I lied...

Was it only yesterday I said that I loved my children? How things can change in 24 hours. It all started to go wrong when we had a sudden, very heavy downpour last evening. Earlier in the day DS and DD had been hanging out of the velux window (does that constitute reckless endangerment do you think?) flying some daft 75 cent wind up bird thing which they naturally got stuck in a gutter. After much prodding and poking said bird was removed from the gutter but do you suppose they shut the window?

It was only several hours later, as the rain continued to fall in stair rods, that DS happened to mention to DD that perhaps, possibly, maybe she may have left her window open. I rushed in to find water cascading down the open velux window straight onto her bed and the large pile of ironing that my dearest Mother had spent the last week sorting out, and which, of course, she had been asked to put away.

Now, being as I am a domestic disaster rather than a domestic goddess, the windows were probably last cleaned at the turn of the century, so the water which was now spreading across the bed, the ironing and the floor was a nasty shade of brown. End result, her mattress looks like the last resting place of a serial incontinent. Did I calmy clean up and say "never mind, darling, accidents happen" or did I scream like a banshee with PMT. You guess!

(I'm just having a quick break to restart my heart. My youngest cat just decided to jump onto the desk which is on a galleried landing, overjumped and just about sailed straight over the bannister. I had to grab him by his tail which now looks a good few centimetres longer. Talk about news as it happens eh?)

Back to my blog....

So DD had no option, or rather I had no option, but to let her sleep in my bed with all the midnight whacks in the face, grinding of teeth and speaking in tongues that that will entail - her not me I hasten to add.

When I finally made it to bed after seemingly hours of picking up clothes dropped on the bathroom floor, empty glasses left under the table (where else?), shoes missing their mates and other assorted detritus, I sought (blimey, couldn't remember how to spell that for a minute) the sanctuary of my bedroom where DD was doing a passable imitation of the Vitruvian man, mouth hanging open and snoring gently. Great.

I collected up the jumbled arms and legs and deposited them over to the other side of the bed and hopped in ready to endure another chapter of Carol Drinkwater's 'The Olive Harvest'. I've never come across a writer who can use so many adjectives that it makes my head spin. Still, I press on.

A peaceful 10 minutes pass before DS appears claiming that the storm overhead is stopping him sleeping and can he get into my bed too. (Thank god DH is away!) DS, despite being only 12, is already 5'7 so it's no mean feat to squash us all into the bed, despite it being a superking.

I can hear my mother's doomladen warning ringing in my ears. "You're making a rod for your own back letting the children sleep in your bed" she said when they were but little nippers. But even I thought it was fair to assume that by the time teenagedom was approaching they might have kicked the habit.

So, a very long, very sleepless night, for me at least, followed as I tried my best to hang on to the few square centimetres they had left me, fought for the pillows and prodded assorted snorers and teeth grinders. Eventually at 6am, Basil, my mad kitty decided to come and chew my nose, so that was the end of another rejuvenating night.

Talking of noses, I'm sporting a very sore one today. I tried to peer through a shop window which had one of those security grilles behind it. It created some sort of optical illusion (well that's my story anyway) and I didn't realise the glass was so far forward. I ended up nose-butting the window really hard and now have a slightly swollen, slightly purple nose. Only me...thank god I forgot to spend thousands on a nose job all those years ago.