I Hate Piegeons

Day 58, Friday February 27, 10.15am: A pigeon has just shat on my French windows.

The Futility of Multi-tasking and Clean Windows

Day 58, Friday, February 27 - Who says men can’t multi-task?

It is 9.11am. This morning I have 1) rolled out of bed 2) made Emma’s school lunch 3) fed her breakfast 4) fed myself breakfast 5) washed up 6) dried the dishes 7) played my three piano pieces 8) washed the French door windows inside and out 9) had a hot lemon juice 10) done a couple of cursory physical stretches 11) set up the ironing board and ironing 12) started to sub-edit a book 13) taken out the rubbish 14) ambushed Clare and told her about my five lengths of crawl yesterday (she tries hard to conceal her admiration but I can sense it all the same) 15) written this blog 16) served Jan her breakfast.

And what have I ended up with? Some smudged French windows, a cracked plate, Mary Had A Little Lamb played in the wrong key, Jan unhappy with the coffee I made and a bad neck.

Worse still, Jan is sitting right next to the French windows and has not apparently noticed that you can now see out of them.

It's not that men can't multi-task. They just don't see the point.

PS It's now 9.20am and still no mention of the windows... I was going to do the skylights later today but I'm reconsidering.

More About Fragrant Wife...

Day 56, Wednesday February 25, 1pm: I’ve got a soft spot for Fragrant Wife (see posting January 3).
She’s one of those people with a real talent but without the confidence to match (I’ve always preferred a diametrically opposed approach, myself – overbearing arrogance based on nothing of any consequence).
I dropped in unannounced on FW the other day and demanded a cup of cha. FW blushes as she opens the door. It’s another of those endearing qualities. She blushes at dropping hats. She turns crimson when greengrocers say “tomatoes” and Welshmen “Aberystwyth”. That’s just how she is.
FW, if you remember, resolved to do a sketch a day to try and resuscitate her art. She admits, though, that she has already fallen way behind. Could I, though, see some of the sketches she has completed? FW blushes. No, I can’t.
Halfway through the cup, though, she changes her mind and fetches her book. She really can draw, can FW. There is a gorgeous still life of a pineapple, and an exquisite sketch of her two sons.
There’s also one of her husband, Boot Boy, but it doesn’t look anything like him. FW has made him look far too young and handsome and relaxed. He should be in Dr Martens, holding an axe handle and bellowing.
Perhaps that is just the way she perceives him. Which is rather sweet, however misguided.

The Day The Russian Artillery Shell Missed Captain Nolan

Day 51, Friday February 20, 9am: Captain Louis Edward Nolan died 150 years ago, give or take, courtesy of a red-hot splinter from a Russian artillery shell at Sebastopol.
He supposedly gave out a blood-curdling scream on his way to his Maker.
The bit that really fascinated me as a boy, though, was that Nolan remained upright in his saddle, his sword held out before him, despite being very much dead as his horse galloped off the battlefield. That’s military discipline for you, that is.
Anyway. You may, or may not be immediately familiar with the Charge of the Light Brigade (even after my warning shot across the bows, see blog posting Feb 5). You may be wondering what I’m on about. But bear with me. In my mind, Captain Nolan and his commanding officer, Lord Cardigan, are inextricably linked with my New Year resolution of trying to be tidier about the house.
But back to 1854 and the Crimean War.
Historians disagree, of course – don’t they always? But the most popular hypothesis suggests that Nolan, suddenly realising that Cardigan and the Valiant 600 (actually about 673 horsemen took part in the charge, but don’t let specifics get in the way of a good poem) were about to ride into the Valley of Death, tried to intervene by riding across the front of the brigade. That, unfortunately, was when he copped it. Cardigan, being an absurd British toff, thought Nolan was showboating and trying to steal his thunder. “Damned impudence,” I hear him saying as he hurtled on towards the awaiting Russian guns (typically, Cardigan was one of the few to survive the charge, his eyebrows only lightly singed. He spent the evening drinking champagne on his yacht in Balaclava Harbour).
My point?
Simply, I have come to the conclusion that, domestically at least, there is more Cardigan in me than Nolan.
I keep charging off, doing things I find exciting and stimulating, even when the Nolan side suggests: “Look, perhaps this is not a great idea after all, those guns do look a tad menacing, why don’t you slow down, stop even, take a rain check, perhaps go and polish your stirrups or clip your sideburns rather than waving that sabre about in such a bellicose way?”
I simply will keep on doing the things which promise to quicken the pulse.
Which is why I go to the golf range (okay, okay, it might not quicken your pulse but it does mine), or practise my piano, or swim, rather than hang up my coat in the right place, take the washing out of the washing machine, hang up my ironed shirts or clear out the study.
Oh? Haven’t I mentioned the study yet? This is what this is all about, really. The study dominates everything, if I’m honest. It’s a boulder that I carry about with me in the haversack of life. It’s a monster lurking in my shadows. I know it’s there but I refuse to acknowledge it.
The study – actually, the whole house, to be honest, the study has just become the metaphor for my domestic incompetence - is now so untidy and cluttered that it’s impossible to traverse without falling over. I avoid going into the study whenever possible. If there’s paperwork that needs filing, I post it under the door.
Fact - I’m allergic to our study.
Which would be fine except that Jan sometimes works from home. I get ordered to tidy up and what do I do? I carry all the stuff from the study to another room. Then, when she complains about that room, I carry it all back.
It has taken my 49 and a half years, but I’ve just realised this is a waste of time. I was having a cup of tea with Lydia yesterday (aka Fragrant Wife, see posting of January 3) and she said she had cleaned up one of her sons’ rooms because she was sick of paying the mortgage for the three-bedroom house when her family appeared to be living in a two-bedroom home. Good point, I thought.
Lydia’s right. Things must change. No golf range today.
I am going into the study. I’m going in. I’m going in… (if I repeat it enough times, maybe I’ll believe it).
It’s time for Captain Nolan to stop Lord Cardigan for once. It’s time for the Russian artillery to miss.

Whining (2)

Day 47, Monday, February 16, 11.45pm: You won’t believe me so there is no point in writing this. But I will anyway.
I had a glass of wine on Saturday. Oh alright… I had two glasses of wine on Saturday.
Which may suggest (see Resolution 7) that I have in some way failed.
I would argue, though, that Saturday and Resolution 7 are perfectly consistent.
In fact, I'd got further. Saturday was a show of strength.
I didn’t drink because I needed to, but because I wanted to. Jan and I had a film to watch and a nice meal to eat. The wine was the obvious accompaniment. I could have abstained. I chose not to.
I know, you don’t believe me. I said you wouldn't. But I believe I’m now a person who doesn't drink unless there's a good reason to do so. Before, I was a person who drank unless there was a good reason not to. I reckon that’s a fundamental shift.
I’m back to abstaining now, by the way. Until the next good film and the next good meal.
Try as I might, I couldn’t find anything to watch this evening. My pizzas were pretty good, though. Ask Jan. She has a glass of wine with hers.

Whining

Day 47, Monday, February 16, 7.22am: You won’t believe me so there is no point in writing this.

So I won't.

It will save us both time to get on with other things.

The Mildly Mad Magistrate

Friday February 13, 8am: Day 44.

Let me introduce Matt The Mildly Mad Magistrate.

Not, I admit, a particularly accurate sobriquet. Matt is not yet a magistrate and he is not mildly insane either. He is totally so.

Matt – who I last met aged 13-and-a-half, until, that is, he turned up on my doorstep the other day as a Friend Reunited – has arguably out-resolved the rest of TRSNYRC by a fair distance.

He does, to be honest, have time on his hands after retiring early.

He also, however, has Go-For-It. Particularly for a man needing a kidney transplant and with knackered hips.

Here are his resolutions:

1) ride 100 miles in a day on the way to losing weight (while eating and drinking whatever he wants – cakes and alcohol most welcome).

2) Prepare for a Masters degree in Maths. So as to carry out research at the Dept of Cosmology and Gravitation. So as to get a Phd. So as to stick two fingers up the doctors, consultant and anaesthetists living in his road (if Brian May can do it, why can’t Matt?)

3) Climb Mount Washington in New Hampshire (despite hips/kidney)

4) Rebuild his Z1000 Kawasaki and upset his neighbours (Matt was never a Hell’s Angel, he tells me, just leather jacketed, anti-social, immature, heavy drinking and belligerent).

5) And, of course, become a magistrate (thus giving him the power to incarcerate leather jacketed, anti-social, immature…

Mind you, these are mere resolutions, Matt. The proof will be in the pudding.

And you have a lot of catching up to do. We already have a fairly large pike in our keep-net. And I don’t want to crow but I wrestled my way through two entire lengths of crawl today before asphyxiating. I appear to have hurt my back in the process, and tweaked a hamstring but, for a sedantary 49-year-old would-be athlete, that's real progress, that is. Mount Washington? Pah... I'll believe it when I see it. Until then, it's a molehill.