Let's get out of Dodge

Dear Marianne,

There are two kinds of buyer for our house – the family who want to move from London but don’t have enough money for the posh houses around the corner, and have to settle for this place with too many rooms, a yard not a garden and a view of the Hot Pot Cafe, and there are the “room counters” – the buy to rent folk.

I had to show a room counter around the house today. I’m not very good at this and Craig usually does it whilst I take the children out. This time it was me and the children.
So firstly I’m pissed off that I tidied up and hoovered and put cushions on the bed and threw half a hundred weight of plastic toys in to the loft. Because I know that room counters don’t care about tidiness they just count rooms and money.
His name was Perry, so that makes me hate him more. He was suffering from that male disease, “a little bit of knowledge”, and he wondered around the house and yard pointing at cables and pipes asking what they were for. I put up with it for a bit until I said well that’s obviously for the bog, but I don’t tend to worry about these things. He responded with: “Oh, I see you have a crack in your wall” – “Yes – sorry “. This is what happens I end up apologising for everything in the house.
Lots of uhmming, ahhing and chin scratching. Anna kept asking, “What is he looking for?”

“Well I may come back and see it again, or I may send some agents.” He said finally.

“Yes, why don’t my people talk to your people and then you can fuck off and fuck yourself!” I didn’t really say that – I just thought it.
I must leave this sort of thing to Craig.

It was "eco week" at Anna’s school last week. On Friday the children had to dress up in recycled costume. This sort of thing can put me out for weeks, I don’t knit or sew or have any artistic bent at all. So Anna went wearing a rubbish bag with pieces of rubbish stuck to it and a sign which said "recycle me!" – not ground breaking haute couture, but good enough, and more importantly her best friend Sara was wearing the same thing! I could have kissed her Mother for being as crap as me. Other Mothers see this sort of thing as a kind of competition – and true to form there had been some stunning work done over the last month. Sewing, knitting, working well with the media they had chosen for the year 1 project.
“Everyone looks rubbish!” I shouted hilariously as I left the classroom …silence.
My most favourite moment though was watching the Mums drop off their little recycled children and without any sense of irony settle in to the leather seats of their 4x4 BMWs and their Hummers – what the hell are they for? And drive off to put their two cans and four cleaned bottles in the bottle bank, before driving little Johnny to Planet Carnival for the air conditioning. I need to sell this house and soon!

Can’t wait to get to Brighton – see you there.

Rx