Saturday, February 5, 2011

mundane domestic ststus

As I sit here writing this I am vaguely aware of a faint
stench of cat piss. This is my life. As I may have mentioned previously, our
cat sprays/wees in our house due to stress, induced by what I call ‘Tough Love’
given to him by Little Companion.
Little Companion adores Lee-Lee, as he calls him. The
problem is with how he demonstrates his love. Little Companion has been known
to shout ‘KICK LEROY’ and wildly swing his legs at Leroy in the past, swiftly
changing the expression on his face to deep concern, as he strokes Leroy saying
‘Be GENTLE (to) Leroy’. This is a phrase he has picked up form Naked Chef and me as any time we see
Little Companion hovering near Leroy we say in warning tones, ‘be nice to Leroy, stroke Leroy,
be gentle to Leroy’ ‘Awwwww’ as we
try desperately to protect Leroy from Little Companion’s crushing love. It’s a classic
abuser/abusee relationship, with Leroy seemingly needing to be close to Little
Companion most of the time, but instantly becoming completely terrified when
Little Companion actually turns his full attention onto him. Its awkward
writing about how your son tends to be violent towards your cat. Its awkward knowing
that the grand you had to spank over the Christmas period saving said cat’s
life is probably because your son has traumatised it to the point of no return.
It’s troubling knowing that  having
cried, worried and stressed out, now, when I smell the wiff of wreaking cat piss I
remain calm, and slightly detached and shrug – oh well...

So much so that last Saturday, 2 days after our boiler broke
(so 48 hours since I’d had a shower) the most perfect of the perfect NCT
friends came over for a coffee, with her perfect husband, two perfect sons - (she was one of the planning for Number Two mums), from their perfect SW London home, in their perfect family car, when Leroy weed on Little Companion’s chair at the exact moment that the door bell went off, I had
to brightly say,

‘not only is there no heating, and I am part of the Great Unwashed
as there has been no hot water for two days, but the windows are open in the now
sub-zero Lounge to try to clear the stench of cat piss.’

Great. Not exactly the Nigella-esque dom-goddess impression I’d
been planning to make...  (Mood Milliner
is branching out into wig making – think sumptuous dark locks rolling down my
heaving bosom)

They laughed, were very nice about it, but I know they were
thinking ‘if it’s not one thing with them, it’s another – it stinks in here,
and its bloody freezing.’ So, we got through the coffee morning - them with thier coats on and me sporadically spraying Fabreeze about the place, I then had a
shower (probably the best in living memory) as the boiler man was fixing the
heating while the cat pissing/coffee drinking was going on, cleaned up the
house and got on with life.
I’m an avid Facebook fan – it appeals to the massive stalker
lurking in my not-so-sub-conscious. I recently set my status about something to
do with getting a doctor’s appointment. My brother who is currently living in
South America (think almost complete polar opposite to me in that he is super fit,
super frugal, loves travelling, is brilliant at languages and studying, is
incredibly funny but seems to be perpetually single as far as I’m aware, maybe
because he is slightly socially awkward and a bit quiet) deemed it a mundane
domestic status, something he doesn’t want to read about in his news feed. His disdainful
attitude to the joy I felt at getting a same day appointment after work at my
new doctors surgery got me thinking. What is worthy of Facebook statuses? Funny
moments with friends? Things you see on the street. Things that make you happy?
Its a dangerous game putting your thoughts and feelings out into cyber space – I
am SO judgemental it’s not right. Below are my thoughts about but a few of my (current...
although probably not for long after reading this) status updating Facebook
buddies...
To the person who is constantly drunk/hungover – dude, do a
detox! (to be fair I am definitely not someone to be giving advice about
drinking less, but still, I can have my mildly judgemental thoughts, can’t I?)
To the person who is constantly having days out with other
people and enjoying themselves, which people? What do you do? You must be SO
busy, you are constantly seeing loads of different people, are you not
exhausted?!
To overly mysterious status person. Stop it. Say what you
mean! I can’t be bothered to ask you what you are talking about – are you
itching for someone to ask you, so that you can reveal the real meaning behind
what you are saying?
To über cool sporadic one word status person. I am jealous
of you. I want to be as cool as you, but I am not. Harrumph.
To traveller person. How do you do it – how do you afford it?
How do you get the time off work? I genuinely don’t understand.  I
want to take 35 holidays a year and have an AWESOME time doing it.
To dramatic/depressed person –I think sharing intimate
personal stuff is a bit too much for facebook. On the other hand, I worry about
you – I want to give you a hug.
To general life update friends, I salute you, I get you and
a laugh with you.
The statuses I am now too scared to leave for fear of
brotherly judgement:
Mood Milliner was given the gift of a lie-in by her Naked Chef husband. She slept until 12.20pm
and then ate a cheese and pickle sandwich- heavenly.
Mood Milliner My latest lust food: a cheese and pickle sandwich. Yum!
 
It’s not worthy of an Eastenders plot, it’s not hilarious, its not mysterious, its not a massive overshare, its not particularly interesting, but this is my life, these are the boring things that make up our existence, judge me in return if you will, but good god I’m going to share it with you – cat piss
and all.