‘… and that’s when it fell off in my hand.’. Louise Rennison
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I was holding my candle and thinking and thinking about the Sex God and our love that knew no bounds and stretched across the Pacific Ocean. Or was it the Australian Bite? Anyway, our love was stretching across some big watery thing.
I think I might actually have nodded off for a little zizz, because I came round to see a small inferno ablaze in front of me. Oh hell’s teeth, I had accidentally set fire to an elderly pensioner! The end of her headscarf was blazing merrily and she hadn’t even noticed.
I started beating the flames out with my handbag. I was trying to help, but she started hitting me back with her handbag. Before I knew it, I was in a handbag fight.
11:45 a.m.
I did try to point out that long dangly scarves on the very elderly could be considered a health hazard around naked flames. But Call-me-Arnold wasn’t calling me his child any more and he didn’t ask if he would see me next week.
Which he won’t.
Lunchtime
I am exhausted by trying to get along with the Lord.
Monday March 7th Back to Stalag 14
As a mark of my widowosity, I wore dark glasses and a black armband. Also I found a black feather from Mutti’s sad feather boa that she wears if I don’t spot her first. I stuck that in the side of my beret, which I pulled down right over my ears.
I was walking along with Jas and I said, “Even in the depths of my sadnosity I think I have a touch of the Jacqueline Onassis about me.”
She said, “Why? Did she look like a prat as well?”
A quick duffing up showed her the error of her ways.
Oh God, oh Goddy God God, a whole day of Stalag 14.
Assembly
Our revered and amazingly porky Headmistress Slim rambled on about exams and achievement and said wisely, “Now, in conclusion, girls, I would say, it’s not all about winning, it’s how you play the game.”
What game? What in the name of Ethelred the Unready’s pantyhose is she talking about? As we filed off to the science block, Hawkeye was in a super-duper strop for some reason. She made me remove my armband and she was marching up and down looking at people like a Doberman, only much taller. And not a dog. She alarmed a first former so much that the first former fell into a holly bush and had to be fished out and sent to the nurse to calm down.
I said to Rosie, “I think widowhood has toughened me up. If Hawkeye gets on my case I am going to say to her, ‘Hawkeye, sir, when you have suffered the torments of love like I have, you will not give a flying pig’s bum about your Latin homework. Romulus and Remus could have been brought up by ostriches for all I care.’”
Rosie said, “Yeah right, well, let’s see what happens when she gives you double detention.”
“Do you know what I saw on TV the other night? Ostriches fall in love with human beings. On ostrich farms they go all gooey and even more dim when humans come to feed them. They try to snog them.”
“Ostriches try to snog humans?”
“Yes.”
“Non.”
“Mais oui, mon petit idiot, c’est vrai. It is very very vrai.”
“How can they snog when they have beaks?”
“You are being a bit beakist, Rosie.”
Lunchtime
The Ace Gang are going on and on about the teenage werewolf party. Jas said, “Tom and I are going to wear matching false ears!” And then she had an uncontrollable laughing spaz.
I said, “Jas, when was the last time you saw a teenage werewolf with false ears?”
That made her stop snorting like a fool. She was all shuffily on the knicker toaster (radiator). “Well… it’s, well… I mean…”
Rosie – who is in an alarmingly good mood now that Sven is winging his way home on his sleigh – slapped me on the back and said, “What do you get when you cross a mouse with an elephant?”
We all just looked at her and she put her glasses on sideways and said, “Massive holes in the skirting board!”
I feel like a bean in a bikini, tossed around on the sea of life. Set apart from my mates because of heartbreakosity. I love them but how childish they seem, chatting on about false eyebrows. I may never wear extra body hair ever again.
3:00 a.m.
We should be having Hawkeye for English but she is too busy torturing people, so Miss Wilson will be taking most of our lessons this term. She is a tremendous div, so English will be more or less a free period.
Oh, what larks! We are doing Macbeth as our set play. Although Miss Wilson says we are not allowed to say its name: we have to call it “The Scottish Play”, because it’s bad luck to say its name. As I said to Rosie and Jools, “Hurrah! A play about blokes in tights talking in Och Aye language for a thousand years.”
We’ve all been dished out parts and, tragically, Jas is going to be Lady MacScottishplay. Rosie, Jools and Ellen are the three witches and I am some complete twit in tights called Macduff. Nauseating P. Green is my wife, Lady Macduff. She is thrilled and keeps mooning over at me.
I don’t see how I am supposed to be a bloke, because they are – as we all know – a complete mystery.
4:15 p.m.
On the way home Jas was looking at her hand and going, “Out damn spot.”
I said, “It’s not the spot on your hand you have to worry about, Jas, it’s the huge lurker lurking on your chin.”
That shut her up and got her feeling about.
Actually, she hasn’t got a lurker on her chin, but if she goes on fingering it long enough she will have.
Home (ha)5:00 p.m.
Oh brilliant, Angus has gone into my wardrobe and found some of my knickers to attack. He was ambling out of my room with his head through one of the legs like some sort of Arab sheikh. I kicked at him but he dodged out of the way. He was purring really loudly; he loves it when you get rough with him. He is a good example of the benefits of rough love. I should really give him a good kicking every day.
Kitche 5:30 pm
Oh yum yum and quelle surprise, we are having les delicieuses fish fingers and frozen peas for our tea! I am sure that I am developing rickets: my legs look distinctly bendy. Vati came in in a hilariously good mood. He kissed me on the head even though I tried to dodge him. I said, “Father, I need my own space and frankly you are in it.”
He just laughed and said, “I’ve just seen Colin and he and Sandy are having a Lord of the Rings party and we’re all invited.”
Mutti said, “What a hoot.”
I said with great meaningosity, “Vati, I will never – and I repeat, never – be wearing an elf’s outfit in this lifetime, and for the sake of any sensitive people on the planet – that is, me – I beg you not to consider green tights.”
He just smiled