Hullaballoo

As I sat on a park bench, a 3 year old girl came up to me. "I want to play cafes with thoes boys," she said emphatically, pointing at YS and OS.

The boys were obliging and gentle, role playing as waiters and chefs as she delivered chocolate cake and running ever so slowly, so she could catch them at tig.

Her mother came up to me and praised them for being so obliging. "Most bigger boys wouldn't do that, they're very caring," she said.

I beamed and praised her daughter for being so brave. "I don't know where she gets her confidence from," the mother said disarmingly.

I love going to the park. There is so much to learn from a wee girl knowing what she wants and being bold enough to ask for it, bless her. It's taken me 37 years to reach that level of self assertion.

Full of the joys of feminism after a Bobo free evening and a long chat with Schmetterling. I am staying up late, watching movies and kicking up my heels. So now I'm going to do this tag thingie of Suburbia's

1.What is your current obsession?
Jigsawduko, it's totally inane but lovable
2.Which item of clothing do you wear often?
My wonderbra
3.What's for dinner?
toast....with peanut butter, cheese and jam. I believe in a varied diet for kiddies.
4.What are you listening to?
the Christian art therapist upstairs making funny rowing noises upstairs. At least, I hope it's rowing.
5.Say something to the one that tagged you.
Let's meet up with our boyfriends.
6.Favorite vacation spot?
A noisy, arty, hot and vibrant city
7. What I'm reading right now?
A long Spanish love story and I have finally got to the dirty bits
8. Four words to describe myself.
Resilient, sexy, mischievous and unconventional
9.Guilty pleasure.
Friday afternoon's Guinness Book of Records event....and bed picnics.
10. What do you think you will feel about your life when all is said and done?
Pretty much as I feel now, knackered but happy.
11. What do you look forward to?
dancing in big, friendly, uninhibited groups
12 Who or what makes you laugh until you’re weak?
YS doing breakdancing/ belly dancing
13. Best thing you ate or drank lately?
My homemade Rosemary and sundried tomato focaccia
14. Flower of the moment?
Easter Cactus.
15. Favourite ever film?
Juno, I cried all the way through.
16.Care to share some wisdom?
Don't get caught.

YS is in primary 2 and becoming less and enthusiastic about his reading. Any tips on how to encourage him in his reading, without being too heavy handed and putting him off.

Did you know that expansiveness is one of the five elements? Well, it so is, the tai chi man at my class said so this morning. I could see that Bobo thought I was pushing the bounds of credibility when I described communing with the elements in the class, so I have booked him in for a session, so he can see for himself. If I remember correctly, the word Bobo used to describe it was "bollocks." We shall see....

Unfortunately, Bobo's day of study converged with my afternoon off. Yes, I did lead him astray until 6.40pm, but he could have resisted. Now I am patiently listening to his Vivaldi records while he studies away in the next room. Listening to Vivaldi, makes me feel worthy, I like his flamboyant, histrionic style. The music is full of playful burst of sheer pleasure. What classical/baroque music do you associate with pleasurable experiences?

I took on a bit of a purple leopard skin theme at the psychotherapy conference Bobo and I were at this weekend. And now I have spotted a leopard skin for my laptop.

We attended mind bending workshops, had deep and meaningful chats, danced our socks off, ate loads, slept far too little and indulged in a little too much red wine. And, as we were staying on a university campus, it was just like being a student again.

Now, we just need to recover.

My charity shop purchase pressure cooker has just sucked ALL the water out of my home made soup. And because I 'forgot' to put in a stock cube, I am left with a pile of, well, lumpy veggies. Grrrrrr. Nigella doesn't have these woes.

Lets hope my homemade sundried tomato and rosemary foccaccia is less of a f**k up lol.

I am not one to blow my own trumpet. So I'm not even going to begin to describe how I sliced and diced himself at Scrobble yesterday. I won't describe how truculent he was when I offered help or how the silent huffyness was palpable long after the game had finished. Honestly, you'd think I'd taken his maltesers without asking.

I am just coming down from the past hour's great excitement. Three fire engines and an extra one with a massive, stabilised ladder appeared outside a neighbouring flat. Our boys chose the wrong day not to be here, so of course we videoed it. I met one of the mums from school who happened to be passing, and compared notes on potential catastrophes from the upstairs neighbour.

Bobo stood filming and a passing student said, "look, he's filming it, how cool is he?" Of course he grinned smugly at me and I wanted to tell her it was all my idea really.

For some reason, passersby kept coming up and asking me what had happened. Of course I didn't have a clue, so I made stuff up, like, "oh, there's someone on the roof, hence the ladder," or "there's been a gas leak, that's obvious to me." One woman said she was sorry that someone's flat was on fire and I realised I had an empathy bypass and was caught up in the excitement of all the ladders. Yesterday, I even got excited when my bread making yeast rose, so you can imagine what I made of tonight's excitement.

It turned out to be a false alarm, but not before I offered to pass around hot drinks and light snacks to curious onlookers. I was just waiting for Spiderman to appear, but he never did.

My patience is now as slim as a Parisian wafer. I have hit the school holiday wall, where my initial burst of enthusiasm wanes, to be replaced by tearful snappiness. Since the easter holidays began last Friday, I have:

Taken the kids swimming 6 times.
Eaten lunch late or not at all 5 times.
Seen 4 clients.
Persuaded the boys to spend time at the gym kid's club 3 times.
Made pancakes twice (in a very harried, pan bashing way).
Been kept awake for one and a half hours during the night by YS's conviction that there were 'supernatural beings in the office, mummy."
And lost my temper big time with them once (this afternoon when I saw the state of their room).
And had no lie-ins.

Oh, and fallen out with one neighbour/or several neighbours if she's been gossiping.
And I wonder why I am tired. My aim for this afternoon is to get to read the paper in peace and deflect any easter nest baking requests. This blog isn't called hullaballoo for nothing.

Rowing is part of my gym work out and I hate, hate, hate, hate it. However, I discovered that watching the freakshow, appalling, over-the-top WWF wrestling matches makes me row. It really does. Just for 10 minutes, I become a warpainted, leopard skinned freak who goes all out to win......or even row 2000 metres quickly. Is this wrong? Do I have to give up reading the Guardian now?

Why did we have to be in one of the most crowded thoroughfares in the city when younger son inquired, "mummy, why do ladies call their private parts vaginas?" Like so many other things, I have no answer for that.

I did, however, enjoy his observation that 'chillies' should be called 'hotties' instead. How true.

I have just had a run-in with a neighbour, who thinks that the boys have no right to play in the communal garden with her son because they always cause a 'carry on' and stole money from her son last year. Her evidence was that the money had disappeared from the piggy and the boys were the only ones in the garden. She obviously goes by the daily Mail readers' brand of fact finding and justice. Repeatedly, the boys have been told by her sons that they are not allowed to play in 'their' garden. Now I see where they get it from.

Luckily I was walking a few paces before younger son as we bounced into the garden to play badminton in the sun. She obviously hadn't clocked that I was there and started telling YS that he wasn't welcome to play in the garden.

I was incredulous and angry. She walked away, bringing her poor embarrassed son indoors in case he played with YS. I told her she was being unfriendly and felt like saying a lot more. Maybe I should have mentioned to her that I had told off her teenage son the other day for playing on broken scaffolding.

She has lived here a while and owns her flat, we are only renting. There is obviously a hidden pecking order, if the terrotorial and bullying nature of her sons is anything to go by. Grrrrrr.

YS and I still played our game. I encouraged him to make friends with a different wee boy in the garden and included him in the game.

Later, I reflected on how nervous I had been about the better weather, because our boys had been bullied in the garden last year. I had even been reticent about going to hang out the washing myself. In short, I had felt bullied. Sadly, it looks like I will always have to come with them for backup when they play outside. People can be so damn petty and unwelcoming.

So, where do I go from here? I am not interested in starting a feud, at the same time, I just won't tolerate being bullied.

Because everyone has been so damned miserable during the credit crunch, the Scottish Executive has decided to give 50pence to everyone who sends them in a video clip of them singing a happy song and wearing yellow at breakfast. What a wonderful idea, I wonder if it will catch on?