Dear Arvon...

Dear Arvon Foundation

You requested feedback on your recent short story course at your Totleigh Barton venue, but there wasn't much space on the form, so I though it appropriate to provide some further detail.  I feel I have
identified some key points which could improve the experience of future course attendees.


Food

Consider locking the fridge at night.  Or maybe just be a little less welcoming.  This will prevent a large number of nocturnal incidents in which your clients are prevented from sleeping by a persistent little voice, whispering enticingly in their ear "Treat this as your home.  Eat anything you like from the big silver fridge."

And if there are any Geordies on the course, hide the crisps.  Northerners are often prone to a little-
known condition known as IT'S-TWO-AM-AND-I-NEED-SOME-CRISPS-NOW-WHERE-ARE-THEY-DAMMIT-ITIS.

Please also bear in mind that not everyone is from England and may not, therefore, be aware of the requirement for as much tea as is humanly possible to be consumed over the course of a week.  You may wish to send them some information about this, so that they can begin acclimatising.


Accommodation

I would propose a detailed questionnaire for all those attending your residential courses, in order to establish the precise nature of all your clients' sleep requirements.  This will probably reduce the number of minor nervous breakdowns experienced by your management team, due to multiple five-

way room swaps, all requiring an updating of the in-case-of-emergency paperwork.

Identify your insomniacs at the earliest possible opportunity, and put them in the rooms above the kitchen and off the dining room.  They will be so spectacularly hyped-up on gallons of tea and writing-related adrenaline that there is no prospect, whatsoever, of them sleeping, and can quite safely be lodged in the parts of the house most likely to be the location of midnight fridge-rummagings, early morning
gatherings and impromptu field-hospitals following the spraining of ankles.

It's probably worth asking your clients to keep a tally of the number of times they wee during the night, the week before they arrive.  You can then average out the number of nocturnal, bladder-related wanderings, and decide the most appropriate occupants for the rooms nearest the bathrooms.  No-one who wees more than once a night should be permitted to sleep in the room above the kitchen unless they sign an undertaking that they will, under no circumstances, step on the third and fifth step, between the hours of eleven and six.

Writers can't do maths.  Any room swaps should be carefully supervised by a member of staff, preferably with a note taken, and signed off in triplicate.  Otherwise all that will happen is that three people will finish up wandering around the annex, clutching bags and looking blank, while a fourth attempts to evict a puzzled, non-swap-participant from a room that was never actually involved in a set of arrangements, which are so complicated that they should probably be run by a military tactician, before being unleashed on the world.

Establish, right at the beginning of the week, if anyone is planning on falling in a ditch and spraining their ankle.  Consider placing them in a ground floor room.

Someone will lock themselves out of their room at some point.  At the first briefing, you should probably make the entire group repeat, out loud, the location of the master key.  Probably three times, at least.  And then do spot-checks.  I guarantee that none of them are listening.

Do not allow the various room-swaps to be referred to as "bed-hopping."  It gives the wrong impression.



Dictionaries

Please correct your entire stock of dictionaries.

Jigiliaise, saxoding and yolearning are definitely words, referring, respectively, to a new, slightly saucy dance craze, the Saxon method of calling others in for dinner by "dinging" a pot with a spoon, and a complex emotion, a sort of amalgam of yearning and learning.

Hinch, however, is not a word.  No matter how many Canadians try to persuade you that it is the act
of a tall person shrugging.

Rectifying this minor etymological oversight will prevent another entirely-avoidable situation in which England loses to Canada in a game of pan-continental Scrabble.


The Pub

Do not, under any circumstances, permit anyone to leave the site after nine pm, if they have uttered the word "pub" at any point in the last twenty-four hours.  All that will happen is that they will drive around Sheepwash, accosting locals and demanding to know if they've seen a pub, before arriving just before closing-time and refusing to take the landlady's increasingly broad hints. 

When the lights are turned off, they will then sit in the dark for several moments, clutching their glasses, before asking, with an air of surprise, "Oh.  Did you want us to leave?"

When they do, eventually, leave, they will then discover the Sheepwash Book Exchange, and all attempt to crowd into the telephone box to explore the stock of Danielle Steele romances, while being frantically shushed by the designated driver, who will be the only one who has figured out that it is after midnight in a very small, very quiet village.

None of this will endear you to your neighbours.


The tutors

Vet them carefully.  Some of them are a Very Bad Influence.  They will teach your naïve, unsuspecting students subversive techniques for avoiding unwanted company on public transport, and other undesirable things. 

This will give Arvon a Bad Name.

It would be helpful if all tutors could be encouraged to develop a secondary skill.  This means that when the students reach writing saturation point, and their brains have turned to mush, the tutors can
provide extra value for money by entertaining them with light, unchallenging displays of artistic talent, or perhaps acrobatics.

For example, Rob Shearman can draw daleks.  In order to broaden the appeal of the Arvon courses, it would be nice if Alison Macleod could perhaps learn to draw cybermen.  Not all students are scared of Daleks.  A sizeable sample of the Short Story 2013 group were more frightened of cybermen.  Or, as one student put it, "the ones that look a bit like people."  Not terribly descriptive, perhaps, except when coupled with a rather alarming impression of something that could, just about, have been a cyberman, but could equally have been intended to represent a zombie on its last legs.

And it's understandable, really.  The Daleks were a bit rubbish.  Mainly because they could be thwarted in their attempt at world-domination by a flight of stairs, or a very small kerb.  Only residents of bungalows needed to be remotely alarmed.

It wouldn't have to be cybermen, necessarily.  Perhaps Slythin.  Or the ones that look like rhinos.  There are many Doctor Who villains to chose from.

Or maybe she could juggle.

It might also be sensible to ask tutors to undergo psychological testing before entering the intense atmosphere of a residential writing course.  Not all will be able to stand up to the pressure, and some
carefully constructed tests might weed out the type of tutor who will, for example, succumb to momentary bouts of madness, on or around day three, and demand that students insert the words "left-luggage office" and "guzzle" into a piece which has, up till that point, been a gentle musing about the philosophy of the stars.  It is fortunate that writers are a resourceful bunch, on the whole, but no-one should find themselves in a situation where they are forced to use the words "Jupiter" and "left-luggage" in one sentence.


Firemen

This aspect of the course was, I'm afraid to say, an immense disappointment.

I'm not sure whether or not the Totleigh Barton management team are aware of the Chekhov's Gun theory.  This states that if a gun is mentioned in chapter one, it must, at some point in the novel, be fired.

At the initial briefing, fireman were mentioned.  At some length.  The fact that the Totleigh Barton fire alarm is directly linked to the local firestation was mentioned several times.  We were informed that the alarm has never gone off before, and that it was highly unlikely that it would do so during our time there.  A classic Chekhov's Gun, if ever I saw one.

On Friday, the fire alarm went off, due to an unfortunate incident involving some halloumi.

We accordingly assembled, expectantly, in the appointed assembling place and waited for the firemen to appear.  Someone even put on a high-viz jacket.  Although it's worth noting at this point that the mere act of donning a high-viz jacket does not a hero make, whatever the wearer of said jacket might think.

No firemen appeared.  We stood there for a while, before someone informed us that the firemen had been informed of the absence of any actual fire, and would not, therefore, be putting in an appearance.

The gun was clearly visible on the wall.  It was taken down, cleaned, loaded and pointed.  We were led to believe it would be fired.

And then...no firemen.

I would suggest that actual firemen are produced on the next occasion.

This will avoid disappointment.


Telephone/Internet Access

A little more information about this aspect of the course would be useful.  "Somewhere between the second and third cattlegrid", while technically accurate, isn't all that descriptive.

I have drafted a suggested information sheet for those who might need to make an urgent phonecall, or pick up an email.

1)  Climb hill.

2)  Proceed past second cattlegrid.

3)  Pass through gateway and continue for approximately twenty paces (based on the average stride-length of a 5'4" female)

4)  Stop

5)  Turn phone off and on again.

6)  Repeat step 5)

7)  Take two steps sideways to the very edge of the lane.

8)  Hold phone in an elevated position and walk backwards and forwards for approximately ten seconds.

9)  Attempt to dial.

10)  Repeat step 9)

11)  Listen to voicemail.

12)  Proceed a further ten paces along the lane.

13)  Reverse step 12)

14)  Download emails.

15)  Do NOT attempt to reply.  This will not work.

16)  Phone someone and shout "I'mupahillinDevonandthephonesignalisrubbishcanyoulookupanumberforme"

17)  Repeat step 16) as necessary.

18)  Attempt to memorise number.

19)  Dial number and shout "I'mupahillinDevonIcan'temailyoubuttheanswerisyesthat'sfine."

20)  Return to the house.  You will find that the phone signal develops a strange, elastic nature and, as long as you do not hang up at any point, you will retain signal most of the way back down the hill.  This is a good time to fill in loved-ones on random details of your stay, and embark in a spot of gentle musing about the quality of the rain.  The problem with this is that you won't know whether their silence means that they have expired with boredom or that the signal has cut out.  It is therefore important to punctuate the call with occasional interjections of "Hello?  Hello? Are you still there?"

Please note that the above instructions only relate to O2 customers.  Vodaphone users will, of course, discover at an early stage that they can, in fact, receive phonecalls while standing on the windowsill in the upstairs front bedrooms.  This might be something that you wish to address.  The current situation is faintly discriminatory and ensures that O2 customers spend a lot of time wandering about in the gently-drizzling rain, absorbing the idea, deep down in their fractured souls, that they are, and always will be, on the signal-less side of life.

Perhaps it might just be a good idea to confiscate all phones at the beginning of the week.  It's so much easier to embrace the complete lack of hope, if everyone around you is similarly hopeless.


Hallucinatory Drugs

I think you probably need to have the place surveyed for any strange gases or mushrooms.  Several fellow residents were quite clearly under the influence of some sort of intense hallucinatory substance by the end of the week.  I suspect it had a cumulative effect - like that stuff in the Hound of the Baskervilles.

If the source of the problem cannot be identified, perhaps a gentle debriefing session could be arranged for those who are worst-affected.  You know, the ones that are convinced that they were involved in a three am tutorial session with some strangely-named, probably Freudian, versions of the course tutors.  Or the ones who develop a strange obsession with a disembodied voice, or a soggy wasp.


Insurance

I am fairly sure that your insurance limits the number of people that you can accommodate in the barn at any given time.  You might, therefore, wish to look into the unexplained and alarming Friday-night presence of assorted dubious characters: a stiff-legged man, a couple of cannibals, some women of uncertain morals, a philandering policeman, a maybe-angel and a once-was-angel, an almost-ghost, a witch, a wolf, a juggler, some moonlight wanderers.

I'm not saying we didn't enjoy their presence, simply that, no matter how engaging and diverting we found them, they did rather fill the place, and this almost certainly has implications in terms of fire safety and potential insurance claims.


Trust

Please do remind your guests that they are, at the start of the week at least, strangers to one another.  They should be very aware of what they choose to share.  They should probably be advised to stop talking after one glass of wine, rather than continuing to spill their innermost secrets and most embarrassing disclosures.

The other guests may not have their best interests at heart, and residents should make sure that they carefully scrutinise any advice given to them during this week.  For example, should any resident, who discloses the fact that she has embarrassed herself with exactly the same, particularly stupid comment to a well-known author on two separate occasions, be advised to track down said well-known author, ring her doorbell and explain herself yet again, the resident should probably be offered some help in analysing this advice, and deciding whether or not to act upon it.  Particularly if the advisers also express a wish to be notified of this visit in advance, in order to come along and film it for the internet.

Perhaps guests could be encouraged to draft a short disclaimer, for fellow attendees to sign, confirming that, in the event of any member of the course becoming a famous and celebrated novelist, other guests will refrain from disclosing, on the eve of the Man Booker Prize announcement, the embarrassing anecdote that was shared, somewhere between the third and fourth glass of wine, on the second night.


Notebooks

Guests should be reminded to bring a large amount of paper.  There will be more information than they could possibly have foreseen.  Failure to write it all down will lead to wailing and gnashing of teeth upon their return home, as they try to remember that one, tiny life-changing piece of information disclosed at 11.03am on Day Two, aware that nothing else so profound and important will ever enter their lives again, and that the whole of their existence has been rendered meaningless and monochrome, all due to the fact that they thought "Don't worry, there's no way I'm going to forget that," never realising that their heads would have exploded messily by the end of the third day, leaving no room for anything but the most casual contemplation as to whether another cup of tea would be a good idea.


So, to conclude, thank you Arvon, for a wonderful week.  But please do consider acting upon this feedback in order to improve the experience of all future guests.

Yours sincerely

A Very Happy Punter

Spamalot...

I think I've been missing a trick.

Life is full of opportunities that pass us by, because we were busy, or we didn't have babysitting, or we quite frankly couldn't be arsed and sitting on the sofa watching series three of Luther on DVD seemed much more appealing, at that particular moment in time.

I've been trying to take advantage of more of these opportunities, recently.  I've been to various writing events, including a book-signing by Margaret Atwood, organised by Topping & Company, who I can only assume have some major dirt on every well-known novelist in the western world, given who they manage to entice to come and talk; a masterclass with Helen Dunmore; some Bristol Literary Festival workshops, and a few other things.

But I've just realised that there are a whole host of opportunities winging their way to my computer, or through my letterbox, on a daily basis, without me having to lift a finger.

I recently inspected the contents of my spam folder, and I was astonished at some of the things I've been missing out on.  So I decided to stop hitting delete and, instead, take a little time to ponder over some of these opportunities.


So my first opportunity this week arrived courtesy of Mr Robert S Mueller X.  I'm not sure whether that's like Malcolm X, or whether he just puts a nice little kiss at the end of his email address, just to make us all feel loved.  Now I feel that I've been a little mean to all the kindly-sounding emailers who've been offering me vast sums of money over the last few years.  Instead of giving their claims the consideration that one really should give to someone who is offering you $9,000,000,000 in cash, I've thought ill of them, and spurned their advances. 

I feel particularly bad about Mrs Mary Parker A Widow In Christ, who called me her Dearly Beloved and wanted to give me lots of her late husband's money.  She got quite cross with me after I'd ignored her a couple of times, and chided me gently about my lack of manners and failure to send her $1500.

So, it was with Mrs Mary Parker A Widow In Christ in mind that I opened Mr Robert S Mueller X's email.  Well, he's clearly put an awful lot of time and thought into ensuring my well-being.  He is most concerned about the fact that I am apparently "transacting with some imposters and fraudsters." 

Fortunately, Mr Robert S Mueller X is not one of these unsavoury sorts.  Nor is his counterpart, Mr Kim Williams, ATM Card Center Director of the Central Bank of Nigeria, who has a surprisingly un-bank-like yahoo email address.

Mr Robert S Mueller X has a whole list of people with whom he thinks I should not be transacting.  One of them is called Ben, and works for FedEx.  Another has the rather unlikely name of "Boden".  Now I'm pretty sure I haven't transacted with Boden recently.  Although they do keep putting their catalogue through the door, so it might all be part of some major conspiracy.

 Anyway, clearly Mr Robert S Mueller X and Mr Kim Williams are extremely concerned about my transacting activity and would like me "to stop communication with any one not referred to you by us."

Now that does seem a bit drastic, but then again they are offering me $9,500,000, which I will be able to withdraw from the cashpoint at a rate of $15,000 a day.  And all they want is a measly $550 which, by a massive coincidence, is the exact amount being offered to me by Nextdaypaydayadvance.com.

The only problem is that I'm not sure what I would do with the money, given that I received a most alarming communication from my bank recently.  They wrote to me, at my home address in Somerset, to advise me that it was with great regret that they must inform me that my local branch was closing down. 

I was mildly perturbed about this, but not overly distraught.

And then I read the next line, in which they were pleased to advise me that my nearest branch was now in Oxford city centre.

This was a little more alarming, since that would suggest that every branch in Somerset, Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, a fair chunk of Oxfordshire and possibly parts of Dorset and south Wales, has inexplicably closed down, or possibly dematerialised.  Which is going to make it a right bugger to pay cheques in.

So I thought I might offer to open a new branch.  With my nine million dollars from Mr Robert S Mueller X. 

Particularly if I add it to the $8,500,000 currently on offer from Mrs Lisa Adams, the UN Payment Director, and her colleague, James Anton, Diplomatic Agent. 

Who also has a yahoo email address. 

It seems to be the in-thing in international banking and diplomacy circles.

And I was delighted to hear from my old friend, Mrs Mary Parker, who was clearly anxious to make sure I wasn't short of funds, since she has "the sum of 7.5 Million Pounds to use the fund for God's work."

But things like this should obviously be approached with caution.  It's a good job I have people looking out for me.  People like Lloyds TSB, Natwest and HSBC, all of whom would like me to enter my details so that they can check I'm not being "frauded."

Which is extra nice of them, given that I don't even bank with them.  That's non-customer service for you.

And then there are all those people who want to help me spend my money.

Team Casino would like me to Live It Up at the Ruby Palace.  While someone called Welcome would like to offer me Perfect Internet Prices for Rolexes and jewllery.

I can probably afford a Rolex.  And some jewllery.  Because Mr Wems is Waiting for My Response in order to Discuss this Issues with me. 

Actually, I'm just assuming Mr Wems' issues relate to money.  He could just be really cross about something I've done.

Maybe my rude rejection of the kind approaches of Mrs Mary Parker A Widow In Christ.

Perhaps I better use my shopping voucher to buy the jewellery.  Because it is apparently NO JOKE.  I am a possible winner.  Possibly.  They are VERY HAPPY for ME.

I'm feeling pretty happy too.  When I collect my $18,000,000 and my £7,500,000, I'll be able to buy myself some nice jewellery to wear while browsing a list of Hot Singles (Free! to Look!) who will obviously all want to come and help me spend it.

Or possibly lug it all the way to Oxford, in $15,000 cash bundles, to deposit it at the last remaining bank west of London.

All these lovely people who just want me to be happy, rich and not transacting with imposters.

It gives you such a fuzzy, warm feeling inside.

School daze...

So, our precious firstborn son has started school.

Apparently, this should have involved me weeping copiously at the school gates, while my beloved offspring clung to my leg wailing "nooooooo mummmeeeeeeee!"

What actually happened was that aforementioned beloved offspring wormed his way through the crowd at the entrance to his classroom and proceeded to make himself thoroughly at home.  When I eventually reached the door, he was installed at a table, doing something unidentifiable, with a definite air of "oh for goodness sake, mother, don't you dare embarrass me by coming in here and flapping around me." 

I therefore found myself backing out of the classroom muttering "er, bye, then.  Thomas, bye.  I'm going.  Er..."  I was eventually granted a vague waft of a hand over a shoulder and a "yeah bye."

I decided, on balance, that a bout of copious weeping might be superfluous to requirements, and slunk away.

The thing is, I don't think Thomas had remotely appreciated how much bloody effort went into getting him to his first day of school.  There was the wailing and gnashing of teeth over school places, and then there was the unutterable joy of uniform shopping - I eventually staggered into M&S during a sale, located a chirpy sales assistant with an ipad and croaked "just give me some uniform - any uniform."

Then, of course, the trousers were too big, and had to be returned.  Which involved trips to multiple floors and lengthy discussions about a receipt.  Which I had, of course, lost.

And once the correct uniform had finally been sourced, there was the extra-special fun-time which was the Sewing On Of The Labels, about which we Shall Not Speak.  What I will say is that there is no way on this earth that any of those little woven buggers are coming off. 

There was much stitching. 

There was even the embroidering of initials.

At around 11pm, I thought I was done.  And then I discovered the instructions for sewing a gym bag.  Which had to be done to a particular pattern.  With the child's name appliqued on the front.

I may have whimpered a bit at that point.

But the bag was duly produced.  I can only assume that this is some secret testing process, to establish which parents to focus on when it comes to making costumes for the nativity play.  Hopefully the wonky, post-midnight applique-ing will sort that one out....

Then there was the paperwork.  I had some difficulty in establishing when he was actually due to be in school.  The phased start involved an incomprehensible combination of mornings and afternoons and lunches and part-mornings, leading to extensive negotiations with the after-school club:

No, sorry, I meant mornings.
No, forget that, he's going to his gran's that day.
Actually, you know when I said he was going to his gran's?  Yes, I actually meant he's not.
No, this is definitely right, I promise.
No, it's not right.

I strongly suspect that the after-school club staff sent someone over every day, just to see if Thomas had been left on the doorstep, clutching his book-bag and wondering if there was any chance of anyone collecting him, or whether he'd be better off bedding down in the playhouse for the night.

There was stuff I had to sign, and fill in, and read, and read and sign, and fill in and sign, and I have absolutely no faith that any of it was signed and filled in and read correctly.

And things are not improving.

Because Thomas, ever the possessor of an over-active imagination, has decided to take things to a whole new level, lately.  He has identified the exact spot on our morning school-run where I am just fractionally too far away to turn back, and then he casually drops a bombshell.

Thomas: Mummy.  Can I tell you something?  I've forgotten [insert vital item]
Me: Aaaaaaaaaaargh!
Pause
Me:  Thomas?
Thomas:  Yes, mummy?
Me:  That's not actually true, is it?
Thomas: No

Thomas:  Do you know, mummy, there are no school dinners today.  Everyone is supposed to have  a packed lunch.
Me:  AAAAAAAAARGGGGHHHHWHYDIDN'TYOUTELLMEAAAAAAARGHHHH!
Thomas:  No, no school dinners.  I need a packed lunch.
Me: [hyperventilates]
Pause [suspicion dawning]
Me:  Thomas?
Thomas:  Yes, mummy?
Me:  That's not actually true, is it?
Thomas:  No.  No, it's not.

His timing is impeccable.  Halfway up the hill, in the really narrow bit, where there is no way of turning round.  And even if you did, you'd be fighting against the steady tide of commuters coming down the single-track lanes.

So I'm not exactly the epitome of calm at the moment.

I therefore decided on a displacement activity.  When stressed about one thing, find something else to stress about.  Since Thomas is now, courtesy of school, just about able to sit still for five minutes and do drawing or letters,  I decided to make a craft table.

She's making stuff again.  This should be good for a laugh...

As usual, with my projects, this did not go as smoothly as predicted.  But I got there in the end.  So, in case anyone else is feeling like they could do with a bit more stress in their life, here are the instructions.  It is broadly based on this table that I found on a blog, but obviously I couldn't just change things.
leave well alone and follow the instructions - that would be too straightforward.  No, I had to

Materials:

Ikea Lack coffee table x 2
Plastic tubing
2 x Curtain pole brackets
2 x Ikea rails and accessories from the kitchen department
Packet of metal screw-in hooks
Piece of elastic
Screws




An attempt to photograph the back without
moving it away from the wall

I assembled the table with a surprising lack (Geddit? Lack?  Geddit..oh never mind) of difficulty.  I'm not very good at flatpack furniture, but there's very little that can go wrong when all you have to do is screw four legs to a table-top.

I then screwed the shelf that came with the table, upright to the back edge of the table, using three screws.  I then sat the second tabletop upright on top of the table, and attached it to the shelf/support using six screws.

*NB  At this point, make sure you are on a flat surface.  I didn't.  This is why, having completed all the following steps, I had to undo them all and re-position the shelf.  There was swearing.

The two brackets went onto the side. 

* Another NB.  Put the plastic tubing, with the roll of paper on, in place BEFORE, screwing the second bracket into place.  This will avoid further swearing.  There is probably a clever way of not
having to remove a bracket to change the paper roll, but I couldn't think of one, so screwdriver it is.

On the other end, I put in two screws and fastened a piece of elastic tight between them, to keep the paper flat.

Finally I added the rails and hooks in convenient places, and hung the baskets and tubs.

And then I sat back, feeling pleased with myself for all of five minutes, before discovering that Ben likes to eat crayons and would much prefer to use felt-tip pens on his brother, his clothes and
his own face, than on the paper.

Oh well, you win some...actually you don't.  You never win any, where small children are concerned.

Leave your name and your number....

Ok, Mr Call Centre Man.  I appreciate that you probably started the job about 2 hours ago, after approximately seventeen seconds of training. 

Five seconds of which went something like "Those are the toilets and there's a microwave on the second floor."

I sympathise.  I really do.  I too have had rubbish jobs.  I still can't hear "It's a small world after all" without being instantly transported back to a high stool, beside a small barrow in the Gateshead Metro Centre, where I worked for £2 an hour (plus commission), attempting to sell family history name scrolls and sticky toy bugs that walked down windows, and imagining all sorts of horrible ends for the unfeasibly perky staff from the Disney Store a few yards away.  All "HIIIYA!" and "HAVEALOVELYDAYNOW", to a background of Disney's greatest hits on loop.

I am probably the only person in alive able to sing the entire Pocohuntas soundtrack from  memory.

Anyway, I have considerable sympathy for the trials and tribulations of those employed in less than salubrious situations.  However, if you do hope to progress in your chosen career of defrauding the public, you probably need to polish up your act.

Since I'm in a compassionate mood, I am therefore willing to offer you some much-needed feedback.  So let's have a look at where you went wrong, shall we?

Call Centre Man:  Hello, I'm calling from [your phone provider] about your upgrade which is due at the beginning of August.
Me:  Oh good, someone called me the other day but it wasn't convenient and I've been waiting for a callback.
CCM [presumably taken aback by my enthusiasm]:  er, did they?
Me:  Yes.  My phone is knackered so I've been waiting to be upgraded.
CCM:  Er, ok, right.  So, how much do you estimate your monthly bill to be right now?
Me:  My tariff is £18 and I usually come in somewhere around £20.
CCM:  Yes, yes, that's right.  So are you looking to spend a bit more, or do you want to stay around the same monthly cost?
Me:  About the same.  I'm willing to go up to about £22, but not much more than that.
CCM:  So which iphone do you have?
Me:  The original one.
CCM:  Ah, the iphone 3.
Me:  No, the ORIGINAL one. 
CCM:  What?  The old one?
Me:  Yes
CCM:  Oh.  Well.  I can upgrade you to an iphone 4.
Me [like a child in a candy shop]:  Oooooh!
CCM:  For £29.99 a month, you'll get the iphone 4 and...
Me:  I don't want to pay £29.99 a month.
CCM:  But iphone 4.  It's all lovely and shiny and people will want to sleep with you because it's so lovely and shiny.       Ok, so I'm paraphrasing a bit, but that was the general gist.
Me:  No.  What else have you got?
CCM:  How about the Samsung Galaxy?  Tariff of £22 a month and it's even lovelier and shinier and even more people will want to sleep with you.
Me:  Hmmmmmaybe.
CCM:  I've got one.  It's the best thing ever.  It gives you free wifi and 16gb of memory and access to a teeny-tiny wormhole that takes you anywhere you want to go and converts woodlice into gold nuggets.
Me:  Oh go on then.
CCM:  Excellent.  We'll get that to you for Thursday.  Now, a few details.  Can I just re-confirm that you are the account holder.
Me:  Yes
CCM:  And how do you spell your surname.
Me:  C-H-A-O-S
CCM:  C-H-I-U-F...
Me:  Er, no.  You've got the right spelling on your screen surely?  
CCM:  Oh yes.  There it is.  I just had to check for security purposes.
Me:  [suspicion dawning] What?  That I can spell my own name?
CCM:  Er, yes, yes, right moving on.  Can I confirm your postcode?
Me:  Of course you can.
CCM:  [puzzled silence]
CCM:  Er, hello?
Me:  Go on then.
CCM:  What?
Me:  You asked if you could confirm my postcode.  You tell me what postcode you have and I'll tell you if it's right.  You know, confirming it.
CCM:  Ah, no.  You tell ME what your postcode is, and I'll tell YOU if you're right.
Me:  No.  I definitely know I'm right.  It being my postcode and all.
CCM:  Well I do need to confirm your postcode for delivery purposes.
Me:  But I'm your customer.  You have my delivery address.
CCM:  But it's for security purposes.
Me:  [relenting, just in case this is actually some poor brand-new O2 bod]  I'll tell you the first half and you can check it against your records.  [provides first half of postcode]
CCM:  [frantic button pushing audible]  Is that Newton St Loe?
Me:  Not last time I checked.  I'll just have a quick look out of the window.  No, definitely not Newton St Loe.
CCM:  Ah, is it...
Me:  How about you actually look up the postcode you have and then you'll know where I live?
CCM:  Ah, um, yes, I can see it now.  So what's the name of the street?
Me:  There isn't one.
CCM:  No, the STREET name.
Me:  There isn't a STREET name.  It's a very small village.
CCM:  There must be.
Me:  Oh.  Must there?
CCM:  Yes.
Me:  Oh dear, I'd better tell the parish council that.  They'll have to do something about it.
CCM:  Yes, that's a good idea.  So what's the house number?
Me:  There isn't one.
CCM:  There must be.
Me:  Can I refer you back to the aforementioned 'really small village' answer.
CCM:  [with a burst of inspiration]  Oh, is it a house name?
Me:  You tell me.  You're presumably looking at it.
CCM:  Oh yes, but I need you to say it for security purposes.
Me:  What sort of security purposes?
CCM:  Well, how do I know you are who you say you are?
Me:  How do I know that YOU are who you say you are?
CCM:  Er, what?
Me: I know I am who I say I am.  I'm reasonably sure that you're not who you say you are.  So which one of us should be trying to reassure the other one?
CCM:  I'm not sure I follow you.
Me:  No.  I'm sure of that too.
CCM:  Er, yes.  Good.  So can I have your date of birth?
Me:  No.  I don't think so.
CCM:  Well, I'm not going to be able to put the upgrade through.
Me:  I tell you what.  How about you give me your telephone number and I call you back, just to set my mind at rest.
CCM:  OK, 077...
Me:  Not your own number, you numpty!  The callcentre number.
CCM:  Oh, right.  0844 12345678
Me:  Interesting.  The internet says you're a marketing company in Lancashire.
CCM:  Yes, that's right.
Me:  Aren't you supposed to be an international phone services provider?
CCM:  Ah, yes, well the international phone services provider outsources its upgrades to us.  Because they're very busy, what with being all international...and the providing of phone services and...um...
Me:  I tell you what.  I'll just call my phone provider, shall I?
CCM:  [with obvious relief]  Um, yes, yes, er, bye.

Oh dear.  And it all started so well.  You knew I was due an upgrade and everything.  But you let it slip through your fingers.  So what went wrong?  Well, let's break it down a bit.

1)  Not being able to spell the customer's name is a bit of a giveaway.

2)  Not knowing where said customer lives, or even the general shape of their address, is generally going to arouse suspicion in even the dopiest of customers or, in this particular case, customers who are being distracted by two brawling pre-schoolers and the nauseatingly cheerful strains of "Mike the Knight, he's a brave young hero..."

3)  I've got to hand it to you, the iphone was a good guess.  But I suppose a reasonable percentage of the population have an iphone.  You did let yourself down a bit by your complete failure to get your head around the idea that anyone could still be in possession of the original version, without having taken it off to the Antiques Roadshow for a quick valuation.

4)  Giving out your mobile number.  Oh come on.

5)  Don't even get me started on the whole "Your phone company are really busy" thing.  Honestly.  I know you had me for about a minute and a half, but really.  How stupid do I sound?


Needless to say, my phone provider has confirmed that Call Centre Man is not One Of Theirs.

Maybe he's been disavowed.  He's probably on the run, right now, waiting for some sort of mobile phone provider counter-agents to track him down and persuade him to hand over his marketing list.

Or maybe he's just gone home to lie down in a darkened room.

Maybe he should consider a change of career.  Maybe to a barrow in the Metro Centre.  They probably pay much more than £2 per hour now.  He might even make his commission.  I never did, but maybe there's more demand for sticky bugs these days.  And anyway, there's always the cheery tones of the Disney Store denizens to lighten his day.

All together now.  "It's a small world after aaaaaaaall."

When in France...

So we finally made it to an actual foreign country without being sabotaged by perforating eardrums or other child-related dramas.  Although after the Gatwick  departure lounge fiasco, we did play it safe and go by sea.  And we nearly had to leave Ben behind after a minor misunderstanding about the application process for a child’s first passport and the requirement to supply documentary evidence that said child does actually exist, rather than expecting the passport office to take our word for it. 

I shall not mention any names or assign any blame.

*cough* HWSNBN did it *cough*

But the passport did eventually turn up and we made it to France.  Whereupon Thomas looked around dispiritedly and demanded to know why we weren’t in Jersey.

Don’t ask.

Token attempt at artistic shot...

He perked up when we reached the place where we were staying and discovered that there was a swimming pool.  It was by now nine o’clock at night.  Not the time we tend to go swimming.  But he had, to be fair, only asked “are we nearly there yet?” about a hundred and fifty times during the whole six hour journey, so swimming seemed a reasonable trade-off.  We got changed and headed out to the pool.  At this point I got down on hands and knees, looked him in the eye and explained the pool rules.  No running.  No jumping in.  No going in without armbands.   He nodded and looked serious and generally gave all the signs of having absorbed these important pointers….and then ran over, jumped in the pool and sank.  After being hauled out, shivering and spluttering, he was slightly more inclined to listen….

Ben was considerably more cautious.  So cautious, in fact, that he spent the next 10 days walking slowly round the edge of the pool, occasionally venturing in as far as the first step, or deigning to be pushed around on a giant inflatable stingray.

Except the time that he tried to balance on tiptoes on the very edge, and promptly fell in headfirst.  From the wailing and bashing and glaring, this was clearly all our fault for not pointing out that water is wet or that 18 month-olds generally don’t have the co-ordination to tight-rope walk along an inch-wide ledge of stone.

That was pretty much it for the rest of the trip.  Thomas splashed around in the pool.  Ben circumnavigated the pool.  I floated gently around on an inflatable crocodile.  That sort of thing.

We did venture out a couple of times.  Once was to the Valle de Singe, where we witnessed a baboon orgy, before Ben was heckled by angry chickens and had a Capuchin land on his head, and Thomas was slapped by a monkey.  

 

Do it again!  Do it again!

In fairness to the monkey, it was minding its own business, lolling about on the path, and Thomas walked straight up to it with a very definite air of “hello, here I am, aren’t you lucky?”  The monkey had presumably encountered one too many small children that day and wasn’t messing around.  One back-handed slap later and Thomas was retreating at speed, looking around to see if we’d noticed him flouting the oft-repeated “do NOT get in that monkey’s face” rule. 

HWSNBN was rather taken with the idea of a wildlife park with specially trained animals who will, for a small additional fee, teach your small children to respect nature.

Here are your tickets, Sir.  Now can I interest you in our “Slapped by a monkey” special program today, or would your younger child like to be chased by some chickens at eleven o’clock at the farm area?  Or perhaps our special two-for-one offer.  A bargain at five euros.

Our other day out was less successful.  I believe that someone has written a book called French children don’t throw food.  This is probably because French children don’t have parents who come up with great ideas like “Let’s go to La Rochelle.  It will be lovely.”

It wasn’t lovely. 

We drove for two hours in thirty-four degrees to an entirely shade-free car-park, before heading into the Busiest Tourist Attraction on Earth (known locally as the Aquarium), and deciding to eat at the Hottest Restaurant on Earth (more usually known as the Aquarium Café), which was, for reasons which entirely escaped us, located above the rain-forest exhibit, ie in a giant greenhouse.  Without air-conditioning.

Food was most definitely thrown.  Ben, it would appear, does not like eating hot steak hash in a giant greenhouse in thirty-four degree temperatures.

When we eventually escaped from the Greenhouse of Doom, we discovered that the entire population of France, as well as a reasonable proportion of the British citizenry, had decided to see how many people it is possible to fit in front of a very small fishtank.  We spent the next hour crawling through a forest of legs in pursuit of two small children who had discovered the knack of wriggling their way to the front and disappearing entirely from sight.

You know this is a bad idea, right?

We made a brief, half-hearted attempt to explore the town, before admitting defeat and staggering back to the car in the manner of hallucinating desert-travellers in old-fashioned films about the foreign legion.  Except that I don’t remember Lawrence of Arabia having to carry two screaming children across the sandy wastes of the Nefud desert.

It then obviously took about ten hours for the car to cool down sufficiently for anyone to sit in a seat without suffering extensive bottom burns. 

You would think we might have had enough by now.  You would think we might have decided that discretion was the better part of valour and headed home to watch Ben totter round the edge of the pool a few more times.

But no. 

“Let’s find a beach,” I said. 

“It’ll be nice,” I said.

 “They can paddle,” I said.

A beach was duly located, and we set up camp at a café with tables and parasols.  The tide was out, but there were people making their way through the shallows, so I decided to push on with the paddling idea.  Thomas and Ben were duly stripped down to pants and t-shirts and off we went.

It was only when we stepped in that we discovered that the “shallows” were actually a thin layer of water covering knee-deep mud, and that the people we’d seen from the cafe weren’t actually paddling, but were, in fact, hanging on to each other for dear life as they slithered their way out to the distant waves.

And it wasn’t just any mud.  It was that thick, gloopy, grey mud that somehow congeals itself onto your skin as though it’s trying to eat you, like some sort of B-Movie mud monster.

Ben, it would seem, does not like mud, any more than he likes steak hash and giant greenhouses. 

In an attempt to demonstrate his disapproval, he immediately fell over.  I pulled him out, wailing and thrashing and put him back on his feet.  Whereupon he fell over again.  By this time he looked like he’d just emerged from deep camouflage in some jungle war. 

Except that the enemy would have heard him coming about fifteen miles away.  The whole beach heard us coming.  The whole town probably heard us coming.

Ben screamed at the full pitch of his lungs all the way up the beach.  When we finally got to the shower, we were gazumped by a couple of immaculate teenagers who looked at us with some puzzlement as they cavorted in the water in a carefree manner.  When they eventually figured out that the woman with the small mud-covered object would actually like use of the shower, they vacated it…only for a young man to slide in front of us and begin washing his feet.

It would seem that “OH DON’T BLOODY WELL MIND US.  WE WEREN’T WAITING OR ANYTHING” is universally comprehensible in any language.

We took possession of the shower.

Ben objected even more loudly, while Thomas kept trying to make a run for it.  By this time the whole beach had given up what they were doing and were watching in a sort-of horrified fascination as the strange, and by now rather grubby-looking, British woman attempted to pin two fighting, kicking, screaming mounds of mud under the shower.

In the middle of it all a woman came along and attempted to wash her dog.

Under the same shower that we were using.

It would seem that I can glare in multiple languages too, judging by the speed with which she retreated.

While this was going on, HWSNBN was apparently gazing contentedly out to sea, trying to pick us out of the distant figures.  When he eventually became aware that the eardrum-splitting screaming was actually being emitted by one of his beloved offspring,  he behaved most admirably in not pretending he didn’t know us, but handing me a small towel was rather equivalent to going round turning off the taps on the Titanic.

The mud was eventually scraped off and the screaming was stopped by dint of waiting till Ben opened his mouth for another screech and then inserting an icecream.  The spectators continued to watch us for a bit longer, clearly hoping we were going to do something else entertaining.

It’s a pity they couldn’t see that Ben, naked and wrapped in a towel, was weeing on me.  That would have been good for a bit more hilarity.

It was well into the next day before Ben stopped glaring at us.  He can probably be forgiven for a bit of food throwing.  He was probably wondering if any of the parents of the non-food-throwing French children on the beach might consider adopting him.

But he made it through the holiday.  We all made it.  I think they enjoyed it.  Well, not La Rochelle obviously.  That bit will be stored away in the depths of everyone’s memory and Never Talked About Ever Again.  But they seemed fairly cheerful about the rest of it.

And I returned from our internet-less trip to discover that I’ve been longlisted for the Bristol Prize.

Hooray!

Clearly I am slightly better at writing than I am at seaside-parenting.

I might write a book called English Children Are Entirely Justified in Throwing Food When Their Parents Take All Leave Of Their Senses And Drag Them To La Rochelle.

 

We're going on a Gromit hunt...

So.  Bristol is now home to eighty-four giant Gromits.

The doggy kind.  Not the sticky-in-the-ear kind, obviously.  Although with Thomas’s eardrum perforating three times in as many years, including once in the Gatwick departure lounge (oh how we laughed), his ear may yet become home to giant grommets.

Anyway.  Eighty-four giant, decorated dogs.

This, on the face of it, seems like a Good Thing.  There’s a trail to follow, and they’re located in all sorts of interesting places, and there’s a passport for children to get stamped with big, exciting stamping machines.  There’s even an app – the Detect-O-Gromit.

 

That’s my non-working Tuesdays sorted for the rest of the summer.

Or so I thought.

Let’s go find some Gromits, I said.  It’ll be fun.  Let me just download this app….

That was when things started to go wrong.  A whole three-and-a-half seconds after I’d come up with the idea.

The Detect-O-Gromit is not compatible with the original Iphone.  And that is not a phrase I ever thought I’d have need to utter.

Not a problem, I thought.  I shall put it on my Ipad.  Yes, I’ll look a right pillock, wandering around central Bristol with my ipad held out before me (and on a side issue, has anyone else ever tried to “be in the map” using an Ipad?  It’s impossible – the bloody thing keeps rotating), but then again, I’m taking two small children to hunt down giant plastic dogs.  I’m probably not starting from a point of much dignity.

So, I attempted to download the Detect-O-Gromit.

Only to be informed that it requires ios6.  I assumed this was one of the irritating updates that Itunes periodically tries to persuade me to download.  I obediently hooked up my ipad to the computer and waited for five million years while the two devices had a lengthy discussion about my music and photos.

Ooh, you’ve got that new whatsisface song she likes.  I’ll have a copy of that.

Is that the new update for that game she keeps playing?  Oh, go on then, pass it over.

Good grief, she takes a rubbish photo, doesn’t she.  Come on, let’s just delete them.  She’ll never notice.

The update completed and I made another attempt at the Detect-O-Gromit. 

Apparently I still required ios6.

I did shout a bit at this point.

A spot of googling revealed that ios6 wasn’t obtained via Itunes, but via the Ipad’s settings.  I followed the online instructions…and ios6 continued to be absent from my Ipad.

More shouting.  More googling. 

Apparently the old ipad can’t run ios6.

I am technologically outdated.  Unable to keep up with the latest advances in digital Gromit hunting.

So, I eventually located a map and, after a little more shouting about shoes and coats and wees and what-exactly-do-you-think-you-are-doing-with-that-toilet-brush, we set off.

The first problem came when we arrived at the M-Shed on the harbourside, to collect a Gromit passport.  Unfortunately, someone called me about a Very Important Work Matter while I was queuing for said passport.  The combination of queuing and preoccupied-mother-on-telephone is a bad one, and my attempt to sound professional went something like “Yes, yes, that sounds entirely…GET OFF THE GROMIT!  DOES IT SAY ‘NO CLIMBING ON THE GROMIT’?  DOES IT?  DOES IT?  WELL THAT MEANS NO CLIMBING ON THE GROMIT….sensible, don’t you think?”

We eventually obtained the passport.  A stamp was also procured.  Unfortunately, what I had failed to appreciate is that the stamps are only available at six Gromit locations.  Thomas, with all the single-minded obsession that can only be displayed by a small child who’s been given a sniff of something collectable, was set on obtaining all six stamps NOW NOW NOW! 

I studied the passport.  I noted the various locations.  I considered tearing up the passport and hurling the pieces at the man behind the desk.  One of the six extra-special Gromit stamps is located in Cribbs bloody Causeway. 

Eleven miles away.

Getting there would involve two separate motorways.

I informed Thomas clearly and calmly that we were not, under any circumstances, driving all the way to Cribbs Causeway to obtain a small, dog-shaped stamp.

About five minutes later, under a barrage of nagging, I agreed that we would, at some point in the near future, drive all the way to Cribbs Causeway to obtain a small, dog-shaped stamp.

In my defence, he nagged a lot.

So, with that minor bit of capitulation negotiation behind us, we commenced the Gromit trail.  The first two were located with no problems.  We even had an educational discussion about the fact that one Gromit was decorated with coins.  This was derailed slightly by the fact that Thomas correctly
identified that coins are money and money is used to buy things and by the way had he mentioned that he wants to buy a spiderman toy for his birthday?



No, I don't know what the stick was for either

We moved on.

Gromit number three on our list was unfortunately missing.  It was located on a wooden ship in the harbour.  The ship had gone.  This is puzzling as I didn’t even think it was sea-worthy.  I thought it better not to speculate about whether or not the ship had sunk.  I thought the idea of a drowned Gromit might rather put a dampener on the expedition – no pun intended.

We did manage another three Gromits, by which time Thomas was fired up and ready to crack on with the hunt.  I was not.



We’ll come back another day, I promised.  Five Gromits in one day.  There are eighty-four of the things.  That’s about another sixteen Gromit-hunting trips.

The classic standing-on-one-leg-next-to-a-giant-painted-dog pose

And one of them is on the railway line to Paddington, allegedly.

Still noblesse oblige.  No pain, no gain.  Tomorrow is another day, and all that.

When Thomas went to bed, I asked him if he’d had a nice day.

“Oh,” he said.  “Yes.”

What part of it had he enjoyed the most, I asked.

“Um, um….”



I helped him out.  What had he done today?  What had he seen?

“Oh,” he said.  “Dunno.”

And went to sleep.

One leg AND stick...