A Benecol bottle, a Prince and the world at our feet

If only you could bottle your children (put the phone down, there's no need to call Social Services).

The other day, I asked Daniel (5) to come and sit on my knee for a cuddle and he sensed I was feeling a bit glum and asked what was wrong.

"Oh nothing, I just had a bad dream about you last night".
"What happened mum?"
"Well son, we were playing on the beach and a big wave came and washed you away from me."
Daniel gave this some thought and replied: "Don't worry mum, you know how the sea works, the waves go in and out so I would come straight back to you on the next wave."

Such moments of wonder followed by opening his school bag to find rather a large pool of water swishing around in the bottom with his school work and the usual assortment of sticks, elastic bands and bits and bats floating around in it.

In and among the drenched debris was an old Benecol yoghurt drink bottle which he had filled with water to surprise me.

The lid had been secured with sellotape and he had wrapped it in an A4 sheet of paper (cue smiley face with lop-sided smile and eyebrow raised).

Speaking of which, a piece of A4 paper dominated world news the week.  (Did you see how I seamlessly segued from mumsy trivia to a historic moment in history? Or was it the other way round?)

A child was born; undoubtedly a special child, a future King, of interest to us all, whether we want to admit it or not (you know who you are, S).  But, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, was nothing else happening in the country, nay the world?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  (Please read capital letters in a shouty voice and excuse the blasphemy, you know who you are Rev.)

I felt for the presenters who had to smile a jaw-aching smile and endlessly wax lyrical without repeating the sentence 'it's a boy'.  And I felt for camera operatives who worked for years to gain knowledge and experience in their field and were subjected to a day spent zooming in and out on an easel.

Twenty-four hour news coverage is superb when there's actual breaking news, yet mind-numbing when the news has broken and it becomes like a stuck record (once again, apologies to anyone under 30 who has no idea what this analogy means, imagine your ipod shuffle not shuffling).

And speaking of 'news' that isn't really actually 'new' or even 'true' in my humble opinion, I was reading the Daily Mail this week.  No, I didn't buy it, the in-laws left it for me to clean the windows with (another top tip thrown in there, see previous blog).

I always thought the media's 'silly season', when they roll out the equivalent of Primary School 'what I did in my holidays' articles, was August.  However, it would seem the DM is padding out column inches with seasonal yet entirely non-newsworthy drivel in July.   Zoe Brennan wrote a scathing and entirely biased article entitled 'Scams, cons and the TRUE cost of your budget flight' (the sub editor must have wanted to shout the word TRUE for some reason or perhaps in caps it fitted in the space better).

I won't insult you by explaining in detail what the article is about.....Ryanair, easyJet, baggage charges, legroom charges, jump-the-queue charges, pricey in-flight snacks, yadder yadder, you get the picture.

Cobblers.  COBBLERS, I say.

I could end the blog here, but allow me to pad out my blog with silly season rambling (what's new, I hear you cry!).

Are we all really stupid?  Does anyone actually think that a flight advertised at £17.99 is fully inclusive of return trip for a family of eight to Dubai in Business Class with on-tap champagne, caviar, Pringles and a head, neck and shoulders massage from a handsome man with an Irish accent?!

YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR!  Does that not apply to absolutely everything in life?  Why then do people like Zoe feel that budget airlines are somehow pulling a fast one.  (I hope Mr O'Leary is reading this, I might get extra legroom thrown in on my next flight.....OK, maybe not).  But that's exactly my point, if I want extra leg room, I accept it's an added extra and I will pay for it.

Has Zoe and like-minded thinkers forgotten how we used to fly?  Or should I say, how we didn't fly, BECAUSE WE COULDN'T AFFORD IT!

While living in Portugal, I would endure exhausting day-long journeys with my baby /toddler city-hopping via places such as Frankfurt or Paris because I couldn't afford direct flights.  I could now buy a flight WITH all the fee-payable extras of leg room, baggage and priority boarding for a fraction of the price I would have paid for a direct flight from Porto to the UK in the early 2000s.  AND (oh my, now I've started.....) so-called budget airlines should be applauded for acknowledging that there IS life in the north of England and us lovely folk who live there would like to go abroad too, without a long-haul trip down the M1 first!!

The Ryanairs and easyJets of this world have made this world more accessible to the masses.  End of.

And don't get me started on baggage allowances. If you choose to avoid the fees to stow your luggage in the hold, then you must comply by the cabin baggage rules, simples!  It's not rocket science, if your bag is too big, it won't fit in the overhead locker, duhr (no matter how hard you shove it or shout at the nice lady in polyester).  There are ferries you know, or I hear Margate is lovely at this time of year.

And if you are required to print your boarding card before arriving at the airport, why the hell are you surprised, and offended, if you have to pay to hold up the process.  If you didn't print out your ticket before you got on a train, for example, you would have to pay the full fare on the train, it's just the same.  Zoe, in her article, even whinges about fees for missing your flight!  Does she think an airport control tower runs like a bloody school walking bus!?

OK, I'm going to shut up as I can sense I'm going on a bit.  I'm off to clean my windows....

Fun in the sun

I read my own blog back to check for typos and I suppose it's reasonably funny and yet I don't really consider myself a 'funny' person.  My own husband and mother are always keen to tell me I have no sense of humour ('just like your Grandma', my mum reliably informs me).

However, I am fortunate that those around me ARE hilarious and all I have to do is recount what they say and do and, hey presto, I've got myself a blog, hopefully, worth reading.

This week, I've decided I might venture into 'parenting tips'; here's my top five.

Tip number one: Don't stop digging (ever)

Sunday afternoon, Bridlington beach.  I had been tasked with digging a hole while my beautiful five-year-old trekked up and down with buckets of water.

I made sure I was busily digging while Daniel walked the 100 yards back to the hole and then took a small break while he marched back out to re-fill his bucket.

That was until, on one return journey he calmly said: "Mum, you need to keep digging, even when I'm not watching."

What is it they say about parents having eyes in the back of their heads?

Tip number two: Join in (but avoid cold shocks)

It's not just family that supply the anecdotes, friends are superb blog-fodder too and it seems I'm not the only one who will happily participate in children's activities, with the odd proviso.

Teddy was round at this mate's house for a sleep-over at the weekend and, with the sun blazing, aforementioned mate's dad decided they would all have a water bomb fight.

So off he went to prepare the water bombs while the boys played on the PlayStation.
What a fun and helpful father I thought to myself.

But he let me in on his secret.  If he was to be involved in any water bomb-related 'fun', he always made sure he prepared the water bombs himself so he could leave them in the sun to warm them just enough to take the 'chill' factor out of the fun, for his own sake!  Priceless.

Tip number three: Take a walk (it's a big world out there, so share it with your kids) 

Anecdotes come from the most unlikely sources.  Here's one I heard at the dentist.

As you know I run a walking bus at my kids' school and armed with 20 hi-vis vests while booking an appointment, I got chatting to the receptionist about kids and walking, or should I say, the rarity of kids walking.

Debating the issue, the lady told me a story she had heard that week.

Her son's class were on a school outing to some local fields (a field trip, perhaps).  As they walked from one field to the next, her son's friend, clearly exhausted, turned to his teacher and asked, 'are we in a different country now?'

Tip number four: Avoid slip-on shoes (and ensure their socks are clean)

And speaking of fields, I can't resist this one, although you maybe 'had to be there'.  At school sports day, an adorable friend of my sons' was taking part in the obstacle race.

She had just completed the 'sack' section and was ready for the final sprint to the finishing line. However, as she stepped out of the sack and set off she realised she was running in her stocking feet, having left her shoes behind in the sack.

Bless her, instead of carrying on with a chance for victory, she went back, fished her shoes out of the sack and returned them to their rightful place, much to the amusement of the onlooking peers and parents.  She finally finished the race just as the next one was about to begin, giggling all the way.  Now, that's what I call a good sport.

Tip number five: Make up your own title (that's an instruction, not a title, by the way)

Of course, my inspiration (and indeed my reason for living) largely comes from within my own four walls, courtesy of my beautiful boys.

So I'll end on a Teddy special this week.  While outside playing cricket with the local kids, Teddy said our neighbour had come out and joined in their game.  He later informed me, out of interest, that our neighbour was left-handed but right-footed.

Anyway, we chatted some more and I commented that our neighbour had probably enjoyed the chance to join in the game with the local kids, as he didn't have any children himself.

To which Teddy replied: "Is that because he's left-handed and right-footed?"

Hold the front page

I love that expression, do you think it's actually used in real life?  It never cropped up in my journalism career, more like, "what the **** are we gonna put on the front page, no cats stuck up trees this week?!"

But this week, my news really is worthy of the 'splash'!

I've discovered the single cause of obesity in women aged between 30 and 50 (I make no apologies for being very gender and age specfic).

I can see scientists everywhere scrambling to the computer to read withdewrespect and share the eureka moment with me and a belated entry being added under the Ws on the Queens Birthday Honours List.

My miraculous discovery came just yesterday as I was (again, sitting comfortably) leafing through the new summer edition of the Lakeland catalogue (target market, females aged between 30 and 50).

There it was, on page 67.......a laundry basket with legs.

I rest my case (no pun intended, really).

Laziness (and expensive accessories which nourish this vice) is surprisingly not my 'whinge of the week', although the purchase of such costly comforts may induce the following pet hate.

Now, I work in a shop so I am able practice 'doing as I would be done by' (take your reference from the Classics, Bible or The Water Babies, as you wish) with regards to this niggle.

Picture the scene.  Two kids are hanging round my ankles, I'm trying in vain to squash a dozen eggs, a pineapple, four pints of full fat and a box of Cheerios into the final bag whilst searching desperately for the relevant store loyalty card.

There's an angry queue building as I fumble and curse under the pressure.  I think I'm home and dry, one hand is major-multi-tasking with a bag hanging from each finger, a child's sticky hand clutching my thumb and my open purse balanced in my palm.  I hold out my other hand for the change as the tension, and the queue, builds.

Into my now sweating palm, the cashier piles my receipt, a petrol voucher and my loyalty card precariously topped off with £7.98s worth of coppers.

Anarchy ensues as it all becomes too much for my trembling hands and the coins inevitably topple and roll all over the floor.

Still, I manage to bend down to pick them all up.....just like I'm capable of bending down to pick my clothes out of the washing basket!  'Work that waistline ladies!!!'   (I can't even be bothered being PC and saying 'ladies and gents', my husband doesn't even know where the washing machine is.)

PS: I LOVE Lakeland and the Co-Op (oops!) really.....  (Blow it, let's be honest, I'm never gonna find a sponsor for this blog am I?!)

Clearly not in the mood for a housewife's workout!

The long winter evenings.......

I sometimes read my own blog (I know, as Edmund Blackadder said (with rolling eyes), 'the long winter evening must just fly by'), and I worry.
I worry that people won't 'get it' and will think I'm sad and shallow (and perhaps a bit weird) and should watch News at Ten more.
You see, my blog largely consists of wittering on about life's trivia such as litter, the trials and tribulations of bringing up kids, dodgy Groupon deals, smelly fencing helmets and boiled eggs.
I'm not sure everyone will see beyond that.

But what I AM sure about is that people would a. stop reading; b. give me a hug; or c.punch me in the face; or d. all three, if I wrote about my thoughts on terrorist atrocities, famine, greed, unequal distribution of wealth, the overpopulation of the world, tolerance (and its evil archenemy 'intolerance'), religion, immigration, crime and punishment, excessive smoking, drinking and eating and their resultant toll on the healthcare services etc.
So, I'll stick to writing about the little stuff (or 'grass roots' if you will), which may seem like random banter about annoying children, litter and bad parking, and just hope that people see that what I'm actually writing about is common sense, respect for our planet, the value of friendship, the indescribable joys of parenthood, decent standards, peaceful and healthy living and good old fashioned 'love thy neighbour' morals.
Phew, I need a lie down now.

Well, the footie season is now over and I have my weekends back.  However, the long summer evenings are now spent watching my son play cricket.  It's OK (#yawn) but I miss the shouting (apparently not much to shout about at cricket, and I got told off for telling my son to 'just whack it!').

The footie season ended with the annual presentation and my son was made Manager's Player of the Year and his BFF was Player's Player of the Year (#proudmumsallowed).
I'm loving the # thing on twitter but still not a full FB convert, #mustyoushare/dowecare.  A friend said yesterday, 'blimey, never thought we'd see you on FaceBook!' and I stress that I'm still not a fan and use it purely as part of my cunning plot to take over the world with my blog and, of course, share the obligatory photographs of my beautiful children.

Parental shouting from the sidelines is a must, if only to embarrass the aforementioned beautiful children when they're not near enough to come and dig me in the ribs.
This season there has been a few classics, with mums and dads being heard to shout......
 "Leave your bloody hair alone" (you know who you are, son)
 "Stop pulling your sleeves down"
 "Stop marking grass"  (my personal favourite)
 "Get up and shake it off" (turned out to be a broken leg)
 "Carry on, you can have Calpol at half time" (just a mild case of concussion)

I'll leave you with a quick Women's Weekly reader's page-style observation. It's something that I keep noticing whenever I'm entering my personal details into an online form.  You know you're getting old when you have to scroll, and scroll, and scroll down the drop-down menu to reach your birth year!
#was1971reallythatlongago

Winning smiles

How to build a sandcastle

Sometimes I wonder when and where the inspiration for another blog will arrive, and I find it always does so when I least expect it.
Sitting comfortably (?!), leafing through the free Boots health and beauty magazine I'd just picked up from my local branch and there it was, amid a feature on 'retro' family fun in the sun.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm Boots' number 1 fan; while living in Portugal I missed Boots more than I missed my own parents.....I'd like to say 'only joking', but.....
Anyway, there in the Boots magazine was a half page spread on, wait for it, drum roll, red carpet, small bits of sparkly stuff falling from the ceiling.......how to build a sandcastle!

I jest not, the 'article' described, alongside three numbered 'diagrams', how to fill a bucket, tip it upside down and lift off the bucket with the words 'ta-dah' accompanying the final graphic.

Is it just me or has journalism / the world gone mad?  Why is anything dubbed as 'retro' largely just basic common sense that doesn't cost anything, doesn't involve forgetting chargers and doesn't make you fat.
We could say that walking to school is now 'retro', as I said in my speech to gathered dignitaries, supporters and friends at the press launch of the Hoppa last week (see previous blog), 'it's not rocket science'.

I've often thought I would like to write a book and would have called it 'Is It Just Me' if Miranda Hart hadn't nicked that idea (I'm not a big fan if hers so don't get me started).
Ellen Degeneres (a massive inspiration of whom I AM a huge fan) stole 'My Point and I do Have One' so I need to think of my own idea I suppose or maybe get withdewrespect readers to send answers on a postcard.

Well, today it's confession time as I've been outed as a hypocrite and I'm not afraid to be named and shamed for my behaviour.
After ranting about litter leavers in a recent blog, I made a fool of myself the other week when, in a friend's shiny new car, I couldn't find anywhere to put my exhausted chewing gum as we drove along a country lane, so I threw it out of the window.

My friend was horrified, and quite rightly so.  I immediately realised I  had sunk to the depths of those I abhor and I have been red-faced ever since.  After enduring my just telling off and hanging my head in shame, we chatted about the litter lout culture and I applauded her very brave actions recently.  She explained that she saw some lads drop their Macdonalds wrappers on the floor so she went over and politely said, 'excuse me, I think you've dropped something'.

What's that....children walking to school!?  (how 1980s)

Hoppa fever has taken over my life!!!

I was asked the other day if I'd abandoned withdewrespect.  My indignant reply was, 'certainly not'!
It's been a busy old few weeks as I'm launching 'an innovative new project' (or so my press release boasts!) at my children's school next week and it's taken over my life, leaving little time for idle ramblings.  So I apologise and reassure you that normal service will resume once our Hoppa is up and walking.

Your 'what' I hear you cry?!  (well, I thought I heard a small noise, were you just yawning?)

The Hoppa is a hybrid; a cross between a Walking Bus and a Park & Stride scheme, both of which, in my opinion, for various reasons are not a viable or sustainable alternatives to just driving to school.

Like most primary schools around the country, traffic is chaos outside our school.  And with that 'chaos' comes danger, 'an accident waiting to happen' as the media likes to dub these scenarios.
So, I've taken it upon my little self, enlisting invaluable help from the Head, fellow parents, local business and road safety professionals, to come up with a scheme to help our school children get walking.

I'm not driver or car-bashing, like some national road safety organisations tend to do.  We need to accept that cars are an integral and essential part of every day life and gone are the days when we all walked long distances to school.  Let's face it, in my days as an infant in the 70s few folk had cars anyway.  (I'll move on before I start sounding like a Monty Python sketch, and suggesting we lived in a shoe box in the middle of a road, which we cleaned with our tongues....).  Those were the days eh, when comedy was comedy and not watching Miranda fall off a chair (again)?

Sorry, where was I, oh yes, the school run.  It shouldn't be a chore. It is a rare chance to catch up with your children while they are not physically attached to an ipod, laptop or wii controller with their eyes glued to a flickering screen.
It's also a chance for them to socialise with and make new friends, get their chit-chatting out of the way and be ready to learn when they arrive at school.  It also gives them exercise, another increasing 'issue' in society.

Remember, 'stop, look and listen'?  These days our kids only hear these words when we say, 'hey, stop messing around in the back, look, you'll be in trouble if you drop those crisps on the back seat, I've had the car valeted, just listen to your music and shut up while I drive, we're late!"

And you see secondary school kids ambling down the middle of the road and wandering in front of cars because, if they're not ensconced 'inside' a car, they simply have no idea how to behave on the roads.  We all try to wrap our children in cotton wool, the cotton wool in this case being the latest  Ford SUV (other models are available).

It's simple, human beings are made of rather brittle materials, skin, bone that kind of thing whereas cars, lorries, vans and buses are made of rather strong chunks of iron, steel and glass.  It's not rocket science.  In an argument, human beings don't fare well.
We need to teach our children how to behave around these chunks of metal and we're  not going to do that if they are always 'inside' the aforementioned chunk.
Well, anyway, can someone give me a lift down from my soapbox please cos I need a wee?

Thank you.
That's better.

So, where was I?  Oh yes, I can assure you that, amid Hoppa activities, I've been storing up lots of anecdotal banter to keep you reading withdewrespect instead of Googling your own name when you're bored and the boss is out (ah, is that just me?).

Oh yes, and I've been running, that's what else I've been doing.  Here's a pic to prove it.  I did the Harewood House Age UK 10K in a gruelling one hour and 47 seconds.  Darn those hills, darn those 47 seconds and darn my running partner who lost me in the pack and cracked the hour!

On the buses

Being as I've been away a while, I'll get straight on with today's beef.
I sat opposite a very well turned out, forty-something professional lady on the train to Leeds yesterday.  She smiled politely at me and I formed an immediate opinion that she looked like a nice genteel individual.

Right until the moment she drank the dregs of her coffee, stood up and got off the train, leaving her disposable coffee cup, well, un-disposed, right there on the table!  Why do people think they have a God-given right to leave litter, let someone else come along and sit with their used coffee cup in front of them and leave someone else to clear it away.
It is just me?
Probably.

Sorry, withdewrespect has been on a short holiday, coupled with a nasty chest infection and followed by, oh what's that thing I do again.....?  Oh, that's right, work!
Also, Easter left me with far too much chocolate around the house so I've been on such a sugar high I couldn't string a sentence together.  Well, OK, the kids were left with so many eggs that I hid six in a kitchen cupboard and have been steadily munching through them ever since.  Whenever a child sneaks up and asks me what I'm eating, I smile sweetly and reply, 'an apple, do you want one'?

My holiday was to Portugal, as you know, once my country of residence.  I returned with a friend who was also travelling with children to visit their father.  Going towards the EU or Nothing to Declare exit choices on arrival at Porto Airport, my friend joked there should be a separate exit for International Divorcees.  It would be a busy exit I can tell you!!  And among those using it would be non-other than JK Rowling (and not a lot of people know that!).

On this trip we hired a car and ended up re-mortgaging both our houses thanks to the 'hidden extras' ( well, thanks to Groupon and affordablecarhire.com, NOT!)
Back in the days before I owned a car and the fantastic Metro do Porto was just a twinkle in a Transport Minister's eye, I was a regular on city's bus routes.
There was never a dull moment on the buses in the mid 90s I can tell you. Getting to empty seats was like a rampage scene from Jurrasic Park, jabbing elbows, right hooks and swinging handbags were commonplace in pursuit of an uncomfortable, wet and dirty blob of orange moulded plastic.  Put it this way, seats were as rare as a smile in a Portuguese Post Office (JK knows what I'm talking about!).

It was a daily adventure, often more farcical than Sid James' trousers falling down or Barbara Windsor making a boob of herself.
One day, my newly-purchased Nokia house brick rang.  I delved into my bag (as did everyone else!).  One minute, I'm just a face in the crowd.  I say, 'hello?', and I'm the daughter of Beelzebub!!!
Like a Wild West saloon when the baddie walks in, there's a deathly silence, everybody stares.

'Oh, hi mum, you OK.....yes I'm fine, just on the bus......'

Mothers gather up their babes in arms, children point, old ladies stare, men shuffle away.  Lock up your daughters, there's an alien on the bus!
I'm the one they stare at!!!  Opposite me a lady has two puppies in her shopping bag, behind me two women have set up a cottage industry, crocheting table cloths.  (Is this some form of tax evasion, crocheting on a moving bus, like duty free on an airplane?).  The man next to me retches, gargles and sends an expertly formed green globule of phlegm hurtling over my head and through the open window.
All this, everyone ignored.  I say 'hello' and you'd have thought I'd stripped naked, pulled out a pair of maracas and started singing Viva Espana.

I hasten to add that I am firmly in favour of 'when in Rome' and worked tirelessly to learn the lingua.  Even when I spoke near word-perfect Portuguese, I still had a noticeable (OK, dodgy) accent and grew to love the intrigued stares on the buses.  Or maybe I just bought a car....memory doesn't serve me well.

The Portuguese language is notoriously difficult to master.  Like all Latin languages, it's feminine this and masculine that, with no rhyme or reason, and there's more past and future tenses than you can shake a stick at.  And, perhaps much like English (sun / son), there are many similar sounding words with completely different meanings.
I once walked into a shop with a runny nose and asked for a packet of bed sheets.  (lencos = tissues / lencois = bed sheets)

 (PS: I love Portugal and its people really and I was always, and still am, made to feel at home in the land and like one of the family among its people.  The Portuguese are wonderful; every home should have one, mine does!!!!)