Things my parents told me ......

Mum if you are reading this I hope you aren't offended! But for some reason today these things popped into my head and I was having a really good chuckle to myself. I was wondering if anyone else can remember things that their parents told them when they were young?

1. You will like mushrooms when you are older.

A complete and utter lie! I'm 37 I don't know how much older I will have to get before I like them. I know they impart a lovely taste to food - like mushroom ketchup. But to actually eat a mushroom, no way I would rather eat a bogey!

2. Your sister will be taller than you when you are grown up.

Rubbish. I'm 5ft  9 inches tall shes about 5ft 7 inches /5 ft 8 inches tall. This really used to wind me up as a kid. I think this is why they said it. I was absolutely huge compared to all the kids. At age 11 I was 5ft 7 inches tall and had size 7 feet.I couldn't fit in children's clothes and wore a ladies size 10. I towered over my teachers and was starting to tower over my parents!
 Guess what at 11 I thought I was fat due to the fact I had an adults figure at that age. I would chop my own leg off now to fit into a size 10!  I now have size 8 feet and in some shoes need a 9! At age 7 I was in size 2 adult shoes. I won't tell you what size clothes I am in now......but it ain't a ten!

3. "Stay down stairs we are going in the loft." My parents to my sister and I.

Lie. I will let you work out for yourselves what they were doing but it had absolutely nothing to do with the loft and usually occurred on Sunday afternoons! The shameful thing is I didn't work this one out until I was around 19 years old! How naive and trusting was I? I was more embarrassed that I hadn't worked it out than anything else!

4. You will meet a man who becomes your husband and you will want kids.

This was told to me repeatedly by adults (not my parents) when I was 15/16/17 years old. I've never wanted children of my own. If my health had been better and we had the space I would have liked to provide emergency foster care for troubled teens.

 I just have no maternal desire to have children. Thankfully Hubby doesn't want kids either. He's quite honest he says he couldn't share me with anyone. Its very hard to take this stance and be brave enough to stick to it. There is a lot of pressure from family ( not mine) and acquaintances who automatically assume you will have kids. Even the medical profession seem surprised I don't have off spring. Thankfully my best friend is also a non maternal type so we have a good laugh about this together.

We are always amazed that people demand an answer to this most personal of questions. What if their were medical reasons we couldn't have kids? Would it be OK to pry into our lives then? I have seen some articles in the papers written by woman who don't want children, the pressure applied to them is so great they no longer go to family functions. Thankfully Ellie and I don't have that kind of pressure from our partners or our families.

Sorry that turned into a bit of a rant!

5. You will like Stilton / olives / marrow when you are older.

Guess what I still can't stand them!

Are there things that you remember being told as a kid that you still have a chuckle about to this day? I frequently bring up the mushroom / Stilton / olive / Marrow conversations and we do laugh about it.


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Health wise I am really good at the moment. I am struggling with the antibiotics they are making me nauseous and they are giving me stomach cramps. I have ended up taking anti sickness meds and tramadol for the stomach pain. Not ideal but for the last two days I have felt better than I have in months. I think I must have had some underlying infection going on for quite sometime. I have been tracking my temperature for a while and I kept getting low grade fevers but that was the only symptom. As far as I was concerned it was just another of my strange medical quirks. So that may have been the only symptom I had of this underlying infection. Just seems odd that after 2 days of antibiotics I feel so much better as the antibiotics although broad spectrum are being used to treat a skin infection!!

My ear is good and bad. The popping and scratching noises have stopped since using the ear drops. However the ear drops are hurting when I put them in and leaving me with a feeling of fullness in my ear and a slight ache. I have to say its marginally less annoying than the popping and scratching noise.

I have felt so well I have actually managed to get some small jobs done around the house that I haven't been able to tackle for weeks. I think once I am on top of this I will be able to crack on with my novel. I promised myself that I would complete it this year and it hasn't been going too well. Too much procrastinating I think!

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My latest Reads

I have just read JG Ballards Empire of The Sun and really enjoyed it. You can tell as I finished it in two days. It really shocked me how people became so selfish even towards children in the Japanese concentration camps. It described a harsh and brutal world through the eyes of a child. Children don't analyze everything so Jim, the main character is very matter of fact about everything. I have never seen the film and I don't know if I will bother as films are never as good as the books.

 I will be moving onto J G Ballard's The Kindness Of Women tonight which is the next part of Jim's life. The books are autobiographical but read like a novel as there is no soul searching in them or justification of their actions. It is his life as it was then. I like that kind of honesty as I think we all have a tendency to gloss over things. Thats why I liked a Million Little Pieces and My Friend Leonard.

I have also read 2 books by Lionel Shriver We need to talk about Kevin, and So Much For That. Out of the two I have to say I preferred We Need To Talk About Kevin. I got about two chapters in and realized that I had read this book before a few years ago. It is actually very similar to another book I have read in the last twelve months but the name escapes me.

The story is about a mother of a child who is a mass murderer - as in they have taken a weapon to school and gunned down their classmates. Or in the case of this book used a cross bow to murder his class mates. Its a very clever book which won several prizes in 2005 when it was published and is written as a series of letters.

So Much For That is another book by Lionel Shriver. I actually read this one before We Need to Talk About Kevin. This one was OK but it was hard work, Lionel Shriver needed a very tough Editor on this one. It is over written enormously, there are great swathes of prose that could have easily been culled from the novel without it doing any harm to the story. I found myself skipping pages or speed reading so I could return to the story line. Don't let that put you off though as the dynamic of the story is brilliant. Exploring human relationships in the face of real adversity.

The book struck a chord with me as it is about how chronic illness affects a family. It shows how like a pebble being dropped into a pond the energy waves touch every aspect of every member of the families life. It shows the difference in coping strategies between those who have always been ill and have known no other life and those who suddenly become ill. It is an excellent exploration of the human character.

I did enjoy it and the further you get into the book the story line really takes over and leaves the superfluous information behind.

OK thats all for now!