Mean.
I am trying to find small stuff for the children's stock1ngs by going round all the sites I looked at last year ... but everything still seems to be exactly the same. Also - strangely - crapper and stupider (and not in a good way). I am feeling mean and low and it is now ludicrously cold, inside and out. It is ridiculous to have to wear a hat and scarf in your own bedroom for f.ck's sake. It is predicted to be the coldest winter for decades or some rubbish ... or so I thought. 'As they are incapable of telling you the right weather even five days ahead, how could they possibly know about two months' time?' I argued cleverly a week or so ago. And then it suddenly got unbelievably, farcically freezing. There is thick frost every night which never really melts and I have to take boiling water out to the barn cats' dishes twice a day. Although down in the town it is probably still 'uneasonably warm'.

Weirdly ... my older daughter and her boyfriend drove to the nearestish coast at the weekend on a sunny but still (here) frosty day and spent all afternoon SURF1NG. 'Are you insane?' I said when they came back but 'It is fine as long as you keep your vital organs warm' ... apparently. And the beach was packed.

My son has gone to segurB* on a un1versity trip. 'F.cking typical', he said, 'Last year they went to M@dr1d'. 'Well, it's not so bad', I said 'As it's not somewhere you would ever bother to go by yourself'. 'Oh. I don't know', said my husband, 'there are some wonderful mus3ums there and a marvellous Engl1sh t3ashop'. My son caught my eye, 'Fantastic!', he said bitterly. Practically all I know about Belg1um is that they drink l1ght beer and eat w@ffles all the time .. so he promised to sample these delights. Also the setting for one of my favourite films 'La Kerm3sse H3ro1que' a tiny gem made in about 1930, which has come out again on DVD. Really sweet and funny about the Span1sh army marching through Belg1um in the s1xteenth century. Sounds incredibly boring I know ... but it isn't. I made my son watch it and he really liked it ... so ..

Also .. two Belg1an heros of our time: J0hnny H@lliday and .. as mentioned a few days earlier oddly .. Plast1c Bertr@nd. And T1nt1n?

Belg1um is the joke country of Europe. Dull beyond belief. As W@les is in British terms.
- posted by Iris @ 11/23/2005 10:21:00 PM comment