ill babies and a lying partner

It has been a few days since I last posted which is very remiss of me but I do have a good excuse - both myself and Pork Chop have been rather ill, me with a stinking cold and Pork Chop with a tummy upset which for two nights in a row meant she cried non-stop and shat herself on an alarmingly regular basis. And there is nothing like pungent baby diaorrhea to wake you up at 2o'clock in the morning.

As I said, I have had a cold and so getting up to deal with my poorly daughter has not been much fun. Thank God and touch wood she hasn't got my cold because that would really be the turgid icing on the crap cake that has been my week.

So basically I am writing this with a bit of a runny noise, sore throat and eyes being held open by matchsticks. I am assuming The Other Half is on one of his London lads benders as I haven't heard from him since he left at 8am. I know longer even get angry - at least it allows me to blog in peace - although it would be nice to know he is not lying in a gutter somewhere, just wasted in a bar with a load of other suits.

It also gave me the chance earlier on to steam open a letter from his solicitor. Even now I can't believe I actually did it and do feel rather guilty. It is after all a criminal offence I believe to open someone else's mail but I was curious to see what it said as for some time now I don't believe he has been telling me the whole truth about his court action against the ex-bitch. I don't mean in terms of what the facts are or what she has done. I have seen for myself all too graphically how much she lies, cheats and uses his own daughter against him. No, I am talking about the financial side of things.

As he engaged new solicitors all he has to do with his old ones as far as I am aware is pay the bill and then he is free of the useless, money-sucking fuckers. He told me that the bill was only about £6,000. An awful lot of money to most of us but not desperate considering what he earns. However, according to the letter it is more in the region of £25,000 plus interest. I of course have resealed the letter so he will never know but it terrifies me what this means for the future. £25,000 is an awful lot of money and not something that can be paid off quickly. So do I confront him or do I let it rest? If he lies about something like that what else has he been economical with the truth about?

I am 110 per cent sure our relationship as whole is fine. I don't believe for one second he is having an affair or would indeed contemplate it but I do wonder about the financial side of things about which he is always very very cagey. It just makes me concerned for our life together and our family. I don't want anything to destroy that.

On a lighter note Pork Chop has been farting for England the last couple of days. That girl has no shame and The Other Half is unashamedly proud of her.

Things to make you heave

Two days ago I went shopping with my friend. Rather than go through the whole, "Sorry we can't heat your baby food, it's against screwed health and safety rules" scenario in one of the local restaurants we walked back to mine to feed Pork Chop. Fortunately I have the luxury of living right in the town centre and very close to the shops.

I plonked Pork Chop on the floor amongst her myriad of toys and went to prepare a tasty and nutritious slop that was once trout and courgette savoury before it was blended into oblivion. I went to retrieve her and was surprised at how unusually quiet she was. The reason soon became clear - Pork Chop was muching merrily on a slug. I nearly heaved on the spot, my friend M said she wasn't sure she could stomach her sandwich and Pork Chop just sat their grinning inanely with slug entrails dripping from her chin.

Quite where she got the slug from I do not know. I can only assume one of us walked in and didn't notice.

And by the way, yesterday I got to see the ex-bitch in the flesh for the first time and she bears an uncanny resemblance to Heather Mills-McCartney. Weird. Anyway, I am happy to say that although she may be the size of a Barbie doll and her perfect blonde hair was coiffed to within an inch of its life I still reckon I looked better than her. She is 18 years my senior and that is one thing she can never ever change! For the record I haven't gone and got a sugar daddy, The Other Half was in fact a bit of a toy boy when married with an older wife.

Dental nightmares again

A while ago I spoke about my first nightmare trip to the hygienist when I turned up to have my teeth tortured but was unable to because I hadn't taken my antibiotics ( I have a heart murmur need to take them because there is a slight chance dental work will release bacteria which will cause an infection - weird but true). Second time I went was fine, apart from the pain, and I was told to come for a follow up appointment a couple of months later. Unfortunately Pokr Chop had to come to as I couldn't find a baby sitter.

Normally she is fine, a joy to behold and people marvel at what a good baby she is. Yesterday I strongly suspect Satan decided to possess her, either that or she was just being a kantankerous little moo cow. Less than 30 seconds into the procedure Pork Chop, who was sitting opposite me in her pram, began to scream from the top of her lungs. We are not talking a little whimper or small cry of protest at the indignity of watching while Mummy has her teeth done, we are talking about a full-blown screaming session which makes everyone in a five mile radius run for cover. I tried to to calme her down - that didn't work. I tried bribery next, toys, rice cakes (normally a guaranteed winner) - still no luck and she continued to wail with heartrending abandon.

I was sweating profusely and bright red with embarrassment. The hygienist was sitting there with a kindly expression on her face saying, "Don't worry it happens, we're used to it." However, I suspect that she is lesbian and is only being polite and actually thinks, "What a complete nightmare, thank God I drink from the furry cup instead."

So sheepishly I left with my crying nightmare child tucked firmly under my arm. Fortunately they didn't charge me which was nice but I have had to rebook for January now.

The moral of this story - get a babysitter for dental appointments at all costs.

As an aside, just when you think you know someone.....My neighbours are a lovely couple and we go out with them every so often. I run with the girl and The Other Half has a nice time with her partner. Last night though I discovered they go cruising, for want of a better expression, in bars looking for girls to join them in threesomes. It's not my bag at all but it doesn't bother me and certainly won't affect our friendship (at least if they don't try it on) but whoever would have thought it? Just goes to show the old cliche is true - you can't judge a book by it's cover.

Waking up early and weird lights

I am fortunate enough that Pork Chop now sleeps through the night at eight months. Pretty much 7 to 7 which is wonderful. Yet, my sleep is till broken by The Other Half getting up very very early to go to work at the moment. I feel rather bad about complaining about this as he is after all the one who is bringing home the bacon while I am merely sitting on my arse all day watching Jeremy Kyle (or at least that is what he thinks).

However, I reckon he could do it a teensy weensy little bit quieter than he actually does now which generally involves the moo cow alarm clock going off very loudly at 6am, him leaping out of bed, stomping around the room and managing to turn every single light in the house on. A few more crashes and bangs, plus him jumping on me and telling me he has to go to work (as if I hadn't already realised and wasn't already woken up) is enough to make sure I am not going to go back to sleep any time soon.

Is it too much to ask that he does it a little quieter or am I being really mean?

Anyway, we bought some new lights for our lounge the other day, or to be more precise, some new light shades. They are these white round tooth-like lights which look fabulous once up but are a bugger to put together because they come in 60+ plastic sections which all have to be folded and clipped into place in the right order. There should surely be a warning on the box, something along the lines of don't buy this unless you have at least a degree or better still a membership to Mensa because they are stupidly difficult to put together. The Other Half did one two nights ago and I did the other last night. I now have raw skin on my fingers from folding sharp plastic for hours on end. On top of all that Pork Chop was looking gleefully at the one still on the floor earlier and it was by only diving after her that I managed to stop her chubby little fingers from death gripping it into pieces.

Still despite our toiling and toubles it is worth it and they look great.

Not looking forward to dusting the buggers though....

Swimming babies and poo in the pool

Pork Chop is currently sitting on the floor tearing Sunday's newspapers to shreds. She is now covered in black ink which makes it look like she is severely bruised and social services need to be called at once. I hasten to add THEY DON'T, IT IS JUST INK. Having social services poke their sticky beaks into my life one day in the future because Pork Chop might have got a small bruise from falling over is a constant irrational fear of mine. I suspect it doesn't help when there are so many stories in the media of parents losing their children because of over zealous so-called childcare experts.

Anyway, I digress as that wasn't really the point of this post. Yesterday we took Pork Chop for an underwater baby shoot. Before anyone reacts in horror she has been doing Little Dipper classes for ages, absolutely loves it and is probably more confident in the water than Nemo. Had an argument with The Other Half before we left over Huggies Swim Pants which went something like this:

Me: "Damn, have run out of swim pants. Need to go and get some."

Him sitting on sofa doing fuck all while I try to dress Pork Chop, feed her, dress myself, feed me, make beds and unload dishwasher: "Well stop eating your bloody toast and go and get some or we will be late."

Me: "There is no need to shout, I've been busy getting your daughter fed and ready. You know you can be very mean sometimes."

Him: "That's just nasty, I'm not mean. Listen to you nagging all the time. I'm just trying to help. Go get the pants from Boots and I'll look after Pork Chop or we WILL be late."

Me: "Fine whatever." (fucking bastard)

Him: "Fine whatever." (stropy fucking bitch)

So I rushed to Boots for the swim pants. Boots didn't open until 11am so I stood there with several other mums and stampeded the door as soon as it was unlocked. I then ran, yes ran, all the way up a very steep hill home and we still managed to arrive at the shoot 20 minutes early only to be told we didn't need to put them in swim pants as they looked bulky and spoilt the lines in the photos.

Suffice to say, swim pants or not, Pork Chop loved it. However, it does slightly concern me that they don't wear pants. Within five minutes we were told to "evacuate" the pool because one of the little darlings had had a big shit. Pork Chop also burped and threw up a little milk which landed in the pool before I had time to blink. I surreptitiously splashed the water a bit to disguise it and watched guilty as the little white bits sunk below the surface, no doubt obscuring the camera somewhat. And there is also the huge numbers of wees they must all be doing in there as well.

Five babies per session, roughly eight sessions - that equals a lot of wee.

The nursery nightmare

I am currently in the process of trying to find a nursery for Pork Chop in the event that I do decide to go back to work. I am already limited in my options because unlike certain supermums I didn't put her name down when she was still just a twinkle in her daddy's ....

Still, there are plenty to choose from out there. It is just deciding which one is best which is the problem. Admittedly I have only visited three so far but my first thoughts are these:

Number 1: The worst one of all. All the girls working there were fat and ugly and the place smelt of shit. The baby room had just one cot and other babies were expected to sleep on the floor. the garden was a small patch of concrete and the whole place generally had the air of a Romanian orphanage if that is possible. I was shown around by a girl, who though pleasant enough, clearly didn't want to be showing me round with any great enthusiasm. Where was the manager, the professionalism? The only thing it really had going for it was being two hundred yards from our house.

Number 2: I was greeted by the manager. All the girls working there were young, fit and good looking (this is a requirement of The Other Half's, not mine but I can see his point). It was opposite a lovely park where they take the kids twice a day, weather permitting, and it had lots of sensory rooms for the children to throw themselves around in without getting hurt. Bonus - it also had one cot for every baby and was ten quid cheaper than the Romanian lookalike. Oh and it also had a lovely garden with real grass and a vegetable patch.

Number 3: Higly professional, about the same price as number 2 but looked more like a school than a nursery and was on a very busy main road. I may be a little pushy but even I don't think Pork Chop is ready yet to learn her 12 times table and how to join up her writing. We were greeted by an overly friendly, slightly rotund manager. Very very talkative but a little bit strange. "Hello, and how are you today?" (I'm not the child, daughter is you don't have to speak to me like I'm three).

So number two is looking good if I go back and that's by no means definite. Have had meeting with editor and he is thinking about my request for part time hours. In reality because he is a mysogynist it means he was paying me lip service and will consider my request only because he is legally obliged to until he can come up with some credible reasons why it won't work. Hmmm watch this s pace

P.S. still loving I'm a Celeb - it's a close run thing between David Gest and Dean Gaffney right now but Lauren Booth just really gets on my tits.

I'm a Celebrity

It is official. I am addicted to the current series of I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here. It is now the highlight of mine and The Other Half's evenings in front of the telly. Already the bitchiness and cattiness which makes it so watchable has started and David Gest is my new hero. Scot Henshall on the other hand is a conniving arrogant little twat, or at least that is how he comes across in the editing.

But Gest is just fabulous. I admit I was somewhat biased to begin with having followed the Minelli split and read all the salacious gossip in the papers which made him out to be a vain and pompous control freak with tattooed eyebrows and outrageous demands. However, over the last three days he has proved himself to be extremely funny, entertaining, intelligent and brave - he did after all get six meals for the camp and had me and The Other Half in stitches when he did his bushtucker trial. Not at all like Henshall who I am told freaked out, had a hissy fit and failed to get a single meal for the unhappy campers last night.

So I reckon we should all vote for Gest to win. I think he deserves it.