Saturday, March 28, 2009

Whoops

We just scuttled back dripping after stepping outside in bright sunshine. By the time we reached the end of the road it was hailing and blowing up a storm, and once our brolly flipped itself inside out we thought it might be best to turn around and go home. We got in and shook ourselves... and outside the rain stopped and the sun came out.

"It's my fault" I told Ben gloomily.

"Why?" he asked. "We took the brolly; this shouldn't have happened."

He hasn't read my last post yet, but when he does, he'll blame me too. I laughed in the face of Sod and he exacted a revenge most soggy.

Friday, March 27, 2009

Sod and his Law

I'm a great believer in Sod's Law (or Murphy's Law, as my mum insists on calling it and tries to insist on me calling it - sorry Mum, Murphy's Law makes no sense; I mean, who is this Murphy? What kind of a guy is he (or she, of course) to go round trying to spanner the works and what authority does he has over the fickle ways of Fate anyway? At least you know where you are with Sod). My belief thusly caused me to be in two minds about even posting this, but when I mentioned it to Alana she made me laugh, so I thought what the heck.

I went to the laundrette today (yes, another laundrette post. Are you surprised? Mons really is that boring). I went to see the swans on the way - there is no trace of the cygnets whatever. The eggs are gone, but there aren't any fuzzy babies. We thought for a while maybe they were hiding under their parents wings, but today I had a good look and I really don't think they are. Tis very sad. Anyway, as I was leaving it was very bright, and I thought, shall I take my sunglasses? Then I thought, better not, Sod's Law and all that. In fact, I thought to myself, I'll take my brolly and a heavy coat, then it'll be gorgeous weather.

Then of course as I was leaving I forgot both the brolly and the coat, and left with only a jumper on. The weather was pleasant though, and so nice that when I got to the swans I took my jumper off.

Upon arriving at the laundrette the heavens opened - with hail stones, no less! Tch, I thought gloomily. It's my fault, that is, for forgetting my brolly. At least I've got my jumper... where is my jumper?

In the wash, of course.

So I sat and watched as the rain fell outside and people rushed by. My wash finished and I spent all the change I had on dryer tokens. At the end everything was dry - except for one item of clothing.

My jumper.

I sighed heavily, dreading the walk home.

Then as I stepped outside I realised the rain had stopped, and the clouds were dispersing, and the sun was shining. It carried on shining until I stepped through the door of the room, when suddenly it got very dark and started to rain again.

This led me to wonder - had I accidently pleased Sod somewhere along the line; so much so that he had decided to exempt me from his tyrannic Law? If so, what had I done, and could I keep doing it?

I mentioned it in an email to Alana, and she thought about it for a minute before replying wisely.

"Maybe it was just that numbers were working in your favour and he could upset more people by doing it that way round. In which case, its luck you need to be worrying about appeasing."

It will be the first time that numbers have ever worked in my favour, but I am not complaining. Now I just need to work out how I've been appeasing luck.

Sunday, March 15, 2009

My Heart Will Go On

No posts recently because I have been roadtripping across the universe (England) with Sara and as might be expected internet access was few and far between.

We arrived at our penultimate destination at our uncle's house in Oakham with Nana in tow and breathed a sigh of relief as we hooked up our laptops to their wireless.

I brought with me a recent purchase - the special edition of Titanic on DVD. I don't much like girlie films; Pretty Woman, Dirty Dancing, Bridget Jones I have no time for, but Titanic is my weakness. I saw it four times at our local sticky floored cinema (12 hours of my life I'll never see again) and I generally start crying half way through, which means I have to have a large glass of water nearby in order to stay hydrated.

This special edition is special as it has an ALTERNATE ENDING - 9 minutes worth, no less. Auntie Di is, like Sara and I, a self confessed Titanic fan, so we fired it up. It was rubbish. Jack still died, the boat still sank; rubbish. They just had a party on the boat in the present day (who watches it for the present day bits, honestly) and had an argument with old Rose when she insists (stupidly) on throwing the diamond into the sea because of some trite faux-philosophical nonsense "The real treasure is our day to day moments, blah blah etc"

But then it went back to the proper ending, where old Rose dies and goes back to the boat. To my horror and embarrassment my eyes welled up in a Pavlovian response, even though we hadn't watched the film itself. Then Auntie Di turned to me with a sheepish expression and shiny eyes, and Sara shouted "You're both crying too!" which made me feel a bit better. Soppiness loves company.

Auntie Di made me giggle, as we grumbled about how our respective other halves probably would push us off the wardrobe door, or at least say "Move up you fat cow, it's freezing in here" (sorry Ben, you know it's true) and she leaned back in her chair to call to Uncle Mark, pottering around the kitchen, tidying away.

"Sweetie? If we were floating around in the icy waters of the Arctic Ocean, would you say 'Don't worry love, I'm toastie warm down here, you stay comfy up there'? Sweetie? What would you say?"

There was a brief pause whilst Uncle Mark considered the implications.

"I always look out for you," he said.

Which was very sweet, but did not actually answer the question.