The city that never sleeps

I'm sure ol' Blue Eyes had different reasons than I for this description of New York City. It is, however, the most fitting quote I can find for my long weekend, now sadly over, during which I probably averaged about four hours sleep per night, either because of jet lag or the desire not to miss a thing. Yes, the reluctant housewife is back in Bovinia, the place where plenty of sleeping goes on, not a high heel nor miniature dog in a coat is to be seen, and the silence seems louder than the Manhattan overpass.

Surprise surprise - a claustrophobic, thick blanket of fog lay over the village as I returned, though CG assures me that the weather was good while I was away (funny how that always seems to be the case; how often have I returned from a rainy holiday abroad, only to be told how wonderfully sunny it was in my absence). Seeing my family again more than compensated, of course, for these slightly negative feelings. It's just that, having experienced city life again, Bovinia seems even more pedestrian and insular than before. Ho hum, I guess I'm tired. Tomorrow I will wake up with renewed vigour and determination.

Let us not forget the purpose of my visit to NYC, namely the wedding of my brother, which took place last Friday evening at the Harbour Lights restaurant overlooking Brooklyn Bridge. I had not known what to expect, having never met his intended apart from a few brief minutes on skype. Well, she's a stunner, there's no doubt about it. The evening was a bit strange though. My brother has accrued quite a few friends and drinking pals over the years, and quite a number of these had made it across the Atlantic to be there, in full force, as well as six relations and local mates from New York. His bride was, in contrast, rather under-represented, I felt. All in all, the whole she-bang was more like a knees-up in honour of my brother (who will be so sorely missed in London) with the wedding as a little side attraction. The party broke up at around 11.30 pm and the bridal couple departed. I found myself drifting along to some random bar with the die-hard revellers. A couple of hours later, though, my bro reappeared, having left his new wife reading in bed. He proceeded to party on till 5 a.m., not that I am one to criticise, as I was still up an hour or so later, drinking tea made by a little Indian guy, sitting on the sidewalk and trying to persuade my accomplice, the little-but-only-in-age pilot brother Rory, to stay up and watch the sun rise (higher) over the East River. Thank goodness we decided against it and finally hit the hay.

The next day I met up with the happy couple on the Lower East Side and was much reassured. I think this girl will take my brother in hand. (It's about time someone did.) Various other jaded people arrived and poked around in salad plates or drank coffee. Another evening of hard drinking was heralded, so I was most glad that my sensible side, who only makes rare appearances, spoke up and excused me in advance. There's only so much carousing I can do.

Well, it feels good to be back in the RH saddle. I do encourage you to comment if you feel like doing so. Sometimes it feels as if I am posting stuff into the ether. Let me know what you'd like to hear more about. Otherwise, you run the gauntlet of being subjected to my random anecdotes ad infinitum. Or is that the very charm of this blog?

Start spreading the news...

Bovinia is once again under a thick blanket of snow. Nobody seems very happy about it. There are lots of people out clearing their driveways and moaning that they thought spring was on the way. I couldn't agree more, but as I said to Titus on the way to kindergarten today, there are worse things, like pouring rain or freezing fog.

Snow or not, this week will be somewhat untypical for the reluctant housewife, who on Thursday is hopping over to the Big Apple for the weekend. As a result, this will be my last post until next week. No doubt I shall return armed with lots of material for the blog, as the reason for my trip is my brother's wedding and it is bound to be unlike any other I've been to before. I shall just get the chance to meet his fiancee before she becomes his wife at City Hall on Friday. So goodbye temporarily and have a wonderful week:)

A clean sweep

It's ten minutes to eight in the morning and there's a MAN ON MY ROOF. Yes, really. Not that I'm scared, at least not now that I've ascertained that it's the dreaded chimney sweep. I used to see them as romantic, Dick Van Dyke figures who would merrily poke their brush up the chimney a bit, scatter a bit of soot and scintillate with their cockney banter. The modern German breed is a merciless money-grabbing creature - they don't give you the chance to book an appointment (or whatever you do with a chimney sweep - a session? A brushing? A clean?); no, they just arrive and get on with their job and present you with a bill for a hundred euros afterwards. I remember the first time this happened to me - I was completely flummoxed, as I wasn't even aware I had a chimney. Maybe I didn't. Being a law-abiding citizen, I paid the bill anyway. Then there was the time when we did have a chimney, and our fireplace was smoking terribly, but the chimney sweep said nothing was wrong, swore blind he did, and it was CG who discovered the dead squirrel blocking the flue, poor thing, I mean of course the squirrel. And we had paid to be told nothing was wrong.

Writing this has called to mind my London days, when the window cleaner would also simply arrive and start cleaning, always at the most inopportune of moments. Don't tell me that appearing at somebody's upstairs window, while said person is dressing, is down to pure coincidence. I would love to hear the stories swapped at the annual window cleaner convention, or whatever they have. To my shame I remember hiding in the bathroom (small, frosted pane, hard to reach) while Andy/Steve/Gary rang the doorbell for his twenty quid. I never had it to hand, and as a result received red bills in the post for hundreds of pounds. Could it be that the fault lay with... me? Could I have been a little more organised? Nay! Never explain, never apologise, a la Maggie Thatcher. Life's so much simpler that way.

Tread carefully

Although it is only February, it seems like spring is on its way to Bovinia. This means good and bad things. Good - snowdrops. Bad - all the farmers in the vicinity (and there are hordes, believe me) have decided to monitor and rearrange their manure supplies, which involves ferrying it around by the trailer-load from one barn to another, dropping most of it on the road as they go, and stirring it up to produce steaming brown piles everywhere, marring the bucolic idyll and probably covering up half the snowdrops.

I should tread carefully - both literally and metaphorically. Those who know better, i.e. the true Bavarians, are darkly predicting more onslaughts of snow, perhaps until the middle of April. This means CG and I might get the chance to work on our skiing technique, or should I say develop one in the first place, but it also means goodbye (again) to the short-lived pleasures of inline-skating and bike riding.

Today is just grey. But even this has its advantages - no neighbours to be seen in the street. Extremes tend to bring them out - snow, which needs shovelling away, or sun, which means gardening and hanging stuff out to dry. In-between days see them staying inside quietly, doing whatever they do; I don't quite like to speculate.

Gaia, the girl-woman

Gaia complained recently that I never write about her, and that my anecdotes concern mainly Titus, and on reflection I think she is right. However, and it is a big however, I had to point out to her, in my defence, that I generally write about things I have personally seen or experienced. This rules out people who stay in their bedroom for hours on end. I am sure she's having loads of fun in there, whatever she might be doing - to date I have never been invited in to join in. My visits to her boudoir mainly involve laundry delivery, checking that the heating is not on 'high' next to an open window, and telling her that dinner is ready, having shouted from downstairs several times only to find she's plugged into her iPod.

The other restricting factor is the teenager's rock-bottom embarrassment threshold. Practically anything I do or say is likely to be a faux pas of the worst possible kind, so I thus feel rather constrained in mentioning my dear daughter at all, but I know she reads this, so here you are Gaia - you are the star of today's post! I have written about how and why I don't write about you!

Teenagers are a strange breed. Do we all remember being one, or are we just aware that we were - there is a difference. When I think really hard about how I was at Gaia's age, I feel so removed from that person that I might as well be watching my younger self in a film. I was so convinced of my beliefs, yet at the same time insecure and completely self-obsessed; a hundred times more than I am today. At twenty I wrote in my diary: "I have finally realised that I know absolutely nothing about anything at all - I have SO much left to learn!" This, in retrospect, was a turning point in my life.

It is funny, both peculiar and ha ha (as we Brits love to say), to observe your own child turning into you and doing all the things you did, and to hear yourself react in the way adults did to you, although you swore you never would, should you ever get old enough to be a parent! Gaia has several advantages over my teenage self, though: 1) the internet, 2) the tumble dryer, 3) affordable air travel, and 4) a mother with fashion sense - I have never recovered from having to wear a rust-coloured anorak with a fluffy reindeer-print lining, and a hood, when all the other girls in my class were wearing donkey jackets in inconspicuous dark blue and black. It still crops up in my worst nightmares.

Saint Val aftermath

Aaahhh... the card was worth waiting for - cute wobbly writing from doing it in the car but who cares; it's the thought that counts! In case you are feeling sorry for CG, please stop - I decided against the dog food and made him a cherry cheesecake instead. And I got a beautiful bouquet. So all is well and we can relax for another 364 days.

Am torn between really wanting to go swimming, but then I'll be confronted by the nudes in the showers, and staying here in the warm (fully clothed) and eating an omelette. My stomach is pushing me to the latter, my conscience to the former. Have got to overcome this British prudishness if I am going to survive here for any length of time, for what will I do in the summer, when nude lake-bathing overtakes nordic walking as the favoured pastime? And while I'm on the subject, why is it always the wrinkled, withered, slack-bellied (and other assorted body parts) people who throw caution and their undergarments to the wind and parade around unselfconsciously? Nobody would mind too much if young, nubile people did it, but mostly, I'm sorry to say, it's the older generation who put themselves on display. Perhaps they are beyond caring.

Love is in the air....

... every time you look around; a completely nonsensical lyric designed to irritate the cynics of this world, as indeed was Valentine's Day. A commercial circus without which, however, the red rose industry would wither and die, and sales figures at Hallmark would take a nosedive. You can probably guess by now that Bovinia is an exception to the rule - you would never know that it is February 14th at all, unless you check your calendar, of course. The only reference to the day of love appears in the flyer for our local supermarket. Right at the top of the page there's a gaudy reminder: "Valentinstag - 14 Februar" surrounded by blurred red hearts. Directly underneath is a technicolour pastiche of fishfingers, washing powder and dog food, all at discount prices and guaranteed to set pulses racing. I shall have to pop in there later and get CG a tin of Pedigree Chum.

Over the years, CG and I have reached an uneasy truce concerning Valentine's Day and the obligations attached. So when he asked me yesterday if we could "do the card thing after work tomorrow, not before", I knew this was man-speak for "haven't bought the damn thing yet so please don't embarrass me by giving me a card tomorrow morning" and nodded graciously. Then I said he didn't have to get one, which is woman-speak for "no card, you die", as most men must know, and if they don't know that by now, they'd better learn fast for self-protection purposes. (Do they teach you things like that at pre-marital counselling? They should!)

I did have a card already, but that was in case he turned romantic on me (I mean, even more so than usual, in case he's reading this at work). I guess I'll scribble a few lines in it now and put the envelope next to the dog food to greet him when he gets home later.