:: The Wendy House ::

says the Very Nice Lady (VNL) from the highways and drainage specialists at Reading Borough Council freephone information.

VNL:  if I don’t have any joy I’ll get back to you in just one second

Wendy: thankyou

VNL: I didn’t have any joy

Wendy:Oh

Lunching with an hearing impaired friend (HIF) who uses spoken words rarely, with good effect:

[silence]

HIF: you are the only person I know who talks less than I do

Wendy: is that good?

HIF: yes (laughs)

Wendy: (laughs)

[silence]

chap:  I have to smoke in bed,  I wake up at 3am every morning regulalr as clockwork just to have a fag

wendy: oh (signifying:  failure to segue effectively into another topic)

chap:  I can’t give up,  I have a fowl temper if I do (his hand is shaking as he scrunches his face while taking a long deep draw from his hand-rolled, warped, filterless cigarette)

wendy: oh (recalls him slamming doors, stamping his feet and throwing things all with a fag balanced in his mouth)  I’ve locked myself out,  got to go and pick-up my spare key.

chap:  do you want a lift?

wendy: no, I’m alright (signifying: no way am I getting in a car with a chap demonstrating signs of emotional instability)

chap: where are you going?

wendy: not far, bye  (signifying: no way am I letting this chap know where I store my spare house key)

Shop assistant (Sa):  have you got a [name] card?

Wendy:  No,  what type of card is it?

Sa: Its like a Nectar card

Wendy:  I don’t know what a nectar card is,  what type of card is it?

Sa: its like a Tesco’s card

Wendy:  I don’t know what a Tesco’s card is

Sa: raises eyebrows…

Wendy: is it a customer loyalty card?

Sa: yes…

chap: it’s not easy being a poof over 40

Wendy:  oh!  (signifying: suprise at being informed of sexual orientation)

chap: my boyfriend’s an artist,  he’s built like a brick shithouse, 6 foot 5, paints the same pictures again and again,  never makes any money, I’m getting tired of it.

Wendy: Oh  (signifying: the height is suprising)

chap: last night he smashed a chair on the bed right next to me

Wendy: OH  (signifying: violence is suprising and concerning)

chap:  he’s always been such a gentle giant before now, he says its my fault, but I don’t know what I’ve done

Wendy: oh (signifying: I am not qualified to help), I’m off to homebase to get some cheap loft insulation from the sale (signifying: BYE)

customer:  what is blue cheese souflee?

French Waiter: …..

overheard on a bus

….minor accident with a chainsaw…..   ….it was turned-off…   …he still has all his fingers…

Homebase Till Operator (HTO):  would you like me to help you carry this to you car?

Wendy:  I don’t have a car, or a fitness club subscription

HTO:  …

waiting room receptionist:  are you being seen to?

I had my cats ’seen to’ as a condition of adopting them from rescue centres.   

Wendy:  someone has been notified of my arrival

Cunningly avoiding providing information on the impending existence, or not, of my reproductory organs. 

Phew,  near miss!

Some snippits from recent cell-phone conversation with the fellow coordinating the builders (occassionally) working on The Wendy House kitchen roof replacement.

Wendy: not having a kitchen roof is very inconvenient.
Foreman: Not for me its not.

…

Wendy: so the slates will all be in place by end of day tomorrow?
Foreman: yes
Wendy: That’s Autumn!
Foreman: more like gruesome
…

Wendy: Cheerio
Foreman: Bye Darlin’

According to a Westminster tour guide and the world wide words website:

Our parliament comes from the old French parlement, which at first meant only a “talk, consultation, conference” (it derives from the same French word parler, “to speak” as parlance, parley and parlour, the last of which, etymologically, is a “room set aside for conversation”). Later parlement evolved to the sense “formal consultative body” and so to “legislative body”.

Now that was interesting,  wasn’t it? 

Lady on plane with English accent (LOPWEA):  where are you from?

Wendy:  Bristol, England

LOPWEA:  I though you had a foreign accent

Wendy:  I’ve recently lived abroad for 8 years,  where would you guess the accent is from?

LOPWEA:  Austraila or New Zealand

Wendy:  yes,  its ex-colonial English,  the NW US

first Man In Panama Hat (MIPH): that is the most striking womans hat at this wedding,  I didn’t recognise you earlier, is it new?

Wendy:  I have a tan.  The hat’s about 20yrs old, from Cornwall, it’s my favourite hat, though I rarely have a special-enough occassion to wear it (subdues jumping impulse based on the excitement of being in the company of 2 other people wearing hats).

first MIPH: it did SAY Cornwall to me (giggles). 

second MIPH: it is the ONLY woman’s hat at this wedding (giggles).

Headgearless guest:  Isn’t it good of the Bride and Groom to arrange a wedding so that we can all wear our favourite clothes (smiles).

On this fabulously sunny and very cheerful day the female wedding guests were not ruining their immaculate coiffures by squishing them under hats.  Instead a rash of fascinators were jiggling with the movement of their wearers.

wandering through an empty mall, alone,  wearing fitted jeans and t-shirt, I stopped at the information centre for some vital information:

Wendy:  Excuse me,  can you tell me where the restrooms are?  (Soprano voice)

I still haven’t sufficiently re-adjusted to England to actually say the word ‘toilet’ out loud in a public place without sniggering.

Mall Information lady (MIL):  Toilets?

Wendy:  Yes (smiles, manages not to giggle)

MIL:  Womens? (no hint of a smile,  a stern facial expression)

Wendy:                     …..Yes?…   (stops smiling and listens to the directions from the seemingly grumpy looking MIL)

The Ladies toilets were next to the mens toilets.  The directions to find either of them were the same.  Why do you think the MIL wanted to establish with me whether I was asking for womens or mens toilets? 

My outline form in said Jeans and a t-shirt (flickr photoshare)

“how are the cats settling in?”

Thankyou to everyone who inquired after the wellbeing of my darling fluffballs.  I am happy to confirm that they have quickly adapted to this Wendy House and are exhibiting a full range of healthy fluff-ball-ee activities,  most notable of which is the Monaco-ish,  formula-1-ish speed and agility,  dangerous-staircase dash.

Dangerous-staircase dash

Starts in the garden where Sampo cues-up Matrix by strutting backward and forward in front of her just out of paws reach.  Next, Sampo runs for the front-door gathering sufficient speed to arrive before Matrix,  maintaining sufficient control to take the entrance-hall-front-room 90 degrees doorway-bend.  Occassionally Sampo misses the bend and ends up in the bathroom where she is cornered by Matrix and has clearly lost the chase.  After several months of practice she has the hall-front-room doorway-bend almost fully mastered. 

The subtle curve on the approach to the foot of the stairs occassionally causes loss of footing on the bare floorboards and is invariably accompanied by liberal doses of meowing from both teams.  The main course-obstacle is the dangerous-staircase u-turn.  The dangerous-staircase u-turn either involves a headlong crash into the front-room wall for those missjudging their momentum,  or falling down the first couple of steps for those misjudging their paw-friction.  Sampo tends to crash into the wall due to belly-induced-momentum,  Matrix tends to slip on the steps.  Once past the first few steps,  if Sampo is still ahead of Matirx she’s pounces safely to the finish line on the first-floor landing and is ready to start the next round.   Fresh water,  views of local trees and birds are provided on the landing at the end of the course for the competing kitties.  

The cats are regularly able and willing to practice this tricky F1 course on a daily basis often changing chaser-chasee roles and investigating route variations including the dinning room table top,  sofa-bends and comfy chair corner.  

Ringside tickets are available. 

Corporate bookings and sponsorship considered.

”’bring”’ ””’bring””:  Hello…  …Wendy House speaking,  how can I help you?

American friend:  Wendy?  Is that you?

Wendy:  Yes

American friend:  OH MY GOD,  Wendy,  your accent has gotten so English that I didn’t even recognise you! So,  how are you liking being back in England

Wendy:  It’s the little things that you didn’t realise that you missed or thought were over romantised like the sound of leather on willow during a cricket game in a park,  followed by a brief silence then clapping as the players on both sides applaud a good shot,  the smell of freshly mown, damp, grass in the morning, the diversity of nose shapes, the plethera of watery blue eyes and men wearing shoulderbags.

American friend:  are you reading one of your blog posts?

Wendy:  I’m not sure,  I’ll check and get back to you on that one

Collegue:  did you catch a taxi home last night?

Wendy:  no,  I walked

Colleague:  how long did it take you?

Wendy:  35 mins,  5 of those were spent crossing the road at cemetery junction

I’m working on my commute conversations,  but I suspect they are still well-below par

Wendy:  I accidentally pulled the bathroom light fitting on the ceiling,   today I picked up a newer sealed light fitting.

Dad:  Do you want me to bring me tools?

Wendy:  Not really,  [brothers' name]’s coming round with his tools, advice,  and innovative home-improvement books on Wednesday.  I’d rather he climbed the ladder than you or I.

Dad: Yes, I do get a bit dizzy when my feet leave the ground.

Waiting in the cold March night air at a crowded bus stop…

Ottowan: I’ve learned so much from you British
Wendy: give an example?
Ottowan: how complaining can be used anywhere, anytime, to entertain complete strangers, like at a bus stop where you’re waiting 30 minutes for buses that are sKeduled to turn up every 8 mins
Wendy: nods, giggles, “look, there are 3 buses coming now” and 3 buses did indeed arrive together

Does this count as a good commute story?

Wendy aged 12 (1975): can I have my ears pierced?
Mumzie: when your are 18yrs
Wendy: will you pay for it?
Mumzie: yes, when you are 18yrs
Wendy: if I pay for it can I have it done now?
Mumzie: yes if I choose the place that you get it done and come with you.

-

Wendy aged 18 (1981): remember you said you’d pay for me to have my ears pierced when I’m 18.
Mumzie: you’ve had them pierced already, I’m not paying for a second piercing, I’ll throw you out, if you get them pierced a second time.

-

Mumsie didn’t notice the second piercing for nearly 6 months.  Rather than throw me out she sighed very heavily and used the mumsie version of the Chinese water torture.  almost lethal.

The younger generations of the House family have, more topical, gory, body-piercing stories, because time has changed the etiquette of piercings

This could be evidence that I am conforming to current local constructions of femaleness.

Or,  this could be evidence that shoe appreciation is a legitimate conversation opener between females in the Northwest USA.  Rather like the weather is in the UK. 

Probably evidence of both because obviously, in my opinion, I do have very comfortable and good looking shoes and females do comment on them.

These comments on the shoes in the accompanying photograph,  all happened last week:

1. US accented person of colour follows me along a corridor: “digging the shoes“
2. woman in a stairwell: “cute shoes wendy,  you always wear cute shoes“
3. woman in cinema: “those are cute shoes“
4. while sat cross-legged on a desk the woman on the chair next to me grabbed my be-shoed foot,  looked at its fabulous tread then smiled at me.  I took that to mean fabulous tread on your shoes….and smiled back.

Niece (teenage):  “I HATE YOU”

Bros: “do you know how to say that in French?”

Niece: “Je tu déteste”

Bros: “shouldn’t that be Je vous déteste?”

Neice: “NO, you are tu and I hate you”

By this stage I’ve fallen off my chair giggling and started dribbling tea on my woolly jumper (It was cold in England).  During my 4 day stay I managed to avoid my niece’s wrath without ducking or walking into any nearby walls.

No pedestrian crossing’s or sidewalks in this district.  Everyone drives.  I just wanted to pick up some supplies from a store near my hotel without getting into the car.  A low slung car pulled up as I looked for a gap in traffic to cross the road

shiny black man:  wanna ride?  white-toothy-grin

Wendy “thanks,  but no thanks” yellow-toothy-grin

He pulled away.  A helpful native?  A guy with a thing about skinny older white chicks?  Someone surrupticiously working out whether I was a street walker? A budding serial killer?  I’ll never know.

Outside the deserted suburbian strip mall Hotel a group of men loiter, smoking.  No-one is white.  The Hotel provides free ’beer’ (lager) to residents between 4 and 5pm.  This fills the lobby with the elegantly labelled ’business men’.  The mature manageress proudly referred to the hotel’s 20yrs history and recent renovations to suit it’s business clientelle.  It certainly meets basic needs.  It is in some taste of finery that doesn’t permeate my senses.  It feels bland.  Only the people make it special.  She complimented me on my ‘cute accent’.   I returned the compliment.  Her drawl is kind to the listener and speaker.  No hurry,  think before you speak,  its ok to ponder. Even the lifts are slow. I like it.  She giggled as if no-one had ever told her she sounded cute.  Her cell phone rang,  she left…

In the foyer an attractive 44yr old black man talked about his business.  He’s training chef’s across the east coast.  He pondered on how he came to this point in his life.  An easily shared story of college and job changes. He has a french speaking friend from the Ivory coast who now owns a cafe somewhere in Paris.  He commented that I looked European.  I giggled.  Can he not hear my accent? Is this a subtle form of politeness?  He asked if I can spot Americans.  I looked at his faded,  XL t-shirt and khaki cut-off cargo pants while pondering telling the truth. I told the truth without citing khaki cargo pants or t-shirts.  Then my colleague arrived wearing khaki cargo pants and a t-shirt and we left to meet 3 more American people,  all of whom wore khaki cargo pants and t-shirts.