The Service Wash

I've never used a service wash at a launderette although I suppose it's a bit like being a minor whose parent does their washing for them. The problem is that you don't appreciate the service you're getting until you're the one doing it for someone else.

In our house, it's getting trickier to determine whose are who's as my two sons have started buying clothes from the same shops and are roughly the same size. Of course, I'm supposed to know the difference between two seemingly identical items of clothing. You only have to look around the streets outside the local college to see that whilst there are wild variations in the styles of clothing, they tend to gather in clusters of those with a like-minded sense of fashion.

As you get older, clothes seem to be a more individual affair. My own are not those I would choose to wear; they are more of a collection of things which have stood the test of time and the tumble drier. They don't represent me, they're just a convenience to stop me from being arrested. If I had a little money, I probably wouldn't buy clothes but if I had a lot, I would.

At my counselling course, we were discussing making observations of how people look in order to gauge their mental state. This is worrying. That would make me an unco-ordinated, faded, worn-out, outdated heap of rags. OK, that's maybe a bit strong but it is enough for me to vow to buy some new clothes at the first opportunity.

And so I have been paying a little more attention to people and what they are wearing. On my way back from dropping my son off at college, I keep seeing this man on foot crossing the railway bridge. The first thing I noticed was his dark eyebrows and white hair, chin length and blowing like sheets on a windy day. His face is bony and he's so tall and his strides so long that I imagine office workers being lost in his inside leg. His coat, a navy blue quilted anorak flaps open in time with his hair and he moves so lightly as if hastily gliding from cloud to cloud in order to avoid falling through to earth. The thing is that he looks out of place, from a different time and doesn't fit the demographics of your average Horsham person. All that and I'm supposed to be concentrating on the road and if making observations for writing purposes wasn't enough, now I've got another excuse to do it.

It seems that it is inescapable for us to judge each others' appearance. So I'd never use a service wash. I couldn't face going back to collect my clothes.

Pussy Paranoia

I'm all for giving those on the fringes of society a voice. And no one lives more on the edge of things than Tiger. Therefore, despite the libelous content and sly insinuations of his little soliloquy, we have decided to let me have his say. Marmaduke, has not only put up with the cat-cursing and clicking of claws on the keyboard but permitted him to publish it there so thank you to him for his cool co-operation.

Yo-ho-ho!

On Saturday, when I should have been doing other things, I entered Sarah's competition in honour of National Speak Like a Pirate Day. So, if you've got time, go to Sarah's posting for today to see the result!

Today's posting

Marmaduke has decided to write today. I'm surprised that he's managed to stay awake long enough.

I could survive for 51 seconds chained to a bunk bed with a velociraptor

Jobs you have no chance of getting

I think that most of us would consider ourselves extremely lucky if we ended up with a career for which we were both ideally suited and enjoyed. I think that most of us settle for the best we can get to get by the best we can.

Sarah's prompt for today set me off thinking about making lists of things in reverse. Reverse lists could be useful and could tell us more about ourselves that the conventional sort. Here are some of the jobs I would have no chance of getting:

MP: My knowledge of current affairs is sporadic ranging from watching Newsnight every day for a fortnight to falling asleep at 9pm after a glass of wine. Also, I never have time to read a newspaper.

SALESPERSON: I'm too honest. This was proven when I showed prospective buyers around the house and I ended up telling them how I'd like a smaller house and a bigger garden. I think they came around to my point of view.

TEACHER: I enjoy intellectual debate and challenge. The trouble is, I'm not sure I want to share it with anyone.

AIRLINE PILOT: I tend to avoid crowds and or queuing for ages to park. I also like to sleep and watch films whilst flying.

Clearly, this list has infinite potential. As does my shopping list. Therefore, next time I go shopping, I will make a list of the things I don't want and it will be shorter. I will honestly be able to say 'Look, there's not much on my list, please come with me'. Problem solved.

So this is the beginning. No, wait, this is. No, actually this is ...

They say that life begins at 40. I'd like to pretend that this little milestone is something to look forward to but unlike my husband who is soon to celebrate this momentus point in his life, it's something I look backwards at. Actually, my 40th was really quite a non-event given that I had only given birth to our youngest son 2 months beforehand and that he was 10 weeks premature. Around the time of my birthday was the point at which he should have been born so it marked a new phase whereby people no longer stopped us in shops to marvel at his tiny form and exclaim 'I've never seen one that small before' and instead we became a normal family rather than a travelling circus.

Beginnings are not just about newness, that's the easy bit;they're about having the energy to enthuse, perhaps to inject a new life and hope into what has become staid (at this point, I hope that my husband doesn't think that I'm describing him in this way) and start over again.

I'll soon be back at uni, resuming my MA studies and that's another beginning because if I'm honest, I've managed to switch off from it almost entirely with all the moving house business. But I can only face it if I sit down with my books spread around me and a new resolve, an attitude that says 'Right, I am now a student again' and this magical vow will transform my thought process from one belonging to a harangued mother into academic genius. If only.

With the children, we have beginnings all the time. When the morning routine slips into a cacophony of chaos (as it frequently does), when just getting them to brush their teeth seems to be the most unachievable goal in the universe, I think up a new scheme to encourage their co-operation. A new beginning in the form of a star chart.

Well, I must go now. We're expecting a man. My mother's getting a new car which means I'm getting her old one. It's the same old one I've been borrowing regularly for the past 6 years and yet, to have it given to me makes it new again. I'm even going to clean it. It will be born again....