morning from Jim to say he was supplying the cheese and crackers, bought from the famous Arran Cheese Shop, just before my Dad turned up in his gardening gear with his hedge loppers and his ladders. He was here to start the back garden.
The hedge running up the left of our back garden was ridiculously overgrown and, as a result, blocking a lot of the Scottish sunlight out so Dad and myself had been talking about trimming it all down at some point and getting it into some kind of order. I hadn’t expected to see him turning up on the doorstep with his ladders a mere four and a half hours before the arrival of the first guests though. The first of which would be the bouncy castle organised through one of the Mum’s in Ka’s work. This Mum owns, or is part owner, to a company that hires these inflatable structures out and Ka had the rather brilliant idea of hiring one to keep the kids entertained throughout the day. We had told people to turn up whenever, and however, they wanted from 3 o’clock onwards, saying there would be entertainment for the kids in the earlier hours of the afternoon.
Just as Dad and myself finished tidying the last of the giant bushes and hedge branches away from the back garden’s lawn, a job that involved surreptitiously chucking them over the back hedge into the council ‘controlled’ wilderness behind us whilst cutting and scratching my arms to ribbons, the bouncy castle man turned up at the front door, Ka immediately racing away in fright, up the stairs as she was once more still in her polka dot dressing gown (she does wash it, honest!). The guy brought through the black box generators along with a couple of mats and cables and gave the garden a quick check over and then instructed me to take down the washing lines before he disappeared through to the front of the house again. After obediently deroping our washing poles I jogged off through the house to meet the bouncy castle man once more, this time at the front door, mulling over how he was going to fit the giant roll of plastic between us, through the entrance. With a bit of shoving, a bit of squeezing, a bit of wall scraping and a touch of sweat we managed to squeeze the rolled up monstrosity through the not terribly wide front door, then finding ourselves in the hallway and faced with a similar problem three times more as we took the heavy delivery through the house and into the back garden.
That is the one major downfall of owning a terraced house. No side gate to the back garden.
Anyway, we eventually got the giant barrel shaped roll of plastic through and out on to the back lawn where the bouncy castle man immediately set to work, pinning the flat structure down into the wet, slightly mushy grass as I stood and watched the large square unfold over half the garden.
“We’re going to need a bigger garden”, I thought as John Williams’ dark, foreboding music built up in my head. The castle slowly rose up before me blocking the sunlight out that my Dad and myself had revealed in the previous few hours by chopping the surrounding hedges. A shadow now loomed over me from the giant arched roof of the inflatable monster which continued to rise like a cake in an oven with way too much baking powder. A slide seemed to shoot out from the nearest side of the structure as it filled with air, pillars and loops decorated with bubbling fish and swimming scuba divers rose up inside the filled framework and before long you could barely see a patch of grass around the plastic bouncy building.
These kids better turn up, I thought, as I seen the bouncy castle man off after he’d run through his rather vague health and safety procedure which basically involved making sure little kids were looked after within the castle and nobody did anything stupid.
I’m not sure he realised whose house he was in.
As Ka finished straightening her hair upstairs, I reminded her that I wasn’t doing any kid entertaining today. The whole reason we got the bouncy castle in was for me to specifically not do any child entertaining.
As soon as the first child came through the front door, who as the first on the bouncy castle? Muggins, that’s who.
At precisely three o’clock, on the dot, Aunty Lorna and her three girls, Wendy, Pamela and Susan, turned up along with Yvie, Wendy’s youngest. They all had their own customary tour of the new abode before Yvie finally got her way and headed out to the bouncy castle with Auntie Susan. Along with Yvie the first kids took to the bouncy castle and I helped support the little girl over the curved, wibbly wobbly surface inside the castle. Susan stood on the patio and supervised her niece as she got used to moving over the giant inflatable and the stranger egging her on inside it.
My cousin Sarah arrived soon after with her boys Christopher and Daniel and Uncle Ian and Aunt Anne just after. Before long I had company on the castle as Ian took wee Daniel up into the bobbing innards. More kids arrived in the form of my younger cousins Megan and Lauren with my Uncle Laurence and Aunt Maria, Claire arrived with her wee girl, Olivia and as the afternoon progressed and more and more of the families started trooping through the front door the house warming was soon in full swing. Ka got the buffet served single handedly, only because she refused anyone permission to help, I took coats and served drinks, my time on the bouncy castle now down to a minimal after the growing number of kids took over. I was also a little more hesitant to venture on to the bouncy castle along with so many kids after following Colin, Ka’s brother, on his first attempt to board the inflatable. He got so far as getting up on to the main section before losing his footing, falling back over his arse, taking me with him and managing to land on my head, much to the kids and the Symingtons’ amusement.
Mum, Dad, Jim, Lynsey Ann, Tricia and Tommy came in early evening, just in time for the second serving on the buffet table after the first table full got pretty much demolished within half an hour. Grace’s macaroni and homemade bread along with Ka’s wraps, olives, pizzas, prawns, cheese sticks and my very own chilli all went in the first tableful to be closely followed by the second which included Mum’s lasagne and Jillian and Jean’s coconut snowballs.
Jillian and Jean’s white chocolate coated coconut balls are now famous at family buffets, each in their own small paper cake cases and although merely around 2 – 3 centimetres in diameter each probably hold around 500 calories within their small, sweet interior. The coconut snowballs are almost becoming just as traditional as Aunt Linda’s trifle which, unfortunately, we lacked on Saturday as Linda could not make it due to an extreme cold.
My chilli was well received by most or so I thought until Pamela approached me in the kitchen and complemented it. She asked how I made it. As I started describing how I gently browned the mince in the pot she asked how I made my spices.
Make spices? I had no idea you could make spices? I bought mine from a shop in a jar, I replied to her.
Pamela frowned slightly and then asked how I made my chilli powder. Again I replied that it came from a jar bought in a supermarket. Morrisons own, I believe.
Looking thoroughly unimpressed now, Pamela squirmed with discomfort a little and started describing how she would usually make her chilli powder before trailing off and disappearing off to the living room again leaving me to ponder who invited Nigella flamin’ Lawson.
I wouldn’t have minded so much if it had been the real Nigella Lawson in my kitchen giving me her tips (just check my spelling there…).
Aunt Tricia had been so intrigued upon hearing about the bouncy castle beforehand that almost as soon as she arrived she joined Grace up on the giant inflatable and both ending up marooned, struggling to get up, thanks to the kids bouncing and ricocheting around them like popcorn in a microwave. At one point Joshua even accidentally headbutted Tricia across the head giving my Auntie a small, slowly growing, lump for the rest of the night whilst Joshua bounced off unaffected. In fact, he looked more than at home on the inflatable. He bounces about rooms like a blonde haired tigger at the best of times, giving him an inflated ground to use is possibly asking for trouble. I’m quite surprised he didn’t end up in Betty and Malcy’s garden next door.
The girls of the group also found it highly amusing to run up and hit, tap or punch either myself or Colin over the leg, waist or arse repeatedly before running off back up on to the castle. Lauren also took to mounting my lower right leg in an effort to hold me to the spot. Both were amusing at first but soon got slightly tiresome. There were perfectly good tall pillars of hot air within the castle, to punch and smack, why the kids felt the need to continue to hit Colin and myself I’m not sure.
Once the bouncy castle was gone everyone retreated inside for the night. Megan brought her guitar out to impress us with some Killers tunes and the rest of the night was spent chatting and drinking along with some more eating.
As I poured a few drinks for people and Tricia came into the kitchen requesting an aspirin, I spied Ka pulling a large, rather delicious looking, rectangular pizza from the oven’s innards. I’d barely eaten any of the previous tablefuls so I quickly rushed the drinks I was pouring. Once I’d finished pouring and dishing out the glasses I went straight for the buffet table in the living room to grab a square slice and found an empty breadboard with a large rectangular square of heat, grease and crumbs awaiting me.
“Who invited this lot?”
Tampilkan postingan dengan label McGarvas. Tampilkan semua postingan
Tampilkan postingan dengan label McGarvas. Tampilkan semua postingan
Kamis, 11 Oktober 2012
Senin, 27 Agustus 2012
Secretaries, celebrations and congratulations
Sorry, it's been ages. It's been a crazy couple of weeks. I've had documents, forms and letters coming out my ears not to mention the fights with sellotape, cardboard boxes, bubblewrap and newsprint that went on in the flat. No, it wasn't a crazy, drunken stationery shop party. In fact, we've been anything but stationery (yes, I know, different spelling).
We picked up the keys to our new house two Fridays ago and haven't stopped since.
We arrived at the East Kilbride solicitors office at quarter to five on the evening of Friday 17th, after another successful scan of Baby Reid number 2 at the hospital. I, rather rudely, interupted the two secretaries sitting in the reception office, distracting them from their inane chatter, giving them a rather heavy hint to actually respond to the two new arrivals in their office. Once I had their attention, I asked for the keys to the property now owned by my wife and I. The secretary, who was obviously in possession of such keys, rather huffily went into her drawers and produced a bulky white envelope (and before you ask, I don't know how big her drawers were) and picked up the phone to inform the solicitor concerned that, "that was the keys to Robertson Drive". Ka accepted the bulky, clinking envelope from the solicitor's secretary and we hurried from the office. Normally we would have hurried off to get on with the final arrangements for a flitting that weekend but before all that we had the small matter of a sixtieth party to finalise.
Along with her brother, Colin, Ka had been making a lot of phonecalls throughout the week, rounding up a good crowd of friends and family to help celebrate her Dad, Dougie's, surprise 60th birthday party to take place in his own local, The Rowantree, the perfect location to arouse the least suspicion.
Colin arrived back at the McGarva household straight from work that Saturday evening, to entice his Dad out for a pint, and considering Dougie's big birthday was still 2 weeks away he had not suspected a thing. There was also reason for Colin to celebrate over a quiet pint with his Dad following his own proposal to his other half Jillian, the weekend before.
That shouldn't go without a mention either! (Congratulations Colin and Jillian!)
Colin got down on one knee and set Jillian the question as they had made thier way through to Edinburgh for their first visit to the Fringe festival. Jillian proved that she is indeed a nutcase of sorts, and said yes (only nutcases marry McGarvas, it's a well known fact). The two of them called Ka and myself as we sat down to dinner with Dougie and Grace in the Uddingston branch of the Hot Flame World Buffet where we enjoyed an 'eat as much as you can possibly eat' experience and, at the same time, discovered Dougie is deaf in the right ear (rather than the wrong one). Apparently there was something wrong with the phone as he could barely hear anything Colin and Jillian were saying to him before he switched to the other ear and suddenly heard them loud and clear.
He is 60 now, I suppose these things happen as you get older.
So, a week later, Dougie was taken completely by surprise as he sauntered through to one of the pub's side rooms, apparently where all the women usually sit, and everyone, including family, friends and former work colleagues from DC Thomson, all enjoyed the night. Ka and Jillian made a buffet that was too big for the table with contributions from a few others including Mum who made some delicious tuna pasta, Steven who made his parma ham sticks, and Auntie Lorna who made her caramel shortcake and I finally got a piece of it. Lorna makes a whole tray of the splendid sticky stuff up at every special occasion and I have never managed to get my hands on a whole piece yet. I've always been left raking through the buffet leftovers looking for a solitary piece of Lorna's caramel shortcake like a desperate, starving scavenger looking through the wreckage of a burning cornershop that's just been reduced to a pile or burning bricks by a rogue missile at the end of the world in a smoky, rotting street far, far away. Or even a music fan looking for a fantastic performance in an Olympics closing ceremony.
Anyway, photos were taken, the big golf themed birthday cake was cut, family members all had a chance to catch up and Dougie kept the DJ busy, hardly leaving the makeshift dancefloor in the middle of the small, but comfortable function room as the music eventually enticed a good crowd up to dance, including Aunty Lorna, who ended up on her knees again to the tune of The Killers' "Human".
It wasn't until late on the Sunday morning that I arose from my pit, ambling, zombie like, between the large piles of boxes littering the bedroom, hallway and then living room. Ka was sitting quietly, watching the tv, knackered after the organisation, excitement and then eventual end of the surprise party.
I wasn't feeling particularly energetic myself but we still managed to head out around mid afternoon to visit our new property. It was a lot dryer and sunnier that day than it had been the first day we'd visited as we pulled up outside the terraced house. The rain had been bouncing off the windscreen the first time around. We'd been struggling to see the house from the other side of the street, through the water attacking the glass of the car but it hadn't put us off and once we'd been inside we knew this was the house for us. With a clearer view of our new house now we each took a set of keys from the white envelope and walked on up the garden path with a sort of quiet, mellowed, excitement. We turned the two keys in the old front door's locks and pushed the door open. The name of McCulloch was still present on a small, aged nameplate screwed into the wood of the painted door. We'd have to get a new one of those, I thought, as we stepped inside.
We picked up the keys to our new house two Fridays ago and haven't stopped since.
We arrived at the East Kilbride solicitors office at quarter to five on the evening of Friday 17th, after another successful scan of Baby Reid number 2 at the hospital. I, rather rudely, interupted the two secretaries sitting in the reception office, distracting them from their inane chatter, giving them a rather heavy hint to actually respond to the two new arrivals in their office. Once I had their attention, I asked for the keys to the property now owned by my wife and I. The secretary, who was obviously in possession of such keys, rather huffily went into her drawers and produced a bulky white envelope (and before you ask, I don't know how big her drawers were) and picked up the phone to inform the solicitor concerned that, "that was the keys to Robertson Drive". Ka accepted the bulky, clinking envelope from the solicitor's secretary and we hurried from the office. Normally we would have hurried off to get on with the final arrangements for a flitting that weekend but before all that we had the small matter of a sixtieth party to finalise.
Along with her brother, Colin, Ka had been making a lot of phonecalls throughout the week, rounding up a good crowd of friends and family to help celebrate her Dad, Dougie's, surprise 60th birthday party to take place in his own local, The Rowantree, the perfect location to arouse the least suspicion.
Colin arrived back at the McGarva household straight from work that Saturday evening, to entice his Dad out for a pint, and considering Dougie's big birthday was still 2 weeks away he had not suspected a thing. There was also reason for Colin to celebrate over a quiet pint with his Dad following his own proposal to his other half Jillian, the weekend before.
That shouldn't go without a mention either! (Congratulations Colin and Jillian!)
Colin got down on one knee and set Jillian the question as they had made thier way through to Edinburgh for their first visit to the Fringe festival. Jillian proved that she is indeed a nutcase of sorts, and said yes (only nutcases marry McGarvas, it's a well known fact). The two of them called Ka and myself as we sat down to dinner with Dougie and Grace in the Uddingston branch of the Hot Flame World Buffet where we enjoyed an 'eat as much as you can possibly eat' experience and, at the same time, discovered Dougie is deaf in the right ear (rather than the wrong one). Apparently there was something wrong with the phone as he could barely hear anything Colin and Jillian were saying to him before he switched to the other ear and suddenly heard them loud and clear.
He is 60 now, I suppose these things happen as you get older.
So, a week later, Dougie was taken completely by surprise as he sauntered through to one of the pub's side rooms, apparently where all the women usually sit, and everyone, including family, friends and former work colleagues from DC Thomson, all enjoyed the night. Ka and Jillian made a buffet that was too big for the table with contributions from a few others including Mum who made some delicious tuna pasta, Steven who made his parma ham sticks, and Auntie Lorna who made her caramel shortcake and I finally got a piece of it. Lorna makes a whole tray of the splendid sticky stuff up at every special occasion and I have never managed to get my hands on a whole piece yet. I've always been left raking through the buffet leftovers looking for a solitary piece of Lorna's caramel shortcake like a desperate, starving scavenger looking through the wreckage of a burning cornershop that's just been reduced to a pile or burning bricks by a rogue missile at the end of the world in a smoky, rotting street far, far away. Or even a music fan looking for a fantastic performance in an Olympics closing ceremony.
Anyway, photos were taken, the big golf themed birthday cake was cut, family members all had a chance to catch up and Dougie kept the DJ busy, hardly leaving the makeshift dancefloor in the middle of the small, but comfortable function room as the music eventually enticed a good crowd up to dance, including Aunty Lorna, who ended up on her knees again to the tune of The Killers' "Human".
It wasn't until late on the Sunday morning that I arose from my pit, ambling, zombie like, between the large piles of boxes littering the bedroom, hallway and then living room. Ka was sitting quietly, watching the tv, knackered after the organisation, excitement and then eventual end of the surprise party.
I wasn't feeling particularly energetic myself but we still managed to head out around mid afternoon to visit our new property. It was a lot dryer and sunnier that day than it had been the first day we'd visited as we pulled up outside the terraced house. The rain had been bouncing off the windscreen the first time around. We'd been struggling to see the house from the other side of the street, through the water attacking the glass of the car but it hadn't put us off and once we'd been inside we knew this was the house for us. With a clearer view of our new house now we each took a set of keys from the white envelope and walked on up the garden path with a sort of quiet, mellowed, excitement. We turned the two keys in the old front door's locks and pushed the door open. The name of McCulloch was still present on a small, aged nameplate screwed into the wood of the painted door. We'd have to get a new one of those, I thought, as we stepped inside.
Senin, 30 April 2012
Leaks, fridges and electric hob knobs
After dinner last night I was busy carrying out my husbandly duties when there was a large crash and a horrendous scream from behind. I had to quickly abandon the pot which I had been busy scrubbing with my bubble covered hands in the sink, and turned to see what the commotion was.
The fridge door had fallen off it's hinges. Unfortunately Ka had been trying to close the large, upper door over at the time. Something had been preventing Ka from closing the door over so she looked into the fridge to make sure everything was tidied away properly and just as she moved to take her head back out from the fridge's innards, the door, complete with the weight of all it's interior shelf innards, including the milk and my Branston Pickle, collapsed into her face, banging her across the forehead.
Just as I was about to start moaning at Ka’s volume I turned to find my wife crouched over in pain, holding the fridge door up on one bottom hinge. After shoving the door temporarily back into place I got a bag of ice together from the freezer and told Ka to put it to her head as I seen the red mark now throbbing on Ka's forehead grow into a potential lump.
The washing machine has been leaking. Two of the electric cooker’s hob’s knobs have broke off (and no, they don’t taste great with a cup of tea!). A bit of the front door’s frame even fell off when I closed the door the other night. I had to superglue it back on. What else is going to fall apart? The place is turning into The Money Pit! I’m half expecting Tom Hanks to crash through the front window one night while I’m turning the hobs on with my pliers.
As Ka sat and relaxed on the couch with the bag of ice pressed to her head, giving her brain freeze, I attempted to fix the fridge door with a blob of blu-tac before deciding that the Currys website would probably be a better idea.
A quick, unexpected, credit card payment later and there is now a brand new fridge being delivered on Wednesday morning. Mum will pop by after her pilates and sit in for the delivery which I paid £15 for the pleasure of having delivered between the hours of 1 and 5 for. The one good thing about buying anything on the Currys website is you’re not hounded for guarantees and insurances when you get to the checkout.
No other time would suit unless we waited until the weekend but on returning home tonight I nonchalantly swung the fridge door forgetting all about the worn out hinge and almost suffered the same lumpy head as Ka did.
Everybody seems to be settling in to the new office in Glasgow Central Quay for the time being. Sly Bailey, the Trinity Mirror Empress herself visited Central Quay last week, moving around the various floors accompanied by her entourage. As I have my back to the always open Studio door I missed the whole procession but was informed by the ever watchful Andrea, who sits opposite me, that she had a very nice pair of shoes on. Always one to spot the important details, she said that the pair of shoes in question would be enough to make Andrea’s family go without food for a week. If Andrea’s family are anything like her that what probably be doing them a favour as all she seems to eat are protein shakes, those disgusting looking mushy substances which, apparently, you simply must base your diet on if you intend to build muscle, losing weight or keep fit in anyway, shape or form. I’m not sure what’s wrong with a good healthy diet but maybe some people just like sitting in their office theatrically shaking plastic bottles and flasks around kidding on their working at the Copacabana.
The new colleagues in our office are Graeme, Andrew, Ewan and Yvonne.
Yvonne has a liking to karaoke, singing along to most of the ditties that are played on Radio 2 in the duration of the day. Graeme dances around the office, finds nothing a problem, and occasionally picks up the phone and pretends he’s an answering machine for Andrew, beeping and even singing whilst the caller waits. The Bette Midler classic, “The Wind Beneath my Wings” was the last song a caller enjoyed whilst waiting to be passed over to Andrew, who is forever shaking his head at his colleague, as he types away frantically on his mac. Ewan is the line manager of the three who spends all his time keeping sales people at bay and a lot of his money on Peanut M&M’s which Yvonne hands out willy nilly, without his permission.
I’m enjoying the new surroundings although I do occasionally miss the rest of the S&UN gang who are out in the open plan office with the rest of the production and sales staff. Some of the sales staff I’ve known for years over the phone and only just met face to face. Some people you meet for the first time not even realising you’ve been talking to them for five years. You go out and happily start talking to someone as if you’re only just meeting them for the first time only to realise afterwards that that was the woman that shouted at you over the phone a year or so ago for not understanding her copy instructions.
Mum managed to get a wee job in the town centre last week. Mum’s been looking for a job, on and off, (mostly off) for around four years now so this is quite big news. Kenny emailed me today from Oz, rejoicing the fact (“it’s about time too”, I believe were the words he used).
Mum arrived back from a holiday abroad on Friday. She’d been away for a week with my Auntie Tricia with Aunt Ann for her 60th birthday retreat along with a bunch of pals from both Scotland and London.
Unfortunately Adventure Ted never got an invite, but did send photos of her London trip along in Auntie Ann's card which she would have opened on her birthday on the Sunday.
Mum and Tricia arrived home on Friday at the airport expecting Tommy, Tricia’s other half, to be there waiting to pick them up.
Tommy was indeed sitting waiting to pick them up. Unfortunately he was sitting in Glasgow Airport whilst Mum and Tricia had arrived home at Prestwick.
Grace and Dougie, Ka’s Mum and Dad, arrived home from their week in Turkey the same day. We popped round to see them on Saturday afternoon after seeing ‘The Cabin in the Woods’ in Glasgow.
A bunch of teenagers take a break to a holiday home beside, the river, in the middle of nowhere and unexpectedly enter a game of life and death, involving zombies, ghosts, werewolves and scarecrows. Ridiculous and crazy but surprisingly entertaining stuff if you like a good dose of the ridiculous and the crazy in your horror. By the way, this is the movie we’re talking about, not Grace and Dougie’s holiday.
No, they were living it up in 5 star accommodation, full board. All the sun, food, drink and entertainment they could possibly want. They brought us back a tea towel.
Only kidding, they also brought us back chocolates, socks and a large bag of suspicious looking white powder.
Yes, apple tea. To go with the tea towels, currently soaking up the water splashed over the floor by the misbehaving washing machine.
The fridge door had fallen off it's hinges. Unfortunately Ka had been trying to close the large, upper door over at the time. Something had been preventing Ka from closing the door over so she looked into the fridge to make sure everything was tidied away properly and just as she moved to take her head back out from the fridge's innards, the door, complete with the weight of all it's interior shelf innards, including the milk and my Branston Pickle, collapsed into her face, banging her across the forehead.
Just as I was about to start moaning at Ka’s volume I turned to find my wife crouched over in pain, holding the fridge door up on one bottom hinge. After shoving the door temporarily back into place I got a bag of ice together from the freezer and told Ka to put it to her head as I seen the red mark now throbbing on Ka's forehead grow into a potential lump.
The washing machine has been leaking. Two of the electric cooker’s hob’s knobs have broke off (and no, they don’t taste great with a cup of tea!). A bit of the front door’s frame even fell off when I closed the door the other night. I had to superglue it back on. What else is going to fall apart? The place is turning into The Money Pit! I’m half expecting Tom Hanks to crash through the front window one night while I’m turning the hobs on with my pliers.
As Ka sat and relaxed on the couch with the bag of ice pressed to her head, giving her brain freeze, I attempted to fix the fridge door with a blob of blu-tac before deciding that the Currys website would probably be a better idea.
A quick, unexpected, credit card payment later and there is now a brand new fridge being delivered on Wednesday morning. Mum will pop by after her pilates and sit in for the delivery which I paid £15 for the pleasure of having delivered between the hours of 1 and 5 for. The one good thing about buying anything on the Currys website is you’re not hounded for guarantees and insurances when you get to the checkout.
No other time would suit unless we waited until the weekend but on returning home tonight I nonchalantly swung the fridge door forgetting all about the worn out hinge and almost suffered the same lumpy head as Ka did.
Everybody seems to be settling in to the new office in Glasgow Central Quay for the time being. Sly Bailey, the Trinity Mirror Empress herself visited Central Quay last week, moving around the various floors accompanied by her entourage. As I have my back to the always open Studio door I missed the whole procession but was informed by the ever watchful Andrea, who sits opposite me, that she had a very nice pair of shoes on. Always one to spot the important details, she said that the pair of shoes in question would be enough to make Andrea’s family go without food for a week. If Andrea’s family are anything like her that what probably be doing them a favour as all she seems to eat are protein shakes, those disgusting looking mushy substances which, apparently, you simply must base your diet on if you intend to build muscle, losing weight or keep fit in anyway, shape or form. I’m not sure what’s wrong with a good healthy diet but maybe some people just like sitting in their office theatrically shaking plastic bottles and flasks around kidding on their working at the Copacabana.
The new colleagues in our office are Graeme, Andrew, Ewan and Yvonne.
Yvonne has a liking to karaoke, singing along to most of the ditties that are played on Radio 2 in the duration of the day. Graeme dances around the office, finds nothing a problem, and occasionally picks up the phone and pretends he’s an answering machine for Andrew, beeping and even singing whilst the caller waits. The Bette Midler classic, “The Wind Beneath my Wings” was the last song a caller enjoyed whilst waiting to be passed over to Andrew, who is forever shaking his head at his colleague, as he types away frantically on his mac. Ewan is the line manager of the three who spends all his time keeping sales people at bay and a lot of his money on Peanut M&M’s which Yvonne hands out willy nilly, without his permission.
I’m enjoying the new surroundings although I do occasionally miss the rest of the S&UN gang who are out in the open plan office with the rest of the production and sales staff. Some of the sales staff I’ve known for years over the phone and only just met face to face. Some people you meet for the first time not even realising you’ve been talking to them for five years. You go out and happily start talking to someone as if you’re only just meeting them for the first time only to realise afterwards that that was the woman that shouted at you over the phone a year or so ago for not understanding her copy instructions.
Mum managed to get a wee job in the town centre last week. Mum’s been looking for a job, on and off, (mostly off) for around four years now so this is quite big news. Kenny emailed me today from Oz, rejoicing the fact (“it’s about time too”, I believe were the words he used).
Mum arrived back from a holiday abroad on Friday. She’d been away for a week with my Auntie Tricia with Aunt Ann for her 60th birthday retreat along with a bunch of pals from both Scotland and London.
Unfortunately Adventure Ted never got an invite, but did send photos of her London trip along in Auntie Ann's card which she would have opened on her birthday on the Sunday.
Mum and Tricia arrived home on Friday at the airport expecting Tommy, Tricia’s other half, to be there waiting to pick them up.
Tommy was indeed sitting waiting to pick them up. Unfortunately he was sitting in Glasgow Airport whilst Mum and Tricia had arrived home at Prestwick.
Grace and Dougie, Ka’s Mum and Dad, arrived home from their week in Turkey the same day. We popped round to see them on Saturday afternoon after seeing ‘The Cabin in the Woods’ in Glasgow.
A bunch of teenagers take a break to a holiday home beside, the river, in the middle of nowhere and unexpectedly enter a game of life and death, involving zombies, ghosts, werewolves and scarecrows. Ridiculous and crazy but surprisingly entertaining stuff if you like a good dose of the ridiculous and the crazy in your horror. By the way, this is the movie we’re talking about, not Grace and Dougie’s holiday.
No, they were living it up in 5 star accommodation, full board. All the sun, food, drink and entertainment they could possibly want. They brought us back a tea towel.
Only kidding, they also brought us back chocolates, socks and a large bag of suspicious looking white powder.
Yes, apple tea. To go with the tea towels, currently soaking up the water splashed over the floor by the misbehaving washing machine.
Sabtu, 17 Maret 2012
A Dings birthday
We had another family gathering at the McGarva household to celebrate Ka’s big sister’s birthday. Angela celebrated another birthday an evening early last Friday night with Grace, Dougie, Jillian, Colin, Kelly Ann and myself along with Steven, Morgan and Joshua.
Even though it’s not her birthday Ka was given a present too. Colin gifted Ka with a book called ‘Hollow Earth’ written, and signed by, none other than John Barrowman (and his sister). Colin and Jillian had made the trip to Waterstones in Glasgow one Monday, not too long ago, to meet the man himself. Photographic evidence on facebook shows Jillian leaning over the desk before the television and theatre star, grinning up at Colin’s shaky camera.
“Grannie, help me hide the cake!” Morgan shouted as she ran through the front door before her Mum had even got out on their car.
The Leckie’s had arrived and Joshua ran straight into the centre of the living room and spun around on the spot excitedly and almost immediately started throwing Iggle Piggle repeatedly up into the air. As everyone shouted and chatted with one another Dougie brought out the Ding’s take away menu.
Ding’s is a small Chinese takeaway on Uddingston’s Main Street, which is now traditionally called upon on a McGarva birthday. The shop itself houses a large open kitchen in the centre of the room in which various cooks shuffle their woks, toss their onions and boil their their noodles over the gas hobs, the large extractor fans hanging from the ceiling humming with exertion. Ding’s serves up some great takeaway grub including a rather brilliant szechuan. This time round I went for the Hong Kong style Sweet and Sour Chicken, another favourite. A favourite introduced to me by Chaz, who always used to order it on Sauchiehall Street at the end of a night out.
As the menu was passed from person to person Joshua jumped, spun and flung himself around the room, occasionally tickling peoples’ feet, looking up at you expectantly with a big toothy smile on his face whilst. He did look at little uncomfortable at one point though as he walked over to the coffee table with his plastic cup of water and stopped. A look of mild worry came over his face as he realised all the coasters were taken by all of our various cups of tea, coffee and water. He’s obviously been well housetrained. Morgan, who was feeling, and looking, a little peaky, chilled out taking a break from the games for a change settling instead for her colouring book.
After dinner the traditional cake and sing-a-long was carried out and a few photos were taken, Angela giving Morgan and Joshua big, birthday hugs. Recovering from her slightly peaky self briefly for a piece of the birthday chocolate cake, Morgan then went back to her colouring book at the dining table and Joshua went back to his toy cars, which he’d won in the all too brief game of pass the parcel.
Perhaps even the best game of pass the parcel as I managed to win a parcel without even passing!
I was sitting in the other room, at the dining table, suffering a slight headache from the strange whistling, squealing noise the living room tv had been making (a noise that caused a minor debate earlier in the night), chatting to Steven about Angela’s still secret Birthday present (an iPad!!!) as Morgan feverishly worked at her colouring book and Joshua delivered my freshly unwrapped present.
A DVD. ‘Hitch’ starring Will Smith. A little sceptical at first I soon realised Eva Mendes is in it so I accepted my prize more than gratefully before being admonished by Dougie who had been listening from the kitchen behind me.
After Steven took the two kids home to bed the McGarva siblings whiled away the remaining hours with glasses of wine, reminiscing about old times. After talking of the various drunken exploits of youth the conversation went on to Colin and Ka’s employment in Poundstretchers through their early working lives. They talked of the old Pounstretchers boss who found herself being attacked by a shutter one night, the life size dolls, Ka chasing the shoplifters, the old man that bought the condoms, and Colin entertaining the passing Hamilton shoppers in the street with his microphone and speakers.
Grace and myself listened intently as Dougie quietly tried to watch Lee Westwood play golf on the whistling television from the depths of his armchair and didn’t show much concern when Grace confessed her love for Patrick Swayze. Unfortunately she doesn’t have much of a chance now. Not a chance in hell.
Heaven, now that may be a different matter. Grace nodded excitedly when it was suggested the two of them could hook up in heaven.
“You better make sure you go first Dougie” I told Ka’s Dad. “She’s having ideas over there!”
Before long it was time to go home again and Ka and myself drove Angela up the road to her bed, well, her doorstep anyway.
Angela got out the car and sauntered up the garden path to the front door, swinging her birthday bottle of Halcyon wine (one of our favourites) at her side and pressed the doorbell. Ka and myself politely waited in the car for the front door opening, just in case there was somebody waiting in the bushes to jump out on her. After a few minutes of waiting politely Steven eventually opened the door and with a quick wave we were off home.
Even though it’s not her birthday Ka was given a present too. Colin gifted Ka with a book called ‘Hollow Earth’ written, and signed by, none other than John Barrowman (and his sister). Colin and Jillian had made the trip to Waterstones in Glasgow one Monday, not too long ago, to meet the man himself. Photographic evidence on facebook shows Jillian leaning over the desk before the television and theatre star, grinning up at Colin’s shaky camera.
“Grannie, help me hide the cake!” Morgan shouted as she ran through the front door before her Mum had even got out on their car.
The Leckie’s had arrived and Joshua ran straight into the centre of the living room and spun around on the spot excitedly and almost immediately started throwing Iggle Piggle repeatedly up into the air. As everyone shouted and chatted with one another Dougie brought out the Ding’s take away menu.
Ding’s is a small Chinese takeaway on Uddingston’s Main Street, which is now traditionally called upon on a McGarva birthday. The shop itself houses a large open kitchen in the centre of the room in which various cooks shuffle their woks, toss their onions and boil their their noodles over the gas hobs, the large extractor fans hanging from the ceiling humming with exertion. Ding’s serves up some great takeaway grub including a rather brilliant szechuan. This time round I went for the Hong Kong style Sweet and Sour Chicken, another favourite. A favourite introduced to me by Chaz, who always used to order it on Sauchiehall Street at the end of a night out.
As the menu was passed from person to person Joshua jumped, spun and flung himself around the room, occasionally tickling peoples’ feet, looking up at you expectantly with a big toothy smile on his face whilst. He did look at little uncomfortable at one point though as he walked over to the coffee table with his plastic cup of water and stopped. A look of mild worry came over his face as he realised all the coasters were taken by all of our various cups of tea, coffee and water. He’s obviously been well housetrained. Morgan, who was feeling, and looking, a little peaky, chilled out taking a break from the games for a change settling instead for her colouring book.
After dinner the traditional cake and sing-a-long was carried out and a few photos were taken, Angela giving Morgan and Joshua big, birthday hugs. Recovering from her slightly peaky self briefly for a piece of the birthday chocolate cake, Morgan then went back to her colouring book at the dining table and Joshua went back to his toy cars, which he’d won in the all too brief game of pass the parcel.
Perhaps even the best game of pass the parcel as I managed to win a parcel without even passing!
I was sitting in the other room, at the dining table, suffering a slight headache from the strange whistling, squealing noise the living room tv had been making (a noise that caused a minor debate earlier in the night), chatting to Steven about Angela’s still secret Birthday present (an iPad!!!) as Morgan feverishly worked at her colouring book and Joshua delivered my freshly unwrapped present.
A DVD. ‘Hitch’ starring Will Smith. A little sceptical at first I soon realised Eva Mendes is in it so I accepted my prize more than gratefully before being admonished by Dougie who had been listening from the kitchen behind me.
After Steven took the two kids home to bed the McGarva siblings whiled away the remaining hours with glasses of wine, reminiscing about old times. After talking of the various drunken exploits of youth the conversation went on to Colin and Ka’s employment in Poundstretchers through their early working lives. They talked of the old Pounstretchers boss who found herself being attacked by a shutter one night, the life size dolls, Ka chasing the shoplifters, the old man that bought the condoms, and Colin entertaining the passing Hamilton shoppers in the street with his microphone and speakers.
Grace and myself listened intently as Dougie quietly tried to watch Lee Westwood play golf on the whistling television from the depths of his armchair and didn’t show much concern when Grace confessed her love for Patrick Swayze. Unfortunately she doesn’t have much of a chance now. Not a chance in hell.
Heaven, now that may be a different matter. Grace nodded excitedly when it was suggested the two of them could hook up in heaven.
“You better make sure you go first Dougie” I told Ka’s Dad. “She’s having ideas over there!”
Before long it was time to go home again and Ka and myself drove Angela up the road to her bed, well, her doorstep anyway.
Angela got out the car and sauntered up the garden path to the front door, swinging her birthday bottle of Halcyon wine (one of our favourites) at her side and pressed the doorbell. Ka and myself politely waited in the car for the front door opening, just in case there was somebody waiting in the bushes to jump out on her. After a few minutes of waiting politely Steven eventually opened the door and with a quick wave we were off home.
Rabu, 15 Februari 2012
The Iron Horse, the Grey and the Hammer
Dad and myself sat in The Iron Horse as West Bromwich Albion hammered Wolverhampton 5-1 on the tv's hanging from the ceiling over our heads. We had just dropped Ka and the Mums off, among the traffic, piled up outside the SECC, for the Strictly Come Dancing afternoon show and had struggled to find a space for the car in the busy Glasgow streets on Sunday afternoon. I usually park up at The Station Bar, up next to the father in law’s old work, D. C. Thomson the printers, but since we were heading into town from the other direction we ended up just of Blythswood Square, where the ladies of the night used to hang out (I believe they’re all now based further down the hill, or over it). A swanky new Hotel has just opened up there and the street prices (for parking!) have doubled but thankfully, it was Sunday. Wonderful, free, Sunday street parking.
We headed up to the cinema and bought two tickets for 'The Grey' at half three, so, finding ourselves with at least two hours to spare we decided to while away the time over a few pints and a chat in the closest drinking establishment. We didn't fancy a coffee at the Starbucks or Pret a Manger though, both of which are almost, more or less, next door to the cinema. Instead we opted for The Iron Horse on West Nile Street. I thought it'd be a good opportunity to take my Dad for a pint for a change as we very rarely get the chance. While the women were watching the likes of Nancy Dell Olio and Robbie Savage trying to dance, Dad and myself were sitting relaxing by the window of the Iron Horse, over a pint of Caledonian Best, catching up, whilst the surrounding older clientele were served large Sunday lunches brimming with chips and onion rings.
So, for the first time in many years, I went to the cinema with my Dad. We could have repeated one of my very first cinema trips, from many moons ago, of which I, unfortunately, have no memory, in which he took me to see The Muppets, but I didn't think he'd be too interested in that these days. Instead we chose 'The Grey', a survivor thriller starring the ever dependable Liam Neeson.
Neeson plays a depressed oil-rigger, working out in the Alaskan wastes, defending the camp, the factories and the workers (a ragged bunch of characters from ex-cons and thugs to disgruntled family men) from the wild wolves which prowl the surrounding desert of snow. On a trip home, not long after take off, the plane crashes in the snow covered wastelands and leaves a small bunch of survivors struggling in the low temperatures and barren lands, Neeson taking the role of leader as the wolves start closing in around them.
As the small band of survivors try to make their way through the snow to some kind of safety, the weather and the wolves attack, picking them off one by one making each of the men face not only a struggle for survival but a struggle of friendship, cooperation and faith.
There were more than a few God debates and a few desperate calls for the almighty throughout the movie, especially once things started getting more than a little tough for Neeson, a man with a dwindling faith, struggling to come to terms with recent events in his life. The circumstances were different but it was something I identified with, having revisited similar big questions quite frequently in the past year or so and still coming up with no significant answers.
'The Grey' was the second visit to the cinema this weekend. The first being on Saturday afternoon on an unexpected family outing with the McGarva clan to see 'The Woman in Black', Hammer's new adaptation of the Susan Hill novel, which Ka and myself had previously seen in the theatre last year.
After attending a birthday party in East Kilbride on Friday evening, Jillian and Colin had stayed the night and together we were to go into town to see a movie on Saturday afternoon. That was only if the chaos in Glasgow had been sorted out by then.
At around half past three on Friday afternoon a man ran into the Italian restaurant Amarone on Glasgow's Nelson Mandela Square, demanding drink. Nothing particularly unusual there but when the waiters refused to serve him the guy claimed to have a bomb under his jacket.
The Police were called. Streets were closed. The nearby underground was closed. Trained negotiators were called in with shield bearing officers. Police cars and helicopters swooped into the area. Fire engines, ambulances, the Royal Navy bomb disposal team. All were called in before the nutter was quietly taken away in the back of a van at around midnight.
During the ruckus people were either diverted or forcibly kept in surrounding streets and shops whilst others, including all members of the restaurant staff, were all evacuated. A local student complained when the police told him to remain in a nearby branch of Subway, the sandwich shop. Surely any students dream come true?
I was in Subway for the first time in years yesterday. I met Ka for a Valentines lunch and bought her the £3 lunch special, a half baguette with whatever filling she could possibly wish for(as long as it was in the glass cabinet), plus a drink for a mere £3.
Not bad at all.
I text Ka from the office, wondering when her lunch break was, and asked her when she’d be “on the street”? Apparently this made her sound like one of those Blythswood Square ladies.
Anyway, as we sat on the high stools in Subway I realised the last time I had been in a Subway restaurant had been in New York, just off Times Square, in December 2003. The quality of that baguette was nowhere near as good as Hamilton's, but then I was probably slightly hungover back then and I may have been in a better mood yesterday as it was Valentines Day.
It’s a lot of nonsense. Another commercial card factory created piece of money making tomfoolery.
Valentines Day is supposed to be the day to celebrate your love for your significant other, shower her, or him, with love, affection and appreciation.
What’s wrong with any other day then? Do we slap them about for the other 365 days of the year? (it’s a leap year!)
Ka got a bunch of flowers, a card and half a chicken tikka baguette. I know how to treat my woman (none of your Greggs sausage rolls here, thank you very much!).
Anyway, back to Saturday’s cinema trip. As it turned out, the McGarva seniors were also invited to the flicks, so Jillian drove the four of us over to Uddingston to pick up Dougie and Grace and from there we headed into town, parking in possibly the most excpensive car park in town.
Jillian was driving her Mum's car, a large Scooby van like Volkswagen, with an abnormal number of seats, which housed us all among the bags, heavily wrinkled books, wrappers, abandoned crisp packets, long empty juice bottles and an almost full bottle of Absolut Vodka that was rolling around the floor at our feet. As the journey went on that vodka became more and more attractive.
It had been a rough morning.
The cinema was packed. With a 12A certificate I didn't expect too much from this new supposed horror starring the slowly maturing Daniel Radcliffe. In fact, I suspected a lot of the younger members of the audience to be there because of the mere presence of Harry Potter.
After taking our seats, we relaxed, sitting back to watch everyone else pile in after us, people soon struggling for places together as seating became more and more limited. Upon sitting, Grace quickly produced Cadbury's Fudges, brunch bars, trebor mints and tin foil parcels full of sandwiches from her handbag. All were passed up and down our line of six as we awaited the lights going down and the usual onslaught of adverts.
This new version of 'The Woman in Black' was pretty good and a decent enough adaptation of the ghost story with plenty of freaky effects and jumpy moments. Radcliffe was even passable alongside the excellent Julius Ceasar, sorry, Ciaran Hinds.
Unfortunately some of the viewing experience was marred due to the younger elements in the crowd who apparently found it hilarious whenever they jumped with fright. Quite often they'd be laughing, giggling or talking among themselves long after their initial jump of fright, enough to put you off what was going on in the movie long after the jump.
On one occasion, moments after one of the film's jumpier moments, a voice echoed from one of the seats behind me.
"A pure shat maself there, by the way!"
The young guy's voice echoed throughout the cinema as the film's dialogue went on. As entertaining as this ned shitting himself may have been, I was rather more interested in what the following effects of the sudden blur, moving shadow or face in the window was on the big screen before me.
After the film we made our way home, getting lost in the car park across the road, unable to find the Scooby van. We got the elevator up and then back down again after realising the payment machine was at ground level. After waiting in a short queue, behind a snobby woman that sniffed in our general direction (I’m not sure who she was sniffing) we were then charged a grand total of £6.60 for the two and a half hours we’d been parked there (it may have been an NCP, robbing gits). Following this we then hit two different floors before finally arriving at the correct floor to find Jillian’s Mum’s car patiently waiting.
We should have just parked at the Station Bar.
We headed up to the cinema and bought two tickets for 'The Grey' at half three, so, finding ourselves with at least two hours to spare we decided to while away the time over a few pints and a chat in the closest drinking establishment. We didn't fancy a coffee at the Starbucks or Pret a Manger though, both of which are almost, more or less, next door to the cinema. Instead we opted for The Iron Horse on West Nile Street. I thought it'd be a good opportunity to take my Dad for a pint for a change as we very rarely get the chance. While the women were watching the likes of Nancy Dell Olio and Robbie Savage trying to dance, Dad and myself were sitting relaxing by the window of the Iron Horse, over a pint of Caledonian Best, catching up, whilst the surrounding older clientele were served large Sunday lunches brimming with chips and onion rings.
So, for the first time in many years, I went to the cinema with my Dad. We could have repeated one of my very first cinema trips, from many moons ago, of which I, unfortunately, have no memory, in which he took me to see The Muppets, but I didn't think he'd be too interested in that these days. Instead we chose 'The Grey', a survivor thriller starring the ever dependable Liam Neeson.
Neeson plays a depressed oil-rigger, working out in the Alaskan wastes, defending the camp, the factories and the workers (a ragged bunch of characters from ex-cons and thugs to disgruntled family men) from the wild wolves which prowl the surrounding desert of snow. On a trip home, not long after take off, the plane crashes in the snow covered wastelands and leaves a small bunch of survivors struggling in the low temperatures and barren lands, Neeson taking the role of leader as the wolves start closing in around them.
There were more than a few God debates and a few desperate calls for the almighty throughout the movie, especially once things started getting more than a little tough for Neeson, a man with a dwindling faith, struggling to come to terms with recent events in his life. The circumstances were different but it was something I identified with, having revisited similar big questions quite frequently in the past year or so and still coming up with no significant answers.
'The Grey' was the second visit to the cinema this weekend. The first being on Saturday afternoon on an unexpected family outing with the McGarva clan to see 'The Woman in Black', Hammer's new adaptation of the Susan Hill novel, which Ka and myself had previously seen in the theatre last year.
After attending a birthday party in East Kilbride on Friday evening, Jillian and Colin had stayed the night and together we were to go into town to see a movie on Saturday afternoon. That was only if the chaos in Glasgow had been sorted out by then.
At around half past three on Friday afternoon a man ran into the Italian restaurant Amarone on Glasgow's Nelson Mandela Square, demanding drink. Nothing particularly unusual there but when the waiters refused to serve him the guy claimed to have a bomb under his jacket.
The Police were called. Streets were closed. The nearby underground was closed. Trained negotiators were called in with shield bearing officers. Police cars and helicopters swooped into the area. Fire engines, ambulances, the Royal Navy bomb disposal team. All were called in before the nutter was quietly taken away in the back of a van at around midnight.
During the ruckus people were either diverted or forcibly kept in surrounding streets and shops whilst others, including all members of the restaurant staff, were all evacuated. A local student complained when the police told him to remain in a nearby branch of Subway, the sandwich shop. Surely any students dream come true?
I was in Subway for the first time in years yesterday. I met Ka for a Valentines lunch and bought her the £3 lunch special, a half baguette with whatever filling she could possibly wish for(as long as it was in the glass cabinet), plus a drink for a mere £3.
Not bad at all.
I text Ka from the office, wondering when her lunch break was, and asked her when she’d be “on the street”? Apparently this made her sound like one of those Blythswood Square ladies.
It’s a lot of nonsense. Another commercial card factory created piece of money making tomfoolery.
Valentines Day is supposed to be the day to celebrate your love for your significant other, shower her, or him, with love, affection and appreciation.
What’s wrong with any other day then? Do we slap them about for the other 365 days of the year? (it’s a leap year!)
Ka got a bunch of flowers, a card and half a chicken tikka baguette. I know how to treat my woman (none of your Greggs sausage rolls here, thank you very much!).
Anyway, back to Saturday’s cinema trip. As it turned out, the McGarva seniors were also invited to the flicks, so Jillian drove the four of us over to Uddingston to pick up Dougie and Grace and from there we headed into town, parking in possibly the most excpensive car park in town.
Jillian was driving her Mum's car, a large Scooby van like Volkswagen, with an abnormal number of seats, which housed us all among the bags, heavily wrinkled books, wrappers, abandoned crisp packets, long empty juice bottles and an almost full bottle of Absolut Vodka that was rolling around the floor at our feet. As the journey went on that vodka became more and more attractive.
It had been a rough morning.
The cinema was packed. With a 12A certificate I didn't expect too much from this new supposed horror starring the slowly maturing Daniel Radcliffe. In fact, I suspected a lot of the younger members of the audience to be there because of the mere presence of Harry Potter.
After taking our seats, we relaxed, sitting back to watch everyone else pile in after us, people soon struggling for places together as seating became more and more limited. Upon sitting, Grace quickly produced Cadbury's Fudges, brunch bars, trebor mints and tin foil parcels full of sandwiches from her handbag. All were passed up and down our line of six as we awaited the lights going down and the usual onslaught of adverts.
Unfortunately some of the viewing experience was marred due to the younger elements in the crowd who apparently found it hilarious whenever they jumped with fright. Quite often they'd be laughing, giggling or talking among themselves long after their initial jump of fright, enough to put you off what was going on in the movie long after the jump.
On one occasion, moments after one of the film's jumpier moments, a voice echoed from one of the seats behind me.
"A pure shat maself there, by the way!"
The young guy's voice echoed throughout the cinema as the film's dialogue went on. As entertaining as this ned shitting himself may have been, I was rather more interested in what the following effects of the sudden blur, moving shadow or face in the window was on the big screen before me.
After the film we made our way home, getting lost in the car park across the road, unable to find the Scooby van. We got the elevator up and then back down again after realising the payment machine was at ground level. After waiting in a short queue, behind a snobby woman that sniffed in our general direction (I’m not sure who she was sniffing) we were then charged a grand total of £6.60 for the two and a half hours we’d been parked there (it may have been an NCP, robbing gits). Following this we then hit two different floors before finally arriving at the correct floor to find Jillian’s Mum’s car patiently waiting.
We should have just parked at the Station Bar.
Kamis, 09 Februari 2012
Conversational struggles
On Friday night I was at a stranger's birthday party. Strangers to me, but not Ka as it was for one of the women in Ka's hairdressers. Linda was 50 and invited us along to the Tannochside Miners Welfare Club.
The Tannochside Miners’ Club was like any other Miners’ Club. One of those small, aged buildings, no way near as busy as days gone by, probably situated in a dark, slightly dodgy street, that houses various halls and bars for various different occasions and, to make up for the stickiness of the carpets, serves cheap booze and allows self catering. Perfect for private functions.
This Miners’ Welfare Club was only a short taxi journey from Ka's Mum and Dad's in Uddingston, so we had decided to save the taxi fare and stay the night there.
In all honesty, I wasn't particularly keen on going.
An invitation to a birthday party for a woman that goes to the same hairdresser as your wife is not a fantastic prospect for any husband I’m sure. A party a which you'll know no one but the wife, who'll probably chat away endlessly to the other women, leaving you sitting looking like a lemon.
Cue the awkward conversations with fellow husbands in similar situations (if there are any!).
I wouldn’t know anyone. I had visions of being surrounded by the gaggle of women that usually inhabit ‘Nutters’, Alan, the hairdresser’s, salon in Tannochside. As the women laugh and joke together, reminiscing about many a Saturday gone by in Alan’s ‘Nutters’, I’d be left sitting with a pint in the middle of a Miner’s Welfare hall, listening to ‘Grease’ from the giant speakers in the corner of the room, watching a bunch of older women line dancing or doing the slosh, whilst vaguely attempting to mingle with husbands in similar situations.
Mingling with other husbands is sometimes a bit of a struggle. At least I’ve found it a bit of a struggle at various parties or weddings in the past when I’ve been invited along as the husband of Ka.
The conversational struggles usually evolve from football. Quite often I've met other blokes for the first time and they've instantly launched into conversations about the nation’s favourite sport. Some of the guys have either hinted at or just asked straight out, "what team do you support then?", always with a suspicious glint in their eye.
It seems to be a bit of a clincher for some folk.
In fact, some husbands look at you even more suspiciously if you admit to not really giving a sh*t about any team. Sometimes you're better off just admitting to a team, any team, as you risk the suspicious looks which silently accuse you of great unmanliness (most people have never heard of The Glipton Giants).
I love movies but I don't hit out with, "what's your favourite movie?" whenever I meet someone, sneering if I don't like their answer and they reply with something starring Adam Sandler, for instance.
Well, maybe I would sneer if it eventually came out in conversation, but I wouldn't ask straight out where their movie allegiances lay, as if trying to get into some sort of conversational gang from the outset.
But then, if you are into football, like 90% of the male population seems to be, maybe it's a good thing the whole “what team you support” question? At least the other bloke would know exactly where you stand. Perhaps he’s only making a genuine attempt to strike up a conversation himself, struggling to think of anything else to talk about, and wouldn’t necessarily lynch you if you replied, admitting your support for his bitter rivals.
Anyway, as it happened, I didn’t have anything to worry about. Ka and myself met Jean and then Alison and Ben in the Windmill pub, just five minutes walk from the Miners. All three I was meeting for the first time properly, after only greeting them in passing in ‘Nutters’ before. Jean had walked from her house round the corner. She had just buried her dog (not immediately before leaving but a few days back) so was still a little down about that.
Over our first drink, Jean started talking of the burial and how this girl had passed away after only sixteen years.
‘Gawd, that’s terrible’ I said, as a photo was being passed round. It was only when I seen the photo that I realised it was a dog we were talking about.
“Oh, it’s a dog we’re talking about! That’s alright then!”, I very nearly said with a big smile and a deep sigh of relief.
Ben and Alison were nice and down to earth. Alison, a Financial Advisor with very shiny teeth’s Assistant, was chatty and outgoing and Ben, her hubby, was quieter and laid back. Ben didn’t even mention what football team he supported.
As the night went on, our conversation moved from many subjects including work, the secrets of Morrison’s ‘freshly made’ bread, shipbuilding, holidays, potato scones, Terry Pratchett, ‘Game of Thrones’ and cameras. In fact, we had more than a few things in common, which Ka and Alison both seemed quite relieved about. Ka stopped me at more than point during the night’s proceedings to make sure I was alright and that Ben was a nice guy. I nodded with a exasperated frown. It was almost as if the two wives were trying to set us up.
At some point, Alison probably asked Ben the same question except he probably replied with something along the lines of “no, he’s a weirdo, hasn’t even mentioned footie yet!”
We walked into the Miners’ Club at half past eight, immediately getting berated by the DJ for being an hour late, which turned Ka against him for the rest of the night. Whenever the DJ would hit out with a smarmy comment from behind the mike, and Ka was on the dancefloor, she’d waste no time in shouting a curt reply back at him. Alan the hairdresser waved at us from a table and bought us all a drink before disappearing off home and leaving us to the party. He was back in ‘Nutters’ early the next morning so couldn’t stay on to enjoy the dancing or the buffet.
A round of 5 drinks for £13. Where would you get that bargain other than a Miner’s Welfare Club? We also snaffled a couple of bags of onion rings for ourselves, enjoyed a magnificent buffet, drank lots of beer, finished with a Jack Daniels and headed off back down the hill to Uddingston in a taxi with a driver who was boasting about his new cable box. With a face like an old leather cloth, an earring and a voice like a emptying skip full of gravel this taxi driver glared at me as he drove. A one off payment of £180 and he was getting every channel available.
No fuss. No bills. He’d just uninstalled his Virgin package and got the new cable box from a guy he knows. Apparently I’ll know a guy too, if I’m interested.
“Ye’ll know a guy”, he said. “All yer movies and aw yer fitbaw”.
I wasn’t sure I did know a guy.
The Tannochside Miners’ Club was like any other Miners’ Club. One of those small, aged buildings, no way near as busy as days gone by, probably situated in a dark, slightly dodgy street, that houses various halls and bars for various different occasions and, to make up for the stickiness of the carpets, serves cheap booze and allows self catering. Perfect for private functions.
This Miners’ Welfare Club was only a short taxi journey from Ka's Mum and Dad's in Uddingston, so we had decided to save the taxi fare and stay the night there.
In all honesty, I wasn't particularly keen on going.
An invitation to a birthday party for a woman that goes to the same hairdresser as your wife is not a fantastic prospect for any husband I’m sure. A party a which you'll know no one but the wife, who'll probably chat away endlessly to the other women, leaving you sitting looking like a lemon.
Cue the awkward conversations with fellow husbands in similar situations (if there are any!).
I wouldn’t know anyone. I had visions of being surrounded by the gaggle of women that usually inhabit ‘Nutters’, Alan, the hairdresser’s, salon in Tannochside. As the women laugh and joke together, reminiscing about many a Saturday gone by in Alan’s ‘Nutters’, I’d be left sitting with a pint in the middle of a Miner’s Welfare hall, listening to ‘Grease’ from the giant speakers in the corner of the room, watching a bunch of older women line dancing or doing the slosh, whilst vaguely attempting to mingle with husbands in similar situations.
Mingling with other husbands is sometimes a bit of a struggle. At least I’ve found it a bit of a struggle at various parties or weddings in the past when I’ve been invited along as the husband of Ka.
The conversational struggles usually evolve from football. Quite often I've met other blokes for the first time and they've instantly launched into conversations about the nation’s favourite sport. Some of the guys have either hinted at or just asked straight out, "what team do you support then?", always with a suspicious glint in their eye.
It seems to be a bit of a clincher for some folk.
In fact, some husbands look at you even more suspiciously if you admit to not really giving a sh*t about any team. Sometimes you're better off just admitting to a team, any team, as you risk the suspicious looks which silently accuse you of great unmanliness (most people have never heard of The Glipton Giants).
I love movies but I don't hit out with, "what's your favourite movie?" whenever I meet someone, sneering if I don't like their answer and they reply with something starring Adam Sandler, for instance.
Well, maybe I would sneer if it eventually came out in conversation, but I wouldn't ask straight out where their movie allegiances lay, as if trying to get into some sort of conversational gang from the outset.
But then, if you are into football, like 90% of the male population seems to be, maybe it's a good thing the whole “what team you support” question? At least the other bloke would know exactly where you stand. Perhaps he’s only making a genuine attempt to strike up a conversation himself, struggling to think of anything else to talk about, and wouldn’t necessarily lynch you if you replied, admitting your support for his bitter rivals.
Anyway, as it happened, I didn’t have anything to worry about. Ka and myself met Jean and then Alison and Ben in the Windmill pub, just five minutes walk from the Miners. All three I was meeting for the first time properly, after only greeting them in passing in ‘Nutters’ before. Jean had walked from her house round the corner. She had just buried her dog (not immediately before leaving but a few days back) so was still a little down about that.
Over our first drink, Jean started talking of the burial and how this girl had passed away after only sixteen years.
‘Gawd, that’s terrible’ I said, as a photo was being passed round. It was only when I seen the photo that I realised it was a dog we were talking about.
“Oh, it’s a dog we’re talking about! That’s alright then!”, I very nearly said with a big smile and a deep sigh of relief.
Ben and Alison were nice and down to earth. Alison, a Financial Advisor with very shiny teeth’s Assistant, was chatty and outgoing and Ben, her hubby, was quieter and laid back. Ben didn’t even mention what football team he supported.
As the night went on, our conversation moved from many subjects including work, the secrets of Morrison’s ‘freshly made’ bread, shipbuilding, holidays, potato scones, Terry Pratchett, ‘Game of Thrones’ and cameras. In fact, we had more than a few things in common, which Ka and Alison both seemed quite relieved about. Ka stopped me at more than point during the night’s proceedings to make sure I was alright and that Ben was a nice guy. I nodded with a exasperated frown. It was almost as if the two wives were trying to set us up.
At some point, Alison probably asked Ben the same question except he probably replied with something along the lines of “no, he’s a weirdo, hasn’t even mentioned footie yet!”
We walked into the Miners’ Club at half past eight, immediately getting berated by the DJ for being an hour late, which turned Ka against him for the rest of the night. Whenever the DJ would hit out with a smarmy comment from behind the mike, and Ka was on the dancefloor, she’d waste no time in shouting a curt reply back at him. Alan the hairdresser waved at us from a table and bought us all a drink before disappearing off home and leaving us to the party. He was back in ‘Nutters’ early the next morning so couldn’t stay on to enjoy the dancing or the buffet.
A round of 5 drinks for £13. Where would you get that bargain other than a Miner’s Welfare Club? We also snaffled a couple of bags of onion rings for ourselves, enjoyed a magnificent buffet, drank lots of beer, finished with a Jack Daniels and headed off back down the hill to Uddingston in a taxi with a driver who was boasting about his new cable box. With a face like an old leather cloth, an earring and a voice like a emptying skip full of gravel this taxi driver glared at me as he drove. A one off payment of £180 and he was getting every channel available.
No fuss. No bills. He’d just uninstalled his Virgin package and got the new cable box from a guy he knows. Apparently I’ll know a guy too, if I’m interested.
“Ye’ll know a guy”, he said. “All yer movies and aw yer fitbaw”.
I wasn’t sure I did know a guy.
Selasa, 29 November 2011
Chutes, wine, beer and jam
Joshua wasn't too impressed at first. To be fair to him he'd only just woken up not ten minutes before and had found himself surrounded by relations.
Waking up and finding yourself surrounded by grinning relations looking directly at you can't be fun, so why should we think that it would be okay for a kid?
Can you imagine waking up on your couch from an afternoon nap to find your living room filled with various Mums, Dads, Aunties and Uncles, all sitting chatting, drinking, grinning and taking photos of you? Even if your Dad did come over and try and cajole you into being sociable it would take you at least fifteen minutes to come round to any idea of putting up with it, never mind liking the sudden invasion.
Joshua remained in his Dad's arms for around fifteen minutes, taking everything in, before being lowered to the floor in the hallway. His cousins Ross and Jack were wildly running around in circles as usual, speeding through the various rooms, Morgan not far behind them. Grace and Dougie were seated in the lounge and chatting away to Steven's cousins, his brother David and his Uncle John, whilst Jillian and Colin stood chatting in the living room's doorway, Jillian a little worse for wear after a big night out, including karaoke, the previous night.
Ka and myself were late and arrived through the heavy rain of Saturday afternoon. As a birthday gift for our wee nephew we bought a big, bright, blue and green plastic slide and came up with the idea of decorating it in balloons before we arrived to give it to him. We made a brief stop at Sainsburys to buy flowers for Angela and a bag of, what turned out to be, rather disappointing, supposedly animal shaped balloons. Ka and myself sat in the car, in the middle of the rain soaked Sainsbury's car park, blowing the balloons up to stick to the plastic slide, our inanimate third passenger, stretched across the whole of the car's back seat. Unfortunately these balloons were in no way animal shaped, not to any stretch of the imagination, but refusing to go back into the shop for more rubber we begrudgingly stuck them on to the plastic slide with sellotape. They'd have to do.
After being released on to the floor Ka and myself tried to introduce him to his birthday present, now standing in the hallway, the pathetic looking balloons bobbing around pitifully at the top of it’s mighty peak, three foot up. Joshua frowned and grumpily shook his head, waddling off in another direction.
He preferred the look of his Thomas the Tank Engine, that Colin and Jillian had bought him. A push cart version of the familiar blue steam locomotive with the big, grey, grinning face and the Liverpudlian voice. Joshua ran up to the push car, taking a hold of the back, red push rail and ran off into the living room. Colin was delighted and claimed victory in buying the best birthday present. Ka and myself laughed and joked artificially, kidding on we weren't that bothered, grumbled jealously and wandered off, heads drooping despondently.
However, after around twenty minutes of waking up time, and with a little gentle encouragement from Colin, his Granpa Dougie, and myself, Joshua was soon making his way up the short ladder and sitting himself down at the top of the smooth blue plastic slide. A little unsure at first, Joshua spun a little on his first slide down and ended up banging his head as he landed at the bottom of the blue, streamlined plastic. Joshua, being Joshua, was not put off by this minor bump though and immediately got back to his feet and made his way round the side of the chute again, giving an excited wave of the arms and a squeak of approval. Before long our wee nephew was moving in circles, running round, climbing up and sliding down, avoiding any further bumps, as his chute sliding expertise improved.
He liked it.
Ka and myself could hold our heads high, even if the balloons weren't.
Over the buffet lunch I brought up the subject of the large barrel standing in the corner of the kitchen, a third full with suspicious looking liquid. A few months ago Steven had created a large batch of plum jam from the purple fruit he had collected from the tree in the back garden. He had shared the jam out among the relatives including Ka and myself (our jar is only half empty – but still sitting in the fridge if you fancy some?) and was now branching out. He was now concocting some homemade wine in the corner of the kitchen. When I asked how the wine making was coming along Steven took a glass, unscrewed the barrel's cap and lowered his hand down into the barrels innards, a look of uncertainty almost crossing his face, like that scene in 'Flash Gordon' when Timothy Dalton put his hand down the scorpion's hole. After a little movement of the wrist Steven brought the glass back up, now half full of his alcoholic potion. His cousin John was the first to taste who almost immediately grimaced, saying something about vinegar, quickly handing the glass back. After Colin took a few drinks and nodded appreciatively, I ventured a small sip and immediately tasted Steven's jam, only laced with alcohol. With the tang of Steven's plums the wine tasted a little like a foreign brandy of some sort. After only a small taste I could feel the wine travelling down my system, leaving a, not unpleasant, burning sensation at the back of the throat like the after effects from the first taste of a strong whiskey. It was certainly nicer than some of the wines I've drank in the past.
Various members of the Reids used to create beer at home, and jam for that matter. My Gran’s jam was amazing. I could never believe that my Gran could make her own jam, although usually it was rhubard, and I hated rhubarb. Granpa used to eat it straight from the ground, a large growing patch out in his back garden. Dad ate it raw with a dab of sugar.
Dad used to make beer in our bathtub. I remember he used to buy the beer making kits from Boots and have a giant plastic barrel of his own, which would sit in the bathroom for a good few months, slowly brewing it's Lindsay ale, stinking the room out with it’s weird, pungent yeasty stenches.
I'm not sure what happened when it came to bath time?
We certainly never had a beer bath.
Apparently they’re quite big over in the Czech Republic and Austria. There are more than a few beer spas now open. Spas, baths, pools and even beer flavoured treatments are offered, such as facials. Apparently, beer is good for the skin. Good for cleansing, drying and relaxing in. Good for hair rejuvenation too. I should get over there! In the tub, the combination of water, beer, hops and yeast is warmed and bubbled around you, transforming it into a kind of mild Jacuzzi. A hot tub beer machine.
Unfortunately, back in Scotland, being the driver, I couldn’t partake in any of Steven’s homemade wine, much to my extreme disappointment, as I’m sure you can imagine, but made sure I had a glass of Pinot Grigio later, on the comfort of my own couch, where, thankfully, there was a distinct lack of grinning, chatting, relations.
Waking up and finding yourself surrounded by grinning relations looking directly at you can't be fun, so why should we think that it would be okay for a kid?
Can you imagine waking up on your couch from an afternoon nap to find your living room filled with various Mums, Dads, Aunties and Uncles, all sitting chatting, drinking, grinning and taking photos of you? Even if your Dad did come over and try and cajole you into being sociable it would take you at least fifteen minutes to come round to any idea of putting up with it, never mind liking the sudden invasion.
Joshua remained in his Dad's arms for around fifteen minutes, taking everything in, before being lowered to the floor in the hallway. His cousins Ross and Jack were wildly running around in circles as usual, speeding through the various rooms, Morgan not far behind them. Grace and Dougie were seated in the lounge and chatting away to Steven's cousins, his brother David and his Uncle John, whilst Jillian and Colin stood chatting in the living room's doorway, Jillian a little worse for wear after a big night out, including karaoke, the previous night.
Ka and myself were late and arrived through the heavy rain of Saturday afternoon. As a birthday gift for our wee nephew we bought a big, bright, blue and green plastic slide and came up with the idea of decorating it in balloons before we arrived to give it to him. We made a brief stop at Sainsburys to buy flowers for Angela and a bag of, what turned out to be, rather disappointing, supposedly animal shaped balloons. Ka and myself sat in the car, in the middle of the rain soaked Sainsbury's car park, blowing the balloons up to stick to the plastic slide, our inanimate third passenger, stretched across the whole of the car's back seat. Unfortunately these balloons were in no way animal shaped, not to any stretch of the imagination, but refusing to go back into the shop for more rubber we begrudgingly stuck them on to the plastic slide with sellotape. They'd have to do.
After being released on to the floor Ka and myself tried to introduce him to his birthday present, now standing in the hallway, the pathetic looking balloons bobbing around pitifully at the top of it’s mighty peak, three foot up. Joshua frowned and grumpily shook his head, waddling off in another direction.
He preferred the look of his Thomas the Tank Engine, that Colin and Jillian had bought him. A push cart version of the familiar blue steam locomotive with the big, grey, grinning face and the Liverpudlian voice. Joshua ran up to the push car, taking a hold of the back, red push rail and ran off into the living room. Colin was delighted and claimed victory in buying the best birthday present. Ka and myself laughed and joked artificially, kidding on we weren't that bothered, grumbled jealously and wandered off, heads drooping despondently.
However, after around twenty minutes of waking up time, and with a little gentle encouragement from Colin, his Granpa Dougie, and myself, Joshua was soon making his way up the short ladder and sitting himself down at the top of the smooth blue plastic slide. A little unsure at first, Joshua spun a little on his first slide down and ended up banging his head as he landed at the bottom of the blue, streamlined plastic. Joshua, being Joshua, was not put off by this minor bump though and immediately got back to his feet and made his way round the side of the chute again, giving an excited wave of the arms and a squeak of approval. Before long our wee nephew was moving in circles, running round, climbing up and sliding down, avoiding any further bumps, as his chute sliding expertise improved.
He liked it.
Ka and myself could hold our heads high, even if the balloons weren't.
Over the buffet lunch I brought up the subject of the large barrel standing in the corner of the kitchen, a third full with suspicious looking liquid. A few months ago Steven had created a large batch of plum jam from the purple fruit he had collected from the tree in the back garden. He had shared the jam out among the relatives including Ka and myself (our jar is only half empty – but still sitting in the fridge if you fancy some?) and was now branching out. He was now concocting some homemade wine in the corner of the kitchen. When I asked how the wine making was coming along Steven took a glass, unscrewed the barrel's cap and lowered his hand down into the barrels innards, a look of uncertainty almost crossing his face, like that scene in 'Flash Gordon' when Timothy Dalton put his hand down the scorpion's hole. After a little movement of the wrist Steven brought the glass back up, now half full of his alcoholic potion. His cousin John was the first to taste who almost immediately grimaced, saying something about vinegar, quickly handing the glass back. After Colin took a few drinks and nodded appreciatively, I ventured a small sip and immediately tasted Steven's jam, only laced with alcohol. With the tang of Steven's plums the wine tasted a little like a foreign brandy of some sort. After only a small taste I could feel the wine travelling down my system, leaving a, not unpleasant, burning sensation at the back of the throat like the after effects from the first taste of a strong whiskey. It was certainly nicer than some of the wines I've drank in the past.
Various members of the Reids used to create beer at home, and jam for that matter. My Gran’s jam was amazing. I could never believe that my Gran could make her own jam, although usually it was rhubard, and I hated rhubarb. Granpa used to eat it straight from the ground, a large growing patch out in his back garden. Dad ate it raw with a dab of sugar.
Dad used to make beer in our bathtub. I remember he used to buy the beer making kits from Boots and have a giant plastic barrel of his own, which would sit in the bathroom for a good few months, slowly brewing it's Lindsay ale, stinking the room out with it’s weird, pungent yeasty stenches.
I'm not sure what happened when it came to bath time?
We certainly never had a beer bath.
Apparently they’re quite big over in the Czech Republic and Austria. There are more than a few beer spas now open. Spas, baths, pools and even beer flavoured treatments are offered, such as facials. Apparently, beer is good for the skin. Good for cleansing, drying and relaxing in. Good for hair rejuvenation too. I should get over there! In the tub, the combination of water, beer, hops and yeast is warmed and bubbled around you, transforming it into a kind of mild Jacuzzi. A hot tub beer machine.
Unfortunately, back in Scotland, being the driver, I couldn’t partake in any of Steven’s homemade wine, much to my extreme disappointment, as I’m sure you can imagine, but made sure I had a glass of Pinot Grigio later, on the comfort of my own couch, where, thankfully, there was a distinct lack of grinning, chatting, relations.
Selasa, 08 November 2011
Fireworks, flowers and frisbees
It was half past five on a dark, breezy, autumn Saturday evening. The branches of the nearby trees on the side of the hill, shuffled and shook in the bitter, cold wind as leaves spun through the air around them. Ka and myself found ourselves running around a graveyard, dispensing flowers out between three different graves in our shorts and T-shirts like a pair of lunatic flower children spreading peace and love in a Hammer Horror setting.
We had just come out from the gym and after a quick visit up to see Mum and Dad in Chapelton, and a brief stop off at the local Morrisons, we were visiting the grave of our daughter, my Gran and Granpa and Maureen, my Aunt who had been laid to rest just over a week ago.
A year ago I would have never thought that I would be spending my Saturday evenings in such a way.
For the past ten months we have been buying bouquets and sharing them between Lucy and my Gran and Granpa. Now that my Aunt Maureen rests in the next lane along we’re going to have to start buying more flowers.
With the exception of our running around a graveyard in bitter cold winds and another trip to the cinema on Sunday to see Justin Timerlake’s latest cinematic effort, ‘In Time’, it was a pretty uneventful weekend. Ka and myself spent Saturday lying on the couch, watching The Sopranos season one, (we’ve borrowed the series 1-6 boxset off Kenny while he’s off in Oz). A movie night with a few beers, Morgan’s spiced and eating ice cream as fireworks exploded around us. As bangs, cracks and whirrs of various sizes and loudness erupted directly outside our windows for the majority of the night, it was almost as if the good people of Calderwood were aiming their fireworks directly at us. It’s a pity we can’t go out on to our roof as it would have been a fantastic fireworks display. Either that, or a terrifying version of that scene from ‘Mary Poppins’, when Admiral Boom attacked the chimney sweeps with rockets. Not that I’d be dancing at a rooftop fireworks display… not much anyway.
We’d had quite enough of fireworks by the time we went to bed. The last time Ka and myself had seen and heard fireworks was before the beginning of November was Hogmanay. The night we arrived home from the hospital.
Before Saturday’s Sopranos night, we’d been to Morgan, Angela and Steven’s annual fireworks family party on the Friday evening.
We rang the bell at the large black door of ‘Roxburgh House’ and stood back waiting. Moments later the door clicked and slowly opened. The door seemed to inch open of it’s own accord as a small figure was slowly revealed, standing in the light emanating from the hallway behind.
“Eh!” Joshua welcomed us with his usual noises and wide eyed curiosity before Steven poked his head round from behind the now fully opened door.
After five minutes of talking in the hallway Joshua took it upon himself to act as chief coat taker and after pulling at the corners of our coats for more than a few minutes as we stood chatting, the two year old took our coats from us in the hallway and cleaned Angela's laminate flooring on his way back to the porch where he dumped them over his buggy after finding he was four foot too short to reach the coat hooks.
Steven had disappeared by this point, out into the back garden where he was straining his arm muscles sawing up wood for his small bonfire. He’d lit up the BBQ and set up a buffet under the intermittent light of the backyard lamp with the dodgy motion sensor under which seemed to only activate when someone danced below it (we should have tried the Chimney Sweep dance). Candles of various sizes lit up the large buffet Steven, Angela and Morgan had prepared. Burgers, sausages and Steven’s famous Chicken tikka were all hot off the BBQ were all served up. Morgan had also prepared her own chocolate plastered marshmallows and chocolate fingers both decorated with hundreds and thousands along with a second dish of marshmallows on kebab sticks prepared for the purpose of roasting over the small blue bonfire. Ka and myself were the only ones with five marshmallows on our kebab sticks because, as Morgan explained, Ka is her favourite auntie and I’m her second favourite Uncle (and no, she doesn’t only have two uncles!).
After eating the BBQ dinner in our coats and scarves and Steven’s fireworks display of many colours, in which he still can’t get a Catherine wheel to work, it was roasting time and we gathered around the small cauldron of coloured flames in the middle of the dark garden. The small blue and purple flames, created by strange chemical colourants in among the wood, flickered and lapped at the short wooden logs as we held our marshmallows over them. My five marshmallows got slightly burnt in their proximity to the violet flames but I ate them all the same. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d ate roasted marshmallows. Perhaps some long ago and distant family camping trip.
After the marshmallows Steven and Morgan announced we were then to play Frisbee around in the front garden. As we all frowned up at the pair of them Steven flicked a switch of the back of the toy and the disc lit up with UFO like colours.
At this point I would have been quite happy to head indoors but Frisbee it was to be and before we knew it we had walked through the dark, around the house and were tossing the lit up, glowing plastic disc at one another. Some literally throwing it as one of Grace’s frisbees belted off the right side of my body, Morgan almost hit my car which was parked safely, or where I thought was safe, out on the street and Joshua got a hefty bang on the top of the head. Expecting tears, Ka and myself were surprised, as Joshua merely turned around with a frown, decided he’d had enough outdoors and waddled up to the front door, mumbling and unfastening his coat as he went. At which point I thought, I couldn’t agree more, and Ka, Angela and I followed him inside for a cuppa. The games didn’t end there thought as Morgan soon brought out more in the form of Snakes and Ladders and Guess Who? before Ka and myself finally headed home, fireworks continuing to colour the sky around us.
We had just come out from the gym and after a quick visit up to see Mum and Dad in Chapelton, and a brief stop off at the local Morrisons, we were visiting the grave of our daughter, my Gran and Granpa and Maureen, my Aunt who had been laid to rest just over a week ago.
A year ago I would have never thought that I would be spending my Saturday evenings in such a way.
For the past ten months we have been buying bouquets and sharing them between Lucy and my Gran and Granpa. Now that my Aunt Maureen rests in the next lane along we’re going to have to start buying more flowers.
With the exception of our running around a graveyard in bitter cold winds and another trip to the cinema on Sunday to see Justin Timerlake’s latest cinematic effort, ‘In Time’, it was a pretty uneventful weekend. Ka and myself spent Saturday lying on the couch, watching The Sopranos season one, (we’ve borrowed the series 1-6 boxset off Kenny while he’s off in Oz). A movie night with a few beers, Morgan’s spiced and eating ice cream as fireworks exploded around us. As bangs, cracks and whirrs of various sizes and loudness erupted directly outside our windows for the majority of the night, it was almost as if the good people of Calderwood were aiming their fireworks directly at us. It’s a pity we can’t go out on to our roof as it would have been a fantastic fireworks display. Either that, or a terrifying version of that scene from ‘Mary Poppins’, when Admiral Boom attacked the chimney sweeps with rockets. Not that I’d be dancing at a rooftop fireworks display… not much anyway.
We’d had quite enough of fireworks by the time we went to bed. The last time Ka and myself had seen and heard fireworks was before the beginning of November was Hogmanay. The night we arrived home from the hospital.
Before Saturday’s Sopranos night, we’d been to Morgan, Angela and Steven’s annual fireworks family party on the Friday evening.
We rang the bell at the large black door of ‘Roxburgh House’ and stood back waiting. Moments later the door clicked and slowly opened. The door seemed to inch open of it’s own accord as a small figure was slowly revealed, standing in the light emanating from the hallway behind.
“Eh!” Joshua welcomed us with his usual noises and wide eyed curiosity before Steven poked his head round from behind the now fully opened door.
After five minutes of talking in the hallway Joshua took it upon himself to act as chief coat taker and after pulling at the corners of our coats for more than a few minutes as we stood chatting, the two year old took our coats from us in the hallway and cleaned Angela's laminate flooring on his way back to the porch where he dumped them over his buggy after finding he was four foot too short to reach the coat hooks.
Steven had disappeared by this point, out into the back garden where he was straining his arm muscles sawing up wood for his small bonfire. He’d lit up the BBQ and set up a buffet under the intermittent light of the backyard lamp with the dodgy motion sensor under which seemed to only activate when someone danced below it (we should have tried the Chimney Sweep dance). Candles of various sizes lit up the large buffet Steven, Angela and Morgan had prepared. Burgers, sausages and Steven’s famous Chicken tikka were all hot off the BBQ were all served up. Morgan had also prepared her own chocolate plastered marshmallows and chocolate fingers both decorated with hundreds and thousands along with a second dish of marshmallows on kebab sticks prepared for the purpose of roasting over the small blue bonfire. Ka and myself were the only ones with five marshmallows on our kebab sticks because, as Morgan explained, Ka is her favourite auntie and I’m her second favourite Uncle (and no, she doesn’t only have two uncles!).
After eating the BBQ dinner in our coats and scarves and Steven’s fireworks display of many colours, in which he still can’t get a Catherine wheel to work, it was roasting time and we gathered around the small cauldron of coloured flames in the middle of the dark garden. The small blue and purple flames, created by strange chemical colourants in among the wood, flickered and lapped at the short wooden logs as we held our marshmallows over them. My five marshmallows got slightly burnt in their proximity to the violet flames but I ate them all the same. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d ate roasted marshmallows. Perhaps some long ago and distant family camping trip.
After the marshmallows Steven and Morgan announced we were then to play Frisbee around in the front garden. As we all frowned up at the pair of them Steven flicked a switch of the back of the toy and the disc lit up with UFO like colours.
At this point I would have been quite happy to head indoors but Frisbee it was to be and before we knew it we had walked through the dark, around the house and were tossing the lit up, glowing plastic disc at one another. Some literally throwing it as one of Grace’s frisbees belted off the right side of my body, Morgan almost hit my car which was parked safely, or where I thought was safe, out on the street and Joshua got a hefty bang on the top of the head. Expecting tears, Ka and myself were surprised, as Joshua merely turned around with a frown, decided he’d had enough outdoors and waddled up to the front door, mumbling and unfastening his coat as he went. At which point I thought, I couldn’t agree more, and Ka, Angela and I followed him inside for a cuppa. The games didn’t end there thought as Morgan soon brought out more in the form of Snakes and Ladders and Guess Who? before Ka and myself finally headed home, fireworks continuing to colour the sky around us.
Senin, 29 Agustus 2011
An enraged Swedish Chef
Kirkintilloch looked miserable yesterday. The sky was thick with grey. The wind that blew over the hills was bitter cold. The branches on the trees swayed fiercely in the strong breeze and the streets were empty of people. That was until the Reids and the McGarvas arrived.
Yesterday was Dougie’s birthday and Colin and Jillian held a BBQ in my Father In Law’s honour and we all made our way out to Waterside. Colin donned the Chef’s hat, that Ka had found him on Amazon during the week, (she couldn’t find a turban), and got the coals lit with a little help from Dad, an expert BBQ chef himself. Steven soon provided some help with another BBQ, firing on some Chicken Tikka he’d marinated earlier, which everyone soon started munching, raving about, whilst picking the last remaining chicken from their sticks. Colin muttered jealously and then shouted abusively, waving his knives and spatulas around like an enraged Swedish Chef, as apparently we had not praised his own cooking quite so much.
Greasy hamburgers in a buttery roll with cheese and a heavy dollop of tomato sauce. Sausages fresh from the grill. Beef kebabs that nipped at your mouth with their spicy innards as you ate. Pork steaks, pasta bakes, mustards, beers, cake and wine. As Man United scored all those goals, all of the above were happily consumed although none of which were particularly ideal ingredients for a man that’s just had a heart attack.
Dad spent three nights as a guest in Hairmyres hospital last week as a result of the pains he had been experiencing on the Monday morning whilst getting ready for work. It wasn’t until Dad got to work and he was having more than a little difficulty with the short staircase outside the factory’s front doors that he realised something must be wrong. As the pain in his chest continued and he found himself short of breath, more than a little hot under the collar and building up a bit of a sweat on the brow, he googled the symptoms in work and they all gave generally the same answer. A heart attack.
One of Dad’s colleagues flung the phone over the desk towards him and he phoned NHS 24, whose advisors, after passing Dad on a few times to various, different conversationalists, eventually came up with the idea of sending an ambulance out. Gosh, that what quick thinking. Before long Dad was whisked off to Hairmyres.
Of course, once I had got to the hospital on the Monday night I told him that he should have just phoned me. After recently graduating from a three day British Red Cross course I could have told him what the problem was in moments, quickly identifying the symptoms of a heart attack (although I’m not sure if my Dad experienced the ‘sense of impending doom’… I’ll need to ask him that). I could have told him was position to sit in and everything and I certainly wouldn’t have had to hold a committee or pass the phone round my work colleagues to get their ideas on the matter.
Saying that, I may have panicked. I may even have made matters worse. I would probably have rushed out from my work, ran straight into a lamp post, dropping my car keys down a drain and then once having finally retrieved my car keys from under the street drain with the help of a passing burglar who just happened to have a crowbar on him, I would have crashed the car into a Hamilton driver.
Makes me wonder what I’d be like in a real British Red Cross emergency situation. I’m one of three first aiders in our building. I’m also one of two fire wardens for our department?!
The place is doomed.
Yes, it’s probably just as well Dad did not phone me.
Dad has now been prescribed with four pills to take for the rest of his life and a six week recovery programme to help nurse him through the coming weeks. Dad showed the large ring bound book of recovery to Ka and myself when we visited him at home on Thursday after he was eventually released from Hairmyres and Ka immediately started going through the instructions, reading out the various pills’ allowance and side affects, skipping the bit about the possible effects on the sex life.
Dad is now on a morning diet of Aspirins, statins and beta blockers to help thin his blood and keep it flowing properly through his arteries.
As a result of all this I’m now considering my own diet. If my Dad, a generally healthy, fit guy, can have a heart attack, what chance do the rest of us have?
The rest of us being me?
Just for starters, I’ve been mulling over my cholesterol intake today. I came across one list describing the food to avoid online which included all as follows:
Butter – I eat on bread, toast, potatoes, quite a lot really. It was on the rolls I had with my greasy BBQ food yesterday.
Hard cheese – Cheese is great. Brilliant toasted with a tomato on top. In fact, I had loads on my burgers yesterday…
Fatty meat – yep, eat that too. Again, had a fair amount from Colin’s and Jillian’s table last night.
Red and processed meat – yep, again on the BBQ last night.
Biscuits – yep, last night along with…
Cake – well, it was Dougie’s birthday?!
Cream – yep, we had whipped cream with it. Although Dougie kept an eye on Morgan and myself as we squirted from the can (he doesn’t like people nicking his whipped cream).
Dripping – is this grease from your food? If so, yes, again, on the burgers and various meaty products cooked on Colin’s smoking BBQ last night.
Other items on the list included Lard, Ghee (whatever that is) and Coconut oil. These three were the only three not included on Colin and Jillian’s menu last night.
Everything else we ate is on the heart attack list?!
Colin was trying to murder us!?!
Chicken Tikka wasn’t on the Cholesterol list though...
That’s why Colin was so angry at Steven for cooking some of his own recipes.
By cooking some healthy chicken, Steven was foiling his evil plan!
Yesterday was Dougie’s birthday and Colin and Jillian held a BBQ in my Father In Law’s honour and we all made our way out to Waterside. Colin donned the Chef’s hat, that Ka had found him on Amazon during the week, (she couldn’t find a turban), and got the coals lit with a little help from Dad, an expert BBQ chef himself. Steven soon provided some help with another BBQ, firing on some Chicken Tikka he’d marinated earlier, which everyone soon started munching, raving about, whilst picking the last remaining chicken from their sticks. Colin muttered jealously and then shouted abusively, waving his knives and spatulas around like an enraged Swedish Chef, as apparently we had not praised his own cooking quite so much.
Greasy hamburgers in a buttery roll with cheese and a heavy dollop of tomato sauce. Sausages fresh from the grill. Beef kebabs that nipped at your mouth with their spicy innards as you ate. Pork steaks, pasta bakes, mustards, beers, cake and wine. As Man United scored all those goals, all of the above were happily consumed although none of which were particularly ideal ingredients for a man that’s just had a heart attack.
Dad spent three nights as a guest in Hairmyres hospital last week as a result of the pains he had been experiencing on the Monday morning whilst getting ready for work. It wasn’t until Dad got to work and he was having more than a little difficulty with the short staircase outside the factory’s front doors that he realised something must be wrong. As the pain in his chest continued and he found himself short of breath, more than a little hot under the collar and building up a bit of a sweat on the brow, he googled the symptoms in work and they all gave generally the same answer. A heart attack.
One of Dad’s colleagues flung the phone over the desk towards him and he phoned NHS 24, whose advisors, after passing Dad on a few times to various, different conversationalists, eventually came up with the idea of sending an ambulance out. Gosh, that what quick thinking. Before long Dad was whisked off to Hairmyres.
Of course, once I had got to the hospital on the Monday night I told him that he should have just phoned me. After recently graduating from a three day British Red Cross course I could have told him what the problem was in moments, quickly identifying the symptoms of a heart attack (although I’m not sure if my Dad experienced the ‘sense of impending doom’… I’ll need to ask him that). I could have told him was position to sit in and everything and I certainly wouldn’t have had to hold a committee or pass the phone round my work colleagues to get their ideas on the matter.
Saying that, I may have panicked. I may even have made matters worse. I would probably have rushed out from my work, ran straight into a lamp post, dropping my car keys down a drain and then once having finally retrieved my car keys from under the street drain with the help of a passing burglar who just happened to have a crowbar on him, I would have crashed the car into a Hamilton driver.
Makes me wonder what I’d be like in a real British Red Cross emergency situation. I’m one of three first aiders in our building. I’m also one of two fire wardens for our department?!
The place is doomed.
Yes, it’s probably just as well Dad did not phone me.
Dad has now been prescribed with four pills to take for the rest of his life and a six week recovery programme to help nurse him through the coming weeks. Dad showed the large ring bound book of recovery to Ka and myself when we visited him at home on Thursday after he was eventually released from Hairmyres and Ka immediately started going through the instructions, reading out the various pills’ allowance and side affects, skipping the bit about the possible effects on the sex life.
Dad is now on a morning diet of Aspirins, statins and beta blockers to help thin his blood and keep it flowing properly through his arteries.
As a result of all this I’m now considering my own diet. If my Dad, a generally healthy, fit guy, can have a heart attack, what chance do the rest of us have?
The rest of us being me?
Just for starters, I’ve been mulling over my cholesterol intake today. I came across one list describing the food to avoid online which included all as follows:
Butter – I eat on bread, toast, potatoes, quite a lot really. It was on the rolls I had with my greasy BBQ food yesterday.
Hard cheese – Cheese is great. Brilliant toasted with a tomato on top. In fact, I had loads on my burgers yesterday…
Fatty meat – yep, eat that too. Again, had a fair amount from Colin’s and Jillian’s table last night.
Red and processed meat – yep, again on the BBQ last night.
Biscuits – yep, last night along with…
Cake – well, it was Dougie’s birthday?!
Cream – yep, we had whipped cream with it. Although Dougie kept an eye on Morgan and myself as we squirted from the can (he doesn’t like people nicking his whipped cream).
Dripping – is this grease from your food? If so, yes, again, on the burgers and various meaty products cooked on Colin’s smoking BBQ last night.
Other items on the list included Lard, Ghee (whatever that is) and Coconut oil. These three were the only three not included on Colin and Jillian’s menu last night.
Everything else we ate is on the heart attack list?!
Colin was trying to murder us!?!
Chicken Tikka wasn’t on the Cholesterol list though...
That’s why Colin was so angry at Steven for cooking some of his own recipes.
By cooking some healthy chicken, Steven was foiling his evil plan!
Kamis, 21 Juli 2011
Grace's surprise and the toilet incident
The five or six cars piled up outside the Leckie/McGarva household may have given away the surprise element to Grace’s 60th birthday party on Saturday night. If it did though, Grace certainly didn’t let on, as she almost screamed with surprise upon entering Steven and Angela’s living room to find us all sitting there. We all broke in to the routine of the ‘Happy Birthday’ song, as Grace stood there, smiling over the surprise, while I darted about the floor taking some photos and Steven quietly filmed it all with his new camcorder from the corner of the room.
A good portion of Ka's family, along with Lynsey Ann, my Mum and Dad and myself gathered in the large living room to surprise my mother in law who’d come along with Dougie believing the Saturday night to be a simple dinner date with Angela, Steven, Morgan and Joshua. At least she had believed that up until five minutes before leaving her own house when Dougie had asked her to bring her new photo book, that she’d received for her 60th, in order to show Betty.
As Steven made his way up from Uddingston, after getting Grace and Dougie into the car, the rest of us had been running round the house, decorating, preparing food, nappying, fetching drinks, reintroducing ourselves to relatives not seen in months and some never met at all. As the final moments drew near the smokers were hurriedly pulled in from the front garden path, their cigarettes left spinning on the pavestones, and the kids were ordered to move into the living room, myself picking Joshua up from where her rambled around the buffet table in the second front room and planting him down in the living room, where he simply gave a slight frown of confusion at all the hustle and bustle and staggered on to the plate of cakes at the end of the room. Everyone began frantically hushing one another as Grace and Dougie’s feet were heard from behind the closed blinds which obscured the living room’s large bay windows, the small red stones of the driveway crunching underneath their feet, as Steven led them up towards the front door where Angela would meet them upon arrival.
Once the ‘Happy Birthday’ song was over and the initial surprise over with, Steven got the music on and Ka and Jillian got the food cooking whilst the rest of us started enjoying ourselves.
I had been enjoying myself up until I had to make a visit to Steven and Angela’s loo, a visit which ended up being far longer than originally planned. Unfortunately the toilet refused to flush properly and my, let’s just say, deposit, refused to be removed by this particular toilet’s flushing system. Not great in any situation, but in a house party, with a bunch of your wife’s relatives waiting patiently, not great at all.
As I stood there waiting on the cistern refilling itself for the third time the knocks at the door began. Concerned voices and questions from beyond the closed door started echoing through the hallway.
“Is somebody still in there?”
“Who is it?”
“Is the door stuck?”
“Is it the same person that’s been in there all this time?”
Various questions such as these echoed throughout the hallway until Ka’s voice finally piped up.
“Where’s Michael?” Grimacing, I gritted my teeth. “He’s not in there, and he’s not in there”. The ‘theres’ in question presumably referring the every room, other than the toilet in which I stood, swearing at a piece of excretion.
“Michael are you in there?” Ka rattled the opposite side of the door. Hesitantly I closed the lid over the toilet and allowed my dearest Judas wife entry at which I explained the situation. Ka replied by checking her make-up in the mirror and then leaving me to it. Before I got the chance to lock the door after her, Angela, the sister in law, appeared at the door, to which I again, reluctantly admitted the situation. Unfortunately Colin, Ka’s brother, overheard the situation as he walked by and almost spat out a haggis ball with laughter. Angela, determined that she would flush better, took control of the situation. She firmly grasped the toilet’s flush handle and twisted at which the usual gush of water flowed through the bowl.
“There” Angela shrugged and opened the lid of the toilet up. Unfortunately my floater was still there, bobbing around quite happily. Angela shrieked and ran from the room.
“It’s not even very big!” I yelled after her.
“It’s the size of the bowl!” Angela’s voice reverberated throughout the hall, as other passing party guests soon started mumbling about the toilet situation, the occasional laughing.
In my defense, the flush of the toilet was pretty pathetic and I cannot believe that it’s never happened to them before with such a poor plumbing system. Anyway, without going into too much detail, I eventually managed to get rid of the obstinate piece of discharge after attacking it with a good few large cups of water before Ka and Jillian had the chance to come through with a boiling kettle (a remedy Auntie Lorna bestowed upon them after, presumably, much debating in the living room with all the other family members).
Following the toilet incident I spent some time in the kitchen, plucking up the courage to face the guests in the living room again, conversing with Colin and Ryan and any of the drink seekers visiting in order to top up their glass or pull another bottle from the fridge. Uncle Bill told stories of Hawaii, Las Vegas and losing luggage at airports. Paul spoke with me about old Star Wars toys and the inability to throw any of them out. Colin talked of Torchwood, Tom Jones and T in the Park and Jean dreaded the London train at half past nine the next morning as she drank another small glass of wine from the box in the fridge.
Morgan, Sarah and Joshua played in the large rubber dinghy in the middle of the hallway, Uncle Bill occasionally jumping in to act as Captain.
Wee Joshua ate more than his usual allocation of cakes after he’d got bored of the good few pieces of Jillian’s pasta I’d fed him from my paper plate.
Grace and Dougie enjoyed a slow dance to Gerry and the Pacemakers’ ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ immediately after which Dougie demands for Tina Turner’s “Simply the Best” were largely ignored or laughed at.
It had been a successful wee night and it looked like Grace, and everyone else, pretty much enjoyed themselves. It wasn’t until half past one that people started saying their goodbyes, Ka tidying as they went, clearing most of the rubbish up and cleaning up the buffet table which, Ka and myself were pleased to see, had very little of our two lasagnes left. Must have been the Bechamel sauce…
A good portion of Ka's family, along with Lynsey Ann, my Mum and Dad and myself gathered in the large living room to surprise my mother in law who’d come along with Dougie believing the Saturday night to be a simple dinner date with Angela, Steven, Morgan and Joshua. At least she had believed that up until five minutes before leaving her own house when Dougie had asked her to bring her new photo book, that she’d received for her 60th, in order to show Betty.
As Steven made his way up from Uddingston, after getting Grace and Dougie into the car, the rest of us had been running round the house, decorating, preparing food, nappying, fetching drinks, reintroducing ourselves to relatives not seen in months and some never met at all. As the final moments drew near the smokers were hurriedly pulled in from the front garden path, their cigarettes left spinning on the pavestones, and the kids were ordered to move into the living room, myself picking Joshua up from where her rambled around the buffet table in the second front room and planting him down in the living room, where he simply gave a slight frown of confusion at all the hustle and bustle and staggered on to the plate of cakes at the end of the room. Everyone began frantically hushing one another as Grace and Dougie’s feet were heard from behind the closed blinds which obscured the living room’s large bay windows, the small red stones of the driveway crunching underneath their feet, as Steven led them up towards the front door where Angela would meet them upon arrival.
Once the ‘Happy Birthday’ song was over and the initial surprise over with, Steven got the music on and Ka and Jillian got the food cooking whilst the rest of us started enjoying ourselves.
I had been enjoying myself up until I had to make a visit to Steven and Angela’s loo, a visit which ended up being far longer than originally planned. Unfortunately the toilet refused to flush properly and my, let’s just say, deposit, refused to be removed by this particular toilet’s flushing system. Not great in any situation, but in a house party, with a bunch of your wife’s relatives waiting patiently, not great at all.
As I stood there waiting on the cistern refilling itself for the third time the knocks at the door began. Concerned voices and questions from beyond the closed door started echoing through the hallway.
“Is somebody still in there?”
“Who is it?”
“Is the door stuck?”
“Is it the same person that’s been in there all this time?”
Various questions such as these echoed throughout the hallway until Ka’s voice finally piped up.
“Where’s Michael?” Grimacing, I gritted my teeth. “He’s not in there, and he’s not in there”. The ‘theres’ in question presumably referring the every room, other than the toilet in which I stood, swearing at a piece of excretion.
“Michael are you in there?” Ka rattled the opposite side of the door. Hesitantly I closed the lid over the toilet and allowed my dearest Judas wife entry at which I explained the situation. Ka replied by checking her make-up in the mirror and then leaving me to it. Before I got the chance to lock the door after her, Angela, the sister in law, appeared at the door, to which I again, reluctantly admitted the situation. Unfortunately Colin, Ka’s brother, overheard the situation as he walked by and almost spat out a haggis ball with laughter. Angela, determined that she would flush better, took control of the situation. She firmly grasped the toilet’s flush handle and twisted at which the usual gush of water flowed through the bowl.
“There” Angela shrugged and opened the lid of the toilet up. Unfortunately my floater was still there, bobbing around quite happily. Angela shrieked and ran from the room.
“It’s not even very big!” I yelled after her.
“It’s the size of the bowl!” Angela’s voice reverberated throughout the hall, as other passing party guests soon started mumbling about the toilet situation, the occasional laughing.
In my defense, the flush of the toilet was pretty pathetic and I cannot believe that it’s never happened to them before with such a poor plumbing system. Anyway, without going into too much detail, I eventually managed to get rid of the obstinate piece of discharge after attacking it with a good few large cups of water before Ka and Jillian had the chance to come through with a boiling kettle (a remedy Auntie Lorna bestowed upon them after, presumably, much debating in the living room with all the other family members).
Following the toilet incident I spent some time in the kitchen, plucking up the courage to face the guests in the living room again, conversing with Colin and Ryan and any of the drink seekers visiting in order to top up their glass or pull another bottle from the fridge. Uncle Bill told stories of Hawaii, Las Vegas and losing luggage at airports. Paul spoke with me about old Star Wars toys and the inability to throw any of them out. Colin talked of Torchwood, Tom Jones and T in the Park and Jean dreaded the London train at half past nine the next morning as she drank another small glass of wine from the box in the fridge.
Morgan, Sarah and Joshua played in the large rubber dinghy in the middle of the hallway, Uncle Bill occasionally jumping in to act as Captain.
Wee Joshua ate more than his usual allocation of cakes after he’d got bored of the good few pieces of Jillian’s pasta I’d fed him from my paper plate.
Grace and Dougie enjoyed a slow dance to Gerry and the Pacemakers’ ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ immediately after which Dougie demands for Tina Turner’s “Simply the Best” were largely ignored or laughed at.
It had been a successful wee night and it looked like Grace, and everyone else, pretty much enjoyed themselves. It wasn’t until half past one that people started saying their goodbyes, Ka tidying as they went, clearing most of the rubbish up and cleaning up the buffet table which, Ka and myself were pleased to see, had very little of our two lasagnes left. Must have been the Bechamel sauce…
Sabtu, 16 Juli 2011
Lasagne and inadvertant flirting
This afternoon I made the perfect Bechamel sauce for one of Ka’s lasagnes. It turns out I’m a bit of a dab hand when it comes to the old Bechemel sauce, mixing the flour with the butter and then the peppered milk and bay leaf. The two of us worked perfectly together in the kitchen preparing food for a certain somebody’s birthday gathering tonight. I think we surprised even ourselves as Ka usually ends up firing me out of the kitchen when we start working together over the hobs.
It was Ka’s Mum, Grace’s 60th birthday on Wednesday and, as is traditional in the in–law McGarva household, we went to their local restaurant/pub, Angels in Uddingston for dinner. This time a few of Grace’s friends were invited along to surprise her upon entering for the usual birthday meal. Ka, Colin, Jillian and myself went on down to the restaurant early to ensure the select number of friends invited were seated at the table waiting as Grace and Dougie eventually arrived twenty minutes later. Grace had probably suspected something was afoot when we had left the house early, using the excuse of getting money out the bank, but she certainly did not let on and we all enjoyed another meal in the Uddingston restaurant.
The food was okay and the service was okay. My chicken and rice soup was way too salty and I ordered steak and got a pork chop, which didn’t go particularly well with the pepper sauce I’d ordered to share with Colin who also ordered the same steak. Colin, who had been sitting opposite me at the large corner table at which we all celebrated, and myself also ordered the meal under the mistaken impression, due to my own fault, that bubble and squeak was sausage and mash, which is usually referred to as toad in the hole. So, in effect, I thought I was ordering steak and sausage not pork and cabbage. Along with the pepper sauce we ordered we made a bit of a pigs ear of it (whatever you call a pigs ear).
Upon finishing the delicious combination one of the friendly blonde waitresses came up behind me asking if we were all content and finished with our meals. As we had all been sitting with empty plates for the past fifteen minutes we all nodded politely, myself confirming the emptiness of my plate with a firm nod and vocal ‘yes’. Just as the waitress leant over my shoulder to retrieve my plate I, moving to the side to let her over, gave another, loud, affirmative comment of ‘beautiful’. For a few seconds I carried on smiling normally, not realising at first why the waitress looked slightly taken aback at me with a smile as she meekly took my plate away. I looked up to see Colin, struggling to contain a ball of laughter behind a hand clamped over his mouth. It was then I realised that instead of complimenting the food which had just been consumed, complete with pepper sauce, to others it had possibly, just possibly, seemed that I had been complimenting the waitress, her attributes or her lovely smile, just as she leaned over my shoulder to collect the dirty dishes. Of course, for the remainder of our sitting, this particular blonde waitress was named ‘beautiful’ and Ka and Jillian, following this course of action, christened the male waiter who had been serving us, ‘handsome’, even though they were not quite as blatant as myself when it came to the flirting (which I’d just like to point out, was completely inadvertent on my part).
The night finished with a few quick games of the McGarva tradition of ridiculously unfair and fixed pass the parcel after coffees and tea in Grace and Dougie’s house. The McGarva’s own brand of ridiculously unfair and fixed pass the parcel seemed to confuse a few of Grace’s gathered friends before they even got to unwrap any of the equally confusing parcels which included the usual diverse fair such as a feather duster, an ‘Armstrong and Miller’ book, ‘Camp rock’ pencil cases and a book on Yoga, the back cover blurb describing the physical and mental discipline exactly as how Yoda would describe the Force (a far more worthwhile discipline in my opinion).
With a trip to Paris on the cards, a fantastic photo book, created by Ka and yours truly, and many other great gifts from friends, Grace done pretty well turning sixty. She’s even sorted out her bus pass already so there’s no stopping her. Happy Birthday Grace, and enjoy the lasagne!
It was Ka’s Mum, Grace’s 60th birthday on Wednesday and, as is traditional in the in–law McGarva household, we went to their local restaurant/pub, Angels in Uddingston for dinner. This time a few of Grace’s friends were invited along to surprise her upon entering for the usual birthday meal. Ka, Colin, Jillian and myself went on down to the restaurant early to ensure the select number of friends invited were seated at the table waiting as Grace and Dougie eventually arrived twenty minutes later. Grace had probably suspected something was afoot when we had left the house early, using the excuse of getting money out the bank, but she certainly did not let on and we all enjoyed another meal in the Uddingston restaurant.
The food was okay and the service was okay. My chicken and rice soup was way too salty and I ordered steak and got a pork chop, which didn’t go particularly well with the pepper sauce I’d ordered to share with Colin who also ordered the same steak. Colin, who had been sitting opposite me at the large corner table at which we all celebrated, and myself also ordered the meal under the mistaken impression, due to my own fault, that bubble and squeak was sausage and mash, which is usually referred to as toad in the hole. So, in effect, I thought I was ordering steak and sausage not pork and cabbage. Along with the pepper sauce we ordered we made a bit of a pigs ear of it (whatever you call a pigs ear).
Upon finishing the delicious combination one of the friendly blonde waitresses came up behind me asking if we were all content and finished with our meals. As we had all been sitting with empty plates for the past fifteen minutes we all nodded politely, myself confirming the emptiness of my plate with a firm nod and vocal ‘yes’. Just as the waitress leant over my shoulder to retrieve my plate I, moving to the side to let her over, gave another, loud, affirmative comment of ‘beautiful’. For a few seconds I carried on smiling normally, not realising at first why the waitress looked slightly taken aback at me with a smile as she meekly took my plate away. I looked up to see Colin, struggling to contain a ball of laughter behind a hand clamped over his mouth. It was then I realised that instead of complimenting the food which had just been consumed, complete with pepper sauce, to others it had possibly, just possibly, seemed that I had been complimenting the waitress, her attributes or her lovely smile, just as she leaned over my shoulder to collect the dirty dishes. Of course, for the remainder of our sitting, this particular blonde waitress was named ‘beautiful’ and Ka and Jillian, following this course of action, christened the male waiter who had been serving us, ‘handsome’, even though they were not quite as blatant as myself when it came to the flirting (which I’d just like to point out, was completely inadvertent on my part).
The night finished with a few quick games of the McGarva tradition of ridiculously unfair and fixed pass the parcel after coffees and tea in Grace and Dougie’s house. The McGarva’s own brand of ridiculously unfair and fixed pass the parcel seemed to confuse a few of Grace’s gathered friends before they even got to unwrap any of the equally confusing parcels which included the usual diverse fair such as a feather duster, an ‘Armstrong and Miller’ book, ‘Camp rock’ pencil cases and a book on Yoga, the back cover blurb describing the physical and mental discipline exactly as how Yoda would describe the Force (a far more worthwhile discipline in my opinion).
With a trip to Paris on the cards, a fantastic photo book, created by Ka and yours truly, and many other great gifts from friends, Grace done pretty well turning sixty. She’s even sorted out her bus pass already so there’s no stopping her. Happy Birthday Grace, and enjoy the lasagne!
Minggu, 01 Mei 2011
Did Boba Fett brush his teeth?
Another Sunday night dinner at the McGarva's tonight. We all arrived. We all ate Dougie and Grace's food. We wrecked the place. And then we left.
Okay we didn't literally wreck the place, as such, but thanks to us and the kids, the place was left in a bit of a state as we all said our goodbyes. Colin and jillian were the first to escape, using that old excuse of having to catch a train, and then the rest of us followed. Morgan and Joshua were piled into the car by Angela and Ka and myself grabbed our various belongings including slippers, sunglasses and Boba Fett helmets, jumped in the car and were off home. Yep, a Boba Fett helmet. They always come in handy when you need a spot of Bounty Hunting done.
A genius birthday present from Colin and Jillian, which I only just unwrapped today. Ah, geek mode once more as I spend the next ten minutes trying to get the electronic helmet out from it's box. It's even got Boba Fett voice recordings which you can activate by pressing some disguised buttons on the helmet's side. "I am the hunter. You are the prey" is one of the quotes that emit from the helmet as it's antenna lights up. You never know, it may come in handy?
Of course, my only problem now is, where the hell do I keep it? Probably the first thing that popped into Ka's head, groaning inwardly, as I unwrapped it. I did suggest that I simply wear it all the time, thus eliminating the need to even find a place for it in our wee one bedroom flat. But that would probably not work so well. Living my day to day life with a Boba Fett helmet on would probably freak a few people out and as Jillian pointed out tonight, how would you brush your teeth with it on? I suppose Boba himself must have taken his helmet off occasionally to brush his teeth. Assuming he had teeth, of course. Perhaps the helmet he wore had a tooth brushing app installed in it's casing? Did Boba Fett even have teeth? Or hair? Or even a face to speak of? Who knows? Maybe he lived his entire life, up until the unfortunate incident with the sarlacc pit, without taking his helmet off. He was a hardened, universally feared bounty hunter after all. Surely he didn't really give a damn if his prey gave his breath a sniff before they were disintegrated or encased in carbonite?
Did Stormtroopers and Darth Vader still brush their teeth, come to think of it?
Before such questions arose in Uddingston, we were in Chapelton seeing my folks and Uncle Jim, who had travelled up from London on business, in possibly the biggest car I've ever sat in. A beautiful Bentley which, whilst sitting in, felt like travelling in some kind of supercar. A giant black beast of a car which you could only dream of tearing the roads up in. Jim also collected his DVD of his 50th Birthday weekend which I'd put together for him, a short film made up from the clips and footage I took on our trip to Banstead in March. Jim and Dad were off to play a few holes round at the local golf course after we left, enjoying the brilliant Scottish sunshine while we have it.
Later in the evening Dad, Mum and Jim sent a picture back to us in reply to a phone picture taken in the McGarva household of me, trying to look threatening in a Boba Fett helmet. Their picture, after at least ten minutes of squinting, turned out to be my mother in some kind of ice hockey mask, complete with clenched fists pointed threateningly at the camera.
The last time I seen a hockey mask that scary was watching Friday the 13th. Jason Voorhees came back from the dead with a hockey mask on, in no less than twelve movies, and slaughtered many a screaming teenager in many a wild, imaginative and gory way.
Who needs Boba Fett, the universally feared Bounty Hunter, when you've got Betty in a hockey mask? Scarier than any horror movie, surely?
Okay we didn't literally wreck the place, as such, but thanks to us and the kids, the place was left in a bit of a state as we all said our goodbyes. Colin and jillian were the first to escape, using that old excuse of having to catch a train, and then the rest of us followed. Morgan and Joshua were piled into the car by Angela and Ka and myself grabbed our various belongings including slippers, sunglasses and Boba Fett helmets, jumped in the car and were off home. Yep, a Boba Fett helmet. They always come in handy when you need a spot of Bounty Hunting done.
Of course, my only problem now is, where the hell do I keep it? Probably the first thing that popped into Ka's head, groaning inwardly, as I unwrapped it. I did suggest that I simply wear it all the time, thus eliminating the need to even find a place for it in our wee one bedroom flat. But that would probably not work so well. Living my day to day life with a Boba Fett helmet on would probably freak a few people out and as Jillian pointed out tonight, how would you brush your teeth with it on? I suppose Boba himself must have taken his helmet off occasionally to brush his teeth. Assuming he had teeth, of course. Perhaps the helmet he wore had a tooth brushing app installed in it's casing? Did Boba Fett even have teeth? Or hair? Or even a face to speak of? Who knows? Maybe he lived his entire life, up until the unfortunate incident with the sarlacc pit, without taking his helmet off. He was a hardened, universally feared bounty hunter after all. Surely he didn't really give a damn if his prey gave his breath a sniff before they were disintegrated or encased in carbonite?
Did Stormtroopers and Darth Vader still brush their teeth, come to think of it?
Before such questions arose in Uddingston, we were in Chapelton seeing my folks and Uncle Jim, who had travelled up from London on business, in possibly the biggest car I've ever sat in. A beautiful Bentley which, whilst sitting in, felt like travelling in some kind of supercar. A giant black beast of a car which you could only dream of tearing the roads up in. Jim also collected his DVD of his 50th Birthday weekend which I'd put together for him, a short film made up from the clips and footage I took on our trip to Banstead in March. Jim and Dad were off to play a few holes round at the local golf course after we left, enjoying the brilliant Scottish sunshine while we have it.
Later in the evening Dad, Mum and Jim sent a picture back to us in reply to a phone picture taken in the McGarva household of me, trying to look threatening in a Boba Fett helmet. Their picture, after at least ten minutes of squinting, turned out to be my mother in some kind of ice hockey mask, complete with clenched fists pointed threateningly at the camera.
The last time I seen a hockey mask that scary was watching Friday the 13th. Jason Voorhees came back from the dead with a hockey mask on, in no less than twelve movies, and slaughtered many a screaming teenager in many a wild, imaginative and gory way.
Who needs Boba Fett, the universally feared Bounty Hunter, when you've got Betty in a hockey mask? Scarier than any horror movie, surely?
Senin, 11 April 2011
Mature yet mellow
33. A master number. A long player or LP. Jesus’ age when he was crucified. The amount of minutes the humans had before escaping the pursuing Cylons. The atomic number of arsenic. A mixed bag of meanings for the grand old age I turn tomorrow. After Ka’s birthday at the weekend, it’s now my turn and all I can do is remind myself it could be worse, I could be 34, which my dearest wife turned on Saturday.
Birthdays, and any celebrations of, have not exactly been on our minds of late, especially after the past months, but we forced ourselves out on Saturday after a breakfast of toasted cheese.
Not just any cheese. Birthday cheese, ‘mature yet mellow’ Cathedral cheese to be precise, two packs of which Ka received as a present from her Mum and Dad the night before, the square, cold, heavy present, Ka unwrapped with suspicion. As Ka nodded knowingly on pulling the block from inside the glittery paper, I sighed heavily, quite relieved, as I thought it was going to be a block of semtex.
Following the non explosive present unwrapping, Grace and Dougie bought in a Chinese take away with the help of Morgan, the niece, and Angela, Ka’s sister. The obligatory birthday cake followed and the even more obligatory pass the parcel with Morgan losing interest halfway through the games after realising, after the third pair won, that all the parcels were going to be colourful, stripey socks (a pair of which I won – they’ll go great with my red striped shirt!).
Anyway, following toasted cheese on Saturday we were to meet Ka’s brother, Colin, and his other half, Jillian, in town, have a wee Birthday tipple with them and then go our own way and head over to the Merchant City for a nice romantic meal for two. The nice romantic meal for two didn’t quite happen.
We met Colin and Jillian just after the Grand National had started and as a result Colin was glaring at the television, high up on the wall as we entered through the darkened doorway of one of Renfield Street’s smellier pubs, the Maltman. It may be smelly but a beer is semi affordable and there was plenty of screens for Colin to shout at as he clutched his bundle of Ladbrokes slips with a look of stubborn determination. Unfortunately ten minutes later he was ripping the slips up and Jillian was smiling as her horse had crossed the finish line in second place. She won around £2.40. So after a small drink in the Maltman and Ka being given her Hello Kitty bagged birthday goodies we headed off to find a less smelly pub to socialise in.
Ka, Colin, Jillian and myself found some seats on the, mostly unsmelly, paved square of John Street, outside Committee Room No. 9 and spent the majority of the day’s remainder there, chatting, debating, laughing and joking, trying to avoid bum cracks on display on the high stools behind us and shouting at Jackie, a lady drinking at the next table, who got up before a whole troop of tourists and groped a nearby Roman statue in his nether regions. She was under the impression that this would cure her of all her ills, or something, when in fact, according to the tourist guide, she should have grabbed the statues bag of coins, draped over his left arm. Silly woman. I thought all women went for the money first.
After some pub grub, the drinks kept being bought, birthday spirits were quite high and before long it was time to go home.
But did we? No, of course not.
The four of us jumped in a taxi and went up to Ashton Lane to meet my brother, Kenny, on his last, or one of his last, night outs with his mates before he departs the country. He’s bought a one way ticket to Oz and will be spinning off to that particular far flung destination come Saturday afternoon. The adventure of a lifetime, he, and we, hope anyway. I’ll need to get him a leaving present. Better not make it Cathedral cheese… he will be spending around two or three days in an airport.
Birthdays, and any celebrations of, have not exactly been on our minds of late, especially after the past months, but we forced ourselves out on Saturday after a breakfast of toasted cheese.
Following the non explosive present unwrapping, Grace and Dougie bought in a Chinese take away with the help of Morgan, the niece, and Angela, Ka’s sister. The obligatory birthday cake followed and the even more obligatory pass the parcel with Morgan losing interest halfway through the games after realising, after the third pair won, that all the parcels were going to be colourful, stripey socks (a pair of which I won – they’ll go great with my red striped shirt!).
Anyway, following toasted cheese on Saturday we were to meet Ka’s brother, Colin, and his other half, Jillian, in town, have a wee Birthday tipple with them and then go our own way and head over to the Merchant City for a nice romantic meal for two. The nice romantic meal for two didn’t quite happen.
We met Colin and Jillian just after the Grand National had started and as a result Colin was glaring at the television, high up on the wall as we entered through the darkened doorway of one of Renfield Street’s smellier pubs, the Maltman. It may be smelly but a beer is semi affordable and there was plenty of screens for Colin to shout at as he clutched his bundle of Ladbrokes slips with a look of stubborn determination. Unfortunately ten minutes later he was ripping the slips up and Jillian was smiling as her horse had crossed the finish line in second place. She won around £2.40. So after a small drink in the Maltman and Ka being given her Hello Kitty bagged birthday goodies we headed off to find a less smelly pub to socialise in.
Ka, Colin, Jillian and myself found some seats on the, mostly unsmelly, paved square of John Street, outside Committee Room No. 9 and spent the majority of the day’s remainder there, chatting, debating, laughing and joking, trying to avoid bum cracks on display on the high stools behind us and shouting at Jackie, a lady drinking at the next table, who got up before a whole troop of tourists and groped a nearby Roman statue in his nether regions. She was under the impression that this would cure her of all her ills, or something, when in fact, according to the tourist guide, she should have grabbed the statues bag of coins, draped over his left arm. Silly woman. I thought all women went for the money first.
After some pub grub, the drinks kept being bought, birthday spirits were quite high and before long it was time to go home.
But did we? No, of course not.
The four of us jumped in a taxi and went up to Ashton Lane to meet my brother, Kenny, on his last, or one of his last, night outs with his mates before he departs the country. He’s bought a one way ticket to Oz and will be spinning off to that particular far flung destination come Saturday afternoon. The adventure of a lifetime, he, and we, hope anyway. I’ll need to get him a leaving present. Better not make it Cathedral cheese… he will be spending around two or three days in an airport.
Jumat, 24 Desember 2010
Let's get the party started
Mum has just text me saying Santa has just been and she's now getting very excited. I replied by asking if she was drunk and she accused me of having no christmas spirit!
As it happens I've got more Christmas spirit in me now than I thought I would have had a week or so back. The weather outside is still beyond freezing and the streets are still paved with ice and snow, all the presents are organised, wrapped and underneath the tree, I feel like I've been watching Christmas movies all week, I've ate a mince pie a night, I had the yearly encounter with Mrs Santa in the office the other day, we've even been to a panto and at midnight tonight Ka and myself are off to Church with the Reids for a carol service followed by a nice big mug of hot chocolate. How much more Christmas spirit can you get?
Over a week ago now, just before tucking into a big meal at our local Chinese, I was told over the phone that I was one of the lucky ones to keep a job. So from April 2011 I'll be working in a new role within the Prepress department. Great news for me but news that will always come with a tinge of sadness considering so many others are losing their jobs.
There's also the imminent arrival in early January to look forward to. Baby Reid is most definately making his presence felt as Ka grows more uncomfortable by the day. Let's hope she can keep the Christmas spirit as Baby Reid kicks at her ribs from the inside.
At the panto last week there were actual tears in Ka's eyes as John Barrowman belted out another song before us. Unfortunately it wasn't tears of pure joy, pleasure or appreciation, but tears of pain as Baby bounced about inside her, whilst in the tight, less than spacious, seats of the Clyde Auditorium. The strange thing is I had similar tears of pain as John sang his heart out but I don't have a Baby growing inside me. Maybe Baby was complaining about the sheer volume of the Barrowman, who knows.
Ricki Fulton starred in the last big panto I went along to which shows how long it's been. I hadn't been looking forward to Aladdin. Barrowman wasn't bad in it though and proved himself a great family entertainer as always using the panto as a platform for some of the songs he'd sung on his tour which Ka and Jillian had dragged Colin and myself along to a few months back.
Even the Krankies, the usually gawd awful Scottish 'comedy' duo, were quite funny in their supporting roles. I never liked the Krankies when I was younger. The idea of a small woman dressing up as a wee boy with a school uniform and dirty jokes to annoy her/his older, male friend, who in real life is her husband, I always found a bit too weird.
Certainly far weirder than John Barrowman's ridiculously white teeth and accent switching skills.
Talking of accent switching, Ka and myself have just sat through the latest Harry Potter movie in which Bill Nighy puts on some kind of Welsh, Scottish, Can't quite make my mind up, accent as the Minister of Magic. Another fabulously crazy twisted accent to rival the Scottish slurs of Davy Jones in the Pirates of the Caribbean films. The movie itself was entertaining enough but largely for the Potter fans proving that the film was certainly not for the casual cinema goer that may not be familiar with the previous films and the whole back story shindig.
Going to the flicks has always been a tradition for Ka and myself on Christmas Eve. Afterwards we usually have a walk around Glasgow and enjoy the Christmas atmosphere. Breathing in the festive spirit, watching the panicking Christmas eve shoppers run from shop to shop, the whiff of German sausages floating up through the air from St. Enochs Square at the bottom of Buchanan Street and seeing George Square in lights as the skaters circle the ice rink. Usually we'll have a festive tipple or two as well but not this year, of course. No mulled wine or Christmas cocktails this year. With the imminent arrival I'm now on standby. I'll quite happily leave those kinds of festive spirits to the rest of the family!
As it happens I've got more Christmas spirit in me now than I thought I would have had a week or so back. The weather outside is still beyond freezing and the streets are still paved with ice and snow, all the presents are organised, wrapped and underneath the tree, I feel like I've been watching Christmas movies all week, I've ate a mince pie a night, I had the yearly encounter with Mrs Santa in the office the other day, we've even been to a panto and at midnight tonight Ka and myself are off to Church with the Reids for a carol service followed by a nice big mug of hot chocolate. How much more Christmas spirit can you get?
Over a week ago now, just before tucking into a big meal at our local Chinese, I was told over the phone that I was one of the lucky ones to keep a job. So from April 2011 I'll be working in a new role within the Prepress department. Great news for me but news that will always come with a tinge of sadness considering so many others are losing their jobs.
There's also the imminent arrival in early January to look forward to. Baby Reid is most definately making his presence felt as Ka grows more uncomfortable by the day. Let's hope she can keep the Christmas spirit as Baby Reid kicks at her ribs from the inside.
At the panto last week there were actual tears in Ka's eyes as John Barrowman belted out another song before us. Unfortunately it wasn't tears of pure joy, pleasure or appreciation, but tears of pain as Baby bounced about inside her, whilst in the tight, less than spacious, seats of the Clyde Auditorium. The strange thing is I had similar tears of pain as John sang his heart out but I don't have a Baby growing inside me. Maybe Baby was complaining about the sheer volume of the Barrowman, who knows.
Ricki Fulton starred in the last big panto I went along to which shows how long it's been. I hadn't been looking forward to Aladdin. Barrowman wasn't bad in it though and proved himself a great family entertainer as always using the panto as a platform for some of the songs he'd sung on his tour which Ka and Jillian had dragged Colin and myself along to a few months back.
Even the Krankies, the usually gawd awful Scottish 'comedy' duo, were quite funny in their supporting roles. I never liked the Krankies when I was younger. The idea of a small woman dressing up as a wee boy with a school uniform and dirty jokes to annoy her/his older, male friend, who in real life is her husband, I always found a bit too weird.
Certainly far weirder than John Barrowman's ridiculously white teeth and accent switching skills.
Talking of accent switching, Ka and myself have just sat through the latest Harry Potter movie in which Bill Nighy puts on some kind of Welsh, Scottish, Can't quite make my mind up, accent as the Minister of Magic. Another fabulously crazy twisted accent to rival the Scottish slurs of Davy Jones in the Pirates of the Caribbean films. The movie itself was entertaining enough but largely for the Potter fans proving that the film was certainly not for the casual cinema goer that may not be familiar with the previous films and the whole back story shindig.
Going to the flicks has always been a tradition for Ka and myself on Christmas Eve. Afterwards we usually have a walk around Glasgow and enjoy the Christmas atmosphere. Breathing in the festive spirit, watching the panicking Christmas eve shoppers run from shop to shop, the whiff of German sausages floating up through the air from St. Enochs Square at the bottom of Buchanan Street and seeing George Square in lights as the skaters circle the ice rink. Usually we'll have a festive tipple or two as well but not this year, of course. No mulled wine or Christmas cocktails this year. With the imminent arrival I'm now on standby. I'll quite happily leave those kinds of festive spirits to the rest of the family!
Selasa, 03 Agustus 2010
Clowns and carrot cake
We were surrounded. Screaming, shouting, running, bursting, waving, dancing, wrestling, kids. It was the wonderful Morgan's sixth birthday over the weekend.
Ka, myself and the rest of the Leckies and McGarvas went along to our neice's special party in the church hall on Sunday. Around 26 small children in their best party gear hesitantly moved into the hall, after being delivered by parents and greeted at the door by Morgan and her Dad, Steven, who handed each a sticky name label. After the initial disappointment of not being assigned a name tag I went through to the hall and started taking photos of the party goings on, which were largely centred on a female clown hired for the occasion.
The clown was called Giggles and used to be a Procurator Fiscal. One hell of a career change, I thought, she must have wanted a break from the silly costumes and funny wigs. Giggles didn't have a wig. She wasn't even wearing a red nose!? How can a clown NOT have a red nose?!
Giggles spent the next three hours talking through a headset microphone at the kids gathered round, singing songs, playing games and basically controlling most of the kids extremely well in the potentially excitable party environment.
For three hours the clown's amped up voice went on. Kids sitting, shouting up at her. I wondered if this was the kind of thing I'd have to get used to as a father to be. Kids birthday parties. Bunches of yelling kids, chattering mothers and an over excitable Procurator Fiscal who thinks she can get away with being a clown without a red nose.
Only two of the many Dads who delivered kids actually stuck around for the party, the rest were Mums eithering talking away at each other or sitting, quietly watching their small child being entertained. Unfortunately I got bored halfway through and entertained myself by nicking marshmallows, eating carrot cake and talking to Colin McG about The A-Team and The Karate Kid movies. We took care not to speak too loudly though as you ran the risk of Giggles pulling you on to the dancefloor and giving you a job to do, a fate which befell some of the louder gabbing mothers.
Ka and myself once discussed the possability of kids entertainment for a living. Together with Colin and Jillian, who were both members of the Hopscotch travelling theatre group, we could make a bomb - and there wouldn't be any of this namby pamby everybody wins at pass the parcel or musical bumps mentality!
Giggles kept asking us viewers, sitting around the hastily seated kids, who was the last to get their bum on the floor during musical bumps. No matter how much I kept shouting out to Giggles she kept blatantly ignoring me, insisting it to be a draw when it so obviously wasn't. I had been watching. I pinpointed her in the small crowd of kids from my chair at the side. "Her with the pigtails!" I was yelling. "She's out! O - U - T, out, I tell ye!"
I'm looking forward to hosting the kids parties. The kids will get a giant bag of smarties to gee them up, a bouncy castle, if I'm feeling extravagant, and a run about the the back garden (even if it's raining!). Maybe the odd pinata up on the washing line... and there'll be no politically correct and boringly fair clowns! There'll be a winner at pass the parcel. The rest of the losing kids can go home bubbling if they want. If it turns out my child's going to be a bubbler then it'll do him good. It's best he, or she, learns how to be a good sport in life as early as possible and understands that sometimes they'll end up a loser. Just like their old Dad!... That didn't sound right...
Ka, myself and the rest of the Leckies and McGarvas went along to our neice's special party in the church hall on Sunday. Around 26 small children in their best party gear hesitantly moved into the hall, after being delivered by parents and greeted at the door by Morgan and her Dad, Steven, who handed each a sticky name label. After the initial disappointment of not being assigned a name tag I went through to the hall and started taking photos of the party goings on, which were largely centred on a female clown hired for the occasion.
The clown was called Giggles and used to be a Procurator Fiscal. One hell of a career change, I thought, she must have wanted a break from the silly costumes and funny wigs. Giggles didn't have a wig. She wasn't even wearing a red nose!? How can a clown NOT have a red nose?!
Giggles spent the next three hours talking through a headset microphone at the kids gathered round, singing songs, playing games and basically controlling most of the kids extremely well in the potentially excitable party environment.
For three hours the clown's amped up voice went on. Kids sitting, shouting up at her. I wondered if this was the kind of thing I'd have to get used to as a father to be. Kids birthday parties. Bunches of yelling kids, chattering mothers and an over excitable Procurator Fiscal who thinks she can get away with being a clown without a red nose.
Only two of the many Dads who delivered kids actually stuck around for the party, the rest were Mums eithering talking away at each other or sitting, quietly watching their small child being entertained. Unfortunately I got bored halfway through and entertained myself by nicking marshmallows, eating carrot cake and talking to Colin McG about The A-Team and The Karate Kid movies. We took care not to speak too loudly though as you ran the risk of Giggles pulling you on to the dancefloor and giving you a job to do, a fate which befell some of the louder gabbing mothers.
Ka and myself once discussed the possability of kids entertainment for a living. Together with Colin and Jillian, who were both members of the Hopscotch travelling theatre group, we could make a bomb - and there wouldn't be any of this namby pamby everybody wins at pass the parcel or musical bumps mentality!
Giggles kept asking us viewers, sitting around the hastily seated kids, who was the last to get their bum on the floor during musical bumps. No matter how much I kept shouting out to Giggles she kept blatantly ignoring me, insisting it to be a draw when it so obviously wasn't. I had been watching. I pinpointed her in the small crowd of kids from my chair at the side. "Her with the pigtails!" I was yelling. "She's out! O - U - T, out, I tell ye!"
I'm looking forward to hosting the kids parties. The kids will get a giant bag of smarties to gee them up, a bouncy castle, if I'm feeling extravagant, and a run about the the back garden (even if it's raining!). Maybe the odd pinata up on the washing line... and there'll be no politically correct and boringly fair clowns! There'll be a winner at pass the parcel. The rest of the losing kids can go home bubbling if they want. If it turns out my child's going to be a bubbler then it'll do him good. It's best he, or she, learns how to be a good sport in life as early as possible and understands that sometimes they'll end up a loser. Just like their old Dad!... That didn't sound right...
Rabu, 21 Juli 2010
The scale of it
Age milestones are often reason for moments of reflection and sometimes moments of realisation. Sometimes these moments also strike when you least expect them.
Ka's brother hit the big 3 - 0 yesterday and we celebrated over a slap up meal in Angels, the local hotel/restaurant. Colin, with two birthday badges pinned to his shirt at each nipple region, done his best to avoid the cameras after, what must have been, the thirtieth pose under his big helium balloon. Back at the McGarva house afterwards, for cake and coffee, we all participated in the usual game of pass the parcel, presided over, as ever, by Morgan.
When I say 'usual', no game in the McGarva house is ever usual. This one in particular was no exception. Instead of passing the usual layered up present it was decided that in this game we were to pass a near deflated balloon, the size of a disected kidney, around the room, to the gawd awful sounds of the latest 'Glee' album. Whenever the music stopped, a moment that was all too brief in my meagre opinion, the person with the balloon was out and whoever was left at the end of the game was named winner with a present. The presents varied in quality from a can of deoderant to the more substantial clothing or candles bought in the recent Next sale.
Ka, for instance, won a small sleep suit. Grace quickly pointed out the prize was not specifically for her, which was just as well as the label read for a size of 3 to 6 months. Ka, with her sister, Angela, immediately started awing over the suit.
Letting me view her win, I held it up before me, holding it by the shoulders. A small, pale brown felt giraffe looked back at me from the front of the suit's chest and the scale of it hit me. Not the scale of the giraffe, although it was very small, this wasn't the scale factor hitting me. This small suit was for a small person, the same small person growing inside KA as we passed a stupid little balloon around the room. That small instant turned into another of those worryingly giant, earth spinning moments in which you give an internal shout in the great David Byrne tradition, "My god, what have I done?!"
As Byrne's crazed, panic stricken hollers faded in my head it once more gave way to quiet, curiousity and excitement. Just as I started to relax again and the world settled back into normality around me I was sure the small giraffe winked at me knowingly from the sleep suit. Blinking hard, I hurriedly returned the small piece of clothing to Ka and ran off to the kitchen, for a strong cup of tea. I would have loved to had something a tad stronger, like the Glenmorangie Colin was dishing out, but I was driving home. Behind the wheel of a large automobile, to my beautiful house, with my beautiful wife.
Ka's brother hit the big 3 - 0 yesterday and we celebrated over a slap up meal in Angels, the local hotel/restaurant. Colin, with two birthday badges pinned to his shirt at each nipple region, done his best to avoid the cameras after, what must have been, the thirtieth pose under his big helium balloon. Back at the McGarva house afterwards, for cake and coffee, we all participated in the usual game of pass the parcel, presided over, as ever, by Morgan.
When I say 'usual', no game in the McGarva house is ever usual. This one in particular was no exception. Instead of passing the usual layered up present it was decided that in this game we were to pass a near deflated balloon, the size of a disected kidney, around the room, to the gawd awful sounds of the latest 'Glee' album. Whenever the music stopped, a moment that was all too brief in my meagre opinion, the person with the balloon was out and whoever was left at the end of the game was named winner with a present. The presents varied in quality from a can of deoderant to the more substantial clothing or candles bought in the recent Next sale.
Ka, for instance, won a small sleep suit. Grace quickly pointed out the prize was not specifically for her, which was just as well as the label read for a size of 3 to 6 months. Ka, with her sister, Angela, immediately started awing over the suit.
Letting me view her win, I held it up before me, holding it by the shoulders. A small, pale brown felt giraffe looked back at me from the front of the suit's chest and the scale of it hit me. Not the scale of the giraffe, although it was very small, this wasn't the scale factor hitting me. This small suit was for a small person, the same small person growing inside KA as we passed a stupid little balloon around the room. That small instant turned into another of those worryingly giant, earth spinning moments in which you give an internal shout in the great David Byrne tradition, "My god, what have I done?!"
As Byrne's crazed, panic stricken hollers faded in my head it once more gave way to quiet, curiousity and excitement. Just as I started to relax again and the world settled back into normality around me I was sure the small giraffe winked at me knowingly from the sleep suit. Blinking hard, I hurriedly returned the small piece of clothing to Ka and ran off to the kitchen, for a strong cup of tea. I would have loved to had something a tad stronger, like the Glenmorangie Colin was dishing out, but I was driving home. Behind the wheel of a large automobile, to my beautiful house, with my beautiful wife.
Kamis, 15 Juli 2010
The Sarah scream and teddy bear violence
Mum and Dad hosted another BBQ on Saturday and this time invited the entirety of the family, including the McGarvas, Symingtons, Taylors and all. Not to be put off by the worse weather thus far this summer, Dad erected two large tents and a gazebo in the garden, fitting each of the tents out with carpets, comfy chairs and tables.
The BBQ was also the perfect opportunity to tell everyone of Baby Reid. Mum and Ka were especially looking forward to hearing the 'Sarah Scream' when my cousin heard the news. Cousin Sarah is renowned for her scream when either something really exciting, shocking or hilairious happens. In this case it could probably be described as a case of all of the above as, true to form, when Ka told Sarah in the conservatory, she let out a belter. The birds of Chapelton abandoned their branches in fright, the sheep and cows in the surrounding fields faltered in their grass munching, looking up with curiousity and Myra the hairdresser accidentally chopped someone's fringe off next door.
Needless to say, most people had a few beers through the afternoon and enjoyed the BBQ spread along with Grace's lasagne and Linda's traditional trifle. Whilst people's bellies digested the veritable onslaught, the rain kept falling but failed to put a dampener on things. In early evening most of the the blokes retreated into the living room for the World Cup runners up game whilst the kids presented various puppet shows emotionally blackmailing or forcibly bullying us into attending (I was probably one of the latter). These often descended into teddy bear violence with various Princess dolls squaring up to large teddy dogs all eventually transforming into a spinning cloud of felt and fur, whilst us viewers politely watched struggling to keep up with the show's plot. None of the performers were even puppets?! I bet Auntie Tricia preferred the puppet shows of old... When Baby Reid grows up a bit, he or she will be taught how to perform a proper puppet show.
Everyone has been great on hearing the Baby Reid news (apart from Myra's customer). Facebook has even proven itself to be almost useful in aiding with this. We did get one complaint from someone finding out on facebook, but to be fair to us, it was not actually on facebook, it was my blog at Reidnet, so there! -)
Anyway, thanks everyone for your well wishes. They're all greatly appreciated. Excitement and joy is now officially over - let the stress and panicking commence!
The BBQ was also the perfect opportunity to tell everyone of Baby Reid. Mum and Ka were especially looking forward to hearing the 'Sarah Scream' when my cousin heard the news. Cousin Sarah is renowned for her scream when either something really exciting, shocking or hilairious happens. In this case it could probably be described as a case of all of the above as, true to form, when Ka told Sarah in the conservatory, she let out a belter. The birds of Chapelton abandoned their branches in fright, the sheep and cows in the surrounding fields faltered in their grass munching, looking up with curiousity and Myra the hairdresser accidentally chopped someone's fringe off next door.
Needless to say, most people had a few beers through the afternoon and enjoyed the BBQ spread along with Grace's lasagne and Linda's traditional trifle. Whilst people's bellies digested the veritable onslaught, the rain kept falling but failed to put a dampener on things. In early evening most of the the blokes retreated into the living room for the World Cup runners up game whilst the kids presented various puppet shows emotionally blackmailing or forcibly bullying us into attending (I was probably one of the latter). These often descended into teddy bear violence with various Princess dolls squaring up to large teddy dogs all eventually transforming into a spinning cloud of felt and fur, whilst us viewers politely watched struggling to keep up with the show's plot. None of the performers were even puppets?! I bet Auntie Tricia preferred the puppet shows of old... When Baby Reid grows up a bit, he or she will be taught how to perform a proper puppet show.
Everyone has been great on hearing the Baby Reid news (apart from Myra's customer). Facebook has even proven itself to be almost useful in aiding with this. We did get one complaint from someone finding out on facebook, but to be fair to us, it was not actually on facebook, it was my blog at Reidnet, so there! -)
Anyway, thanks everyone for your well wishes. They're all greatly appreciated. Excitement and joy is now officially over - let the stress and panicking commence!
Kamis, 08 April 2010
All tomorrow's parties
Just getting everything ready for Ka's birthday tomorrow. I'll get up and make Ka breakfast in bed before work (I hate working on birthdays!) and then there'll be the usual family party at the McGarvas in the evening with a big slap up meal, either a carry out from the local Chinese or a nice home cooked meal from Grace.
The first pile of cards has just been popped through the door by the postie as I write, which is good because Ka has just been on the phone asking if any cards had arrived yet. None had, I told her, to which she gave a slight mumble of disappointment. But that's all changed now as, surprisingly enough, the postie has now delivered so hopefully that'll put a wee smile on her face when she gets home tonight (I wonder if there'll be money in any of them..?).
I'm just back from the town centre where I picked up a rather splendid present and a big card for her (bloody fortune birthday cards these days!) so I can pretty much relax now... hopefully she doesn't read this and spoil the surprise of me getting a card! The splendid present also involved me making a rather desperate phonecall and unexpectedly giving myself a very unconvincing alias with a JR Hartley style voice. I'll maybe divulge more of that story later... Don't worry though I haven't got Ka an ancient book on Fly Fishing or anything...
I've just realised - the only thing I forgot was birthday paper. I forgot the piece de resistance! A nice bit of sparkly stuff to finish it all off. I'd better go and raid the hall cupboard. Hopefully it's not all just Christmas paper and holographic gift bags. It's amazing how many of those things you inadvertantly collect. There's probably about thirty quids worth of sparkly, holographic or patterned bottle bags in there. All kept for visiting other folk. Which means two things. We have loads of visitors but we don't go to enough parties ourselves!
The first pile of cards has just been popped through the door by the postie as I write, which is good because Ka has just been on the phone asking if any cards had arrived yet. None had, I told her, to which she gave a slight mumble of disappointment. But that's all changed now as, surprisingly enough, the postie has now delivered so hopefully that'll put a wee smile on her face when she gets home tonight (I wonder if there'll be money in any of them..?).
I'm just back from the town centre where I picked up a rather splendid present and a big card for her (bloody fortune birthday cards these days!) so I can pretty much relax now... hopefully she doesn't read this and spoil the surprise of me getting a card! The splendid present also involved me making a rather desperate phonecall and unexpectedly giving myself a very unconvincing alias with a JR Hartley style voice. I'll maybe divulge more of that story later... Don't worry though I haven't got Ka an ancient book on Fly Fishing or anything...
I've just realised - the only thing I forgot was birthday paper. I forgot the piece de resistance! A nice bit of sparkly stuff to finish it all off. I'd better go and raid the hall cupboard. Hopefully it's not all just Christmas paper and holographic gift bags. It's amazing how many of those things you inadvertantly collect. There's probably about thirty quids worth of sparkly, holographic or patterned bottle bags in there. All kept for visiting other folk. Which means two things. We have loads of visitors but we don't go to enough parties ourselves!
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