If you read my blog yesterday you may have been perplexed as to the meaning of “”shovelling” in Chris’s birthday poem for me, after all, shovelling doesn’t rhyme with drivelling! And to think that I spent well over an hour typing out the poem in full on my little kindle using my prodding wand (never again).

You see I am on holiday in Spain and I did not bring my computer (would have taken all my weight allowance – travelling with Ryanair!); hence, my blogs must now be written on my clever little kindle, which is so clever that it likes to show off by way of trying to predict everything I write, which would be great if it always got it right. It doesn’t. In fact, it’s worse than that, sometimes it doesn’t approve of what I write and it changes it when I’m not looking or expecting it. So that is why the word “shovelling” appeared so incongruously in the poem; naturally, as all you poets out there will have guessed already, the word my Kindle took such exception to was “snivelling”! (I just had to override it again!)

Oh, and apologies too for the double-spaceship (spacing), which ruined the intended fast tempo of the birthday poem – it doesn’t run so well in ponderous double-time. Now I must leave you and go for a dip in the sparking bleu pool. Wish you were Herr (here)! Ja vowel!

It’s my birthday. It’s also the birthday of the actress Demi Moore, the Italian actor, Luca Zingarelli, and my niece, Elizabeth, so Happy Birthday to one and all. It’s Remembrance Day too, and many will be sparing a thought for those lost in the Great War. Did you know that Ned Kelly, the Australian bushranger, was hanged in Melbourne on the eleventh November? I doubt you would know such trivia unless it was your birthday too.

I awoke this morning to beautiful sunshine; I drew back the curtains and looked out on the pool – yes, we are in warmer climes, Spain – “Oh we do like to be in sunny Spain!”

Now before we go out for the day I wonder if you would like to read the humorous poem Chris wrote for my birthday? It is meant to be read to the tempo of the song “A Modern Major General”, by Gilbert and Sullivan…..

THE BLOGGISTA’S REFRAIN

I am the very model of a blogger on the Internet

My website’s up and running and on Google I’m not hard to get

I’m always at the ready with the best blogging material

On matters often physical but sometimes quite ethereal

I sit at my computer seeking subjects inspirational

I’ll faithfully impart them in a manner conversational

I’m searching high and low to bring you something “fascination…al”

And hope that all who read it will regard it as sensational

I’ve followers in Germany, Espana ans Australia

I aim to be successful as a blogger, not a failure

And hopefully the folks who come to read my daily offering

Will buy my books and paintings and assorted works I’m or offering

My younger brother Robert thinks my blogs are simply “drivel…ling”

And that my written words and thoughts are sure to bring on shovelling

But when I asked if he’d studied all five hundred blogs of mine

He looked askance; admitting that the maximum he’d seen was nine!

But who cares if a brother lacks the necessary sympathy?

He may be great at piano, and can recognize a symphony

But what he doesn’t realize is there’s method in my twittering

To reach the buying public one relies on blogs and Twitter ing

You see, to be successful as a writer and a novelist

I hear the modern way no longer uses just the pen-and-wrist

Progressive scribes today now live and die quite electronically

We blog, and clog up Facebook, tweet and Twittering most chronically

And so, it stands to reason, I am told by the community

Of bloggers, great and small, that I must seize the opportunity

To maximise exposure and to practise self-publicity

And use my blog relentlessly, empowered by electricity

So when you’re on my website reading blogs with great tenacity

Just spare a thought, and realize that I write with true veracity

For, truth to tell, my blogging is another way to write a book

And soon, I hope, you’ll “get on down” to Amazon and take a look!

If I was shipwrecked on a deserted island, or lost in a foreign land, or in any sort of crisis, I would not be scared if my brother, Bill, was with me. Reminding myself of that has been a comfort in the last few days.

Bill has always been my hero, the perfect brother, my protector and my protagonist; he was even my apologist on occasions, like when I was five and split a boy’s head  open when playing with stones on the way home from school, and Bill took me to the boy’s mother and said, “I apologise on Sally ‘s behalf – it was an accident.” (I never threw stones again.) Whenever I cried it was Bill who used to console me and try to cheer me up in our tree-house. He could walk on his hands, build canoes out of scrap corrugated iron, fix bicycles, and later, cars and boats; and now he can fix houses, and build sheds and boat-houses.

And now that we are adults with grown families of our own, and we live on different sides of the globe, I still feel that special bond that comes of a lifetime of being a much-loved little sister. All we younger siblings feel it.

The “world’s worst typhoon”, according to some reports, hit the Philippines a few days ago and Bill, his wife, his mother-in-law and his eldest son were on holiday in that region at the time; I have been telling myself that they will be alright – with Bill at the helm. This morning we heard news reports of 12,000 dead souls as a result of “Yolanda”……. and then received news from Australia – Bill and his family are safe. I cried…..

I don’t have a horrible boss – I’m my own boss (and quite pleasant when I give myself jobs to do). The financial rewards may not be great but at least I don’t have a horrible boss.

I guess I’m rather lucky because I’ve only ever had one horrible boss and that was when I took my first summer holiday job at fourteen, working for a very mean and bossy Italian landlady of a guest house. During weekdays I had to wash and iron the sheets, and on Saturday mornings I had to help the chambermaids make the beds and clean the rooms. Okay, I didn’t have to wash the sheets against rocks on the banks of a river, and it wasn’t a little Victorian iron that required heating on a stove, but it was hard work; however, I did not mind the hard work, what I objected to was my boss following me about the guest house, shouting at me to “Hurry up”, not because I was slow (perish the thought), but because she enjoyed bossing me around and she didn’t see why she should pay for me to walk from room to room when I could run. The day she told me to iron her husband’s underpants and pyjamas was the day I gave in my notice.

But my personal horrible boss story is by-the-by, I would like to tell you about a film Chris bought last week from the £3 DVD section at Tesco supermarket: in fact, he bought two films – “Horrible Bosses” and “The Tree of Life” – neither of which I held out too much hope for (from past experience of the £3 shelf) but which I thought was worth giving a go because “Horrible Bosses” was said to be “Jaw-achingly funny!”, whilst “The Tree of Life” starred Brad Pitt and won the Cannes Film Festival a year or two ago. However, I’m always slightly suspicious of films I have never heard of.

“Okay, let’s give it half an hour,” I said to Chris when he suggested we try out our new, “Jaw-achingly funny”, comedy DVD.

Ten minutes or so into the film – when the plain, dwarfed, male dental nurse was being blackmailed into having sex with his boss, an attractive, sex-crazed female dentist who looked like a dark-haired Jennifer Aniston – I turned to Chris and asked, “Do you find this jaw-achingly funny?”

“Would you like to watch ‘The Tree of Life’ instead?” he asked.

“Perhaps tomorrow, or in a few days time,” I suggested (one disappointment was enough for one night), “Let’s watch a ‘Place in the Sun’ for now”. (You know where you are with property programmes.)

Two days later we were wishing my nephew, John (the master of face-pulling) a happy fourteenth birthday when his mother informed us that he had seen recently  the same film, “Horrible Bosses”.

“Did you find it funny?” I asked.

John, suspecting it was a loaded question, just smiled and his mother stepped in to answer:

“He did, but he knew you would have hated it because of the bad language and lewdness.”

Later that evening Chris and braced ourselves for a viewing of the second of our cheap videos.

“Maybe we should give it more than ten minutes – it was an award winner,” said Chris.

“Half an hour then,” I agreed.

Perhaps ten minutes in, after the charming scene of a young woman holding a butterfly, “The Tree of Life” burst into a very lengthy, arty and somewhat weird ‘creation’ scene with whispers that you could hardly hear. Unwilling to endure a full half hour or more (we guessed, as it seemed to be heading that way) of ‘creation’, I resorted to the fast-forward control, stopping now and then where it appeared to be interesting (the benevolent dinosaur bit was sweet but unfathomable); how strange then, that after the ‘creation’, the film became compelling. The quiet film is about a man contemplating his life and death, and it’s brilliant. I was reminded of my own childhood and I found myself crying, even though the ending was upbeat. Chris loved it too but we both felt we had missed things.

“Of course, we’ll have to watch it again,” Chris said.

“I know,” I answered, “next time without fast forward.”

“And with subtitles… for the whispers.”

I feel good (as one of my favourite songs go – “You know what I mean now…”). Well, you won’t know what I mean just yet, not until I tell you… One of the reasons I feel good is because my three days of rigorous Dukan dieting, attack phase, are beginning to take effect and I’ve lost two pounds; the hunger pangs that kept me awake last night were worth it, although I felt differently about it during the night. So the reading on the scales early this morning gave me a lift for a start off, plus, it wasn’t raining for a change, and the sun was making an effort to appear through the clouds; Chris and I were even tempted to take a nice walk in spite of the cold, but these are not the only reasons I feel good…

Whilst we were out and about in Dawlish town centre we stopped to chat to one of my most valued patrons, whom I hadn’t seen for ages. After the initial pleasantries Gus reminded me of the amazing occasion when a group of dolphins visited Dawlish and came right in to the breakwater to be petted and fussed over by the local early risers.

“I’ll never forget that day, Sal, when…” Gus began.

“The dolphins came…” I interrupted him.

“And nobody had ever seen anything like it here before, and then…”

“I jumped in with all my clothes on…”

“And everyone was surprised, and you were the only one, and the dolphins circled around you…”

“And you wouldn’t go in because you weren’t wearing your wetsuit – I’ve written about that – it was so funny,” I added and we both laughed about it. “Do you still have a boat?” I asked, keeping the conversation going.

“Oh no, Sal, but George and I are thinking of getting another one, a bigger one next time, one that’s easier to get in and out of. When we do, you and Chris must come out in it with us.”

“Great,” I said, “it was lovely to see you again after so long.”

“You’re a little darling, you,” Gus said fondly as he put his hand on my cheek.

As Gus bent forward it looked very much as though he was aiming to kiss me on the lips so I veered instinctively to one side and kissed him on the cheek; he made another attempt, which I foiled again by yet another kiss to the same cheek. He thought about it again, dismissed the idea and parted company from us with waves, smiles and a handshake from Chris.

“Did you hear what he called me?” I asked Chris, and went on to repeat it anyway because I liked the sound of it, “He called me a little darling. No-one has ever called me LITTLE before!”

So now you know why I feel good (you know that you should now, na na, na na, na). I feel pretty and so witty, pretty and witty and… small? Well, my patron thinks so and he is a man with impeccable taste and judgement.”!

As you know, I’m nearly always on a diet, at least I always start off on a diet. At present I am in earnest – a holiday is coming up and I’m afraid I won’t get into my favourite shorts if I don’t take drastic measures. Well, I became fed up with porridge every day a long long time ago; then I tried “Bran Flakes” – they tasted like cardboard and glue, but they made a change; now I’m on “All Bran”.I find that “All Bran” is less like what you might find in a horse’s nosebag when it is mixed with piping hot milk and left to stand for a few minutes to make it soft.

This morning Chris eyed my breakfast of hot, liquid bran, and he pulled a face of disdain.

“I don’t know how you can eat it,” he said.

“It’s much nicer than porridge,” I answered.

“I bet you would prefer it if it was ‘All Brad’,” he added (or Bradded).

“Of course,” I smiled gleefully, and for a moment or two I relished the thought of having Brad Pitt for breakfast.

The air was frigid in our bedroom early this morning. We notice the change of the seasons more markedly from the bottom storey of our house because we do not have central heating on that level, and we don’t put on heaters until it gets colder still.

Returning from the bathroom, I jumped back into bed and cocooned myself in the cuddly winter duvet. After a while I looked over at Chris’s side of the bed and saw that he had only about two inches of the king-sized duvet to spare, and his right foot was poking out.

“Are you sure you have enough cover?” I asked, pushing the duvet towards him.

“I say,” Chris began in what I thought was a rather aloof English tone, “do you think bed is the right place to try and sell me insurance?”

“He really loves you,” said my neighbours, Karen and Colleen, in unison, laughing and smiling.

“I guess so,” I laughed with them, “you probably think I’ve trained him well – but I haven’t – it’s just his nature.”

“We’ll be standing in line if ever you don’t want him,” Colleen said cheerily in her Irish brogue and her sky-blue eyes twinkled.

“That’s for sure,” added Karen in her down to earth Scottish accent. (We are very cosmopolitan here in Dawlish.)

“It would be a long line,” I joked, but I might as well have said, “You could be waiting for a very long time because I’m not ready to part with him yet.” (Even less so with two attractive women waiting in line!)

I’m certain you could not imagine what Chris did to spark all this banter so I had better tell you. It wasn’t anything particularly earth-shattering or tremendously exciting; actually, I might have found it slightly embarrassing had the ladies not been so charmed. Well, perhaps I ought to go back to twenty minutes or so before the incident, in order to put you in the picture…

Chris and I were in the car driving down into Dawlish town: Chris was dropping me off with a slimming lunch I had prepared for my sister, who was making alterations in her holiday flat (where we had all been a little earlier), and Chris was going on to the Post Office.

“Shall I pick you up from here on my way home?” Chris asked.

“No, that’s alright, Darling, I need the exercise so I’ll  drop this in to Mary and walk back.”

“But you haven’t got your coat on…”

“I’ll be okay. It’s not raining. I’ll walk fast,” I assured him.

I was walking home a short time later when I noticed two of my lovely neighbours chatting and laughing on the pavement beside the zebra crossing only about fifty yards from our house. Naturally, I stopped to pass the time of day and discuss the health of all the older neighbours, planning applications, holiday arrangements, unusual events and illnesses – all the things that neighbours talk about as winter approaches. We were on the subject of Colleen’s suspected case of shingles (which turned out to be an allergy to a bracelet of poor quality) when who should come along in his car but Chris? He beeped the horn and waved.  Because of my close proximity to home I was not surprised that Chris didn’t stop to give me a lift and we all waved as he went on by slowly.

The conversation had moved on to urine infections when, out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of Chris walking on the pavement on the other side of the road. Colleen and Karen followed the direction of my gaze; we could see clearly that he carried something pink over his left arm (no, it wasn’t a hand bag – don’t be facetious!). I knew what it was. They knew what it was. That’s when my neighbours drooled and said, “He really loves you.”  Shortly, Chris crossed the road and held out my coat for me to slip my arms inside.

“Thank you, but you didn’t have to do that – I’m nearly home.”

“The wind has come up and I didn’t want you to get cold,” Chris said, suddenly aware that he was in the spotlight.

“We’re waiting in the long line… if Sally doesn’t want you any more,” said the good-looking divorcee and the merry widow.

We all  laughed, but as everyone knows, “there’s many a true word said in jest…”

You may think I meant to say that I give as good as I get, but you would be wrong: what I really mean is that, at this very moment, I’m as good as I can get… considering certain facts, like being of a particular age, having no make-up on, losing my tan, wearing tired clothes and still needing to diet. Perhaps you are thinking now, “As good as she can get – what a braggart!”  Incidentally, Brad Pitt (my hero) said, “Where I come from we don’t talk about what we do – we just do it. If we talk about it, it’s seen as bragging.” Therefore, I had better explain…

Brad tweeted also, “Before you go and criticize others, make sure you take a good look in the mirror first.” Well, I can honestly say I had no idea of criticizing anybody this morning when I looked in the mirror, least of all myself; nevertheless, I made observations, some of which I do not intend to brag about. What struck me most was how dark and drab my hair looked; my last haircut had done away with nearly all of the evidence of my time in Australia earlier this year followed by a sunny English summer and I suddenly felt the time had come to resort to streaking (no, not running around naked – I did that the other morning!).

Have you ever bought a home-streaking kit? If you have, you will know that the look of natural fair highlights is achieved by wearing a cute little plastic cap (something like the bed cap worn by Red Riding Hood’s grandma, except made of see through plastic) and, using  a crochet hook, pulling strands of hair through the tiny holes that you have already pierced in the cap.

Chris very kindly agreed to help me, otherwise the streaks would not look natural because they would be just around my face and not at the back where I can’t see or reach. After twenty minutes of hunting around the house for another crochet hook (I do the ones at the front to reduce the time of the laborious task) I sat down at the kitchen table and put on the plastic cap and my glasses; I looked in the mirror and laughed – I looked bald! Luckily, Chris didn’t see me from that unflattering, full-on in the magnified side of the mirror pose – he stood behind me and looked down on my bald pate instead.

“Remember to come in at an angle,” I urged, remembering other occasions.

“I’ve done it before,” he answered tetchily.

Chris penetrated the first hole from a ninety degree angle, rather than the forty-five degree angle I was hoping for, and he pulled a strand, consisting of two longs hairs, from the very top of my head; the strand had been battened down by the snugly fitting plastic cap and was unwilling to give in to the relentless pulling of the hook. “No pain, no gain,” I thought (did Brad say that too?) and I bore the agony without even a whimper as the thin strand made its arrival into the open world. Only another fifty or more to go! The second attempt was better – thicker but shorter and nearer the surface – almost no pain. The third was sharp and quick.

“Ouch!” I cried out.

“What’s the matter?”

“Can’t you be more sensitive?”

“Anyone would think I haven’t done this before!” Chris said. (He’s always been a bit ham-fisted.)

“No pain, no gain,” I told myself over and over. I tried to stifle my cries, sometimes successfully, other times unsuccessfully… At one point, after a lunge of the hook at a horizontal angle (thus arriving at, and pulling the hair from an unintended location), I screamed and jumped at the same time; Chris was so taken aback that he jumped too. Through the mirror I could see from the look on his face that he wanted to throw down the hook and walk out; I nearly told him to throw down the hook and walk out, but I didn’t and he didn’t – we’re stoical like that (hope that isn’t bragging).

Truthfully, it did not get any better, in fact it got worse. You see, the more strands of hair there are poking through the holes, the more likely it is that when the hook goes in again it will pull out the clumps from other holes – one comes up and another disappears, like magic. Chris found it quite entertaining whilst I found it agonizing. Chris pulled, I screamed, and he jumped. Occasionally, knots were dragged to the surface, thought better of, and left in a matted mass by the hole. And so it went on until we were satisfied that enough hair protruded on the outside of the cap.

At length it was done and I appeared to be practically bald but with funny limp strands of hair sprouting at odd angles. If you happened to see “Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves” starring Kevin Costner, well, I looked like the ancient oracle played by Geraldine McEwan!

So now, some time later, with my streaked hair in long golden curls reminiscent of sunshine, I feel less dreary and wintry; this is as good as I get, considering all the other factors I mentioned earlier. That isn’t bragging – is it?

By the way, isn’t it funny how the words, dilapidation and depilation are so similar?