Saturday 25 August 2012

The Lonliness of the Long Distance Shopper

It occurs to me that I have written a blog post on this subject before, but it was a while ago now so never mind.
Yesterday Granny and I took Joseph to Ikea. We had decided that we'd do something with the day, my other half being away for the weekend on a camping trip with a friend. Whilst he was off enjoying camping, cream teas and fish and chips, I did not want to sit at home, alone and bereft. We initially thought we'd pop into town for a bit, but then we remembered that it was the time of the music festival and spending even five minutes in a public place full of those sorts of smelly weirdos did not sound like a good day to me. Public toilets are usually all closed and that's not good when you've a small child who needs his bum tending to on a regular basis.
We don't even get the same calibre weirdo that we used to. When I was growing up, in the late eighties and early nineties they used to put some effort into the weird, there were kooky off the wall costumes that looked like some actual thought had gone into it, even if they were odd thoughts that nobody else would understand. Nowadays we just get a mix of the usual tired and grubby hippy types mixed in with the teeny-bopper girly chavvy types who wear hot pants and big green wellies. I want to tell them they look so many shades of ridiculous, but I doubt they'd listen.
We decided to get far out of town instead and we went to Ikea. I didn't have anything specific in mind, but it's a fun place to browse. Thinking of the houses we had looked in, I wanted to look at potential storage ideas and I ended up coming home with a recycling bin system that beats what I had before (a box on the floor in the kitchen) a neat Swedish idea of two square buckets fitting inside a bigger bucket and lids. I can sort my recycling as I go and it's got proper lids and carry handles. I'm getting excited about recycling systems, how sad am I?
I did buy a new front door mat. The old one had got a bit damaged.
Joseph spent a long time in the buggy and seemed quite content to stare goggle eyed at all the nice furniture and things. In the restaurant he ate two and a half meatballs and quite a few chips. He even ate some of the berry sauce they put with them. He only got unhappy when we started eating our puddings and he was still on the mains. He doesn't like to feel he's missing out.
In the evening I got a Chinese takeaway, which I had been very much looking forwards to. When I got home I found that only half the starter I had ordered was in the bag. The trouble is, when that happens you're a bit over a barrel. What do you do? You can go back and complain but by then the food you have got has gone cold. Or you can just sit at home, eat what you have and feel annoyed. I was too tired to walk back. Joseph didn't help much, he didn't want his sesame prawn toast, he wasn't too keen on the sweet cabbage and he didn't like sweet and sour pork balls. He didn't even want any egg fried rice, something I know he's liked before. He didn't half cry this morning though, when I ate the left overs for breakfast and he didn't get any. I told him I wasn't going to waste good pork balls on a little boy who'd just squish them for a bit and throw them away. He still wasn't happy, but he did feed himself almost all of his banana and cereal breakfast without help.
He had oven chips for lunch and ate all of them and for his tea he had pasta with mushrooms, peas and cheese sauce. He not only ate a whole portion, but he was doing so well I gave him some seconds and he ate almost as much again. I was helping this time, he was too intent on watching Chuggington. Sometimes if I try and feed him he refuses and will only eat if he does it himself. Sometimes he's just lazy and will sit doing a baby bird impression with his mouth wide open and I have to put the food in. I didn't mind, he ate such a lot! I worry he's getting skinny you see, so when he's hungry I make the most of it.
I also watched a Disney film with him. You can't have a small child and escape the long, clinging tendrils of the Disney corporation, who have successfully managed to bottle and sell childhood innocence and fun and leave it feeling like the beef in a McD's burger - tasteless and bland. The film was "Homeward Bound II" and it was as cheesy (in a bright orange pre-processed kind of way) as I had expected, but Joseph loved it. He liked the dogs "Go da! Go da!" and he liked the cat "Go miaow! Go miaow!" and he sat on my lap totally transfixed for more than half an hour, the longest any programme has held his attention. He did give up eventually and decided to create Duplo sculptures worthy of the Turbine Hall, but never mind.
After that it was bath and bedtime. Usually, Andy does this as by the evening I like a little break, but today I enjoyed the privilege of giving the worlds cutest little boy a dip in the foamy water. He splashed and shouted and went to bed. I sang "Twinkle twinkle little star" and he laughed at me and then fell asleep in the pose I like to call "Stunned starfish".
Now it's my turn to go to bed and I fully intend to achieve the pose of "Comatose Mum" in fairly short order.
Good night.

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