Unveiling

Eeeeek! The moment of truth!!!

This is me and Lou.

I am surprised the picture came out so well, considering we were off our faces at the time!

Lou was holding one of her Balls........ (oh my God, the puns........lets start again).

Lou was holding her Christmas Ball, (Aaaaaah....there it is again! I am obviously in a smutty mood today), at the Grosvenor, I think. Well, I cant actually remember where it was, but I do remember it was a Burlesque night.

There were lots of sweaty, middle-aged men, gawping at the stage where scantily-clad girls shook their bits and bobs. Girls were climbing out of giant cocktail glasses and lolling about on huge telephones. (No, my drink wasn't spiked).

Anyway, my graduation piccys are stuck in the post, due to the postal strike, so in the manner of a Blue Peter presenter, 'Here's one I made earlier'!

Have a guess which one I am.

Here's a clue:

From the mouth of my Husband, 'You have Trouble written all over your face!'.

From my dry gob, 'I thought it was 'Doormat'

Hope you all have a lovely weekend. I'm off to Lou's.

RMxx

Unveiling

A Little Faith

This is a picture of my mother.

Her head buried in the sand as usual.

Regular readers will recall how my Mother thinks I'm being 'groomed' by my lovely blogging pals, and last weekend she told me that I was her favourite child for 2 and half years, until my sister was born!!!

Yeah.... well, we all have our crosses to bear don't we?

Anyway, last Friday I was invited to attend an award ceremony which was held in London at the Institute of Directors. It was in view of finally passing those bloody exams and becoming a full member of the Accountancy body.

I was only allowed to take one person with me and unfortunately Hubby was in Johannesburg, so Mother muscled her way in and decided she was going to come.

As usual we got behind time because of Mother's incessant nonsensical chatter about absolutely nothing, so I was rushing trying to put on a bit of 'slap' (make-up). I was mortified to discover that I had overdone it with the make-up. My light brown eyeshadow was in fact really dark brown/black and I had put lashings of black Kohl eyeliner on. I resembled something out of a porn movie ... much to my disgust.

Mother, in the meantime, had got rather excited about her jewellery, and was wearing every little piece she had brought with her. She was a walking 'bling'.

With parting comments from the kids on our appearance, 'Oi, what you got on your face?' and 'Nan, you look like a rapper', we left Liam watching the kids and grabbed a cab to the station.

It was pissing down with rain and we spent a hideous 20 Min's stuck inside the confines of a cab, listening to a lunatic cab driver rant about how 'we' are bombing his country! (Oh, just shut up and drive!!!). When I could stomach the rantings no long, I got him to pull over and flung the money at him, whilst Mother and I escaped into the pouring rain.

We caught the train, grabbed another cab and finally arrived in Pall Mall. The IOD was lovely. Mother was extremely happy as the booze was free flowing.

I had asked Mother to take some pictures of me.

This is the one Mother took of me in the hat and gown.

Who the hell is this? That's not even me! This is a picture of a random woman.

And this is the one she took of me going on stage to receive my award from the president:

(!)

This isn't me either. This is a picture of the shoulders of the people sitting in front of us!

Bloody woman.

Luckily, I'd booked the photographer to take some professional photos, so we had to queue up to get my picture taken with the hat and gown. Whilst we were queuing, Mother went in search of more booze.

Mother: I'll just get another glass of wine

Me: Haven't you had enough of a whine today?

Mother(oblivious): Ooh, look at that waiter, there's loads of wine on his tray.

Me: Yeah, you like a nice whine don't you?

(Sometimes I just cant help myself).

I finally got some lovely snaps taken, however, my behaviour in front of a camera has always been a little........sluttish!

I cant help it. I used to model, and its hard to leave those days behind, especially when the photographer is so encouraging. 'Oh, we've got a glamour puss here!', and 'That's it, a bit more, turn this way.....goooood'. It was his fault for encouraging me!

Mother was appalled. 'Everyone's staring at you', she hissed.

'I don't care', I replied, pouting and pushed my boobs out a little more. I do this just to irritate her.

So to irritate me, she somehow managed to persuade the photographer to have her photo taken with me! I now have my Mother in my photos! Urgh!

Admittedly, they are more demure.

While the presentation was being held, I snuck out to go the loo. When I came back, Mother started whispering.

Mother: I never realised what you had achieved.

Me: Does that surprise you?

Mother: Well, you know, you having such a big child......(she meant me having Liam at 17, who is now 23).

Me: Did you not think I could do it then?

Mother: Well, quite frankly, you were the last person I would have thought would have achieved this.

(Charming).

Me: Well, at least I have not lost the ability to surprise you then.

If she stopped playing at being an Ostrich and took her head out of the sand once in while, perhaps she would realise that being labelled for an eternity as a 'teenage single mum', does not always equal useless, stupid and thick forever!

A little faith is required.

(Me singing) Have a little Faith

A Little Faith

Death and Taxes Part 2

Dear God! The shenanigans about my brother-in-law, 'Jolly Roger', have been coming thick and fast. Everyday it is something new. It appears that 'Jolly Roger' is more like Roger the Dodger!

Apparently, the house, which incidentally he bought for peanuts 20 odd years ago, has three mortgages on it! Mortgaged up and beyond all reasonable levels.

My sister-in-law, Suki, has found out that she has two maxed out credit cards in her name, which she didn't know about. Her signature was forged on these documents. Other credit card statements are pouring in, in Roger's name, also maxed out.

Loan sharks have been telephoning the house and people, who we all thought were his mates, were actually people he had borrowed money from. They've been knocking at Suki's door telling her how much he owed them.

Roger's parents were considered 'tight' by my Hubby's family, but now it has come to light that they had been lending or giving him money for years and in the end got really fed up with him and so put a stop to it. Now we know why.

Roger borrowed his sister's life savings and never paid it back. When their father died, he left both of them some share certificates to be equally distributed, however, Roger got hold of them, sold the lot and pocketed the money.

My mother-in-law lent Roger her late husbands car, but, rather stupidly, left the registration details in the car. So Roger sold it!

You would think this was enough wouldn't you?

Oh no!

A couple of days ago, a mistress of SEVEN years crawled out the woodwork. SEVEN years! And he 'took' her for 70 grand as well. We don't know much about her yet, just that she was local and he had known her for donkey's years. Hope there are no secret kiddies.

You couldn't make this up could you? Its bloody unbelievable.

And so the river's of tears that were shed have dried up completely and been replaced by anger. Suki is so enraged, Roger is still in the morgue.

He has had his autopsy which we are just waiting for the results of, (should be interesting), and there also has to be an inquest.

I think he was quite clever, because he kept everyone at arms length so no-one spoke to each other about all this lending and borrowing. I suppose this is how Con-Artists do it. Apparently this had been going on for years. However, it caught up with him in the end, otherwise he wouldn't have had such a shocking demise.

The rough estimate of debt at the moment is in excess of half a million, and rising constantly, with no assets!!! Not a bean! Suki has 35p in her purse and that's it!

The questions I would like to know are these:

What was he doing in that city?
Had he come to meet someone?
Was it a dodgy deal that went wrong?
Why did he have his passport on him at the time?
What was the drain of money?

All the money was going out all time. Maybe he was a gambler or secret druggie (although I don't think it was drugs). Something was draining that money away and it must be huge.

Needless to say, I don't think many people will be attending the funeral. Hubby is flatly refusing to go, and Suki is even debating it. I think the Mistress wants to go though. That wont be much fun, the Wife and Mistress at the funeral!

I would never have pinned Roger down as the 'Artful Dodger' or 'Artful Roger' come to that. But he hood-winked us all.

Just shows you doesn't it? You don't really know anyone.

I shall keep you updated with anymore details that come in.

x

Death and Taxes Part 2

Coming Up Trumps

After recent shocking events it would be nice to have a bit of good news - and finally we have some and its all to do with the boys!

Liam applied for promotion and had an agonising wait for a week, but he got it. This is a massive confidence boost for him, especially after that awful business with his ex-girlfriend Rhino. His current girlfriend Abbi, is still on the scene and they seem to be getting on OK. She is really a nice girl. (Hurrah!).

Olly has surpassed all expectations and has even left me a bit gob-smacked.

He started at his new school (secondary) last month and has come on leaps and bounds.

I started driving Olly to and from school everyday, through despicable traffic, which just made my hair stand on end, it was that stressful.

After a couple of days he got fed up with this. He wanted to go by bus. There is a school bus that picks him up around the corner and drops him back after school. No general public use it and it is just for use by the kids that go to neighbouring schools.

However, Olly having Autism, Aspergers Syndrome, means that catching buses and fiddling around with bus passes and timetables and all those little, everyday things that we take for granted is quite difficult for him to negotiate. He has lots of social and behaviour problems, so the worry for me is about the other kids on the bus. Is it busy? Does he know anyone? Will he get into a fight and punch someones lights out?

(In parent meetings with the ASC Support group I have found it common for most kids like Olly, with some form of 'invisible' disability, to be bullied. But Olly just punches them and they leave him alone. Not ideal, I know, but it does stop the bullying in its tracks).

After chauffeuring him to and from school a few times, he started to get really agitated and kept asking continually to take the bus. After a few days I got really fed up with his badgering, so, once I had armed him with a mobile phone, I walked him to the bus stop one morning. As soon as the other kids started arriving he told me to 'Get lost'. (Charming! This is his way of saying goodbye and is not meant to be interpreted as offensive).

I hid around the corner and just made sure he got on the bus, which he did. I then spent the whole day worrying whether he had made it to school or not, then worrying if he would make it home again! It was agonising. (I know, I know, I'm a worry-wort). But, I reasoned that, at some stage in your child's life, you have to let go of the reigns and, regardless or not whether they have a disability, they do have to grow up and take responsibility. So this was a learning curve for me.

Later that afternoon, he came bounding through the back door like a huge excitable puppy, really pleased that he had made it to school and back on his own.

This is a major achievement as it now proves that he has advanced another step towards independence. I'm well chuffed!

A few weeks ago, the kids decided they wanted to attend an audition for Peter Pan, the Christmas pantomime, that is being held at our local theatre in December.

We attended the audition, but I did tell the kids that they probably wouldn't get a part, but it would be good experience for them. On that understanding, (which I think is very important in this particular industry), they were still happy to attend, so we went.

100 boys auditioned for 12 places and 300 girls auditioned for 10 places! It was like a mini X-factor with queues all the way down the street!

After hours of hanging around and seeing plenty of little kids in tears, I found Amber first. She didn't get a part, but she seemed OK with that. We had to wait for what seemed like an eternity for Olly to come out.

Eventually, he emerged. He'd got a part of a Lost Boy. It is his first professional role and he gets paid as well!

There is a long way to go before Christmas and there are lots of rehearsals to go through and lots of shows to do. They have five boys in reserve, just in case things do not go as planned. As we know, life is unpredictable!

But for the moment, I am so proud of my boys and especially Olly, who despite all odds keeps Coming Up Trumps.

Autism Centre of Excellence

Coming Up Trumps