I am thoroughly disgusted with myself right now.
It's now day 7 of my vacation and I've done almost nothing. I've slept late, stayed up late, overate, drank too much and generally allowed everything from my brain southward to atrophy. I haven't shaved in days, and, including time spent filling the recycling bin with empty wine bottles and a forest's worth of cardboard, I've been outside for a total of perhaps three hours in the past week.
Part of the problem is Christmas. Christmas is a cozy affair here. We don't have family around and, with no work and no obligation to go anywhere visiting, there's little incentive to get dressed in the morning. We spent Boxing Day in our pajamas playing video games and eating frozen appetizers. EA Create for the Wii is strangely addictive, but last year's goat cheese and parma ham canapes are, um, not so much.
After allowing the children to eat porridge for dinner and spending an embarrassing number of hours flinging myself around the living room to Katy Perry in Let's Dance 2 (Caroline and I are becoming quite competitive), I think it may be time to pick myself up, take a shower and actually DO something.
The trouble is, what, exactly, to do? Interesting things to do with the kids invariably seem to thrust themselves unbidden at me at precisely the wrong moments, say, while on the way to work. Conversely, on those rare occasions when I actually have the time to do something with the children (like now), every one with children below the age of 21 seem to have packed up and gone skiing in France and the children's activities in the city are limited to selling matchsticks and filching tourist's wallets.
Out of sheer desperation we went to the movies yesterday. I say 'desperation' because I generally like to do inexpensive activities with the children. In my mind, the authenticity of any experience is inversely proportional to its cost. Thus, my stinginess makes me feel that I'm giving them a real-life adventure rather than feeding them a packaged, artificial experience. This is why I prefer dodgy little cafes to glittering linen-clothed restaurants and Budapest's rusty little amusement park to Disney's plastic princesses. And, since it's difficult to predict what the children will enjoy and what they won't, doing something inexpensive relieves the pressure to try to cajole them into having a good time. I'm sure they will come to hate me for it later.
The only activities that I can find that are both 'child friendly' and free are the Christmas light shows on various shopping streets in London and the tree in Trafalgar Square. We went to see the tree last year. To say that it was something of a let-down compared to the tree at Rockefeller Center would be entirely accurate, albeit a gross understatement. I suppose that misses the point, really: the tree is meant as a simple commemoration of Norway's gratitude for Britain's role in World War II, not as a display of wealth and status. Still, when you slog through miles of week-old slush because the councils can't get their shit together and clear the walkways after even a minor snowfall, you expect to be rewarded handsomely for your efforts.
The only child-suitable movie showing yesterday in the whole of Christendom was 'Arthur and the Great Adventure'. Now, I generally consider myself a pretty intelligent guy, but honestly, I could NOT figure this movie out. It seemed to be set in a town in the Midwest in the 1950's, but some of the main characters were British. One minor character might have been South African. The purpose of the Aborigines living in the forest and making random appearances with their magic telescope was not entirely clear. Equally unclear was Snoop Dogg's role as a sort of Rastafarian spiritual guide/petty thug with bad teeth. It might have made more sense if I'd seen the first one or had taken recreational pharmaceuticals beforehand. A number of people walked out. The kids seemed to enjoy it, but they were strangely subdued for a while afterwards. Perhaps they, like me, were grappling with the subtext of the overbearing father and misunderstood son between the main villain and his nasty-looking offspring. Or maybe they'd just had too much junk food.
Speaking of junk food, the best thing about going to the movies here is that you're allowed to bring your own food. Well, maybe not ALLOWED exactly, but everyone seems to do it. You know, come to think of it, I've never really SEEN anyone else bringing their own food, so maybe it's just us. In any case, we were out of popcorn, having used the last bag on a previous evening sofa-bound evening watching Polar Express, so we brought Nik Naks. Nik Naks are a South African snack that I discovered accidentally while babysitting for a friend a few months ago. Inactivity makes me both peckish and exploratory. I think he was miffed that I'd eaten them. Sorry, mate, but it's a good thing I found them when I did, as who knows what I'd have dredged up if I'd kept looking.
As far as I know, Nik Naks come in two flavors - Original Cheese (very similar to, if not exactly like, American Cheetos) and Fruit Chutney (very similar to, if not exactly like, American Cheetos that have spent too much time in the kitchen of a mediocre Brick Lane curry house). Funnily enough, Michele and I both gave each other a bag of Nik Naks for Christmas. (No, of COURSE that wasn't the only thing we gave each other. I got biltong, too.)
And so, the day begins. My children are stirring sleepily overhead. Soon they'll be dragging themselves out of bed, and we'll begin another round of 'What are we Doing Today?', a game I have grown accustomed to losing. Maybe I'll drag them to see the tree. At least it's outside and it's free.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Saturday, December 25, 2010
Happy Christmas
Sometimes my kids are so sweet they make me cry.
Caroline's letter to Santa, left next to the cookies, tied with a ribbon and marked 'don't read unless you are Santa'.
Dear Santa
Has any one said thank you for the presents? Probably not! Well, I am, right here on this letter. So "thank you for the presents and the things in my stocking you give me"
From
Caroline
P.S. I hope you like the cookies and milk.
Caroline's letter to Santa, left next to the cookies, tied with a ribbon and marked 'don't read unless you are Santa'.
Dear Santa
Has any one said thank you for the presents? Probably not! Well, I am, right here on this letter. So "thank you for the presents and the things in my stocking you give me"
From
Caroline
P.S. I hope you like the cookies and milk.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
The Sleepover
I had the oddest dream last night.
Having recently purchased a large hotel with only the vaguest idea how to run it, I make a tour of the cavernous kitchen and its mysterious gleaming steel appliances. I discover a massive Lavazza coffee machine on wheels behind the industrial dishwasher, but it only makes coffee one cup at a time, using single serving capsules. Without a real sense of certainty, I am obliged to provide breakfast not only for the throngs of hotel guests who all present themselves in the dining room simultaneously, but also for our own hoarde of houseguests, who hover around in the kitchen, demanding pancakes and French toast rather than the eggs, fried or scrambled that I offer. I must go to the grocery store to buy loaves of bread while at the same time instructing the kitchen staff, whom I have inherited from the previous owners and who appear to have been previously engaged in a non-culinary activity, like bricklaying or prizefighting, and who are even more bewildered than I at finding themselves manning a professional kitchen on a busy morning.
I wake at 5.30, my aging bladder recommending itself to my urgent attention. Relieved that my grueling hotel management experience has been only a dream, I stagger, squinting and sleep-drunk into the bathroom. I hear a noise downstairs. And I remember. It's...The Sleepover.
Yesterday was Caroline's birthday and, in keeping with a tradition we stupidly started a few years ago, we have invited several of her friends to sleep at our house. From a distance, this appears to be a fine idea - the girls entertain each other, they whisper and giggle and mince about. They brush each other's hair. One has hair that reaches nearly all the way to her waist, or rather, she HAD such hair when she arrived. Most of it can now be found in clumps on the living room floor. She looks as if she's lost a fight with a lawn mower. I suspect she will be bald soon.
Up close, a sleepover is a plan fraught with danger. For starters, there is the need to provide sufficient entertainment to keep an unusually large number of children with divergent interests occupied. Some parents resort to bowling or the cinema, but these are for the weak hearted, and we choose no such facile routes. Instead, we provide 'activities,' usually in form of some type of craft. Fortunately, Michele is very good at this sort of thing, and these entertainments are undertaken by the participants with a relish and gusto that I have seldom seen outside of a German beer hall. This year, the children made bracelets and necklaces. I thought it would be fun to offer up these adornments for sale at the next opportunity, but my suggestion was not well-received. If it were up to me, they'd be learning useful life skills at our parties, like coal mining or how to make a really spicy Bloody Mary.
Then there is the fact that 'sleepover' is an ironic misnomer. I suspect that "sleepover" is a tongue-in-cheek corruption of the original term, "sleep's over", but I really have no way of knowing. I do know, however, that there is no 'sleep' at a 'sleepover'. There is bickering and cattiness and the inevitable complaints of the sensible few whose efforts at the 'sleep' part are thwarted by those who possess a seemingly inexhaustible capacity for middle of the night inane chatter. What the hell do these people talk about? They're nine years old for Christ's sake - they can't possibly have had enough cumulative experience to have something to say for this long. Perhaps they just repeat themselves, or put random words together without any real attempt at meaning, like stringing popcorn.
The last I remember it was 1.00 this morning and they were still going; a symphony whose movements all begins with a whisper, rise to a crescendo of crashes and bangs of unknown origin and end, falling all in a heap at a sharp but unintelligible paternal reproach. In the brief interlude which follows, all is quiet. Then someone coughs and the cycle begins again. After a perfunctory 'last, absolutely final' warning to shut their pie holes and go to sleep, I drift off myself and, blissfully, paid them no further mind.
I lie awake, simultaneously anticipating and dreading the first undeniable 'someone's awake' noise from downstairs. I am pleasantly surprised that it does not come until well past 7.00. While the whoops and laughter drift up the steps, I nudge Michele and drag myself from the warm nest of blankets. It is time to make the pancakes.
I am a free-range sort of a cook: I normally have a number of things going at once so I need lots of space and to be able to move about unimpeded, catching things just before they burn or boil over. Sometimes I get it wrong, but usually it works out, and, to the best of my knowledge, my cooking has never made anyone sick. This space hungry approach to cooking, however, is incompatible with a house full of nine year olds, all of whom want to 'help'. But I don't really NEED any help, thanks. In fact, dear little ones, I genuinely suspect you'll be more of a hinderance than a help. But of course I can't say that, not to my precious daughter's friends. They might shun her if they really knew what an anal retentive prick she has for a father. I put on the best smile I can manage at 7.30 on a Sunday morning and allow them to stir the batter. "I'm next!" "No me!" "No, MEEE!" The batter slops out of the bowl and I can feel my blood pressure mounting. Deep breath. Don't yell. "Ok, girls, that's enough stirring." "But I didn't get a turn!" More disappointed noises. I chase them out. "If you want breakfast, get out of my kitchen. Go play. Somewhere else. Go on, out." "Where?" they ask. "The street?" I suggest helpfully.
Dragging their feet, they leave the kitchen. The bacon, in the oven to warm so that I can peel the paper thin slices apart more easily, has now been in for too long and has begun to harden. Muttering to myself like a Times Square vagrant, I dump it in the rubbish and start over. About a third of the way through the pancakes, the smoke detector goes off for no obvious reason. Perhaps the downstairs neighbor, roused by the noise of what must surely sound like a zoo full of elephants overhead, has lit a cigarette. The smoke detector is sensitive. Except, apparently, when the kitchen is actually FULL of smoke, as it was later when I absentmindedly left an empty pan on a hot burner while I daubed impotently at the two glasses of orange juice on my dining room carpet. Although our entire kitchen might be burning merrily without our taking much notice, it's nice to know that we'll have adequate warning if the neighbors ever burn their toast.
Most of the girls have now left. One remains, though, and she and Caroline are surreptitiously coloring each other's noses with Sharpies and putting fairy wings on our son, who protests violently but eventually capitulates at the prospect of being promoted to Caroline's 'best friend'. There is a great deal of banging and thumping and cries of 'stretch him, STRETCH him!' I have neither the energy nor the inclination to intervene. He enters the living room, his skin red and blotchy, his eyes like two bruises. I am surprised to be saying this, but I hope this is makeup.
"Maybe this is a dream, too?" I think hopefully. But no. Now I have to make them lunch.
Having recently purchased a large hotel with only the vaguest idea how to run it, I make a tour of the cavernous kitchen and its mysterious gleaming steel appliances. I discover a massive Lavazza coffee machine on wheels behind the industrial dishwasher, but it only makes coffee one cup at a time, using single serving capsules. Without a real sense of certainty, I am obliged to provide breakfast not only for the throngs of hotel guests who all present themselves in the dining room simultaneously, but also for our own hoarde of houseguests, who hover around in the kitchen, demanding pancakes and French toast rather than the eggs, fried or scrambled that I offer. I must go to the grocery store to buy loaves of bread while at the same time instructing the kitchen staff, whom I have inherited from the previous owners and who appear to have been previously engaged in a non-culinary activity, like bricklaying or prizefighting, and who are even more bewildered than I at finding themselves manning a professional kitchen on a busy morning.
I wake at 5.30, my aging bladder recommending itself to my urgent attention. Relieved that my grueling hotel management experience has been only a dream, I stagger, squinting and sleep-drunk into the bathroom. I hear a noise downstairs. And I remember. It's...The Sleepover.
Yesterday was Caroline's birthday and, in keeping with a tradition we stupidly started a few years ago, we have invited several of her friends to sleep at our house. From a distance, this appears to be a fine idea - the girls entertain each other, they whisper and giggle and mince about. They brush each other's hair. One has hair that reaches nearly all the way to her waist, or rather, she HAD such hair when she arrived. Most of it can now be found in clumps on the living room floor. She looks as if she's lost a fight with a lawn mower. I suspect she will be bald soon.
Up close, a sleepover is a plan fraught with danger. For starters, there is the need to provide sufficient entertainment to keep an unusually large number of children with divergent interests occupied. Some parents resort to bowling or the cinema, but these are for the weak hearted, and we choose no such facile routes. Instead, we provide 'activities,' usually in form of some type of craft. Fortunately, Michele is very good at this sort of thing, and these entertainments are undertaken by the participants with a relish and gusto that I have seldom seen outside of a German beer hall. This year, the children made bracelets and necklaces. I thought it would be fun to offer up these adornments for sale at the next opportunity, but my suggestion was not well-received. If it were up to me, they'd be learning useful life skills at our parties, like coal mining or how to make a really spicy Bloody Mary.
Then there is the fact that 'sleepover' is an ironic misnomer. I suspect that "sleepover" is a tongue-in-cheek corruption of the original term, "sleep's over", but I really have no way of knowing. I do know, however, that there is no 'sleep' at a 'sleepover'. There is bickering and cattiness and the inevitable complaints of the sensible few whose efforts at the 'sleep' part are thwarted by those who possess a seemingly inexhaustible capacity for middle of the night inane chatter. What the hell do these people talk about? They're nine years old for Christ's sake - they can't possibly have had enough cumulative experience to have something to say for this long. Perhaps they just repeat themselves, or put random words together without any real attempt at meaning, like stringing popcorn.
The last I remember it was 1.00 this morning and they were still going; a symphony whose movements all begins with a whisper, rise to a crescendo of crashes and bangs of unknown origin and end, falling all in a heap at a sharp but unintelligible paternal reproach. In the brief interlude which follows, all is quiet. Then someone coughs and the cycle begins again. After a perfunctory 'last, absolutely final' warning to shut their pie holes and go to sleep, I drift off myself and, blissfully, paid them no further mind.
I lie awake, simultaneously anticipating and dreading the first undeniable 'someone's awake' noise from downstairs. I am pleasantly surprised that it does not come until well past 7.00. While the whoops and laughter drift up the steps, I nudge Michele and drag myself from the warm nest of blankets. It is time to make the pancakes.
I am a free-range sort of a cook: I normally have a number of things going at once so I need lots of space and to be able to move about unimpeded, catching things just before they burn or boil over. Sometimes I get it wrong, but usually it works out, and, to the best of my knowledge, my cooking has never made anyone sick. This space hungry approach to cooking, however, is incompatible with a house full of nine year olds, all of whom want to 'help'. But I don't really NEED any help, thanks. In fact, dear little ones, I genuinely suspect you'll be more of a hinderance than a help. But of course I can't say that, not to my precious daughter's friends. They might shun her if they really knew what an anal retentive prick she has for a father. I put on the best smile I can manage at 7.30 on a Sunday morning and allow them to stir the batter. "I'm next!" "No me!" "No, MEEE!" The batter slops out of the bowl and I can feel my blood pressure mounting. Deep breath. Don't yell. "Ok, girls, that's enough stirring." "But I didn't get a turn!" More disappointed noises. I chase them out. "If you want breakfast, get out of my kitchen. Go play. Somewhere else. Go on, out." "Where?" they ask. "The street?" I suggest helpfully.
Dragging their feet, they leave the kitchen. The bacon, in the oven to warm so that I can peel the paper thin slices apart more easily, has now been in for too long and has begun to harden. Muttering to myself like a Times Square vagrant, I dump it in the rubbish and start over. About a third of the way through the pancakes, the smoke detector goes off for no obvious reason. Perhaps the downstairs neighbor, roused by the noise of what must surely sound like a zoo full of elephants overhead, has lit a cigarette. The smoke detector is sensitive. Except, apparently, when the kitchen is actually FULL of smoke, as it was later when I absentmindedly left an empty pan on a hot burner while I daubed impotently at the two glasses of orange juice on my dining room carpet. Although our entire kitchen might be burning merrily without our taking much notice, it's nice to know that we'll have adequate warning if the neighbors ever burn their toast.
Most of the girls have now left. One remains, though, and she and Caroline are surreptitiously coloring each other's noses with Sharpies and putting fairy wings on our son, who protests violently but eventually capitulates at the prospect of being promoted to Caroline's 'best friend'. There is a great deal of banging and thumping and cries of 'stretch him, STRETCH him!' I have neither the energy nor the inclination to intervene. He enters the living room, his skin red and blotchy, his eyes like two bruises. I am surprised to be saying this, but I hope this is makeup.
"Maybe this is a dream, too?" I think hopefully. But no. Now I have to make them lunch.
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