True Confessions

In light of my previous post, I have a hereforeto undisclosed on-line confession to make. A few years ago, I went and had me a breast reduction.

Well, c'mon, you've seen my body frame, marrying it to a humongous, bouncing, double F cup set of "in-your-face" boobies, is nothing short of taking the piss.

An early developer, I soon found these "assetts" came with several drawbacks. For instance, I was captain of my netball team for goodness sake! (I mean, can you imagine..??) And clothes, what an ordeal.. you try finding something fetching to wear that fits a snug UK size ten bum, with the sad misfortune of being married to bazooka's half the size of China.

Frocks were out, skirts and trousers - that's all I could wear. As if that weren't bad enough, shopping for tops at Evans (the Outsize shop) was often a downright nightmare.. you have no idea how much hostility I could encounter in that place! And guys, listen up, talking at a woman's chest isn't cute, it's downright rude, okay? Trust me on this, a girlie prefers to be looked straight in the eyes, truly.

In my early twenties, after moving to London, a friend suggested I go to THE top bra-fitters, Rigby & Pellor, just around the corner from Harrods; fitters to the Queen as well as to countless other famous folks, these guys knew their stuff, if anyone could help me it was them. My pockets were not that deep truth be told, but I considered saving up for a visit there a wise investment. It's not a huge place by the way, by my it's busy! You literally have to take a ticket and sit in line.

Trouble is, the type of lady who can afford to shop at this place is not the type of lady who is used to being told to wait for much of anything. One middle-aged matron threw such a full blown hissy-fit, she ended up finding her high maintenance, normally much kissed arse, royally and unceremoniously escorted back out on to the pavement again. (The staff here much prefer to do rather than to receive the intimidation, and are far better at it.)

Still, the show that silly bint put on sure did help to pass the time on for the rest of us.

When my number finally came up, I was led trustingly to a cubicle and told to strip and spin.

Huh? Where was the tape-measure??

See, being just a little Pleb back then, I was completely unaware that professional bra fitters should never need to resort to actually measuring you. Oh my, no, they are so, so way above that. Like a perfumer relies upon the sensitivity of his nose, a qualified trained bra-fitter uses only her eyes to decide upon your perfect bra cup.

A word to the wise here, once she has decided this, please don't be so foolish as to believe you can buy just any old style of bra. No, those delicate, flimsy lace creations you eyed up on the way in may very well look oh, so sexy and alluring, but don't even think of asking for one in my size.

Not unless you want to make a complete and utter idiot of yourself.

See, those pretty little things are not for the likes of us well-endowed girlies, ut-uh, you need to get real.

What we need here are "Busten-Halters", no less - a kind of a cross between a parachute on pulleys, and an evil iron-cast, whale-bone wrap-round clamp (and which naturally also costs at least ten times the price of those aforementioned, much pined for skimpy bras), these that don't come in lace or in anywhere near as many lovely colours.

Sigh.

However, if I thought I had it bad when I was younger, I had no idea what lay ahead for me four kids down the line. No bra in the world was about to save me now. I often thought about tying them in a knot between my knees and flinging them over my shoulders, but as that would only turn me into a hunchback, I knew better than to follow through .

Nah my friends, I was not a happy bunny back then, oh, dear me no, not at all, at all, at all.

But hubby was far from sympathetic, he couldn't see the problem. Surgery?? Was I mad? There was no way he was about to contemplate having his toys taken away.

I tried to tell him, but he just wouldn' listen.

In the end I took it upon myself to slope off on my own, just to investigate the pros and cons of what a reduction involves.

This being a small island, there was the added complication of having to fly over to the mainland for the procedure. It wouldn't be that much of a hassle to get over, but coming back afterwards could prove a sight more tricky. Still, it depended on how dedicated you were to the cause, and in my case, I would have happily trekked barefoot over the Pyrenees, dragging my drip and drains behind me, if that was all it took.

So it was - armed with the facts - I told hubby all I wanted for Christmas (and my birthday) was to go under the knife.

Okay, it wasn't quite as simple as that, it involved lots of pouting, tears and blackmail, but I finally got him to blow his nose, calm down and to agree his grudging support.

I don't advocate surgery lightly, it was a lot of money and far more pain than I had ever anticipated - but for me the cost was well worth it. Nothing's been added, just a little taken away, is all. My surgeon equated it to shopping bags and groceries, and being as how mine were apparently far from empty, no silicone filler was deemed necessary.   Yup, these babies are still very much ALL natural!

I wish I could say it was a simple, trouble free procedure, but that just wasn't to be. (That, my friends, would make a whole good new post all in itself.) But having said that, I can't tell you the joys of being able to finally sport a snug t-shirt, or of wearing a swimsuit without first hiding out in the deep end of the pool.

I've now taken to wearing dresses, using a treadmill (well, once or twice), and have also discovered a thrilling, naughty new found fetish for silk lingerie.

Oh, and hubby? Well, it's only been a few years, I'm sure he'll get over it, given time..

(Wink.)

Who Needs Collagen?

Hey kids, gather round, I want to share something here.


Turning back the ravishes of time is painful, expensive, and doesn't work. Oh yeah, you bright young things can laugh all you like, just wait and see, one day you too will wake up to wonder who dared to replace your face with that worn out mask of your mothers.


S'not nice getting saggier and baggier, in fact it's downright depressing. Well, that's my excuse. Anyways, I wasn't exactly out actively looking for the fountain of youth, was I?  But if it's thrust out on a golden platter, who am I to refuse?

Admittedly in hindsight, perhaps I should have exercised more caution, especially considering the last time I fell foul of a beauty "freebie" in exchange for a full advertising "before and after" spread.


That was when my hairdressing salon bribed me to give them full Carte-Blanche with my hair, a regrettable enough experience, without the added injury of having to see it plastered all over the local weekly rag to every one's amusement. But you see, memory fades and hair grows back, I am a trusting soul at heart, not to mention the eternal optimist.


So when my dentist had me under the drill, (perhaps it was also under the influence of the Novocaine, who knows?) I naively found myself agreeing to play Guinea Pig to her giving me a free shot or two of Botox. All she wanted in return was for me to come back in a week or two's time to do the "after" shots for her portfolio. Although I guess you could've argued she was definitely cheating a lot - well, these before shots were hardly at my most flattering, she had me all numbed up and swollen in this over sized, frozen grimace, didn't she?   But hell, I'm not proud, did I care?


Oh, come on now, we're talking a free couple of hundred quids worth of treatment here, are you telling me you wouldn't have grabbed it with both hands?


Sadly, most of the injections being aimed around my forehead and eyes, few had the benefit of the anesthetic, but hey,  no gain without pain, eh? I laid back and suffered in the gallant name of beauty, taking all she had to give (and then some).

(Ow.)


Telling me not to look in the mirror for the next couple of days she happily ushered me out, on the firm assurance the shots would need a little time to "settle" in first. So it was I exited her surgery as Quasimodo, eagerly hoping to soon return as Esmeralda.


Hmmmn. No fool like an old fool, is there?


She went through the motions, but I am pretty sure I never made it into her portfolio. Instead of lifting my brow, it had the very opposite effect, I walked around for over three months with a permanent scowl, deep, hooded sockets, and appearing to give every unfortunate I tripped across the evil eye. Animals and small children bolted in fright, I'd aged well over twenty years.

Hubby thought it hysterical.


I took this lesson to heart, and vowed to quit kidding myself - age is inevitable, unpalatable or not, no one stays young forever.


Or do they..??? (Insert mysterious smile.)


Something miraculous happened last night. 

Why, if I weren't such an altruistic little soul, I might even be tempted to keep schtoom, and go on to market this discovery for my own fame and fortune (aw, who am I tryin' to kid? I can't keep a secret to save my life).


Mid-way through watching "Luther" on the telly, I got a severe case the "snibblies". The "snibblies", as I am sure you know, is when you are not at all hungry, but are still compelled to feed on something. Anything will do, it's just the motion of satisfying your taste-buds, isn't it? When the ad's came on, I went off for a rummage. The choice was sadly lacking, faced with either a bowl of muesli or one of the kids pouches of Sun-Capri orange juice, I opted for the latter.

Actually, it was rather nice. 

I went back for a second one.


And a third.

                          _________________________


"What the fuck..?""


Now, I don't know about you, but I don't think that's any greeting to give your wife when you turn to her for a goodnight kiss.


"What's your problem?" I found myself slurring through my recently strangely tingling lips.


"Are you okay?"


"Why shouldn't I be?" I asked, oddly buzzing and not in the least bit tired anymore.


"Go look in the mirror!"


Effortlessly sprinting out of bed, (and resisting the urge to take off for twenty laps round the garden, en-route) I did as bid.


Well, bugger me, what a sight for sore eyes! I've never had such luscious lips in my life before, even if I say it myself, they were nothing short of positively stunning - all plumped up and larger than life - I could hardly rip my eyes from the mirror. And the energy surge flowing through my veins made me want to go out and dance right through in to the wee small hours - wow, nothing short of positively electrified, I felt sparks bursting from my pores!


I settled instead for coming downstairs to write for a few hours, not returning until hubby came to drag me (loudly protesting) back up to bed, at around 4am.


So, there we have it. 

Forget all those night creams, the collagen, or Botox, all we really need is a little squirt of this E-additive riddled orange juice to put the bloom back into our cheeks. 

Well, of course I'm banning my kids from drinking that stuff, after all, what kind of a mother do you take me for? (it's far too good to waste on the likes of them). 

I'm doubling my order of it on my next Tesco shop, and plan on hoarding it in a safe, locked place where only I can reach.. It's mine, all mine from here on out.. (Cue thunderbolt & evil cackle.)


Whey-hey, life is never short of little surprises, is it?

Lightening Bolts and Cattle Prods

We had a spectacular light show the other night. I woke to what I thought was our roof sliding off - no kidding - the rumble was so loud I felt it vibrate through the entire house. It took lightening to strobe the room, for me to grasp what was happening. It even jolted hubby awake, and he sleeps with ear-plugs!

Before I had the chance to check on Sweet Sam, he came barrelling into our room, screaming blue bloody murder. Good job we have a big bed, eh? (Smile).

The storm was pretty relentless, squalls of wind and rain battered the windows, as flashes and crashes of thunder and lightning hammered directly overhead. The house two doors up had a bolt of lightening punch a great hole through their roof (miraculously, no-one was injured). I have yet to check out the damage to the glen, but thankfully, at least we didn't take any direct hit to our property.

In my lifetime, I've weathered a fair sample of what the elements can can throw out, but I have never experienced anything quite like this one before. My, but it was wild!

Little Jess, our cat, sleeps in her basket in our garage at night, and Jake, our Golden Retriever, settles down into his, in the kitchen 'til the morn. When I went down to check on them, Abby had already taken Jess, who was shaking like a leaf, into her bed, and Matt had taken a very puzzled and sleepy Jake through in to his room. Nothing seems to faze that hound, guess being raised on the course of a Super bike race track, he's developed nerves of steel!

It's still all wild and windy out today, but it didn't prevent hubby from catching his flight off the island this morning. Poor lad doesn't fly too well at the best of times, it must have been quite a white knuckle ride for him in the small hundred-seater plane he has to fly out in.

Still, one good thing came out of the storms, it's given me a great idea for an opening to a new story, sparks have been flying from my keyboard!

Actually, I've had quite a week of being indoors, I was virtually bedridden for a couple of days when my back and side muscles went into spasm, I just woke up one morning and could hardly move - well, not without receiving what felt like a thousand volt cattle prod jolting me in the kidneys if I did. Scared the bejesus out of me! Convinced I was dying, I had visions of being under the knife within the hour.

With hubby being off the island, I had my eldest see the others off to school, and called a cab to the Accident and Emergency dept. By the time we arrived, I needed help just getting out of the car.

The doc gave me a muscle relaxant, which was also a sedative, some anti-inflammatories and some strong painkillers. I was mortified. How could it only be a muscle spasm? I expected to receive a cat scan at the very least.

"How do you know I'm not internally bleeding?"

"Because you told us you've not received any injury."

"You sure it's not a collapsed lung?"

"I've sounded your chest and you yourself said your breathing is fine."

"Yeah, but I could be wrong.."

They kept me in for a few more hours until the tablets kicked in, and told me just to relax and rest up until it passed. They did offer to keep me in overnight, but I felt it was more out of pity than concern, they obviously thought I have a streak of Munchhausen's running through me, and being as it was a quiet day for them, they probably thought I'd appreciate the attention. My pride demanded I catch a cab back home again, and the cab driver and my son obligingly helped to half carry me indoors. Bless my boy, he took things over for me until his dad arrived back.

It didn't help that I kept throwing up all the time. Took me ages to work out it was the painkillers, not an over-looked fatal malady, causing it. I was fine once I swapped them over to Nurafen, and they worked themselves through my system.

Yup, I am a complete wimp. Never, ever, ever ill, I didn't know how to handle it. Lord help me if I every really do fall sick, eh?

Although I have to admit I thoroughly enjoyed milking it to the hilt for a couple of days - oh, isn't the mobile phone a wonderful invention? (Evil grin.) I had hubby keep his switched on 24/7, so I could reach him on demand. I had him fetch and carry me everything, topping up my hot water bottles, bringing cups of tea, fluffing up my pillows - eeeh, it was proper wonderful, tee-hee!

I'm back to fit as a flea again now, the rest has done me a power of good.. it's amazing what a little pampering can do!

Mad Dogs and Englishmen

Aww, sweet little cutie-pie's, aren't they? Who could resist throwing the odd morsel of a tit-bit out for them, huh?

Humph. Yeah.

I didn't exactly expect them to up and invite all their cousins back to join us, did I? Before we knew it, there we were surrounded by hundreds of hungry impatient waifs, all of whom were more than eager to slice our legs open for a stolen scrap or two from our plate. The girls sagely tucked their feet under their bums and took to loudly shrieking. As if that alone didn't call enough attention to our table, being the only visiting tourists at this place, (sensible Greek folk know far better than to encourage any pesky strays to dine) when the papa of the party about to be seated next to us happened to slip on an errant meatball, there was little as to no doubt as to who the reckless culprits were.

Apologising, I promised we'd behave, kicking the kids hard under the table to stop their giggling, as the waiter (bless his wee cotton socks) finally rescued us by resignedly turning the water hose on to disperse the pride .. all the while, neighbouring tables looked on tutting and muttering, shaking their heads in disapproval.

Here he comes now, Stavros, the hero..

The family owned restaurant spills over the street and on to a courtyard, to where clay pots filled with a colourful climbing assortment of large various blooms trail up and over a large, square wooden trellis, which is in turn surrounded by a dozen or so flickering, open flame torches. The shadow from the flames and the scents of the night all combine with the soft Greek music to ensure a wholly beautiful and enchanting setting.

But a mere short taxi ride from our hotel, it is off the beaten track, and serves nothing but authentic true Greek fare, something we'd been eager to sample since our arrival, well over two days ago. The hotel was fine, but the food on offer proved disappointingly bland and uninviting. The hotel receptionist sympathised and helpfully recommended we venture out some to try one of her own favourite restaurants, which is exactly where we had now found ourselves. We'd been slightly alarmed to find only cash was accepted, but a quick glance through the menu assured us the price range was comfortably affordable, and that we wouldn't wind up washing dishes. I don't think the words "portion control" have ever reached this neck of the woods, one simple dish would have been more than enough to happily keep our family of six going for at least a full week, but hey, better that than to be left wanting for more, eh? Yes, the place was quite a find, we certainly considered ourselves blessed to have discovered it.

I suggested coming back the next day for a leisurely explore through the village, but the kids were having none of it - after all, why immerse yourself in culture when there is a huge swimming pool and a warm beach with a banana boat lying at the foot of your hotel? The eldest, in desperation, offered a trade. In return for holding the fort for a couple of hours, he suggested his dad and I take off there on our own for a couple of hours.

Bliss!

With visions of peace to be able to photograph to my hearts delight, with no nagging, no being left behind as I set up my shots, and no more being dragged along screaming and kicking to yet another tacky tourist shop, I happily tossed my parental responsibilities to the wind and readily agreed to throw the kids over to Matt for an afternoon. (In fairness, we did try to convince Sam to join us, but having just discovered the hotel snack bar, he steadfastly held his ground.) I must add, we have never gone AWOL before, but the prospect was simply far too enticing to refuse.

So it was, around noon the next day, we bit farewell to all and caught a taxi back to the village. It sure was pretty.


And hot.


And closed.


Not a soul in sight. We'd planned on visiting a cafe, sharing a bottle of wine, taking lots of photo's, and eventually catching a taxi back to join the children for tea. Um. Okay, we could improvise. Sort of. We found a closed cafe and pulled up some chairs. A little way back down the road, we'd passed an open doorway with an old man snoozing on the porch, a sign above the door advertised this to be the local village store. Hubby bid me to stay, and he back tracked to risk waking the elderly shopkeeper up for a bottle of his finest. A few minutes later he reappeared with an uncorked bottle of luke-warm white wine, two plastic cups and and a bunch of green grapes (the grapes being a present from the shopkeeper).

Finally, suitably relaxed and refreshed, we packed the camera away and headed back to the store in search of a telephone and a ride home. We spoke no Greek, the owner spoke no English, but through a succession of hand gestures and the offer of our wallet (Of course, I use the Royal "we" here, since it was naturally only hubby's wallet I offered up) we were able to deduce there was only one phone in the village - a public phone - and it was currently broken.


Shit. Now what? Then a vision of loveliness appeared from out of the back - the shopkeeper's small, round and toothless wife emerged clutching a shiny black up-to-the-minute mobile phone between her hands. Glory be, was there ever a prettier sight? I went to hug her. She drew back. I waved Al's wallet - she shook her head. Huh? She shrugged, and waddled back with her phone through to the sanctuary of her private living quarters again, calling something out for her husband to follow. They both disappeared. One minute, five. Ten minutes later we realised they weren't coming back. I contemplated charging through the door to wrestle the phone from out of her mitts, but a vision of her extended family jumping all over me helped to stay my feet. Besides, even if I could successfully mug the old woman, I didn't even know a taxi number, never mind how to order one in Greek.


Disheartened, parched from the wine and wilting in the sun, we set off for a long and weary walk back to the hotel. But the fates were with us, on the outskirts of the village we stumbled across a small mini supermarket. Sure, the owner was snoring in his seat, but when has that ever stopped us? We decided to purchase a pot of Greek yogurt (more about that later) in an effort of good will. He nodded enthusiastically and pointed to his phone. Sadly, proud as he was to own one, that didn't necessarily mean it actually worked. Ah well. We turned to leave again, but were called back. In his pity for our plight, he had us stay until the bus pulled up outside his store, and with much arm flailing and loud negotiation, we deduced the driver was willing (for a small donation) to drop us back to our lodgings. The passengers seemed amiable enough to the cause, and we soon found ourselves blissfully ensconced in air-conditioned heaven, being given a door to door ride back to our much sought after hotel again.


The only complaint the kids had was that we arrived back much more early than expected. Matt was cheerfully lost to the internet room, leaving Beccy free to flirt with the local talent by the pool. Abby and Sam were on their twelfth ice-cream by the snack bar. Fair enough. We took ourselves off for a much needed nap and vowed to eat locally that evening, which we did. Turning in for the night, we looked forward to hubby's birthday the following day, fairly certain of a wonderful time come the morn.


Oh boy, do we ever learn?


(To be continued..)