Smokey the Magnificent

Is everyone familiar with the Handmade Ryan Gosling meme? For some reason, I find it incredibly amoosing. I don’t even know he is - at least, I know he was in The Notebook, but I haven’t seen it. I read it, and I’m still picking schmaltz out of my ears. It was the same chap who wrote The Time Traveller’s Wife, I believe, only this one didn’t even have double-amputation to dilute the sappy.

Anyway, the Internet being the vasty and inscrutable place it is, some bod got it into her (certainly “her”) head to find photos of Mr Gosling and caption them… thusly. (Yes, I couldn’t resize the photos. I’m not… Wonder Woman. Scroll across, it’ll be fine.)

Or:

There’s a whole website of them. And they make me go “heh”; while at the same time, driving the point sadly home that Helpdesk Man (and indeed, surely all actual men) is unlikely to ever truly appreciate the difference between a store-bought duvet cover and a lovingly handcrafted one, or feel genuinely buoyed upon putting his mugs in a cupboard ModPodged with scrapbooking paper. This is OK. One can and, according to feminists, should do these things for one’s own satisfaction and fulfilment; but one should not endeavor to shoehorn them into the Good Wife category, any more than Helpdesk Man should claim that his proficiency at double-tapping virtual alien hordes makes him a Better Husband; because in fact, though I would like to feel crafting is vaguely morally superior, our hobbies are probably about equally as relevant to each other’s happiness (ie, neutral at best, and an irritating waste of time in less cheerful moments).

But he lets me do it, and does not complain when I spend ghastly sums on quilting cotton; and I watched the pigs for three days while he was at a LAN this week. So we tick along. And I have finished all 25 of the nine-patches for the snortlepig’s summer quilt. It was supposed to be 21, but by the time I got around to counting I’d already done 22, so I just decided to tack another row down the side and make it a square seven-by-seven, instead of a seven-by-six. The proportions are unlikely to correspond to any standard bed size, but the pig’s toddler bed isn’t standard anyway - it was handmade by someone’s grandfather, and we got it off TradeMe - and anyway, when she gets big enough for a real bed I can make her a new quilt, and this one can be a lap quilt.

The nine-patches were surprisingly successful. My usual method with quilting is to be careful and precise for the first ten minutes of every session, then go “Ach, she’ll be right” and fling needles and rotary cutters wildly about, with the result that my corners don’t match up and I spent the last half of the project wondering what I was thinking. I thought for many years that when I asked my mother (who is an excellent quiltress) the secret and she said “Oh, you have to be very accurate and careful” that she was holding out on me. It turns out, though, that when you actually do it it works. Who knew. I wouldn’t exactly call my nine-patches the apex of the craft, but I could show them in public without blushing, and that is a great improvement.

Heh. Heheh. (Look, it beats “Keep Calm and Carry On”, alright? Those are just getting ridiculous. People aren’t even trying. The Hermione “Keep Calm and Marry Ron” was kind of funny, but “Keep Calm and Have Coffee”, with the whole font? Please. Let it die.)

*Squafts is what the pig calls crafts. She also refers to skydiving as (the infinitely more awesome) “skyfighting”, and the Star-Spangled Man anthem from Captain America as the Speckled Man song. It is an awesome song, incidentally - Mother, you would like it. Here it is:

1. I am forty million years pregnant.

2. I want to drink ALL THE MILK IN THE WORLD.

3. I am paralysed by a mental inability to make baked custards, which I desire muchly, and to finish sewing a bunch of winter clothes for the snortlepig, which she sorely needs.

4. I watched LA Confidential the other night and was left with the impression that it was a Good Thing, but if held at gunpoint would not be able to tell you who most of the corpses were or exactly what was going on with the bad guy, who surely can’t have been all that bad anyway, because he was Zefram Cochrane and also the farmer in Babe.

5. Braxton-Hicks remind me of when the Enterprise on Enterprise does that weedy hull polarity thing instead of having proper shields. Kinda cool, texture-wise, but it won’t keep the Klingons out.

6. When was the Holocaust named the Holocaust? During? After? Was there a poll? Did some people have an alternative title?

7. The pig made up a song yesterday. It went like this. To get the full effect, you must understand that she has trouble pronouncing the word “fat”, so she says “flat”:

“Mummy’s so flat

She has flat cheeks

She’s so squishy

She’s got a baby in her tum

It’s very very very very very very very very squishy

It’s the squishiest baby I ever seened”.

8. Still haven’t settled on a name for the Auxiliary Pig. I’m thinking Gaviscon.

9. A small and unworthy part of me sort of wants to get into a minor fender bender of dubious faulthood with another car, so when the chap gets out to yell at me I can go into labour and disconcert him all to hell. Wouldn’t you?

10. Just finished reading Love in the Time of Cholera. Good book, but a surprising lack of cholera. I kept waiting for someone to die of it, and nope. It could just as well have been Love in the Time of Eggplant, eggplant featuring rather more promimently in the text and having less sphinctery connotations to boot.

11. I bet a good bout of cholera would get the Auxiliary Pig out.

Last night my computer died. We were innocently watching an episode of QI when it let out a long-drawn-out scream, went “kbbbpt” and perished. According to Flatmate Man, who knows these things, it’s either the power pack or the motherboard; either way, it don’t sing no more, and I am reduced to typing this on Helpdesk Man’s laptop, which I despise.

On the bright side, the loss of easy entertainment did mean I accomplished things last night. I sewed a good portion of a baby shirt, and then spent an amusing half-hour trawling through my past, in the form of a bag full of childhood memorabilia foisted upon me by my mother, who is moderately sentimental about such things but has, after all, six mostly-grown-up children, and who has the time?

The contents were as you might expect: immunisation records, a second prize for needlework, recommendations as to my character wheedled out of parishioners. There were a large sheaf of school reports, all of which stated that I was bright - which was probably true - and a pleasure to have in the class - which was at worst and likeliest a bare-faced lie, and at best teacher-parlance for “has not yet actively committed arson”. There was also a fulsomely enthusiastic assessment of my brainials by a child psychologist, which might have been more flattering if I hadn’t been sent to see him on account of my temper tantrums; but still. Apparently most of my problems were due to the ineptitude of my peers. Yes, you. I hope you’re sorry.

Lest all this praise go to my head, I also discovered two sobering truths about myself.

1. A while back I started toying with the idea that I had had, as a teenager, a mild form of body dysmorphic disorder; a psychological condition in which one views oneself as far more hideous than objectively warranted. Aside from the natural pleasure of diagnosing oneself with a condition of any kind - this year I found out I have megalophobia, and the pleasure this gave me almost outweighed the crippling paranoia I get upon seeing the Free Willy DVD case at the shop - it explained, I thought, why I spent my adolescent yeas hiding behind my hair, unable to respond to personal compliments from Helpdesk Man for the first two years of our relationship with anything other than a muttered denial and ungracious scowl.

Unfortunately, last night I happened upon some photos of my teenage self, and let it be sadly stated for the record:

I did not have body dysmorphic disorder. Just a hella unfortunate face.

2. From somewhat earlier in my lifetime, but perhaps foreshadowing Point Number 1, I came across my birth notes. I have a bit of a thing for birth notes; I find them fascinating; so naturally I perused mine with great interest. The snortlepig’s moment of birth, for the record, was heralded by my lovely midwife with the words “Baby girl born at 6:33; well done Mum! Beautiful girl; welcome [name of snortlepig]“. Not strictly scientific, perhaps, but charming. What did my OB-GYN have to say, in the section marked “notes on newborn”?

“Vernixy”.

That was it. A single, dismissive word, dripping with disgust. One could imagine him dangling my infant self distastefully by one arm, remarking to the nurses that he would skip lunch after all; perhaps then striding down the hallway with a pained expression on his face, heading for the dispensary for the first time since he promised the wife. Maybe he jumped off the carpark. I don’t know; but it seems he could have reflected a little on the ignominity of being thusly summed up in one’s earliest moments of life. “Vernixy”. I should put it on my tombstone.

So there that is. In other news, I am now officially 39 weeks and 1 day pregnant; and if I make it four more days without giving birth, I shall be the most pregnant I’ve ever been. Oddly enough I’m not, as pregnant women are expected to be, impatient to meet the baby. I have a lot of sewing to do; all my Hypnobabies practice has yet to convince me that childbirth will be a fun and Christmassy event; and when it comes down to it, in the words of the immortal Jean Kerr, whoever she was - “Now the thing about having a baby - and I can’t be the first person to have noticed this - is that thereafter, you have it”.

Well said, lady. Anyway, Super 8 comes out on my due date, and I want to see it. And I stood on a small sharp shard of something the other day and cut my foot, and I object to going into labour with a cut foot; it might throw off my whole vibe. (I felt similarly about last week’s flu, but that seems to have mostly disappeared, save for a hacking cough; thank you for asking.) Worse things do happen; I know a lady online who broke her leg a few weeks before going into labour, and can you imagine? Horrid. Even a bad sunburn, really, would put a damper on things. Or ebola.

1. A month or so ago I was downing my hideous fermented cod liver oil tablets, while my sister-in-law watched with great interest. Then she said “Man, those are big, no wonder you swallow them one at a time”. And my brain went “?!”, and I realised that in several years of swallowing supplements designed to make me clever and sleekit, swallowing more than one at a time had never occurred to me. Since then my life has changed dramatically.

2. As of Tuesday, the Auxiliary Pig is no longer tangled up in his umbilical cord. This is a Good Thing. Better yet was the ultrasound tech, who upon seeing “3x nuchal cord” as the reason for re-scanning snorted loudly and kept up a muttered commentary through the proceedings, along the lines of “Never in all my years working here have I seen such a frivolous reason for re-scanning; I don’t know what these people are thinking; too much information, I call it, just causes needless stress, she should have just kept her mouth shut; ridiculous!”, which endeared her to me greatly. Better yet, she had to take a bunch of photos of the Auxiliary Pig’s face and neck to prove that it was unobstructed, and she let us keep them. A bit chinless in a few pics, but promising; he looks a bit like the snortlepig, if she had a more transluscent skull.

3. I am being totally productive. Upon realising I could have fewer than ten weeks to go I flew into a panic and started actually sewing some of the fabric which has been sitting smugly in my sewing niche; which, as it turns out, is the way to get things done. I have currently completed a winter pinafore for the pig, a pair of rather dishy Ottobre rompers for the Auxiliary Pig, a knitted baby hat I made up myself, and a small, short-sleeved shirt. I am now in the process of sewing another pair of rompers from a pair of hand-me-down trou, some winter pyjamas for the pig, a knitted kimono top, and a mei tai. (Yes, all at once; apparently completing one project before starting another is beyond my level of cunning.) After that will come another winter dress for the pig, a ring sling, a sleep sack, a knitted aviator cap, a coat for the pig, and as many more baby clothes as I can churn out before the Auxiliary Pig arrives and demands to be dressed.

Unfortunately our camera is lost, so I cannot show you the gorgeousness of the things I have made. Here’s a water buffalo, though. Just imagine I have harvested its wool and made it into a cunning little vest.

4. Helpdesk Man has officially started the Atkins diet. We have now spent our life savings on slabs of meat and surprising quantities of produce, and he has taken to hoarding his Vitamin C tablet to eat after dinner as a truly pitiful substitute for dessert. Tonight he and Flatmate are out, so I am taking the opportunity to make a Lime Marshmallow Pie in their absence. Ha. (It’s classier than it sounds. Not only do you make the marshmallow topping yourself, from scratch, but you also make the graham crackers for the biscuit base. Also, it has limes in it.)

Helpdesk Man and Flatmate Man have been discussing little else but the carb content of mustard and Brussels sprouts for the last week, and yesterday Helpdesk Man announced he was going to spend his birthday voucher on a set of bathroom scales. I am clearly the manliest person currently living in our house…. not counting the pig, who it turns out can do the splits. How? She certainly didn’t get it from me. I could never do so much as a handstand or cartwheel, and my childhood suffered accordingly.

5. I have discovered the most awesome blog. I read it all. I Am Baker. Lookit that hydrangea cake.

6. It is surprisingly hard to find good, free knitting patterns for baby vests online. Anyone? I want one that buttons on at least one shoulder and down one side, so I do not have to pull it over the head of the pig and give it flashbacks to the childbirth experience and stunt its tiny psyche; also one that is appropriately manly, attractive, easy to knit, and did I mention free? No luck so far; very annoying. I’m tempted to wing it, but last time I did that I ended up with a hat I should probably donate to the preemie ward, if it has a box for spectacularly un-fussy preemies with no dress sense; and I knit so slowly that an unwearable item is no small matter.

7. This may reveal unfortunate things as regards my character, but I have come to the realisation that people who blog about loving their husbands freak me all the way out. Mother pointed me in the direction of a crafty person with a blog she thought I might like; said person lives in our town and Mother feels we might Get Along. I thought so too, until I read her blog, and what is it filled with? “I love my husband”. Like, every third post. And now I can never meet her, because she’s my age (and indeed, her husband used to be in my class at school), and all I’ll be able to think when I look at her is “Heh. You love your husband”.

I mean, naturally I am glad that she does; and had she stuck to discussions of weaving and sewing, I would have probably assumed that it was the case. But come on, people. A little reticence. A little dignity. A slight sneer when the love of your life enters the room, to prove to the world that you are still your own man and not some moonstruck dingbat. Perhaps an occasional well-deserved critique regarding his face. Is it so much to ask? Must you spew newlywed bliss all over the internet like so much rainbow upchuck? It’s unseemly.

Right. I am going to go sew some straps on that mei tai snugly enough that the Auxiliary Pig won’t be able to plummet to his doom, no matter how hard he tries. And he will, if he inherits a healthy sense of nihilism. And I’m pretty sure I’m on a supplement for that.

Tomorrow is my driving test, again. In retrospect the delay may have been a Good Thing, as I think my driving has improved meanwhile; but still. If I do not pass this time - and especially if my car decides to blow another bulb on the way to the test, or start listing to port (they check for that - vehicle posture, it’s called), I shall be most put out. It bust a brake light the other day, but fortunately the bulb I got for the indicator light was in a pack of two, so I was able to replace it with grace and ease - or at least, to watch with grace and ease while my father-in-law did it. I’m thinking of buying a spare packet of bulbs to take to the test, just in case, but it seems needlessly paranoid - but then, so did checking all the lights to begin with, and look how that turned out.

Anyhoo.

In the meantime, I have been a moderately industrious Smokey, feeble constitution notwithstanding. I have baked me a pie, and knitted me a hat (using the Magic Loop method, which took me seven goes to conquer, and I’m still a touch iffy as to how I did it, but still though); I have cut out many pattern pieces for tiny rompers and shirts for the Auxiliary Boy Person Pig; and I have started making a smashing mei tai, which will have a detachable pocket thing on the front in which I can put my keys and a spare nappy and so on, thus transforming Auxiliary Pig into a combination pig-handbag, and possibly an accessory as well if he turns out to be cute in the face. It was hard to tell on the ultrasound, what with the hollow alien eye socket thing going on and all. It’s just as well babies don’t have teeth or they’d look incredibly creepy on ultrasound; and as it is, have you seen those 3D ones? Grotesque. Most off-putting.

What else have I done? Ooh, I saw The King’s Speech, which is absolutely smashing, for trues. It made me weep on several occasions, although as Helpdesk Man unkindly pointed out, this is not in itself a guarantee of actual poignancy. It was super, though, anyway; and prompted me to Google several members of the Royal Family in whom I had until now had little interest. I didn’t realise George VI’s wife was the Queen Mother - she was smashing (in the movie, I mean. Helena Bonham-Carter. Is it just me, or has she been doing the supportive-wife role a lot lately?). And Edward and Wallis Simpson, who I’d always vaguely thought of as romantic sweetcheekses, were actually bally rotters, as indeed the movie portrayed them. Probable Nazi sympathisers, and generally considered to be parasites on decent society. A bit disillusioning after his lovely abdication speech, but it just goes to show.

Who wants to start a viral campaign with me for Luna Lovegood to host the next Academy Awards?

The snortlepig has learned to make personal remarks.

In a way, she has known how to do this for some. She mastered the generic insult long ago - “pesky wench”, “stinky”, &c. But then, a few weeks ago, she pointed to a Baby Of Colour in a book we were reading and said “Chocolate baby!”. And I was like, huh.

Then today we were at the fabric shop, buying fabric so I can make a dress to wear at practically my only sister’s wedding; and the pig caught sight of a somewhat sizeable employee, pointed and enthused “She’s very big!”. Fortunately, the very big lady did not hear us, and I gave the snortlepig a hurried explanation of why we do not make personal remarks about people’s looks, unless they are babies, in which case we may call them cute. Fortunately this took the pig’s mind off largeness, and she cooed “Awww, babies, very cute!” for a bit. She is a sweetcheeks.

Then we were served by another staff member, and the pig pointed once more and said loudly “He has ears!”. He did, in fact, have very large and sticky-out ones. I tried to blandly pass over it by saying “Yes he does, just like you”, but it was nerve-wracking. Worse still, the snortlepig referred to him moments later as “she”, which was innocently meant - her pronouns are on the fritz - but this particular staff member has a very high, squeaky voice which I suspect goes along with an interesting medical condition (similarly the ears, and he’s about eight feet tall - any guesses?), so he probably went away and shot himself after. A pity; he really knows his fabrics.

And then, sitting at the bus stop on the way home, the chappie next to us yawned and stretched his arms, revealing from beneath his T-shirt an impressive expanse of squish. With preternatural parental instincts I managed to catch the joyous shout of “NEKKID squish!” as it leaped from the pig’s synapses, and  arrest it with a thorough tickling. It was close, though. Too close. I do not think he would have been amused.

Question: What should one do? Should I carry copies of Kate Harding essays in my bag at all times? Wilfully misunderstand her, possibly making the situation worse? Beam benignly at everyone and pretend the pig is a Belgian exchange student? I do not know. It’s a pity she enunciates so clearly. Maybe I should Novocaine her tongue before we leave the house.

On Sunday I decided it was Friend Day and I would rank my friends according to their pleasingness on that day. By lunchtime Helpdesk Man was down to -8 points and the snortlepig was in the lead with 1. Then I decided to invite some Friends over for dinner and make a Friend Day cake, so I did (chocolate rum cake with caramel icing and “Happy Friend Day” piped on the top; also a pigeon, which I designated the official bird of Friend Day), and bullied my Friends into bringing cider and bacon to add to the festivities. (Not all of my Friends. Only two. I have more friends than that, but there wasn’t much chicken.) Strangely, Helpdesk Man ended up with the most points, but only after he found out he could win a chocolate pigeon. It was a nice day. The end.

Also, I made a cake. A different, nother cake. Here it am.

Also, I decided this week that I would not surf the internet at all. It was supposed to make me productive, but then the dishwasher broke and my psyche became paralysed with horror and languor and a general all-pervading sense of swimming in treacle, and the table got all covered with dishes so I couldn’t get out my sewing machine and make the cunning skirt for the pig that I was intending to whip out in an afternoon, and then the pig started saying things like “I’m SAAAD, I want to DIEEE” in full-on tragedy voice, so I decided Enough was Enough and went to town to buy some L-Tyrosine, and while I was there I went to the library and got out a bunch of books, so I have spent most of this week reading them. Which is probably an improvement on surfing the internet, at least. I got out a book about adoption and a very bitter memoir by a fat lady about being fat, and some others I haven’t read yet about Celtic Women in Myth and History and a woman who had a face transplant. Also the Usborne Book of Castles, but that was for the pig.I thought she should know about castles so when we go to Disneyland she will be groovy and au fait with Sleeping Beauty’s.

I took the L-Tyrosine a few hours ago, but I don’t feel any more zingy. Well, I made some muffins. They had rum in them, but I’m not convinced, even though Alison Holst doesn’t usually steer me wrong. Hopefully the aminos will kick in in a day or so and I can post photos of myself taking salsa classes atop a mountain at dawn.

Also, we are potty-training the pig. Mixed success. She just throomed on the couch…. for instance.

Today I was seized with a wild, creative urge occasioned by being behind on the laundry. I made the snortlepig some trousies.

They have side seam pockets, the insertion of which taxed my tiny brain to the uttermost.

Also big knee-pockets, into which I am thinking of putting small pillows to cushion the knees of the snortlepig when she falls on them during walks. I’m not sure, though. It seems anti- the survival of the fittest. One would not wish to do the species a disservice by artificially advantaging a snortlepig who cannot retain control of her own two feet.

Just for larks, I also topstitched some pretend pockets on her rump. It’s doing little things like this that keep me topside of the Seine.

And because I am Thrifty and Virtuous, I made the legs very long and fully lined so they can be turned up and the pig can wear them till she’s, like, thirty. And don’t think she won’t.

The pig was also struck with the creative yen today. Know what gets ballpoint pen off an LCD monitor? Handsoap, hairspray and/or rubbing alcohol. Thank you, Google.

1. It’s MOD PODGE, people! Not Modge Podge! I will slay your ancestors!
2. That last episode of Doctor Who was freaking awesome. I cried. Up until that point I was wavering on the season as a whole, but blimey. Epic, yet without sacrificing intimacy. And a corking line. And a fez.
3. I do not like the term “the menopause”. I know it’s technically accurate - well, I don’t, actually, but I assume it is, otherwise why would vast hordes of otherwise unpretentious people emit such a poncy phrase? - but anyway, it gives me the screaming heebies. Enough with ominous articles. I also dislike “an herb garden”, for similar though not identical reasons.
4. I decided on Sunday that my challenge for this week will be to complete one project per day. So today I made a grey skirt - actually I started it in a frenzy late last night, and it even hung overnight to allow the hem to droop correctly. Aren’t I coming along? Anyway, I finished it today and felt v smug, but then realised that all my other projects will take more than a day to complete. I started painting cardboard letters copper in order to stick them on the pig’s steampunked-up whiteboard, my (possibly) next project, but then realised there was no way I could actually paint it and make the fabric baskets all in one day, and then I thought about how many press-studs and little pearls needed to be hand-sewn onto my arm warmers, and how long it would take to learn how to do double-welted pockets in order to make my utility skirt, and then I started wondering if I could count cleaning out the pantry as a project, and then gave up the idea when I realised it just wasn’t gonna happen, and now I’m not sure what my challenge for the week is, but it bothers me unduly that I don’t have one.
5. My sister-in-law is expecting another baby. I will have to knit it something, maybe.
6. Gibbous-inspired clothes just never look as good as the real Gibbous ones. I can’t put my finger on exactly why, but they look junkier. It might just be the lack of incredibly arty photography, but I don’t think so. The skirts have too much fabric and not enough deliberateness of structure, mebbe. Anyway, I’m tempted to try it. But the only event on the horizon which justifies such an outlay of time and vintage lace is practically my only sister’s wedding in November, and I’m not sure if she’d appreciate me turning up looking like a post-Magimix Helena Bonham Carter. Also, I’d have to look at the photos in twenty years’ time, and even now I suspect I would snicker. And that is never a good sign.
7. Flowers for Algernon is not a good book to read if you are even mildly moop. It will make you lunge for a knife.
8. Is not this practically the awesomest thing ever? I want to make one, maybe for Disneyland. Then when we wanted to ride the Grizzly River Run I could just pop it on, and we could oose into DCA and ride it and then go back and romp at the HoJo’s water park. Except I don’t know where I’d be able to buy a towel that wasn’t made in a sweatshop, and one would not like to make it with a used towel. So it might not be doable. Still, I spent a good half-hour today pondering it. This is why I never get anything done.
9. I was playing poker on Sunday with a large, smallish group of semi-manly men, and asked them all “Would you rather have your own unicorn or a hundred sheep?” And they all instantly said “UNICORN!”, and it was awesome.
10. Would you accept a million dollars from a genie on the condition that if you ever said the word “migratory”, you would die instantly?

A Sad Thought: I don’t know how to tie a noose knot. It distracted me in that awful scene in Once Were Warriors, where I should have been bawling and clutching my hanky, and I was a bit, but I was also secretly a little impressed at the girl for knowing how to do it as a mere stripling of a lass. If I ever wanted to off myself, I’d have to Google it.

A Happy Thought: I just discovered Sock Dreams, an awesome site, and because I very badly need some socks, all of mine being either holey or Helpdesk Man’s, I bought five pairs as a birthday present to myself from the piggie. Upon being told of her generosity the piggie stared at her own feet in great perplexity for some minutes and then dismissed the matter. Four of the pairs are stripy. And as I very rarely make impulse purchases online, I feel giddy and daring. They’re even anti-sweatshop.

A Sad Thought: “How to Make a Noose” brings up 276,000 Google results.

A Happy Thought: My worthy mother has given practically my only small sister permish to come along for our trip to Disneyland next year. And my other practically only sister who lives in London is meeting us there for a week as well. If I do not have them both married off before we exit the Haunted Mansion, it will not be my fault.

A Sad Thought: I am worried that I might come over all phobic at Disneyland. I do not like animatronics, and while I hope this is because I’ve only ever met creepy cheesy fake ones like at Rainbow’s End, it might not be. And Pirates of the Caribbean is in the dark and on the water, like the log flume at Rainbow’s End which totally gives me the screaming feebles, because there are OBVIOUSLY killer whales slinking beneath the surface, and it has animatronic pirates and skeletons, one of which I happen to know is real. It’s an E-ticket ride. I can’t not go on it. It’s supposed to be awesome. And it’s 15 minutes long. And I do not want to spend that quarter-hour with the stench of abject terror oozing from my armpits, head burrowed into Helpdesk Man’s pancreas, frantically singing “You Are My Sunshine” and batting wildly at the air above my tender exposed neck. Also, Indiana Jones has an animatronic python that looms at you. And we won’t even talk about the Storybookland Canal Boats.

A Happy Thought: “How to Save a Life” by The Fray is an awesomer song than I initially thought. It has a poignant backstory and surprisingly good lyrics, and by “surprisingly” I mean that I am out of touch with Modern Music and generally assume anything I hear on the radio to be shallow and soulless, a thoroughly obnoxious tendency which I ought to combat, although I did hear Jason Mraz’ “I’m Yours” on two separate occasions in the fabric store and liked it and considered asking the lady what it was, but the second time I realised it was on the radio, not a CD, so the nice radio man told me (not personally, acourse) what it was and it turned out it had been playing in every store every four minutes for the last several months, but I don’t get out much, but at least it proved I liked the song on its own merits and not because it was drilled into my head by insane repetition; and also, incidentally, for weeks this was the only song that would put the snortlepig to sleep.

A Sad Thought: This couch is covered in smeg.

A Happy Thought: I bought two rolls of brown paper today. I ran out of the last lot and its replacement must have fallen out of the pram when I was bringing it home, so I have been without a roll of consoling brown paper for months now and it has been preying on my calm. But now I have two, so I can make the twofeenth and final version of my underbust corset pattern on it, and it will go with my new skirt, and also the arm warmers I plan to start making tomorrow.

A Sad Thought: I was conned into giving a cake decorating demonstration on Thursday to a bunch of Young Mothers, and I have no idea what to show them and will be revealed as a sham and ceremonially stripped of my fondant layer.

A Happy Thought: Singing group now. Bye.