So the younger son and I are travelling today. To Rome, in fact; have I mentioned that before? Packed and ready – not quite (never fail to leave until the last minute things which could have been done yesterday), but now looking forward to it. For, you see, I had a few days of Internalised Parent Superego stuff (I had made the mistake of Doing the Sums, you see. I should have learned by now). It went something like this: "you crazily mad idiot, you are hemorrhaging money like you could actually afford it, with the amount you have already spent and shall continue to spend on this – and can I just underline this fact – your third holiday abroad this year, you could all have lived for a good while at home, and there's not going to be any more where that came from and from now on, it will be doom and gloom for ever and nothing is going to rescue you and you have made a mess of everything and it is all your fault and it will all be found out, you will be found out as being as useless bad as you are", and so on.
Nice guy, isn't he? Also known as The Neurotic Vortex, I haven't heard him this loud for quite some time. Probably a few years, in fact. When he strikes, there isn't much I can do. I don't know if I have anyone to turn to in my panic, and if I do, I don't. If you know what I mean.
But, as I said above, I have somehow managed to shake him off and am now looking forward to it. Rome, I mean. At least this spendthrifticity proves, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that I am not my father. Which – for all his virtues and good sides – is A Very Good Thing. It makes a difference if you can act extravagant and generous in a dire situation, rather than passing on the forever-miserable face of perceived famine lurking around the corner; especially if whilst doing so, you are going to fill the ears of your nearests-and-dearests with how grim your life has been, because of the forever-miserable face of perceived famine lurking around every corner.
A lot of repetition there. I hope you caught my gist. Be seeing you.
Thursday, October 11, 2012
with a bang not a whimper
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7 comments:
Hmmm - well I've had four holidays this year, if you count the short trip to Edinburgh (and why wouldn't you?). And now we're living on gruel and potatoes. Bovvered? Nah. We're all hurtling towards armageddon anyway, so living it up is almost a duty. Please greet the Pope and anyone else who might know me.
I've never been to Rome. So tell me things.
Why wouldn't I indeed? For I think it's simply vile and abhorrent of people not to count short trips to Edinburgh as holidays. Unspeakable behaviour, and I am certainly not going to be found guilty of such stuff.
So you have, in fact, my dearly beloved Signchen, managed more holidays than I have this year; this makes me feel miles better about being a spendthrift, and I thank you.
Rome is the capital city of Italy. Home to some 3.5 million registered citizens, it is impossible to guess the number of illegal immigrants who dwell there. Some 14 million tourists visit it every year. The climate is warm, Mediterranean, with December–January being the coldest months; even then, the temperature shouldn't drop much below +7° C. This will, however, feel freezing cold [so we're told], as the buildings are generally built of slabs of marble and have little in the way of heating. October is a particularly good month for visiting Rome, as the weather is still perfectly warm enough to sit outside for one's evening meal, and there are less tourists than during the summer months, which are also unnecessarily hot. The city is situated on the river Tiber [Tevere, in Italian), and there is evidence of Bronze Age settlements on the Capitolini (lat. Capitolium), one of the seven hills Ancient Imperial Rome was situated on. Nowadays, the hill count has risen. The writer, very sadly, doesn't actually know how many hills lie within Rome's boundaries today. She does, however, know that these are not exactly the sorts of things her dear friend Signskins was asking for, but is just being a smart-ass and a general pain.
Hei Signs. I'm back. Tired but happy; good to see you. I will post pictures and proper tales in due course; but right now, I need to catch up on some sleep. We arrived gone midnight last night, and I had a logic exam (of all exams, it had to be logic) starting at nine today. So, you know. The old brain has been sharper.
In the meantime, I remain, yours truly etc.
x
Look Ms Smart-ass, when I ask you to tell me things I don't mean give me a Wikipedia - but thank you. What one is really after is the, you know, low-down. Things that the guide books would never tell you - proper tales, yes. But anyway, splendid to know that you had a good time. Son of Signs did Logic as part of his course - sounds horrible to me, but chaque un etc and I hope it went swimmingly.
I know, I know. I was only trying to be funny – no, really – whilst perfectly aware of the fact that this is the sort of behaviour that has got me into trouble and heartbreak in the past, starting from the time when, at the tender age of five or six, I rang my parents from the Nuns' Concentration Camp for Girl Children (to plead with them to come and rescue me), but had to call the neighbours because we had no phone at the cottage, and couldn't carry out my mission because the woman answering made the mistake of asking me "mitä kuuluu?" [how are you?] – thinking, you see, that it was just some random child ringing up – and instead of saying who I was and that could she please go tell my parents to come and call me so I could plead with them to come and rescue me – yes, instead of that, I felt The Smart-Ass Urge rise within me, unstoppable and destructive, and lo, to her question I gave the reply of "kukkuluuruu" [untranslatable nonsense word, used as a playful-situation reply to mitä kuuluu. Roughly, it's the same as if you'd ask someone, how are you? and they'd say, cock-a-doodle-doo].
See what I mean? And at that point, my very existence was at stake, my whole life, and I still could not hold back the strange urge to blab something "funny". (The woman, if you wish to know how the story ended, turned to say to her husband, ah, it's just some child, playing – whilst I listened, at the other end of the line, in abject desperation, unable to explain myself, unable to stop her from hanging up, unable to ring her up again and explain…I cried and cried afterwards, and couldn't explain my sorrow to the Sister who was watching over my effort of a phone call. In fact, I am still mostly five-six, stuck at the camp, homesick fit to die, missing my mum with a desperate passion, with absolutely no means of contacting her or coming home. Ah, life.)
(Man, if I'd planned this thing better, I could have made this my post of the day, what? Damn.)
Hope you're as okay as can be, Signs my dear. I will be upstairs one of these days very soon, to post up something again, yes I will. In the meantime, let us continue within these comment boxes.
x
Well one doesn't actually *mind* smartassness, esp as one is on occasion a practitioner oneself. And one did, you know, get the joke - just so you know I haven't turned into a humourless potato. I think that cock-a-doodle-doo is probably quite a good response in that sort of situation - just saying.
OMG the word ver is spnFinn (and the house number indecipherable, huh)
I don't always share your taste in music, but that doesn't mean I don't think you're wonderful. And Zeus and Leda had a flirtation thing going. Who knew? :) x
Well now I'm just all ashamed, because not only is my taste in music too obscure for poets, but also I'm finding the combination of a) some of the words in the title of the post (bang, whimper - geddit, geddit, bang, whimper, fnarr fnarr) and tb) he Leda, Zeus, swan, cetra stuff kinda giggly.
I must be six, surely.
But do please read what I've brought you here, under my name. Fascinating stuff. Who knew, indeed?
x
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