No Peas for the Wicked

I stare glumly at the contents of the fridge as I try to think of yet another way to make our glut of courgettes and carrots into an appetitising meal which will appeal to all the family.
"I never thought I would say this," I say. "But I am sick of cooking."
"But you love it!" says Not-So-Small Boy. "You are always doing it, anyway."
"I am also always washing, ironing and sitting in traffic, but I don't love those things," I point out.
"I have never seen you washing and ironing while we are stuck in traffic," says my son with a titter.
"I have never seen you ironing full stop," says Husband with an even louder titter.
I turn to face the men in my life brandishing a monstrous courgette and a Sabatier knife in what I hope is a menacing manner. "Do you want me to stop doing all the chores?" I suggest. "I would be quite happy to go on strike altogether."
"Oh dear," says Not-So-Small Boy. "No cabbage for the evil."
"What on earth is that supposed to mean?" I ask.
Husband snorts. "Don't you mean no peas for the wicked?"
"Oh, maybe it is no peas for the wicked," says my son. "Anyway, it's what that guy Bob says."
"Which guy Bob?" Husband asks.
"You know - Bob Marley!" says our son. "The dude in A Christmas Carol."
Husband raises his eyebrows. "Ri-ight," he says. "Anyway, back to the real world. What's for supper?"
"It's not courgettes AGAIN is it?" Not-So-Small Boy howls.
"Yup," I say. I bring the knife down hard to show I mean business. "It might be no peas for the wicked. But it's definitely courgettes for the rest of us."

(Note: Check out Roger McGough's fab poem "No Peas for the Wicked". It'll raise a chuckle or two.)

Farewell, Age of Innocence

Not-So-Small Boy has a phone. At last. We held out until senior school before letting him have one. And thank goodness we did. The minute you give a child a phone, the floodgates of social politics are opened wide.
At junior school, my son did all his socialising in the playground and this was kept very separate from his home life. (For socialising read "pretending to be a lemur" or "digging holes to Australia".) Now, thanks to the phone, the socialising follows him home of an evening creating unforeseen complications.

This presents itself early in the term by the sound of Not-So-Small Boy's phone vibrating at such an alarming intensity that I fear it is about to spontaneously combust. My son is upstairs doing his homework, so I peer at the screen to see a message from an unknown number which reads: "Do you like Henry more than me?"
Strange, I think. I cannot imagine one of my son's friends asking him this. Even amongst his less-than-macho crowd, the boys would not ask each other such questions. But a girl would not ask if my son preferred a boy to her - would she? I am feeling out of my depth, so decide to tackle this head-on over supper.
"Your phone has been receiving messages non-stop this evening," I say.
"You didn't read them, did you?" Not-So-Small Boy asks.
"Er, well, I couldn't help seeing the latest one," I say carefully. "But don't worry, I've no idea who it's from."
Not-So-Small Boy leaves the table hurriedly and snatches up his phone. "Oh no!" he cries, flicking his thumb over the screen. "I'm going to kill him!"
I wait.
My son looks up. "This is someone texting me who thinks I'm someone else," he says, his face white with concern.
"Oh?" I say.
"Yeah, y'see, William is getting bullied by these boys who keep picking him up and putting him in the lockers and saying that he's gay and so in revenge when one of them asked him for Ellie's number, William gave them mine instead."
I try to unpick this. "So . . . you are getting texts from one of the bullies because he thinks you are a girl he is interested in?" I say.
"Yes! And I don't know what to do, coz if I play along I might get bullied too."
Poor boy, I think, the Age of Innocence has ended.
But I can't help having a surge of respect for my son's best friend. William - 1, Bullies - 0!

It's a Tangled Web We Weave

"I'm thinking of joining The Face Book," Mother announces.
"Oh," I reply.
What the Dickens has prompted this? Has Mother read something in the Torygraph about Trojans and taken it to mean that the Ancient World is now accessible via the web?
My mind goes into freefall as I imagine her going back through my timeline, reading the inanities I have posted for the past five years (not to mention finding her way on to this blog). All I can think is, "I must stop this. I must stop this NOW."
"I thought it would be the best way to keep in touch, since I never see you or speak to you," she presses on.
I hold my breath to prevent myself from reminding her of our eight-day stay which is still so fresh in my mind, I feel I have driven away from my childhood home only seconds ago.
"And I never get to speak to my granddaughter now that she has become" [audible shudder] "a TEENAGER."
"Ah, well she's not likely to respond on Facebook either," I say, thinking OH MY GOODNESS, IF MOTHER CATCHES EVEN A GLIMPSE OF DAUGHTER AND HER FRIENDS ON FACEBOOK WE WILL HAVE TO GET ON THE NEXT SHUTTLE TO MARS TO ESCAPE THE FALL-OUT. "And the other thing is I'm not sure you've got the time to check all the news feeds and so on," I continue.
"News Feeds?"
"Yes, and then there's all the palaver of what to stick on your wall and who to befriend or de-friend and whether or not you've been poked."
I hardly know what any of these things mean myself, so I am hoping this is jargon on the level of Dawkins-esque genetics for Mother.
"Ah," says Mother.
"And then there's the added problem that Dad turns the WiFi off after ten o'clock every night, so you would only have a limited window in the evening to update your status anyway--"
"So what exactly is The Face Book for anyway?" Mother says, cutting into my mounting hysteria.
"Oh, it's a load of nonsense really," I say. "To be honest I think you would find it rather silly. It's just banter. And chit-chat." I carefully emphasise two words I know will immediately cast a pall on the idea of joining the social network.
"What kind of - banter?" Mother says. Thank heavens. I can hear her eyes narrow as she speaks.
"Well, to give you the most recent example," I say, "there's been a lot of talk this week about the new series of Dr Who--"
"That rubbish?!" Mother spits. "Oh well, in that case. I won't bother."
Phew. That was close.
"I think I might start Twittering instead."

It's Your Funeral

In the days before Daughter starts at her new school, we have some soul-searching conversations. They range from "What exactly is dandruff?" through to what sort of funeral we might like.

"When I die, what will you do for my funeral?" she asks Not-So-Small Boy.
"Oh, I don't know. What would you like me to do?" he says.
Daughter thinks for a minute and then says, "Well, I think I would like to have a funeral down on the rocks in Cornwall."
"Oh, that's boring," her brother scoffs. "At my funeral I want loads and loads of animals. And balloons," he adds.
Daughter rolls her eyes.
"What about you, Mum?" she asks. "What would you like at your funeral?"
"I don't suppose it matters much, seeing as I won't be there," I say. "But I can tell you where I would like to be when I get old."
Daughter rolls her eyes again.
"You already are," she mutters.
"Thanks."
Not-So-Small Boy shuffles over on the sofa and nudges me. "Go on, tell us, Mum."
"OK. Well, I would like to be somewhere where I can see running water every day," I say.
"Oh, that's easy," says Not-So-Small Boy.
"It is?"
"Yeah! I'll just put you in a chair next to the kitchen sink and leave the tap running."

It's great to know I will be in such safe and loving hands in my dotage.