HELLO OUT THERE!
I'm used to making my opinions public. I've had two of my diaries published as books and I do write a v famous advice column for my school mag (it had mega press coverage), but this is the first time I've gone electronic. (Usually I delete everything by mistake.) So I'm a bit nervous. But there's a universe waiting to hear what I think. So here it goes! (Note to You: If you've been up a mountain in Kathmandu or something and have never heard of me you can go straight to my Christmas letter to get caught up.)
Since Marcus and I are still speaking, we went for a Sunset Walk on the Heath last night. It was tres romantic. When I got home Buskin' Bob and Sigmund locked in the bunker listening to Bob Dylan in You-may-as-well-slit-your-wrists-now-for-all-is-lost mode. They were BOTH singing along so I reckoned there was probably a bottle of organic wine in there with them. (Personally, I find it v weird that my father and his replacement should be getting along so well. I can't believe that's NORMAL!) Asked the MC what was going on. She said they're depressed about what's happening in the Middle East. I thought she meant all the people dying every day in Afghanistan and Iraq, but she didn't. Nobody told me, of course, but now there's a crisis in Lebanon and more hundreds of innocent people have been killed there. If Nan and the Vicar are right and there is a God, you sort of have to wonder what His long-term plan is.
Back in London. Except for the time we went to Wales with the Gruesome Twosome I've never been so happy to be home in my life!!!! Everything was going well (especially if you like tinned beans, small winged creatures in your food and incredible, remorseless pain). Then we found this sheep caught in brambles on one of our walks and Wilderness Man decided to free it. I can tell the Prime Minister right now that people aren't the only ones who can be difficult to liberate!!! The sheep much preferred being trapped so that wolves and mountain lions could eat it than being freed by Marcus. It BIT HIM! I didn't even know that sheep had teeth. I've certainly never heard of them biting anyone before. Staggered back to camp to tell farmer about sheep. Then it started to rain. By the second day of rain the only thing that wasn't wet was the inside of the car. Then on Tuesday the storm got tres serious. Marcus (OF COURSE) thought it was brilliant to be sitting in a sodden field in a thunderstorm. I said that, personally, I preferred to watch the lightening and buckets of water pouring down from inside a warm house with a cup of tea. Crawled into our sleeping bags (which was like crawling into a wet sock) not speaking. Couldn't sleep because the wind was so bad that the whole tent was shaking. Then it fell down. I screamed and woke Marcus, who thought for a minute that he'd been buried alive. But it's true what they say about disasters bringing people together, isn't it? By the time we got out of the tent and into the car we were laughing so much that we weren't mad at each other. Marcus said he reckoned we'd had enough romance and fun for one summer and that next time we can go to Spain. So long as we take the train.
We're not precisely in the middle of nowhere. We're in some farmer's field. With about a hundred other people and their dogs. We might as well have stayed in London. At least there you hardly ever see your neighbours.) We got the tent up and all our things in it (which makes it about as romantic as a cupboard) and settled down to make a nice cup of tea. It took Marcus AN HOUR to get the stove going. And then we realized that someone forgot to bring the cups. (He blamed me!!! Isn't that just like a man? Why should I have been the one to remember the flaming cups? Does he think it's genetically programmed? Wide hips, ovulation and bringing cups when you go camping?) So we had to walk to the village to buy some cups. Have been walking ever since. (There's nothing else to do, is there? You can't even snog without ending up with a tin of beans in your back. And God knows you couldn't do anything more than snog, not when if you sneeze someone in the next tent says, "Bless you"!) I've got muscles aching that I never knew I had.
A mood of riotous joy filled the kitchen tonight when I got home. Buskin' Bob had his guitar out and the MC was popping the cork on a bottle of organic champagne. I said you'd think they could at least wait till I was GONE before they started celebrating. The MC said that wasn't what they were celebrating. Can you believe it? The Mad Cow's GETTING MARRIED. I said, what again? She said Buskin' Bob asked her this morning while she was brushing her teeth. (So it probably wasn't as tres romantic as it sounds since if he got down on his knees in our tiny bathroom he would've cracked his head on the sink.) I said but you're married already. To my father. Remember him? The MC said no, she isn't. Apparently they've been divorced for yonks. I said nobody told me. She said she did. (I can only assume that Marcella was crying and Lucrezia was trying to set fire to something at the time so I was distracted.) If you ask me, instead of giving honours and peerages to people who give him money, the Prime Minister should give my entire family an OBE for their services to maintaining the sanctity of marriage and family values he's always banging on about.
Went with Marcus today to buy supplies for our camping trip. I said I didn't see why we have to buy things in advance. I mean, it's not like we're going to the Outback or anything. We'll be in ENGLAND for God's sake. We can drive to a shop for anything we need. Marcus said once we get there we're not using the car, we're going everywhere on foot. And also he doesn't want to spend our holiday buying tins of beans. He wants to settle in and enjoy it. So we bought our tins of beans, etc in the supermarket off the high street.
Life really is GALLINGLY UNFAIR. While all I have to look forward to this summer is sleeping with bugs with Wilderness Man and joining the ranks of the underpaid, Disha is going to NEW YORK CITY. And not with her parents or anything like that - on her own! Apparently she's got some aunt she never mentioned before who asked her to mind her flat while she's away in August. It beggars belief! Told DIsha I was really happy for her. Which I would be normally. But NOT this summer.
Went over to Sigmund's today for some respite from the folk music, weeping and screaming at home. Enquired after his love life. He said he went out with that women who seemed v interesting, but they didn't click. She was disappointed that his idea of cooking is heating something up from Marks and Sparks. But now that he's put his own profile online things he reckons things will pick up. I certainly hope so. Had to wash two cups just so we could have tea!
I know I have to get a job eventually, but I don't see the point in getting one before I go away. Have been wracking my brains trying to think of some way to make some dosh without actually having to earn it. Then I remembered Princess Margaret. Her children sold off her possessions to pay off their inheritance tax. (Even the necklace she wore when she was TWO!) They made a fortune!!! Had a look round the House of Horrors to see if there was anything I could sell. (I know the MC's still alive, but I can't really wait for her to depart this mortal coil, can I?) The few things that are worth anything are all things she would notice was gone - like the telly and the fridge. If there is such a thing as reincarnation, I certainly hope that next time I'm born to people with money.
Even when something good happens, it's BAD.
The holiday in Scotland is officially OFF. I'm not sure why. I heard "We can't go after all" and was so overwhelmed with joy that I stopped listening. Until Marcus said, "So I reckon we should go camping in England instead. My dad said I can take his car." I said when you say camping, do you mean like in a tent and all? He said that's what he meant. I said it was a tres shame but I don't have a tent. He said HE DOES!! I said but I don't have a sleeping bag. He said I can borrow his mum's. (Apparently, he's got a stove, a Swiss Army knife and a lantern as well!) [Note to Self: You truly never KNOW anyone. I always thought of Marcus as an artist - like Picasso and all those blokes - and it turns out he's really Wilderness Man!] Marcus said didn't I think it would be v romantic, just the two of us in a tent in the middle of nowhere? Personally, I reckon it would be a lot more romantic if we had a mattress and indoor plumbing but I can't afford to start another argument or I might not go anywhere. Even sleeping with bugs is better than sleeping with the Deadly Duo. So I said yes.
Disha says I should be glad that Sappho wants me to be her best man. She says it's an HONOUR. I said I'd consider winning the Turner Prize an honour. Being best man at Sappho's wedding I consider a chore. Especially since I just found out that she expects me to make a speech! I said I DON'T DO SPEECHES. (That time I had to do a talk in class about Charles Dickens I was so nervous that I called him Charles Dicker. Even Ms Staples couldn't stop laughing.) Sappho said since I talk so much she wouldn't think it was a problem.
Buskin' Bob took a break from worrying about the England team to save some more whales this weekend and the Mad Cow was off with Mags and Sappho organizing the wedding (you know, the one where I get to be BEST MAN!) so, Naturally, I'm the one got landed with the Gruesome Twosome and the Germ. Decided that going anywhere is better than being in a confined space with them so I took them to Brent Cross. I might as well have taken them to HELL. Marcella and Lucrezia fought like a couple of caged rats the whole way and the Germ cried (I reckon she decided that since Marcella was otherwise engaged she'd have to take up the slack). Was so exhausted by the time we got there that I took them to McDonald's to recover (I don't care what Buskin' Bob says, fat, salt and sugar are very restorative). Marcella decided she's her father's child after all and refused to eat anything. She announced tres loudly that her body is a temple and she's not filling it with junk. Lucrezia doesn't mind packing her temple with junk so she ate her share and her sister's - and then threw up all over the table. While I was dealing with that the Germ grabbed my soda and dumped it over her head. Which meant we had to go straight home so I could clean up the Germ before her mothers saw her (they're amazingly fussy about her for women who don't shave under their arms). Lucrezia didn't want to leave. Had to LITERALLY drag her out, kicking and screaming. Got stopped by a security guard. Security guard seemed to think I was abducting Lucrezia. I asked him if he was MAD. I said, "Look at her! Who would kidnap that child?" He didn't think I was funny. Asked Lucrezia if she knew me. Lucrezia said NO!!!! I never thought I'd count Marcella Hotspur amongst my blessings, but I reckon she saved me ending up at the police station. Marcella told the guard that Lucrezia's insane and that of course she knew me. I'm her sister. I was so grateful I didn't even argue about the sister bit.
In the United States today is Independence Day. Here in the House of Horrors it's Indentured Servant Day. The Mad Cow says I'll have to get a job as there's no way she's going to lend me some money to get my things back from Justin, even though I'm the one who always gets stuck minding other people's children. And also the one who has to share her room with The Shrieker and The Cryer. (I ask you: HOW UNFAIR IS THAT???? Answer: VERY!!!!!) Ditto Sigmund. He says it's about time I learned what responsibility means. I said I know what it means. It means you cheat on your wife and end up living behind a Bingo hall in Kilburn. He said I'm lucky he's not a violent man.
WRONG AGAIN!!! Things have gone from WORSE to WORSER. Justin's nicked my stereo, my portable CD player, my computer and my hair dryer! He says he won't give them back till I start paying him the money I owe him. He said I can start with the interest!!!!! I said I think it's a bit harsh, charging your own FLESH AND BLOOD interest. I wager he wouldn't charge Subcomandante Marcos interest! Justin said he wouldn't. He said if he'd lent Subcomandante Marcos money he would have spent it to help the people, not buy himself bags of over-priced clothes made by one-eyed, imprisoned orphans in China.
Life is funny, isn't it? You work and slave, thinking when you're done you're going to be as happy as Bill Gates when he gets his bank statement - and what happens? Nothing much, that's what happens. Nothing that you'd want to happen at any rate. Exams are over, I'm on the threshold of MY REAL LIFE and my BRILLIANT FUTURE is waving frantically to me - and I'm a whole lot less happy than Bill Gate's dog. I might as well be back in Infants the time I had that unfortunate accident in assembly and the boy next to me screamed out, "Oi, Miss, Janet's got piss on my shoes". I'm DEEP IN DEBT, I have to go to Uni in London and live at home, Marcella and Lucrezia are moving in for THE WHOLE SUMMER because their mother's going someplace where she can't hear them scream like Australia (while I'm going to some rock in Scotland for my holiday) and - TO TOP IT ALL - I've hardly spoken to Marcus for weeks. And not just because we've both been tres busy (and usually row when we do speak). Because of the FOOTBALL!!! It's on ALL THE TIME! Apparently, he'd rather have toothpicks stuck in his eyes than miss a game. (I'd be happy to help him with that!) And when it isn't on, it's all he talks about. (It's all ANYBODY talks about. Even Buskin' Bob!!! How I long for the days when he all he talked about was Corporate Greed and the Imminent Destruction of the Planet.) Am trying to console myself with the thought that things can't get much worse.
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Monday 31st July 2006 
Friday 28th July 2006