Sizzling Hot!

Someone gave me this a few years ago cut out of a newspaper- don't know which one. I'm not normally in favour of the slightly sexist slant these articles can sometimes take (either in favour of male OR female) but this one seems to me to be fairly accurate!
Anyway, it still makes me laugh, so given the predictions for the coming summer, I thought I'd share...


When a man volunteers to do the BBQ, the following chain of events is set in motion:

1) The woman buys the food.

2) The woman cleans the salad, prepares the dips and makes pudding.

3) The woman prepares the meat for cooking, places it on a tray along with the necessary cooking utensils and sauces, and takes it to the man who is lounging beside the grill ? beer in hand. The woman pours herself a large glass of white wine. Here comes the important part:

4) THE MAN PLACES THE MEAT ON THE GRILL! Commander of the Coals, he brandishes the tongs in a manly fashion. Everything about his posture says: "This cooking lark's a doddle."

5) The woman goes inside to organise the plates and cutlery.

6) The woman comes out to tell the man that the meat is burning. He thanks her and asks if she will bring another beer while he Deals With The Situation. Another very important part:

7) THE MAN TAKES THE MEAT OFF THE GRILL AND HANDS IT TO THE WOMAN.

8) Inside, the woman cannot find a clean glass and starts drinking wine from the bottle. She scrapes the burnt bits off the lamb steaks and, from the oven, produces some M&S kebabs which she has bought, just in case. The woman prepares the plates, salad, bread, cutlery, napkins, sauces and brings them to the table.

9) After eating, the woman clears the table and loads the dishwasher. And most important of all:

10) Everyone PRAISES the MAN and THANKS HIM for his cooking efforts.

11) The man asks the woman how she enjoyed "Her night off". Woman grips barbecue skewer tightly. Says nothing.

Happy Bard-day to you...

As well as St George, St Phil (my brother) and countless other important luminaries, today is the lesser known William Shakespeare's birthday. Wiki says they don't know his birthday, only the day of his baptism. But, hey ho, this'll do. It's also the day he died, and four hundred years to the month that his first book of sonnets were sold for sixpence. Apparently.
Anyway. Here's my tribute. I read it at Poetry Cafe at the Bluecoats tonight. They didn't seem to mind that I was teasing slightly.
Mind you, I didn't dare attempt to tell them that St George was probably Turkish o_O x


No Longer Eighteen

Shall I compare thee to a wet weekend?
The ruthless winds have stripped our orchards bare
The lease is up, and yet we still pretend
sweet temperance? Or do we just not care?

In time, most mortal flesh begins to sag.
In Shakespeare's day they died at fifty one.
Who wants to live forever? let death brag.
At least the shade will keep us out the sun.

And so you raise the volume on the box.
Deaf as a post, but still with eyes that see-
In widescreen watch as Britney shakes her locks
Long gone the times you looked like that at me.

But trade you in? My darling, don't dismay-
I'll hang on, so the life insurance pays.

Genius

Two reports for you today. Spot the connection.

A couple of weekends ago, my brother's wife's sister (stay with me) got married.
Her father is the vicar of in Holy Trinity in Idle, Diocese of Bradford, and so he performed the ceremony, and the reception was held at a nearby venue.

As my sister in law and her father have been involved in firework displays on and off for years, at the previous two siblings weddings the evening had been rounded off by a spectacular light show of some sort. True to tradition, they decided, as a surprise gift for the bride and groom, to launch some paper lanterns, lit inside, creating a beautiful display.




The day was a success, and the lanterns rounded things off beautifully.







The second is a report which appeared a few days ago in the Telegraph and Argus, a local Bradford newspaper. The report is by Marcus Meneaud, and the full text can be found here.

The headling states "UFO sightings are no joke for Denise", and the article goes on to describe

"...reports of up to five red or orange orbs hovering silently in the night sky before quickly disappearing."

The 'Denise' in the headline is Denise Wilson, who 'saw them circling above her home in Moorside, Daisy Hill, Bradford, when she took her dog for a night-time stroll.'

“There were four round red or orange glowing lights flying in formation,cruising towards me. ... They weren’t flying very high, not as high as planes and then they disappeared above the trees.
... I don’t care what people think of me, I know what I saw and it wasn’t normal and it wasn’t man-made. It was very, very strange, like some-thing out of Close Encounters of the Third Kind!”

A further couple of residents had spotted the same UFO's, although one described similar lanterns he had seen in China.

Coincidence?!
the truth is out there.....

Do you think they should confess?! :-)

Hitting the Bottle

Hitting the Bottle
Originally uploaded by smont

My nephew seems to have developed a love of drinking directly from the bottle.
It would seem he's transfered this skill to bottles of wine.

I would like to point out that it isn't my hand holding the bottle, I was taking the photograph. Honestly.

Bless x

Random Statistic of the Week...

STRONGER FEELING HAIR*, SHINY COLOUR, WORKS IN JUST 10 MINUTES

Introducing NEW Garnier Herbashine, our first hair colourant enriched with bamboo extract, containing no ammonia and it works in just 10 minutes
Is this range right for me?
- If you want a colourant with no ammonia.
- If you want a colourant that works in just 10 minutes.
- If you want to help cover greys.
- If you want hair that feels stronger and looks shiny.

*87% agreed when tested on 304 women. Strength also measured as resistance to brushing

(Garnier website, 31st March 2009)

Two thoughts. Number one, that means 264.48 (point four eight of a woman could be interesting...?) agreed that their hair felt stronger. With the population of the UK alone being approximately 61,612,300 this would be an interestingly small sample, but on the Garnier website you can choose your location from not one but sixteen countries, including Russia, USA and China. I went to wikipedia, found their best UN population guesses and added them up, making a total population of 2,312,343,413 people. Given they specified 'women', half of that is 1,156,171,706.5 (ish). Lots of them will be kids, I know. But you get the idea. That means, that in order to advertise this product as producing 'stronger feeling hair', they sampled about 0.00002% of their target audience, 87% of whom agreed with the premise that their hair felt stronger*. I'd work that out but I feel my luck on the maths front is running out- where's Nathan when I need him??! Anyway, I wonder if those who participated actually had to buy the product or if they were given it for free? And now I think about it, I wonder about the 39.52 women who said 'No, it's stupid and doesn't make any difference at all.'

Second thought. 'Strength also measured as resistance to brushing'. Who? What? When? How? Where? Why? What colour was the brush? Was it a Tuesday? Is that the hair or the participants strength they're talking about... 'Give me that brush'... 'No, get off'.... 'Give me the damn... blimey, you're strong...'

Adverts. Gotta love em.

I'm not even going there with the bamboo extract...

*All figures are unproven and totally unscientifically worked out. In fact, I got my pet iguana to draw them out of a hat. I don't actually have a pet iguana. Which makes that last bit a lie. A lie is like a statistic, only more honest.

A Smear on my Character...

So, I'm not sure how I got myself into this, but here are my thoughts on smear tests, for Rosie and anyone else who cares to read!

I first had a smear test when I was at university. In those days it was encouraged for all women, not just those over twenty five as the crazy rules are today. It was done by the sister at the health clinic, and whilst not my first choice of relaxing occupation, it was in no way painful or uncomfortable.
You undress, bottom half only (actually, that's the really strange bit, I find- being naked waist down only is an unusual thing! Maybe if I'd had a baby it wouldn't be so odd) and lie on the bed, with your knees bent. It's not a torture chair arrangement like you see on American tv, it's just the usual doctor's couch thing. The doctor will insert the speculum, which is not cold, is round tipped so slides in easily, and doesn't in any way hurt. In fact, I've found that once it's in you don't really notice it, stretchy as us girls are. Just as painless and easy as tampons.
The doctor will open it slightly, just to allow her to see, then will take a swab from inside you using what looks like a long q-tip thing. It doesn't scrape in any way, you don't feel it.
And that's it. Job's done, it's over.

The reason I understand the fear is when I started with a new doctor about ten years ago, she asked me if I'd had a smear before, I said I had, and so she didn't feel she needed to explain what she was doing as she was went along. This would have been ok, but she decided to do a pelvic examination as well, which was not something I'd had before, and apparently is unusual to do with no reason. It also wasn't painful, was more embarrassing, as it involved inserting fingers inside and then pressing upwards and down on the abdomen from the outside. Again, this wouldn't be a problem but for the fact I didn't know it was going to happen!
As a result, I didn't go for a smear test for a long time, ignoring the letters and reminders from the doctors. Pure embarrassment, nothing else.

The thing is though, it could save your life.

It's free, it takes about five minutes, and it really, really could save your life.

By the time you have symptoms of cervical cancer, it's often too late. Screening picks up PRE- cancerous cells, that is cells that may turn cancerous one day but haven't yet. And it's pretty curable. The point is, without screening, you won't know you have cervical cancer until it's probably too late.

Eventually I plucked up the courage and went back. I told the receptionist how nervous I was, and she said she'd not been for ages either, and if I went through with it, she would too. I told my doctor how nervous I was, and she was amazing. She talked me through every step of the way, explaining what she was doing and where she was up to in the whole process. She was patient, understanding, very calm and very practical. It took minutes, and at the end I felt foolish for not doing it sooner.

Our daughters won't have to do this. The human papillomavirus (HPV) that causes cervical cancer is now preventable with a vaccine, and is being offered to school aged girls. Stupidly, some schools are opting out on the grounds that it might encourage the girls to have sex. Don't start me on this topic or this blog post will be very, very long. It's also stupid that boys aren't getting it, because they can be carriers, if not actually falling ill themselves. So, anyway, we're the last generation that will need to go and do this.

But, speaking of our daughters, if we are ever to have any of our own, we need to make sure we don't die of cervical cancer first.

So, top tips.
1. Be seen by a female doctor. Ask when you make the appointment. It's perfectly ok.
2. Make sure she knows you are nervous. She won't think you are stupid or immature, she's seen it all before. Really.
3. Relax. Honestly, if you can face dentists, needles and the Next sales, this is child's play. And the more relaxed you are, the easier it will be.
4. Ask your doctor to talk you through the steps she is taking. It really helps, and can allow you to ask questions as you go along if you need to.
5. Congratulate yourself on how brave you've been- rewards are essential!

I know it seems scary, but once you've done it, you'll realise it's not. At worst, it's a little embarrassing, because we're so English and reserved. And for me, a red face is not a good enough excuse!

Please comment, ask questions, disagree, debate, discuss and encourage. The only stupid question is the one you don't ask. We need to support each other with this. In 2006 (the latest stats) 949 women in the UK died from this. Nine hundred and forty- nine. Let's prevent as many more as we can.

Further information is available here.

Feelings... nothing more than...

This morning I watched Dancing on Ice: The Final, a repeat from Sunday evening. Being pathologically unable to watch television without my laptop in front of me, I'd already seen that Ray Quinn, a celebrity due to his previous appearance as runner-up on the X Factor, having discovered a genuine talent for ice skating through the competition had then won overall. He beat Donal MacIntyre, a journalist, made celebrity due to his willingness to go undercover and put his life in danger, which seemed a little at odds with the neon spandex of his ice dance costumes; and Jessica Taylor, a celebrity due to her previous appearance on the talent competition Pop Stars, a forerunner of X Factor, where she and the other runners up became the momentarily successful pop group Liberty X.
Over the series, Torvill and Dean, famous for being incredibly successful at their sport of ice dance and winning a lot of medals, auditioned amateur none-celebrities (there ought to be a word for people who aren't celebrities now, just to distinguish them. Might I suggest 'ignority', one who is unworthy of notice?) to become their Ice Stars. So, they auditioned a selection of ignorities, all of whom were talented ice skaters, all of whom were wannabe celebrities, and they selected five acts to appear last week, the winner of which would appear live on last night's Dancing on Ice: The Final. The finalists were interviewed, worked with the choreographers from the show, then performed for Jane and Chris, who chose a group of five lads calling themselves The Oxford Freestylers, as being suitably talented but also 'street' and 'out there' for their ignority act. It is important that when sharing a stage with a genuine celebrity that an ignority is either a rough diamond (in their performance, their accent, their intelligence or their clothing) or if showing potentially equal talent to the real celebrities (ie, they've appeared in a reality TV final before as Ray and Jessica had), then they must be only about six years old in order that they will not pose an immediate threat and so that the tabloid press can chart their slow decline into rehab by the age of fifteen.
Am I starting to sound cynical? I do apologise, stay with me, there is a point...
The Oxford Freestylers were interviewed before their performance about what winning Meant To Them. And their youngest member, straight to camera, said that for him, it had been an amazing journey. And it got me thinking... how on earth did a fourteen year old come out with the words 'amazing journey'? I mean, don't get me wrong, I'd been listening to Ray, Donal and Jessica for the last hour- 'chance of a lifetime', 'such an honour', 'amazing thrill', 'pleasure to work with', 'didn't think I'd get so far', 'just wanted the experience' almost on a loop, but something struck me about hearing it from someone so young. It's not a natural thing for a teenager to say. And his expression when he said it- so earnest, so serious, so self deprecating- now modesty is all well and good, but I know teenagers, and when they're good at something they like to tell you about it. And I realised, he'd learned it from watching. From our (un)reality TV soaked culture, where every contestant knows that they must strike the right balance between confident and humble, charming and demure, endearing and cheesy, must profess shock when they win and gratitude (and tears) when they lose, must, in short, play the game by the established celebrity rules.
We are reaching a point where our teenagers will expect that when they go for a job interview it will involve a ten minute piece to camera about how much the job means to them, what they will feel if they get it, how much they've enjoyed the selection process, how great it's been to meet the potential employers and other candidates, and a tearful tribute to their nan, who's always believed in them This will be followed by a vote and a prolonged announcement of the winning candidate by the MD. Oh, and lesser jobs awarded for the runners up so no-one feels left out.
I contrast this with three news reports, two from today, one from earlier in the week. In the earlier one, Dr Carol Craig, addressing a conference of Headteachers, warned that the constant drive to build self-esteem in schoolchildren had gone too far, and that we were in danger of creating a society of narcissists, unable to take criticism. 'If we say to people the most important thing is how you feel about yourself, then if a child fails maths and feels bad, it is very tempting for them to blame it on others like teachers and parents.'
The second, from today, was from Childline, the charity set up with the whole purpose of listening to children, and how they feel. They said that the number of children ringing to talk about feelings of suicide had tripled in the last five years, some calls from children under the age of eleven. Tripled. Now this would seem to be at odds with Dr Craig's assessment of the way we manage the feelings of children, were it not for the fact that Dr Craig's job is as chief executive of the Centre for Confidence and Wellbeing.
Now before I get lynched at dawn, please understand, I am a great supporter of therapy, having been in it for several years, and fully support people being in touch with their feelings, an expression which has always reminded me of the old joke about having baths- once a month, whether I need it or not. How do you get in touch with your feelings? By email? a quick call? Perhaps these days a tweet is all that is necessary- in touch in 140 characters or less. And there, in all seriousness, lies the problem.
We encourage children to feel, but then we don't tell them what to do with those feelings once they've got them; how to manage a sense of success and failure, how to form sense of well-being and develop a proportionate response to things around them. We compartmentalise feelings into something you 'do' when a camera is pointed at you, or when a tragedy occurs. We then blur the lines between tragedy, setback and minor disappointment. We set up celebrity role models to show them the correct way to respond to disappointment, the depth of sincerity required to get anywhere ('it means the world/my life/everything to me'- count how many times it occurs on the next X Factor auditions) and the expectation that you too can be Ray, can be Alicia, can be Jade. And I write this knowing the end of that particular tragic drama, whilst already the 'peoples princess' comparisons are being written and the black- edged red- tops tout their particular pledge for a legacy, a tribute, a memorial. We tell our kids that they can have that. They deserve it. And why? Because they're worth it. And then we're surprised when they feel an overwhelming sense of hollowness, of failure, when they wonder what the point of life is and talk genuinely about suicide, and we're shocked by how harshly they judge each other, bully each other to establish the same pecking order that we as the adults show them to be the norm. Dr Craig is right- we have to find a way to teach them what reality is, but more than that, we have to show them some way of handling their feelings in life, and somehow start to realign our culture to promote role models who do that successfully, and I'm not talking about Rooney's little tantrum on Sunday. I'd be willing to bet that the statistics on not only suicide, but also drug abuse and teenage pregnancy would show a remarkable shift if this was our aim, rather than mere A-C at GCSE.
The Oxford Freestylers were fantastic, really, and I genuinely applaud them, the parents who supported them going, and the people who coached them. They were very talented, and their routine was creative and innovative. I just pray that when the lights fade on the Dancing on Ice tour that there is enough satisfaction within themselves to sustain the interest in their hobby, and pass it on to another generation of Oxford skating kids. To find the merit in a journey away from the media spotlight.
Interestingly, the third news item was about a report from Becta, suggesting that parents are beginning to feel left out by their children's reluctance to talk about school and their lives. There's already a psychologist on the case, ready to deal with the anxiety the parents feel about this matter. Maybe we're a generation further in to the narcissism than we thought. How do we teach this new generation of reality culture parents to begin to introduce realism into their own parenting?
Would it be cynical of me to suggest they bought a video camera?