Of Mice and Mould

I made the silly mistake of going away ALONE for the weekend - although now that I think about it, it was silly only in as much as I came back.  What was I thinking? (And while I’m at it – forget Singapore – I HEART Edinburgh.  My God it’s gorgeous up there.  And cheap! £6 for a cocktail! Or maybe London is just a rip-off? )  Anyway, I’ve now come to the conclusion that coming home is the price parents pay for going away. 

This is a choice selection of what I came home to:

A pan full of mould.  Not just any mould – oh no.  This was mould crafted from the finest ingredients that money could buy. A mould of smoked-fish chowder, which was made with my own fair hands to feed the hungry hoards in my absence.  It appears, however, that the hungry hoards prefer fishfingers and ketchup. I don’t mind so much that they didn’t eat it;  it’s that they didn’t even look at the stuff that annoys me.  There is little less welcome a sight after a 6 hour journey then lifting up a lid and being greeted by... green, rancid cat-puke. Blugh.

An indescribable amount of laundry.  I will leave it at that.

Icky offspring.  When I picked the Girl up from nursery I was greeted by the sight of her in her spare clothes, and her teacher with a look of... disgust / horror, bearing a plastic bag filled with... disgust / horror.  She (the Girl, not the teacher) then spent the rest of the day wandering around doubled over with her hand on her tummy telling anyone who’d listen: “I have the diarrhoea”.

A Baby who has grown horns.  (And, if her weight is anything to go by, has been eating animal sacrifices.  Large animal sacrifices.)

A mouse.  In fact I was sitting on my bed, hiding from the children, reading an article on the Daily Misogynist Mail’s  website (that my sister had sent me, I hasten to add) about a lawyer woman in Clapham who heard a thud from her daughter Ava’s room and went in to find... (I could barely read any more, assuming that I was actually reading about MYSELF)... a FOX sitting on her kid’s bed, LICKING HER FACE.  At this point a mouse dashed across the bedroom floor, giving me a fucking heart attack.  I tell you, it’s non-stop wildlife in these parts. Once I had regained my composure, and climbed, acrobat-like, from the bed to the hall (without touching the floor), I went in search of the Boy who picked up the dish-brush and announced, in a very serious voice:  “Leave it to me, Lady.” Well he upended every piece of furniture in my room, but no sign of our furry friend, until – SQUEAK! – there it was ON TOP OF THE CURTAIN...  The Boy picked up my shoe and flung it at it, whereupon it jumped down – I think I’m going to vomit just thinking about it – and scuttled out of the room, down the half-stairs, into the Boy’s room.  The Boy WHOOPED for joy, legged after it, and disappeared into his room, slamming the door behind him.  I have seen neither the Boy nor the mouse since, but there’s a Godawful racket coming from up there. (Update: The mouse has, so far, escaped.  The Boy has just left the kitchen with a block of cheese.  “I have a plan”, he tells me. Beside me the Girl and the Baby are huddled, both looking petrified.  Nature or nurture?)  

Just think, I could be back in Edinburgh. It was FANTASTIC.  Being unbelievably high maintenance I had my own personal concierge to do ALL my thinking for me!  It was like I’d imagine it to be to have a really fabulous wife. She decided that I was to hang out in a spa, have a massage,  get pissed, read every weekend paper I could get my hands on, sleep in...  She even organised a hair cut (I clearly look like someone who lives in a house with mice and foxes.  And mould.)  Mind you, the joy dissipated somewhat when I asked the woman cutting my hair to just pull out that big huge white hair that was, to my horror, sticking straight up from my parting.  She looked aghast, I assumed because you should never pluck a white hair, or something equally random.  “Don’t you usually pluck white hairs?” I asked her.  She visibly squirmed, then said – “Well sometimes my mum does if she finds one on her head...”

Excellent.  I am officially ANCIENT, older than a hairdresser’s mother.  I’m never going away again.

Ps:  Big thanks to everyone for the various comments, emails and messages I got about my Big News last week. I am very excited.  Even if it is the other side of the world.  And I don’t know One. Single. Person.  I will have staff.  STAFF!  All the white hair in the world can’t diminish my exhilaration. (And anyway, I can order my slave STAFF to pluck out all offending hairs and KILL HER if she so much as thinks about being aghast...)