Friday 6 November 2009

Roll on the weekend...

Once upon a time there was a smart, groomed, elegant, sassy (or at least, I like to think so) thirty something who's life was sorted.

And then she had children.

This morning this rumpled, messy-haired, slightly down-at-heel, struggling to remember the date now forty-something has:

  • dragged two unwilling children from bed
  • breakfasted them
  • tidied them up and asked them at least 4 times each to PUT. THEIR. SHOES. ON.
  • started the dishwasher (half empty, but the smell of last night's baked bean saucepan was just too dreadful not to)
  • done the school run
  • checked her oldest son's shoes when he climbed out of the car at school to try to locate the source of the very unpleasant smell, and discovered it was not his footwear, just the car decaying
  • stopped for a restorative cup of tea in a cafe and been generally amazed at how unpleasant some business people can be when they feel their space is being invaded by a small boy who is behaving beautifully - even if he is a little demanding on the subject of having Harry and Dinosaurs read to him
  • picked up a product to review (more of which later)
  • been to the supermarket
  • made more adult conversation with the guy on the fish counter than she's had in the last 24 hours
  • unpacked the shopping & put it away
  • put the laundry on (actually paying attention to the care labels for a change in the hope that the new wool jumper purchased for her oldest son doesn't shrink like the last one did, before he's even worn it)
  • Put some vegetables in the oven to roast so that she can throw them out cooked rather than raw
  • Negotiated with her youngest son for half an hour of internet time by selling out and letting him watch tv

And found out when she finally managed to fit in her first loo stop of the day that she had completed all of the above tasks with her flies undone.

19 comments:

  1. Isn't the life of a mother just great? (Feeling it just now as well. Off to get another cup of tea.) x

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  2. I'd have got to the 'identifying the smell in the car' bit, but then would have taken the car seats out or disassembled something really complicated (for better access to the problem) and spent the rest of the day and night working out how to put it all back together again. That, in a nutshell, is why blokes don't get as much done!

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  3. I love this! I'd have (and in fact really have) done the same thing. Only not the car bit. I'm mostly chasing pooey smells round the living room floor at the moment...

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  4. Having woken at 6.15am to get the man-child to 7am orchestra practice, I was looking forward to a bit of "me" time before getting the Little Guy up. Only to find that he'd actually been up and watching TV since 6.30 in another room.
    Since it's still early morning here I haven't done much but I did walk uphill on the treadmill for 45 minutes (holding three pound dumb bells) so I'm feeling rather saintly.

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  5. The joys of being a mum and even then the loo stop isnt on my own!!!

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  6. Fabulous.

    Once did almost the same with piece of toilet paper hanging out of my trousers.... That's what you get when you have a 'pit stop' before doing chores.

    LCM x

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  7. I remember those days. You better enjoy them while you can. They may be the happiest days of your life.

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  8. Are you sure we aren't twins separated at birth. My flies are always accidentally undone (so difficult to remember to do them up when you are also trying to get 2 small boys out of the bathroom and stop them spraying water out of the taps) and I used to be so well groomed. Can't remember the last time I went to the hairdressers...

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  9. Mwa, early grey? Or Rooibos?

    MD, you said it - not me!

    PlanB, oh I remember that - and from not very long ago, either.

    EPM, now THAT's saintly, I totally agree. Does it mean you deserve an extra croissant for breakfast?

    TMH, no, it isn't. One day I will reclaim the loo stop.

    LCM, you get to have a pitstop first? Now I'm jealous.

    Irene, I do enjoy them. Well - most of the time!

    Brit, yep. And my hair is supposed to short; it'll be in a ponytail before long.

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  10. I'm sorry to say I have to do that with 2 grown boys as well. One in his 30's - the other in his 40's.

    Ummmmm - sad isn't it?

    Because I wear sweat pants quite a bit I don't have to worry about my fly being open. I do have to worry about them falling off these days - but that's another story.

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  11. haha! I love you - that's something I would do although with much less accomplishment thrown into the mix. I finished a business meeting a few weeks back and realised my suit trouser flies were completely undone... very professional..,

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  12. Ooooops!

    Hope the day improved as it progressed.

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  13. I feel your pain! Only mine is more likely to have a really nasty blob of something stuck to my shirt under my boob where I can't see it. x

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  14. OMG, and I thought I was busy! Totally get the car thing, usually smells of old grapes (which is similar to the smell of stale wine..)

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  15. I'm sure gravity worked slowly on your fly, and that it only came right down right near the end. Just before you got to the loo, right?

    (Hmm, sadly I can relate to the car odour as well...) I blame the fact that it leaks in the rain.

    (Yay, thanks for getting the Open Id sign in!)

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  16. Aims - not sad, just life. (And so good to hear from you!)

    Sparx, we've all been there. I once fell asleep on a train and woke to realise in horror that not only were my flies open but I had dribbled all over my shoulder as well.

    Sharon, it did - thank goodness.

    Ellen, now you're just showing off with the not being able to see under your boob thing...(and thanks for the visit!)

    Muddy, thanks for visiting, and at least the stale wine thing is preferable to the smell I couldn't find the source of (it's disappeared now, thank god - or maybe I've just got used to it?)

    Tracey, hurrah! You can comment! And our car leaks too. Had to take it to the garage recently as the window seal has gone on one door. Rather than replacing that they just opened the valve at the bottom of the door, so now it still leaks but at least the sloshing sound when I drive around corners is gone...

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  17. I was sort of hoping that by the time my elder child was at school I would have stopped doing this kind of thing (he's two and the younger one is seven weeks). I remember going to the bathroom in a cafe holding eldest when he was a baby and finding I couldn't do my trousers back up with one hand.

    I'm a new reader - enjoying what I've seen so far!

    Dot.

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  18. Aha, PM, let me introduce you to the world of very long jumpers. You need never worry about your flies again! The mysterious smell in my car was caused by grapes left there in the summer. By the time I found them they were raisins. Yum.

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  19. Aha, PM, let me introduce you to the world of very long jumpers. You need never worry about your flies again! The mysterious smell in my car was caused by grapes left there in the summer. By the time I found them they were raisins. Yum.

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