Splendid another ramble. Be prepared to laugh, another day in Ze's life.
Cats in the Cradle...
...or up the curtains. Or something.
I knew it was going to be a bad day. Because I hadn't done the laundry.
Just lately I've been working a 45 hour week and then coming home and rebuilding my sister's kitchen. So I haven't had much time to breathe, let alone anything else. Which is why I got behind with my laundry. So when I looked in my underwear drawer there were only three pairs of boxers left.
Now, normally that wouldn't be a problem but this time...well...I'm superstitious you see. The first of the three pairs were my England ones; these are white with the cross of St. George on. That's the flag of England, (as opposed to the flag of the UK). I wear those to England national football or rugby games (with my England socks) and not as an everyday pair. I couldn't wear them without there being a game, it would be incredibly unlucky for the team. Trust me – they don't need any more bad luck.
The second pair were my Superman ones. They're blue with the superman symbol. I wear those whenever I have to travel by aeroplane. (I was going to say "whenever I fly" but coupled with "Superman" that might have lead to misunderstandings). I figured wearing those when I wasn't on a 'plane would jinx me the next time. And I already have more problems with customs and immigration officials than any one human should be required to deal with in a single lifetime.
That left the third pair. Pale blue with little green & red aeroplanes on them.
The boxers of doom.
Regular readers may remember them from my caravan cleaning adventure; or perhaps from the unfortunate incident with my favourite work jeans.
I stared at them for a couple of minutes. I couldn't be reduced to just these choices, surely?? I checked my sock drawer just in case I'd put a pair in the wrong place. No luck. I checked my shirt drawer. Blimey, that's where my Palm Pilot went. Been looking for that for days. But no boxers. Now what. Which set of fates did I want to temp?? The flying fate?? The sporting fate?? Or my own personal I'm-going-to-hold-you-up-to-ridicule fate??
I decided I couldn't tempt the sporting fate. If England lost their next game I'd feel responsible. After all, everybody knows it isn't the 11 (or 13 or 15) men on the pitch who affect the outcome – it's whether Joe Smith put his socks on before his trousers; Peggy Brown puts the milk in the tea-cup before adding sugar; and I wear the right underwear.
Similar reasoning led me to reject the Superman ones. If I wore them on an ordinary day and broke the luck I'd never forgive myself if the next time I flew the plane crashed and I died. Ah... that doesn't make sense even to me. It would have made perfect sense to my mother but then she was Irish.
That left the boxers of doom. It was with no small feelings of trepidation that I put them on. I kept telling myself it would be ok. After all, the two previous incidents had occurred at work, hadn't they?? And I wasn't going to work. There would be no dodgy jeans to split. No tiny rooms to get locked in. I would be wearing a nearly-new pair of dark blue 501s and my best black polo shirt. I was going to lunch with my sister. She was treating me and a friend of hers. Me because of all the work I'd done on her kitchen; the friend because it was her birthday.
I finished dressing and headed downstairs to grab my morning coffee. Cup in hand I left the kitchen intending to sit in the lounge. Unfortunately Reisen decided he wanted to get there first. The doorway to the lounge is not quite big enough for me and a very large Golden Retriever to pass through at the same time. He made it. I didn't.
Have you ever noticed how, when you're lying on the ground covered in hot coffee and groaning in pain, dogs think it's a new game?? And have you ever noticed how much a retriever drools?? And how much long, curly, light-coloured fur they shed when they're hopping from foot-to-foot in excitement at this new game??
Twenty minutes and a second shower later. I came back downstairs in my second-best polo shirt and a not-quite-so-new pair of dark blue 501s. But still wearing the boxers of doom.
I decided to skip coffee and head out straight away. I really should have taken heed of the warning. I should have gone commando.
I arrived at my sister's house a little before her friend. My sister offered coffee. I declined. Just to be on the safe side. Her friend turned up and we all piled into my sister's car & headed to the city centre. We were going to La Tasca. It's a tapas bar and restaurant. Expensive but fantastic. Great food.
The waitress (very cute – I got told off by my sister for flirting) brought menus, the menus are big, they take up half the table. She asked if we wanted bread and olives. Of course we did. She brought us a plate of mixed olives, a basket of bread and the usual olive oil and sherry vinegar. In the Spanish style we put a little oil and a little vinegar on a side-plate, mix them together and then soak a piece of bread in it. My bread was dripping on the menu so I pulled the plate a little closer to me. Unfortunately the table stopped before the menu did.
Cardboard menus aren’t very good at supporting the weight of a plate of oil, vinegar and bread. The olive oil was cold. I knew because it was now coating my left thigh. Why does liquid always quadruple in size whenever it leaves whatever it's contained in?? I jumped up and grabbed for some napkins. Bad idea. I caught the olive dish in my haste. Olives flew everywhere. I watched several bounce all the way to the door. My sister summoned the waitress and asked for a towel. I gave up trying to flirt. It seemed pointless as the waitress was laughing too much to reply.
I stood up to attempt to remove approximately half a litre of oil from my jeans and as I did so I watched idly as a waiter approached with my sister's glass of house red. I continued watching as his foot came down on two olives. I was still watching as he crashed noisily to the floor. I calculated the trajectory of the airborne glass. Oh-oh.
My sister's brand new silk blouse was a delicate cream colour.
I did the only thing I could.
I flung myself full across the table and took one for the team. Fortunately my second-best polo shirt is dark blue and so a glass of red wine soaking into the back of it was unlikely to stain.
The waitress brought me two more towels.
We finished the remainder of our dinner with no further incident. None of us wanted a desert. My sister’s friend hadn't said a lot throughout the meal. Maybe she wasn't much for conversation. Maybe she just didn't know where to start. But now she asked if we'd like to have a cup of coffee at her flat. She had some cakes for us as it was her birthday.
The cakes turned out to be those little things the French call "tartelettes aux fruit". They're a hard pastry case about 10cm across, filled with confectioners' cream (a cross between fake cream and vanilla custard) topped with various bits of fresh fruit; in this case strawberries, grapes, kiwi. I usually pick them up in my hand to eat.
We sat on the sofa and my sister's friend served the cakes on little tea-plates with a desert fork to eat them. I was filled with a sense of foreboding. I'm not good with things like that. While the friend went to the kitchen for the coffee, I began to pick the cake up and my sister hissed at me. "Don't you dare!! Be civilised". I obeyed and began to try and cut the cake with the edge of the fork. It was hard. I exerted more pressure.
The cake split. Suddenly. Very suddenly. And half of it shot off my plate like a runner from the starting blocks just as the friend came back. It curved through the air before landing with an audible splat, cream side down, on the carpet. Right beside the cat. (A large grey Persian).
The cat went from curled in a ball, fast asleep, to flying through the air, claws extended, with no intermediate stages. It sought comfort from its beloved owner and landed, claws first, on her chest. She screamed and dropped the tray of coffee-filled mugs onto the beautiful, pale-blue pile carpet.
The cat, startled once more leapt for the red-velvet curtains. As it ran swiftly up them you could see little pin-prinks of daylight, gleaming through the tiny holes its claws made. It had almost reached the top when there was a peculiar popping sound as the curtain-pole began to slowly and gracefully come away from the wall. Cat and curtains landed on my sister's friend's head.
The curtains were thick and probably pretty good at keeping traffic noise to a minimum but all the same we could still hear her scream. I was going to help her unwrap herself but as I reached her she shouted. "Out!! Get out!! You’re a walking disaster. Get out and don't ever come back!!"
We left.
It seemed best.
I burned those boxers last night. Tempting fate is never a good idea.
Ze
Ze, I'm glad you share these with us. We can all use the laugh.
Off to your updates enjoy!
Elisa
