What is your inner voice telling you?

We all have one whether we recognise it or not. That little voice inside our heads which ways up our decisions and berates us when we get it wrong.

Mine of late seems to be shouting or possibly even screaming in my head to give what for to a few people. Never a coward in any situation, a trait that has left me in circumstances of which I will get beaten anyway but I keep fighting to the bitter end. I find myself at the end of a battle that I can't retaliate in, but my inner voice so desperately wants to.

Reasons for this restraint are easy to explain and so I shall.

1.  Its not worth it.  Self explanatory really my life is better off by not doing it.  It won't get me anywhere, it won't make me a better person and I won't proving anything to anyone just making an idiot out of myself.

2. My relationships would suffer.  This is a biggy, I am not prepared to allow anyone to drag my family's contentment, happiness, unity or love in to a gutter brawl with people that quite frankly have no business voicing opinions on my or my family's life.

3. I'm better than that.  Yes I will always protect and defend my family but these people have no influence on them, they aren't impacting anyone of this family, comments on social media, emails and videos can all be ignored, deleted or laughed at.

4. I have nothing to prove.  People will always want to talk, they will always want to gossip its human nature that doesn't for 1 second make whatever they are saying to be a truth.  I can count my blessing on one hand my children and my partner.  My friends are the sprinkles of deliciousness on the top of life and I am grateful that so many have stood by me, so many tell me they love me.  My friendships don't come from lies they come from the ugly truths that we've shared and we've supported each other through, strong bonds built through trust. So me screaming from the top of my voice that's not me the person you are saying I am, I am not like that at all, is pointless because those that matter know who I am, love who I am and respect who I am.

5. If I retaliate I would be feeding a sickness of the mind that I am so better off staying well away from.  Someone who lives in a fantasy land of their own making.  Who spends too much of their time listening to that inner voice and acting on it continuously, is not healthy, especially when that inner voice is also a little bit sick and twisted too.  We all have a "ideal" of who we'd like the world to see us as, whether that be the saint or the sinner, the studier or the partier or the whatever. But that ideal we try to project doesn't always come across to rest of the planet the way you'd expect it.  You may like to think you are a kind sweet innocent person but then if you act upon your inner more basic voice who demands that you gain what you want no matter the cost then you aren't that sweet and innocent are you?

My point being to all this, is my inner voice wants to defend herself against a barrage of spiteful venomous comments made against her, which are based on no facts, just the ideas and thoughts from an attention seeking, insecure woman who should know better at her age who has nothing better to do with her time than comment on, read, and make judgements on a family that has nothing to do with her, that she isn't involved with, related to or has any connection with, her children aren't related to, her partner isn't related to in fact I am at a loss to why if she truly wants to get on with her life and she's so much happier now she still feels she needs to keep any form of contact she can ?? But as I suggested there maybe a screw loose somewhere up there.

Hence my inner voice can keep screaming but I shall not be answering.  I will continue to post on social media the things I think are funny or interesting or matter to me for people to either read or not read but I will not be hauled into a no win argument with anyone especially someone who has no relevance in my life whatsoever even if they are trying to use every spiteful nasty thing they can conjour up in their heads.

Help my Mum is on steriods, Living with the older generation.

One dose she's taken, just one and already she has me wanting to crawl up the wall with my teeth. How is that even possible the stuff can't have even got in to her system yet and she's charging round the place with a self imposed sense of importance and the attitude of a stroppy teenager.  I already have one of those, who is of my own creation, I don't want to deal with another one thank you.

It started yesterday when eldest child offered to make dinner. Now I don't know how you play this is your own household but in ours those that are doing get to choose what they do.  It seems the only fair way in my opinion of making this ardourous task (see previous blog post) anymore bearable.  So she decided she wanted to make homemade wedges from actual potato's.  I know, shock horror this would involved actually having to prep stuff, so as I was being let off one of my less enjoyable chores (I'd rather iron than cook, its that bad) I full supported this decision of hers.  Now we weren't prepared for a wedge type dinner in the sense that I hadn't bothered to get any meat out to cook at all that evening, before you ask, I don't know what I was planning to do for food that night before eldest child kindly stepped in (again see previous blog post) luckily, well not exactly luckily as the whole family know what I am like and so we regularly stock up on frozen chicken in various forms. We had in the freezer some chicken steak things so we decided we would together go wedges from scratch, broccoli and frozen chicken steaks.  Its almost there in the healthy eating stakes.  Anyway the point to the is incredibly long winded story is the fact that sterioded up mother walks in on daughter and I sweating & swearing over the ovens and stoves and has a complete paddy over what is being cooked.

The conversation went as follows, "WHY are you making THOSE things?" "Mum, Lexi is cooking and she wanted to do wedges we didn't have any fresh steak or chicken breast so we've used this instead but the wedges are fresh and so is the broccoli" "Well I bought fresh meat, I'm not eating this crap, why should I have to eat this crap" me know slightly irritated "Its not crap Mum we are cooking from fresh most of it, and the meat you bought is for stir fry, you bought 2 different types of meat, neither of which is a big enough portion for all the family so we decided it would be ok to do this and feed the entire family the same thing. ok" she storms off through the swinging doors muttering "its not good enough, I don't want to eat that crap, its not fair" anyway I turn to look at my daughter and her face is crestfallen.  I know that look, its the look that must be on my face when I am trying hard to cook for everyone and someone turns their nose up at it, and while I expect it from the boys to have my mother make my daughter feel that way, got me alittle bit angry.

"You are either cooked for or bought food for every bloody night of the week, Mother.  If you want to start making demands on what is eaten in this house, you can either cook for everyone or cook for yourself but you are not going to dictate to me how this entire family eats just because it suits you"  She sulked the entire rest of the evening, though she did manage to throw some veg and wedges down her throat without choking and I bet she enjoyed them to as Moo did a fine job of seasoning them.

Needless to say, we're still not on the best of talking terms, second dose has gone down and she's whizzing around slamming doors, demanding why things are where they are, driving the cleaner up the wall moaning about everything and generally huffing and puffing alot.  Don't get me wrong I'm glad she's feeling better I just wish she's calm the feck down otherwise there will be war on our hands and I won't be held responsible.

Tonight I shall use the beef and the pork she bought but I am not going to cook it in the way she demands but in the way I think the entire family will enjoy it so heads up round two will be around 5.30pm tonight.

Wish me luck xxx

Give it up for the slow roast and other dinners they hate

As awful as it is to say and totally non PC, being born female a layer of expectation is already being placed on me from the minute I draw my first breath in the world.

One of these is an innate predisposed ability to cook.  Whether it be just the pressure of tradition or the natural maternal instinct to feed our off spring, women on the most part are the main cooks in any given home anywhere in the world.

There is only one slight problem for me with this whole set up and that is the fact I don't actually like doing it. While I like the praise for a meal well prepared and the pleasure of seeing faces enjoying the meal I have placed in front of them none of it makes up for the pain and drudgery of having to not only think what I can make but then go about preparing it.

Don't get me wrong there are days when I am totally up for the challenge and feel positive about the food I am making.  I take pride in adding flavours together and challenging myself to push the boundaries of my food comfort zone.  But unfortunately these days are few and far between, given that anything new I put in front of my darling children at least one of them will turn their pretty little noses up at it.

I don't know about you guys, but my heart breaks alittle when I spend all day cooking and they refuse to eat it and then the next day I present them with chicken nuggets and the wolf it down.  Persistence, you may say, or even, they will look back and appreciate your efforts one day, which quite possibly is true, but you couple this normal parent/child relationship with the fact I don't actually like cooking and you hit an impasse.  I don't like doing it, they don't like eating it. Where do I go from here?

I could give in and just make pizza and nuggets everyday but that goes against every parenting bone in my body.  I was brought up on meat, veg and potatoes every night, how can i possibly not do that for my children as well, plus the other grown ups in the house might complain slightly as they would find a diet based solely on stick it in the oven jobs rather hard to swallow (excuse the pun).

There's always the other possibility of simply handing the job on to someone else, but we all know that's never going to happen unless I drop dead or something.  I could just cook meals I like every day and have everyone complain at me but not give a toss as I would be eating something I like. I could try and get the kids more involved with the cooking but past experience has left me rather scared by these events and the kids are probably traumatised still to this day.  I could go on strike until they all agree to promise to always eat whatever I put before them, but I am pretty sure we'd all starve before this happened.

So my only conclusion is I keep plodding on till they all leave home as most mothers do, then get complained at bitterly that I always cook far to much for "just the two of us" while I'm secretly hoping that one of the kids will pop in and fancy something to eat.

What is really important to you ?

I do understand for all of us this questions has a myriad of answers, answers probably as unique and individual as we are as people.  But I also think we can generalise a bit on this question too for instance.

Most of us that have children will want them to be happy.  But the degrees in what this entails varies, for parents of sick kids, all we want is for them to get better.  If we have a child who is getting bullied at school all we want is for that to stop.  If we have grown up children we want them to be happy in their lives and make good choices.  If we have babies we just want them to stop crying.

For those of us trying to succeed in life whether write that long buried book that is bursting to get out or that catchy tune that will be on every radio station and hummed on every ones lips or the next step on the rung of that extremely long career ladder, what is important is to get noticed, seen or heard.

Then there are those who's value they hold on things is monetary and power.  They see wealth as important and have a deep need to obtain money in whatever way they are able to.  They have a desire to control others and have materialistically all they can get.

Then there are those who are not happy with anything they have and that is what is important to them.  They covert others, in all ways. Simply they are not satisfied with the way their lives have turned out and will never take responsibility for that. They look at others and either critisize or pick on aspects of the other persons life to berate or compare with their own.  Finding fault in how they choose to live their life, jealous and resentful but hiding it behind a vale of contempt and self righteousness.  They choose to feel indignant when someone is doing better than them and spend their time finding ways to bring any other person down rather than looking inward and finding happiness within themselves.  These are the people I pity the most, because what is important to them is not how they can improve themselves or make others feel better, these people are the takers in life.  They are the ones who buy you a gift, then tell you how much it cost them, they want constant praise and flattery, to boost their fragile ego and this is because they have no depth of character of their own to draw from. These people who look at a pretty woman and say "well she's got a fat arse" or "she shouldn't be with him she's a slapper". These people who judge, demean, belittle and have a deep need to always be seen to be doing better than anyone else, lead horrible lives.  Lives lived by others standards because they can never be happy with the standards they set themselves as they can't stand it if they think someone is doing better than them.

People stop caring when you are a taker. When you are constantly wanting praise because you did something nice once and keep reminding everyone. They stop caring when you critise a person because you don't like the way they live their life or clothes they wear, or their makeup or their hairstyle, no one wants to know your opinion its boring and annoying. People stop caring when you are constantly bragging how something was bought for you or money was spent on you its not what is important in life and people truly stop caring when you constantly spend all your time trying to convince the world how stunningly beautiful and attractive you are. It shows how shallow you truly are when these things are certainly not what matters.

I accept I am not the most attractive woman on the planet, I do my hair in the morning, my makeup when I can be bothered, I could lose weight but I like food and I'm fairly healthy. I am nearly 40 I have had 3 babies who are all beautiful and I am just so proud of. I don't have a lot of money but I certainly love what I do for a living and that makes me happy.  I have a man by my side who never ever wants to leave, who I giggle with, who makes me happy and I make happy too, who knows me inside out and accepts all of me (warts and all) who still thinks I am sexy, even with my grey knickers on and who I think is gorgeous.

I have no need to look at others and feel intimidated or threatened by them, I have no need to think I am not good enough because all the facts say I am, I have no need to think bad of others.  But I will always feel the need to protect what I have, to defend it and to look after it because that is WHAT IS IMPORTANT TO ME.

Oh Sh*t its 2014 already

Lord, one minute I was panicking about what to buy people, how I was going to pay for it and will they think I'm a cheapskate because I only got them chocolates and the next we are here, New Year!

What a whirlwind, not in the sense that our time has been taken up with relentless parties and endless entertaining because quite frankly its been a quiet one.  Its more the roller coaster of emotions that have been running through the house on a daily basis.  Don't get me wrong they have mostly been positive ones, with hyperactive giggling children, semi drunk over loving teenagers and the continuing honeymoon period of my current relationship but there has been a few dents in the whole rose tinted merriment of the holiday season.

For instance the slight panic I felt on Christmas eve with the prospect of 60 odd presents still to wrapped at 7pm and my designated helper gently snoring on the sofa.  This panic state was quickly averted by me also putting my head down and then us waking up together at 10pm and commencing the wrapping until 1am Christmas morning..See no problem really until of course we were woken up at 5am by 2 very excited little people.

Then there was the Boxing Day or otherwise known as, Mum's 70th birthday, moment of surrealism where we presented Mum with her birthday present...(a meat grinder) which she proceeded to completely unwrap take out the box and study intently. Leaving, what I would consider, some rather gruesome looking apparatus to hand and a strange glint in her eye as she handled the sausage maker expectantly.  I spent the rest of the day with the music of Sweeney Todd randomly popping in to my head at inopportune moments.

Then there was the rather unpleasant news on the 28th where we discovered that the house has damp via an email with alot of red writing and capitalisation in it. This was while we were trying to enjoy a local kids Christmas disco, which had already been slightly spoiled by the fact that Santa had run out of Christmas presents for all the children and had had to make a quick exit back to the sodding North Pole and back again (well that's what it felt like time wise) to magically provide presents to appease all the parents who'd paid the £5 for this enchanting event (tube of milky buttons, not impressed, to be honest though the kids couldn't have cared less of it was just the tube).

By the 30th we'd got to the running out of food stage and it was really a short straw moment as none of us had any desire whatsoever to leave the house, but New Years Day was fast approaching and someone had to go.  Mum was the hero of the hour, because after much wrangling and sighing and haven't we got ANYTHING left at all, she quietly slipped out the front door to return an hour later fully laden with basic essentials and a few goodies as well. A true family hero was greeted on her return, with various grunts from the children and a mumble from me of "did you buy me any chocolate?" (she had).

The infamous last night of the year (New Years Eve) was spent almost in the most perfect way possible, phone calls from the eldest every 90 minutes to tell me that she was still "FINE MOTHER"  The boys were bathed early with vast amounts of their new smellies and nice and settled and the evening was spent in various positions snuggled on the sofa wishing all the friends and family a Happy New Year via facebook, twitter and text, while laughing at some of the horrifically embarrassing images being posted all over the net, even before the clock has reached midnight.

I can honestly say I am as ready for 2014 as I have ever been ready for any new year but I did have a quick wonder what 2054 will be like and whether I will see it, being as that will be my 80th year as apposed to this one being my 40th :-) HAPPY NEW YEAR everyone :-)