2004-11-09 - 9:58 p.m.

Today is Phoe's birthday and I surprised her with a really cool de-gunking.

Perhaps I should explain. Phoe is a proper person and by that I mean that she goes to a real hair salon inhabited by over bleached, orange skinned stick women to get her hair styled rather than just brush it straight and hack at it with fingernail scissors like I do (or kitchen scissors, whatever's handy). Anyhoo, a few months ago she went to be beautified and during that famous hairdressing conversational gambit 'So, you goin' on holiday this year then?' to her 'no', the conversation dragged over to beauty treatments (hey, I guess that hairdresser types have little else to talk about when faced with a miserable realist who's seen it all) and she mentioned that they had a new detoxing machine that was really cool.

....actually, before we continue I want to ask why trendy hairdressers all seem to be called Nikki or Debbi and why their names all have to end with an 'i'?

Sorry to sound like a cow, I'm a miserable sod ain't I? Back to the subject. This detox machine sounded really cool; it sucks all your toxins out through your feet and the colour of the gunk tells the therapist what shit you've been doing. Phoe said that she'd LOVE to try it and like the epitome of best friendness (?) (look up 'best friend' in an encyclopedia and you'll see my smiling face) I retained the information for future use. Basically I booked her in for a good old de-gunking and it was gross. She put her feet in the machine and almost immediately the water went grey, then it kept getting darker and darker until it had yellowy brown streaks and then bright green bubbles. By the end of the sesh it looked like a cow had done it's business on her feet - thick brown, bubbly greeny slime. Cool.....

After that we re-toxified by going to Pizza Hut and then drinking loads of beer and eating gooey chocolate cake - yipee, we're women and it's our job.

.....of course, Fit Nigel is going to be able to tell that I've been slacking when he comes for me any day now. I'm so crap that I don't remember exactly when he said he was coming and I'm too scared to phone him in case he says NOW. I'm banking on it being the weekend but I'm not holding out much hope.

In other news: The aged gerbil who had survived the stroke has taken a turn for the worse. I did at one point think that I was going to have to take her for her final journey on Phoe's birthday which would have been terrible. I then thought I was being a bit hasty, she's just sleeping in a hunched up ball, so I dunno what to do. I'll decide tomorrow, I've asked that she be taken swiftly and painlessly over-night if now is supposed to be her time. Poor little old lady.

...and finally, an update on my Mom's neighbour Graham. She and the neighbours were under the impression that he had no one apart from a very elderly aunty living in Burnham on Sea which is not the Lake District at all so I was talking shit yesterday. It turns out that he has a lovely cousin who is very worried about him and they have all decided that he will go and live with them when he gets out of hospital. In the mean time, the cousin went to the house where my Mom introduced herself. They went into the house together and were appalled - it was like something out of Life of Grime. Utter filth everywhere, over 100 unopened bottles of wine stacked up in the living room, a microwave sized box of used stamps, SHITTY UNDERPANTS that were so hard you could crack 'em (according to my Mom, although why she went that close I'll never know) and wallpaper hanging in strips off the walls. The cousin started to just bin stuff whilst my Mom picked up clothes to wash for him. Both women recoiled in horror at the bathroom - the toilet had no seat or lid and was covered in hard shit. When my Mom was telling me that she's agreed to clean the place up I joked that she shouldn't pick up any used tissues or hankies (what with him being a single bloke whose never had a girlfriend) and she asked why (bless her). I didn't have the heart to tell her what blokes do into tissues etc and I didn't have the strength to tell her after she said that she'd already picked up an abundance of dirty handkerchiefs which were going around her washing machine right now.....

Perhaps I've just got a filthy mind (she hoped)

�

previous - next