The Rhyme* of the Ancient Cassandra *Lengthy Grumble

6.30am- Bastarding alarm goes off.  Hit snooze button.

6.47am- Finally give in and accept I have to get up and stop pressing snooze.  Glare hard at the Terror who disagrees with the concept of getting up and wishes to stay cosy and warm in my bed.

6.48am- Bang on Saffy's door, and receive assurances she is up.

6.49am- Physically drag the bastarding dog from my bed.

6.55am- Kick unwilling and protesting dog out for a piss.

7am-  Bang on Saffy's door and demand to know what the fuckety fucking fuck she is doing.  Receive assurances she is up.  Suspect assurances are but hollow and meaningless.

7.05am- Let dog in and feed it.

7.06am- Notice suspicious smell.

7.10am- Track suspicious smell to sodding dog, who has stood in his own shit, tracked it across the kitchen, up the hall and onto the sofa.  Vociferously blame Saff for not de-pooping the garden when asked.

7.12am- Have existential crisis.

7.13am- Start scrubbing dog shit, while screaming at Saff to get fucking ready and brush her teeth before she straightens her sodding hair.

7.24am- Finally chivvy children into car.  Drive to school bus like a maniac, whilst berating children for never helping round the house unless I nag like a naggy thing.  Wonder if perhaps it is my fault children do not help, as I have turned them into pampered middleclass brats.  Decide it is not my fault as I am a saintly and helpful person*, and they have clearly inherited all their lazy and selfish genes from the DC and TQ.

7.34am- Shove some unattractive porridge at the Beast.  Insist he eats it all, mainly out of general malice.

7.40am- Have tea and marmite toast.  Remember after eating the toast that I decided after the third bag of crisps last night that today would be carb free. 

7.50am- Read Daily Mail online.  Feel smug and judgemental.  Take comfort that at least I haven't sold my children's souls, like Shona Sibary. 

8am- Attempt to tidy up a bit.  Wonder if there's any point in putting away the gin.

8.30am- Remember I haven't made the Beast's packed lunch.  Open his lunchbox to find the interior smeared in yesterday's yoghurt, which has now dried on.  Confiscate the iPad in a fit of pique.

8.45am-  Finally bother to read the note that Scottish Water shoved through the door two days ago.  Realise it says they are turning off the water at 9am.  Panic fill kettles and pots and turn on the bath.

8.50am-  Blizzard starts.  Wave son off to school in it.  Grit my teeth and resolve to tackle de-crapping the garden.  Pick up shit in the blizzard, muttering darkly to myself.

9am-  Remember bath is still running, and water has not yet gone off.  Run inside and find bath overflowing. 

9.05am- Water goes off, as I attempt to mop up the flood in the bathroom.  Realise I have not actually managed to get washed, and the bath is full of ice water, that I am keeping for an unspecified 'emergency'.  Think about gin and search the sky for albatrosses.

9.30am-  Give in to the Terror's demands for a walk.  Meet fellow posh Border Terrier lady in the woods.  Spend a blissful fifteen minutes conversing with someone who understands.  Till the dogs fall out over a rabbit they are both attempting to kill and we must go our separate ways.  Cross torrential river with dog, lose balance and fall over.  Successfully save iPhone from the raging currents, but not my dignity nor poise.  Emerge dripping, to find dog has taken advantage of my distraction and scarpered.  Meet the nice retired vet neighbours, as I am standing like a drowned rat bellowing "YOU FUCKING DOG, WHERE ARE YOU?"  Confirming my suspicions that the little sod never goes far when he bolts, but just hides to annoy me, the Terror chooses this moment to appear, looking like butter wouldn't melt.  Recross the raging currents, hoping the wretched dog gets swept away.

10.30am- Return home, to find the Twat Bags neighbours have parked across the road from my drive again, inhibiting the Mighty Honda's passage.  Call police.  Speak to nice lady who agrees they are indeed twats**  Realise I have turned into the sort of person who calls the police about parking disputes, but my existential crisis is already so severe I cannot bring myself to care.  Consider not reading the Daily Mail so much, but discard this foolish notion, because otherwise how would I know what will give me cancer, then cure it; or who Katie Price is married to; or whether Suri Cruise is All Grown Up yet?

10.42am-  The glow of the Fires of Righteous Indignation fade, leaving me sodden, cold, grubby and still waterless.  With people coming for lunch at 12.  Mercy dash to M&S, where I squelch round and spend an unfeasible amount of money on quiche and salad.

11.14am- Stop off at the overpriced pretentious gym I pay £69 a month not to go to.  Spend too long in the shower, trying to get my £69's worth.  Try not to think about all the other months I've paid for and the true cost of this shower.  Think about existential crisis instead, and albatrosses.

12pm- Watch Other People's Children trash my house.  Lose the plot when one hits my Most Precious Dog, all thoughts of my wish to drown him forgotten.  Find existential crisis greatly eased by chocolate eclairs.

3pm- Survey the carnage, wonder why the police haven't come round yet.

4pm- Collect my ghastly children; dick around on Facebook instead of listening to them wittering.  Feel aggrieved that the forecast Snowmageddon is the only topic on the local FB pages, with people demanding to know the state of the roads, instead of having poorly spelt public spats about where they should leave their bins, and how dare farmers put cows in fields they might want to walk through.

5pm- Think about gin.  Wonder if it would be unseemly to be shitfaced if the police come.  Consider setting timer for six o'clock and legitimate gin. 

5.13pm-  Realise setting timer for gin was a pointless exercise. 

6pm-  Look!  S'an albatrosh.  Oh no, shorry offisher, I mishtook you for an albatrosh.  Would you like to hear my tale?  Here, have shome ginny gin gin.

*Nosy do-gooder
**Possibly not in so many words

SNOWMAGEDDON!!!!!! Or We Are All Dooooooooooomed!!!!

There is snow.  Not that much snow, but enough to cause fear and distress in the hearts of those feeble and pathetic creatures who are not as clever as me.  I, of course, possessing a Mighty Honda, a pair of Dubarry boots, and a brave and intrepid soul*, embrace the snow, for I welcome the opportunity to demonstrate to the world just how fucking clever I am, and just how stupid everyone else is. 

This time though, my snow day has been spoilt by twats.  It should be going so right.  The Beast is finally old enough to be sent out sledging in the field by himself.  The Terror is exhausted by running around in the snow, and sleeps instead of trying to kill things.  I have many ingredients for soup, and much flour to smugly make homemade bread, so I do not have to panic buy from the Local Shop, like the unprepared fools.  But I had reckoned without People, and their thwarting ways.

The day started well.  So well.  How smugly I smirked to myself as I bestrode the frozen fields, judging the other dog walkers as they slipped and slid in their inferior wellies.  No slipping for me in my insanely expensive 4x4 Dubes.  How I mocked their nasty fleeces and fluorescent water proofs, as I marched on, so cosy in my cashmere, and pitied them all their lack of pearls. 

The Terror, for once, even behaved like a normal dog and did bizarre things like coming when called, and not trying to kill packs of giant dogs singlehandedly**.  He even removed himself from a rabbit hole when admonished, saving me the ignominy of lying on my stomach in the snow, rootling around trying to grab his tail and haul him out.  This excellent behaviour left me in the unusual position of even being able to judge other people's dogs, for being pathetic, feeble creatures that needed to wear coats in the snow, not like my hardy Terror, who laughs in the face of all weather.***

Home from our walk, I had a good chuckle over the local Facebook pages, where there was much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth****, and dire warnings to drive nowhere on the snowy roads, for all was doomed, doomed.  Then I hopped in my Mighty Honda and popped off to the gym*****.  Such fun! 

I must confess I did indulge in a spot of panic buying while I was out, but only in Majestic- the idea of running out of wine fills me with horror.  I returned home, smugger than a smug thing, as I drove merrily up our hill behind a VW Passat sliding all over the place and blowing blue smoke as they over revved the engine, only to have my smug joy replaced by burning ire when I discovered the Twatting Twattish Twatty Twat neighbours had parked their shitty car across the road from my driveway.  Again. 

This has been an on-going issue for three years.  Our road is narrow.  The Twats have off road parking for at least six cars on their driveway, but they refuse to use it, even though if someone parks across the road from a driveway, it's nigh on impossible to reverse out without many complex manoeuvrings. I have explained this to the Twatting Twattish Twatty Twats many many times, including through the medium of sharply reversing into their car and shouting at them for it.  I have also tried parking across from their driveway to demonstrate the difficulties they cause me; and my personal favourite, standing in the street with the nice old ladies who live on either side of me and loudly discussing the Twats' shortcomings, both in parking and for being lazy, workshy, southern fops, who ponce around being all 'meejah' instead of having proper jobs.  Also, they once stole my hedgehog******

This time the DC assured me he had dealt with it.  He had spoken to He Twat, who had moved the car.  To a worse place. He had spoken to them again and they had promised to move it.  He went to the pub.  He came home and the car had moved four feet.  He went to 'speak' to them again.  It seems having fourteen stone of angry, swearing Irishman on your doorstep concentrates the mind wonderfully.  The car is now parked outside their own driveway, but I think it's time for us to move.   



*Some say I am just foolish and reckless, but they are stupid.  And wrong.

**I was going to say 'singlepawedly' but that seemed excessively twee.

***Except sunshine.  Sunshine makes him want to die. I suspect he may be a vampire dog. But luckily we live in Scotland, so sun is never a problem.

****Well, teeth were gnashed in the Enclave.  The Non-Enclavular Villages have to arrange an Annual Tooth Gnash, where they all gather by torchlight and solemnly watch each village's Tooth make a grand Procession to the Square, whence the Elder Wolf Man of each village bears The Village Tooth forth and all the Teeth are ceremonially gnashed together, to represent all frustration suffered over the preceding year.  Soup is served afterwards. 

***** Swam one length, then went in the Jacuzzi and steam room. 

****** The hedgehog theft still rankles so deeply, I may have to devote a whole separate blog post to it.  It was my hedgehog. And they stole it!  Twats!

Of Pearls and Print.

I have been chastised for my feeble and pathetic approach to blogging and have resolved to try harder.  I have also resolved to drink less gin and go to the gym though, neither of which are likely to happen, so don't hold your breath.

All the jolly, festive things I could have blogged about are no longer pertinent, as I was extremely busy over the festivities working my way through the 51 bottles of wine the DC had thoughtfully purchased to numb the pain of Christmas with the TQ. 

Suffice to say that in a break with tradition, I did not end Christmas Day crying in the garage with a bottle of Baileys for company, declaring my hatred of humanity in general and my family in particular.  This year I decided to cry in the dining room instead, due to the garage roof blowing off.  I must say the dining room proved a much better choice, having a) heating b) an armchair and c) lots of other booze as well as Baileys, and I think I shall make that my default flounce location in future.

In other news I have binned off the PTA, hurrah, such fun, joy of joys of joyous joys!  I am free as a bird to tell anyone and everyone to fucking fuck off as far as they fucking can, to my black, little heart's content.  Or I was, for about a week, when my desire to meddle, do good and annoy people all at the same time overcame me, and I signed up to help with the local newsletter ("It's not a newsletter Cassandra, it's a proper newspaper"  Despite it being only twelve pages long, six of which are obituaries, and only issued quarterly). 

This is not as dire as it sounds.  The newspaper is run by a coven of fritefly fritefly Grande Dames, who rule the village with an iron fist.  The good thing about associating with them is that I am young and sprightly by comparison, and also I don't have to explain why I talk like a BBC radio programme from 1932, because as far as they are concerned, that is how everyone should speak, and if you don't, you are a ghaaaaaastly oik, or one of the staff. 

I swathed myself in pearls upon pearls and draped many layers of cashmere about myself for the first meeting.  I drew the line at tweed, lest they thought I was taking the piss, but on reflection, I could totally have got away with it.  I perhaps overdid the pearls and cashmere slightly though, as I may have been a bit bling for the dowagers, judging by a few of the 'looks' cast through their lorgnettes.*

The meeting was blissful blissikins.  They know everything about everyone (I was slightly worried what they might know about me), and it turned out we all hate the same people.  Much of the meeting was devoted to how much they could publish about secret planning applications for the enclave, which may sound dullsville, but we do adore a good planning ding dong out here in the country.  My eyes must have grown saucer like and my jaw slack with wonder at the gossip being revealed, because eventually Clarissa felt compelled to snap "You realise all this is confidential Cassandra, and you must be extremely discreet" and I slumped disconsolately against Dorothy's divine silk cushions and resumed wondering how much her house was worth. 

I did however stun them with the revelation that I could do spreadsheets, which seemed to them a thing of wonder, and I was thus deemed worthy to be accepted into their number.  I twirled my pearls in acknowledgement of the honour bestowed upon me, and spoilt the moment rather by choking on a crisp.

*OK, maybe they didn't actually have lorgnettes, but in my head they did!