As I write this I am just starting my lunch break. It’s been a morning.
Laura has started walking with her friend during lock down. She wakes up at about 5.30am, turns on every light in the house, has a 20 minute chat with Alexa and then slams all the doors on her way out. It is a very relaxing and pleasant way to start my day, which should by rights start two hours later with a relaxing cup of tea and a shower.
One of the side effects of this admirable fitness challenge is that by 8.30pm she is sound asleep on the sofa, head nodding along as I sit through the 9th episode of Schitts Creek that night as it is the only thing we can agree on to watch.
The morning walk usually is between 4 and 6 miles and takes about 90 minutes. 90 minutes just Laura and her friend, talking about life and all it’s quirks. I don’t think I have spoken to one person for 90 uninterrupted minutes in my life, let alone 6 times a week. I often wonder what they have to talk about for that long and assume it is about what a great husband I am as that is the only topic that could sustain 9 hours of conversation a week. Most people would have nothing else to say to each other after that, not these two. Laura gets in puts together 4 completely different breakfasts and then calls this friend for another 2 hours. Also their conversations aren’t really conversations. They kind of talk over each other, each getting louder and louder as the minutes pass.
Today though they took a break from this new venture and there was no walk. I thought this would mean we would get a slower paced start to the day, some peace in the house as I started my work day. I was clearly wrong.
It started OK actually, Laura is up at 7am which is a lay in for her now, making just enough noise to wake up Harriet who took it as a sign she could run in my bedroom and elbow drop me in the nuts. I got all set up for work, ready to go and Laura started breakfast, a picture of domestic bliss.
8.55am hits and the morning took a turn for the worse. As the clock on the microwave hit 8.55am Laura’s phone went off, I know this not because she has an annoying message tone, but because I looked up to see her pick up her phone and then at the top of her lungs shout ‘SSSHHHHHIIIIITTTTTT!!!!!!”
Summer Camps are hard to come by at the moment, something to do with CHII-NAA and WOOO-HAAAN, so we have improvised a bit and made some other plans. Freddie’s teacher has a son of a similar age and he was getting some one on one Football (Soccer) coaching today. They kindly invited Fred along and this was arranged weeks ago. I know it was arranged weeks ago because we had to pay cash and cash is not a concept in this house. The money had been sitting in Laura’s saving pot for at least a month. Well today was the day of the coaching and despite having a charming Cavalier King Charles themed calendar, multiple iPhones, no less than 6 Alexa’s and an iWatch all of which able to record the date and time we are doing things, nobody had made any note that today was the day. Oh and it started at 9am.
With only one adult dressed in anything it fell on me to get Fred out of his pit, dressed, in his football gear, sunscreen on water bottle ready and over to the park in 5 minutes. This happened whilst Laura did what I like to call ‘faffing’. Faffing is panicking, shouting, generally achieving nothing at all, but ensuring everyone else is laser focused. As I chuck on Fred’s kit, get his boots on and cover him in sunscreen Laura throws the cash at me like I’m working the champagne room at Rachel’s, Orlando’s premium Gentlemen’s club and almost certainly Harriet’s future workplace.
Fortunately it is only a couple of minutes walk from our house to the park and I managed to get Fred there just 5 minutes late and I get back in to my house at 9.10am pleased that the fire has been put out and I can crack on. Still in her pajamas, Laura’s next 5 minutes were spent explaining to me how it was my fault and that she couldn’t be responsible for everything.
We agreed that it was my fault and off she went for a shower, somehow this was managed while being on the phone to her friend who she would have been walking with. Now I know iPhones are water resistant now, but surely I can’t be the only one who thinks being on the phone in the shower is odd. I don’t really get the logistics of it but each to their own, if she’s chatting on the phone I am not at fault for anything. As long as she could pick Fred up at 10 I was good, I had a lot to do.
Fortunately for me she did manage to do that and brought Fred home from training Now Fred has done no physical activity for weeks, he uses his hoverboard to go from his bedroom to the fridge, that is the grueling level of cardiovascular work out that he has been putting himself through. Well at 10.10am this morning the poor kid fell through the door like one of those people you see getting carried over the line in a marathon. He fell on to the sofa, right in my eye line, face as red as his hair, full of lactic acid and regrets. Some discussion followed about him going in the shower and he actually agreed and started to literally strip off there and then. The next 15 minutes of my life involved a sweaty 9 year old sitting stark bollock naked on my sofa trying to “get the energy together” for a shower.
Still he did it and I will likely not see him again today as he retreats back to starting his Fortnite clan, a venture which currently stands at 2 members with others slated to try out in August. I hope the entry requirements are low.
Next up Harriet, her turn to go in the shower, or bath, or shower, or bath, the argument between the women of the house on that could only be rivaled by the Brexit negotiations. Each back and forward becoming more and more urgent as Laura needed to get to the grocery store. Tears followed, some shouting, a couple of “it’s not fair”s (and that was just Laura) and by 11.15am some semblance of normality was back. Laura was on the phone, Harriet was knee deep in her latest Nickelodeon show and Fred was shut away in his virtual world, spending real money on clothes for a computer character.
Time for some peace? Not by a long shot
Before going to the shop Laura checked her bank account, there was some sort of administrative cock up that cost her $19. That $19 might as well have been $19m. Heads were going to roll, people needed firing, that bank was “No use to her anymore”. We settled on a strongly worded email followed by confirmation that this $19 wouldn’t immediately impact her during her fight with ‘The Man’ to get it back. This however as it often does snowballed into a forensic examination on whether or not her credit card had been paid, if so what account from and then somehow into purchasing new swimming goggles for Harriet. I kind of zoned out during this, the faffing was at peak level, no real input from me was going to help other than confirming everything had been paid and finding $89 left over from our weekend gambling trip which I just gave to her. After 11 years of marriage I have learnt that many of the crises which cause Laura’s mad panic can be resolved by me just handing over cash. The $89 was quite literally every penny I had in the house.
Finally, finally, it was time for Laura to go and get the shopping, finally I would get some peace. As the door closed behind her I let out a sigh of relief, I could feel my blood pressure returning to its normal, only slightly higher than the average man’s level. I even reclined my seat a little to get into peak email writing position. By the time I got there Laura was back, literally 15 seconds after shutting the door.
Picture the scene, she runs over to me, screeching, “Check my neck! I’ve been stung by something”. I took a cursory look, mainly because since my eye surgery I cannot see anything up close, it’s pointless. There was a freckle, which I am assuming has been there longer than 15 seconds and that is about it. So I went with my fall back in times like this, told her to put some Sudocreme on it. That answer has saved me more times than I care to remember. Really I just wanted to be left the hell alone.
It’s at this point I saw my second semi naked body of the day as Laura ripped off her T-Shirt and found an ant. She called it a “Big bastard ant” but I think it was a pretty standard sized ant. The process of elimination led very quickly to the ant being the culprit.
What followed was a scene I have only witnessed watching uprisings in Iraq on TV. Laura stood their boobs swinging in the breeze, flip flop in hand, shouting things I couldn’t understand, while she brutalized this ant to death with her shoe. The picture of her half naked, angrily waving a rubber flip flop is one that will live with me forever.
Eventually after the aggressive retribution of justice on this ant Laura left, giving me some quiet. Normally a trip to the grocery store takes 2 hours. I started writing this blog when she left. She was back by the time I finished it. I have wasted that 45 minutes of peace on lunch and writing this. Right now, I am so jealous of that ant.
The Shroders in Florida 