The Birthday Blog

It was my birthday last week. Thirty-fucking-five. How on earth did this happen? I can no longer say I am in my early thirties as I creep closer to the big 4-0. Bum.

Still, it wasn’t all bad. The last few birthdays have coincided with my evening class and gym shifts so I wasn’t really able to enjoy it or do much. This year the celebrations started on Wednesday evening and were drawn out until Monday.

Wednesday started with an innocent coffee catch up (plus a lovely lemon cupcake) which over ran into a glass of red at La Tasca and then segued into meeting the delightful Lady G at the local pub without the vital evening meal window. But that was okay as I snagged a roast potato somewhere around 11.30 pm and then ate some soup in my kitchen just before midnight. I drank a few nice red wines and smoked about a million horrid Spanish cigarettes whilst Lady G merrily smashed up her cider glass. My present from Lady G was mint. She had tracked down a copy of this for me:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/This-Return-Cult-Fiction-Various/dp/B000026LYZ/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1319634489&sr=1-1

which I used to own on a cassette many moons ago. So happy to have it back in my life for all its’ cheesiness!

The actual birthday (Thursday) involved a personal training session (I know!), Nandos (ill-advised fresh pineapple ring in my wrap), haircut number one, cup of tea catch up with fellow birthday girl and omelette and home made twice cooked chips washed down with my favourite pink wine. I also got some presents and cards too! Yay.

Friday involved an afternoon in Reading to pick my birthday gifts from the man. Say hello new Paul’s Boutique handbag, another MAC lipstick and a nice bird print frock. We then had some weak cocktails at the Slug & Lettuce followed by a disappointing meal at Old Orleans whereupon they had literally run out of everything and tried to rinse me for extra jalapenos. Bastards. Really should’ve cut our losses and gone elsewhere.

Saturday was the day of the big birthday bash. So it was necessary to go and procure Indian snacks, hummus (no gathering is complete without it?), olives, pitta bread, falafels etc and to make 40 vodka and lime jelly shots. I also had haircut number two. I know, two haircuts in two days. This must be the sort of stuff only WAGs and the cast members of TOWIE do all the time. Totes living the dream eh? My new haircut was so, so fabulous that I almost vetoed my choice of birthday party themes which was: Wigs, hats and glasses. I had a trampy and very tangled blonde wig and my friends did not let me down with the assortment of props they came armed with. I’d have to say other than the slurping of 40 vodka jelly shots and the wig swapping this was a fairly tame party by my standards. Even with the amount of Kronenbourg thrown in. No-one was sick. No-one got off with anyone else. No-one fell asleep. No-one threw a hissy fit over a missing bottle of tequila. No-one left a plum on the stairs. Which was a shame as all of the above happened last year…honestly.

On Monday I was treated to an altogether different type of party as my young niece and nephew are in town to visit my parents. My niece donned a tiara and made me some very fine party decorations. We had pizzas and salads and the niece and nephew had decorated me a very splendid and garish pink/lilac birthday cake. Of course they had to help me blow out the candles. Fireworks were supposed to be a feature but the weather proved too inclement. After dinner there was of course Pass the Parcel. But even though the music stopped on me and I won the prize I was forced to give up my gifts to my niece and nephew – what a swizz! The evening was topped off with a recorder recital by my niece. Ahhh such a beautiful sounding instrument.

All in all a very good birthday indeed. I guess I have to take everything 35 has to throw at me.

Sunday Bloody Sunday

Ok I’ll ‘fess up that the topic of this blog was inspired by someone who is far more talented and entertaining than I could ever be Ladies & Gents meet : http://thedollsays.wordpress.com/

So The Doll’s blog kinda got me thinking about the Sundays of my youth. Cast your minds back to when Sundays were ‘a day of rest’ and there was nothing save for maybe your local corner shop open. It wasn’t really that long ago I think Sunday trading started (in 1994 or thereabouts). Hence Sundays were ‘boring’ when you were a child and retail opportunities and fun were on lockdown.

For me a typical Sunday as a child went something like this: swimming at the Westfield Lido with Dad and older Sister, sometimes Mum would come to watch from the viewing gallery. I say watch but whenever my sister and I were desperate to catch her eye to show off some fancy new acrobatic move we had just invented she was far more interested in thumbing through her ‘Ideal Home’ magazine. Next on the agenda was the Sunday Roast. It was always chicken because at the time chicken was cheap. That meant that the next few night’s dinners were also chicken based. Mum even used to boil up the carcass to make soup. I did grow up in the 80s honest, not the 40s! You can also see why my transition to vegetarianism was an easy thing with only dry old chicken to satisfy any carnivorous urges. It was also the one day of the week we got ‘proper pudding’ rather than the ubiquitous Neapolitan ice-cream or Super mousse.

After the delicious lunch my parents would then thumb through the vast range of Sunday papers and supplements. This is still a staple in their Sundays! This was of course pre-Eastenders Omnibus era so there was sod all on the television. If we harangued and whinged enough then there may be a small family outing after lunch. Nothing too riveting I can assure you. Usually a walk round a local garden, garden centre or stately home that sort of thing. All very dull and middle class but sometimes a tea room or ice lolly might feature that made it worthwhile. More often though an argument between Mum & Dad as they got lost en route or couldn’t find a parking spot.

If the weather was inclement there was no chance for one of these beanos. Instead Mum would tackle a pile or ironing in front of a ‘boring’ black and white film and Dad would polish the shoes ready for school and work. I am sure he did other stuff too but my memory is just of him polishing shoes.

Things brightened up around 5 o’clock on a Sunday evening. No, not because of Songs of Praise but because that was when most weeks you would sit, cross legged on your bedroom floor worshipping at your little tape deck/radio combo taping your favorite songs from the Top 40! Oh yes, this rite of passage didn’t pass me by and I think it was not that long ago I last threw out some tapes labelled as ‘Top 40’ ! You see I didn’t tape over them the following week, oh no, I catalogued them and kept them ad infinitum incase, you know, I just had the urge to hear ‘Camouflage’ by Stan Ridgeway or ‘History’ by Mai Tai. In the days before Spotify this is what we had to do! For quite some time I had a separate LW/MW radio balanced atop a small portable cassette player in order to achieve my quest. Sound quality was shite but at least I could still hear my beloved charts whenever I wanted to. This was the future!

Attempts to record the Top 40 were often interrupted by the drudgery of the weekly bath and hairwash. I know. Once a week! Ew gross! But it seems that this was the norm and not some soap dodging laziness on my part. Once the hair had been washed and your eyes no longer resembled that of a rabid dog once the shampoo had been fully rinsed out, then you were sated with a ‘snack tea’ as the main meal had already been taken at lunchtime. I know what the ‘snack tea’ consisted of as there is photographic evidence of it somewhere. With my Sister and me resplendent in those very long old fashioned nighties, which were de rigeur in the early 80s, with newly washed wet hair tucking into plates of sandwiches (possibly marmite), Sainsbury’s own brand crisps and Penguin biscuits with beakers of milk and squash to hand.

And then you really had to face facts that: Gulp! It was school again tomorrow. Doom! I remember being allowed to stay up until 8.35pm on a Sunday so that we could watch the end of ‘Howard’s Way’ so once you’d watched yet another episode with Ken Masters sporting some dodgy pastel coloured sweater trying to get off with yet another young girl you were packed off to bed. I will always remember that ‘Mastermind’ was next up on the beeb with its’ ominous and rousing theme tune. If you were in bed and you heard the closing theme tune to that segueing to the theme to ‘That’s Life’ you knew you really were in trouble as you hadn’t managed to get to sleep yet!

So there you have it, a charming insight into what Sundays used to be like before nearly everything opened. In writing this I think I do feel some sadness that now Sunday is essentially just another day rather than a little bit special. Although of course I enjoy the fact that you can go shopping to places that sell things other than plants and ornamental pots!