We were trying to persuade my mother to rent out the static caravan in her garden as an AirBnB. We took her on a bus ride to show her how this could be done: the bus itself had been converted for similar purposes.
When TPR, my mother and I all misunderstood one another over the stop at which we would disembark, I didn’t think that this would matter – until I realised that neither of them was carrying a mobile phone.
A small, yet overweight, black dog came flying through the air and knocked me to the ground.
The dog’s owner looked up briefly in concern. However, of more interest to her was her silver Volvo. The car had just collapsed to the ground behind her, resting on four flat tyres.
Two boys on screen could be seen leaving the grounds of a public school. One was small, blond and modest-looking. The much larger one seemed to be very much in charge, leading their conversation. This was confirmed by the narrator of the documentary when he announced:
‘Of these two boys filmed several years ago, at the time you would be just as surprised as the smaller one to learn that one day he would be monarch of the United Kingdom.’
He was alluding to my nephew PMF, who had recently ousted Prince William in the line of succession. After Prince Charles, PMF would be king!
This raised some sensitive issues, including how to deal with the ‘other side’ of our family and their non-aristocratic habits. Our very loud young cousin H was a particular concern. Similarly, I was at a loss over what to do about my long-dead paternal grandmother and an aunt, not least because the pair of them had recently taken up sleeping in my bed.
TPR took charge of the ladies’ swimming club at the Isle of Lewis guest house. The moment that the families arrived, however, we were all ordered out of the pool.
This was the disadvantage of taking annual leave during the school holidays.
I apologised to my mother for the state of the bathroom, but we’d left in a rush and had not had time to clean it.
Then I gave her all the equipment that she needed for her sewing project, including a brand new set of embroidery needles.
‘Be sure that you return them to me’, I said (convinced that I would never see them again).
The students chose their modules using a manual ‘course sorter’. This was an enormous sectioned white roller blind. The Chinese contingent was extremely disappointed not to be able to select a particular combination of modules.
However, this was not my problem. Rather, I was trying to work out how to incorporate three 3-legged dogs into my teaching. I remarked to GMcM that the academic role had been so much easier at Queen Margaret College in the 1990s.
Having tired of watching footage of my sister-in-law J making an early departure from a reality television series, the rest of us set off to find more interesting entertainment on the Isle of Lewis.
TPR and I contrasted the new commercial developments that made our usual holiday destination look rather backward and shabby. How had we missed the wonderful luxurious hotel and all the organised activities?
With my sister J, her family, and my mother we walked through the new hotel and towards the activity building to join an ‘art wall’ class. I expected that this meant that we all would contribute to the same canvas, but instead we sat around a table with other participants and were each handed a laminated postcard on which was already sketched a mountain scene.
The main instructor asked everyone at the table to introduce themselves from behind a white painted screen. I dreaded my mother’s response, but she managed a few words without breaking into tears. My sister, unfortunately, made someone rather uncomfortable by insisting that she say more about her failed doctoral studies.
When the time finally came to do some drawing, I was keen to take advantage of the advice of the Finnish instructor next to me and perfect my Moomin technique.
The food at this conference WAS good, I admitted begrudgingly. This didn’t stop me shouting loudly that the slices of Spanish omelette were too large. The person responsible for the catering success was Australian comedian Chris Lilley, whom I had previously denounced as only getting the job because it was “man’s work”.
There were a lot of rottweilers attending the conference and a girl with great legs kept standing on her hands and showing off her red pants. I met old school friends, one of whom said that he was recovering from brain surgery and his aftercare programme involved sniffing talcum powder.
I had a makeover at the conference and was astonished at how good I looked. The secret, apparently, was to always use a hairbrush to apply lipstick.
My dog fell in love with a dog in a pram. Its owners (and now my in-laws) took us on a tour of the terraced houses in Birmingham.
In one of the kitchens, the hostess pulled back the louvred wooden shutters to reveal the inside of a pub. All the drinkers cheered at our appearance.
There was nobody at the reception desk when I tried to check into the hotel.
Having made a couple of enquiries as to their whereabouts, I found the staff lined up along the edge of the hotel playing field. They were watching their guests – dressed in bright red paper costumes – perform as dancing radishes.
This was yet another reason for me to hate spa hotels.
Dreamaticus 