A Tale of Losers, Stoners and Little Blue Pills

Freddy had been banging his ex wife behind his girlfriend's back and suddenly realized he was scuppered

I think it's fair to say we've all been fools for love and many of us have fallen hard for men and women who were pretty duplicitous. That said it's so much more amusing to poke fun at others than to recount one's own sorry tales of woe. But I think we can all say that at some point we've had this lightbulb moment. It's quite terrifying really, scales fall from eyes and this wonderful Adonis/Sexpot is suddenly revealed as a terrifying arsehole.

Looking back we always say, "I should have seen the signs." And so, it is with much hilarity that I recount this tale I heard recently about a friend that was pretty funny because this girl, Hannah wasn't really getting much out of the relationship apart from money and still she somehow battled on thinking he would change.

I believe Hannah was with this bloke Freddy for five years. He was a trust fund kid and sat around all day smoking pot. Oh yeah and he was addicted to pain killers. Still, maybe he was a nice bloke. Or good in bed. Or maybe not because the pain killer addiction meant he had to take Viagra to maintain an erection. At which point it gets interesting because he was hoisted by his own petard so to speak.

I have not (thank God) ever had anything to do with a guy on Viagra but I believe at some point Hannah smelt that something was rotten in the State of Denmark in their relationship. I mean beyond the fact he was an impotent pothead with a pain killer addiction. You know, he had money and was bankrolling things. It was all good.

Her lightbulb moment occurred when Freddy said he was going on some trip and before he went Hannah counted his Viagra pills. Freddy sets off on this trip alone and Hannah notices four Viagra pills have gone with him. So she calls him up and asks where they've gone and instead of thinking on his feet and saying they were for a friend he just denies knowledge of the 'lost' Viagras. And then Hannah checks his cell phone account and finds tons of calls to his ex-wife and somehow it all comes out that he's been banging the ex using the Viagra. Then the lightbulb goes off that this guy's an arse.

We've all been there I suppose. But this was an interesting tale of modern romance. The message being if you are going to use 'performance enhancing drugs' and want to keep banging your ex keep your pills well hidden and don't have a cell phone account your current girlfriend can easily check.

I think Freddy's lightbulb moment occurred at that point too, that he was basically scuppered, but then he smoked a bong and took an Oxycontin and felt a lot better.

You will be pleased to say Hannah has now left Freddy.

So, what's your favorite lightbulb moment? I think I realized something was not quite right when I dated a very sexy Swede called Magnus. Later when he was snogging me he rubbed me between the legs through my jeans and said, "That's so different, that it's flat down there. I mean, different in a good way." It took a few more dates to realize that Magnus was gay, not bisexual or anything but 100% into crotches with protuberances. Maybe he was trying to steer himself in the opposite direction. We parted ways soon after.

This was inspired by a prompt at Sleep Is For The Week to write a piece inspired by the word 'light.'



And now..here’s the week’s Flog Yo’ Blog Friday list

Flog Yo Blog Friday

It's been a fairly uneventful week. On Wednesday my daughter Scarlett jumped off her bunkbed in the dark and sliced her forehead on the ceiling fan and ran down the stairs looking like something out of Hammer House of Horror and had me mopping up blood for a long time on a cut that turned out to be pretty small in the end thank god. My husband said she needed sugar for the shock, but I am pretty sure that is an irish thing (how can that possibly work?) He ended up giving her a bowl of icecream and I was pretty jealous. What about my shock? The shock of seeing a semi nude kid running down the stairs covered in blood? I did not receive any icecream, alas. She is fine but I think she has learnt her lesson there.

Other than that it is just the usual type of week: I got another parking ticket. I always park somewhere where it says 'no parking' and dash into a shop for five minutes figuring how attentive can these meter maids or whatever they're called really be? And almost every time I do that I get a ticket. Sod's law being that if you park illegally you will get a parking ticket within seconds. I know you'll tell me what did you think would happen but look, I'm cheap, I'm not paying a dollar just to run into the library to return some library books. It's just a case of sod's law (can you think of any other examples?) It's like wearing a cream suit while drinking a glass of red wine - nine times out of ten you will spill it on yourself as my mate Misssy M recently discovered.

Harry Kewell - no idea what team he plays for but that's hardly the point - Mrs Woog turned me on to him

Other than that I have been ogling semi-nude World Cup footballers whenever I have gotten a spare moment. Then I woke up this morning in the middle of a dream where I was in a jacuzzi with Harry Kewell and Glen Johnson although I'm pretty sure David Beckham was in there somewhere too .... and realized oh bugger me that it was the last day of the kids' school. So seeing as the kids will need me to entertain them I'm not sure how much I will be around. Oh goodness me .... how time does fly.

Anyway it's that time again - time for me to flog my blog. So do join in. This is what you need to do if you want to Flog your blog:

1. Follow my blog. (if you haven't already done so).
2. Grab my bubbly button and post it on your sidebar.
3. Link your First Name/Blog Name and URL below.
4. Add a short description (max of 125 chars). It could be a description of yourself, your blog or a teaser to your latest post.
5. Follow at least 1 linkyer/blogger (Pay it forward is the name of the game).
6. The list will be open for linkyers on Fridays
7. A new and fresh link list will open every Friday. And you will have to link up AGAIN. The previous link list does not carry over to the following week.

And lastly, have lotsa fun.

Carry on then...

Shirtless Monday

David Beckham tears ACL; Abs thankfully fine

I wasn't sure I was going to get into the World Cup. Quite frankly I'd never seen one sober. And most things are quite exciting when you're lagered up to the gills in a pub full of screaming countrymen and women. But since I find myself an odd British fish adrift in the wider waters of the USA where no one's that worked up about it all I wasn't sure what would happen. Luckily I found that there was a jingoistic dog inside me scrambling to be let out. To my delight on watching the USA-England match I suddenly becoming a raging nationalist and was actually very excited every time England tried to score a goal. This time I was stone cold sober and - this is so sad I can hardly bear to tell you - I watched the match at the gym on the running machine while wearing ear buds. England played terribly but on the upside, let us give thanks to the lads. Let's give thanks to their gifts to the world - such wonderful abdominals should never be hidden.

I hear there's a petition making the rounds to get the FIFA to rescind the rule that players are not allowed to take off their shirts during the match. I need to find this petition and sign it - not that I am that much of a bigwig around FIFA but still I'm sure every signature can make a difference.

I'm hugely disappointed at this championship's jerseys so far. Two years ago Nike'd made lovely, lovely body-hugging jerseys, and many a side wore them too. And now we are back to the baggy ones. No matter, luckily some footballers generously got their tits out for the ladies ....

My thanks go to ..

Glen Johnson and Ashley Cole

Steven Gerrard thanks for the gift of abs

Glen Johnson again ....thank you

Also got a quick glimpse of Bastian Schweinsteiger of Germany. I like you. I like you very much.

Any more shirtless player links gratefully received - but right now I simply can't justify a day googling 'shirtless footballers.' And what about you? Are you getting much out of the World Cup?

Flog Yo Blog

Bear with me because I am flogging my blog today. This is a great way to stalk discover some cool new blogs. I believe the dominatrix who started all this is here and she tells me her regular blog floggers are some of the most brilliant bloggers on the interwebs. No lies! She don't lie. Much.

Besides, she is a practicing Catholic. Yes, really! And, she hates doing penance.

I too am a lapsed Catholic. I did want to be a nun when I was twelve though. I am totally serious.

Anyway, let the flogging begin.

This is what you need to do if you want to Flog your blog:

1. Follow my blog. (if you haven't already done so).
2. Grab my bubbly button and post it on your sidebar.
3. Link your First Name/Blog Name and URL below.
4. Add a short description (max of 125 chars). It could be a description of yourself, your blog or a teaser to your latest post.
5. Follow at least 1 linkyer/blogger (Pay it forward is the name of the game).
6. The list will be open for linkyers on Fridays
7. A new and fresh link list will open every Friday. And you will have to link up AGAIN. The previous link list does not carry over to the following week.

And lastly, have lotsa fun.

Carry on then...

Frog Hopper: Caption Competition

Well I return battered and bruised from a weekend at an amusement park. And such was the humor of this photo I took that I thought hey why not have a caption competition? So, put your captions in the comments section by Friday at which point I will randomly draw a winner. And remember, politically incorrect captions are most welcome.

So as for prizes. Well if you are yourself a frog I can send you a couple of juicy flies. I was in a county near here called Essex recently and actually saw the grossest thing ever - a live bait dispenser where fisheman (I presume) could get live maggots out of a machine. But assuming that most of you aren't a frog the winner will receive a copy of my hilarious book Cocktails at Naptime which will be published in Australia by Finch Publishing in October (so okay it may be a while before you get the book but I guarantee you will love it!!!)

Details about the book as listed at the London Book Fair:

Cocktails at Naptime
The woefully inept guide to early motherhood

by Gillian Martin & Emma Kaufmann

There are secrets that no baby book will tell you, stories that no parenting magazine will even touch with a set of forceps. And that’s a shame because out of postnatal nastiness and the human struggle with sleep-deprivation, couch stainage and perineum bruising, comes forth humour; lots of it. Read about how the Mothers of History dealt with getting their figure back, discover how to transform your partner into a sex symbol using only household bleach and a pair of rubber gloves, and find out how to recognise (and avoid becoming) a stereotypical Mummy From Hell. Cocktails at Naptime is a hilarious look at those first twelve months (from birth to back-to-work) and the antidote to the ‘how to’ parenting manuals and the glut of ‘girlfriend’ books. It gives you a hug, a tip or two and the nod to have a big glass of chardonnay.

Emma Kaufmann (Baltimore, USA) and Gillian Martin (Aberdeen, Scotland) met over the Internet and wrote the book together. Gillian has been published in several blogger compilations and is a radio personality with many connections to UK media outlets. Emma has been published in You’re Not the Only One, as well as in the British blogger compilation for Comic Relief, Shaggy Blog Stories. She has also written the successful erotic novel, Lured by Lust (Virgin Books/Random House 2000) and Confessions of a Cake Addict (Agora International 2009).

Publication October 2010 224pp, illustrations, trade paperback. RIGHTS AVAILABLE: All excluding ANZ.

Les French! Les Bastards!

I feel quite good today because I went for my gyno checkup and it turns out I am perfectly anatomically correct! My Gyno had a trainee assistant with him and he told her “This is a very normal vagina, do have a look at it! And now feel her breasts. This is how normal breasts feel.” So she had a good grope of my breasts (does that count as a lesbian experience – I don’t think either of us got anything out of it but still)?

Where was I? Oh yeah I wanted to talk about this barbecue I went to on Sunday – very picturesque, kids messing about on the lake in kayaks until my daughter cut her toes on some rocks. Yes indeed it was great for the kids but I spent the party being pursued by the French Paradox. I don’t mean he was trying to grope me or show me his baguette but initially this French bloke who is a conductor, not a lighting conductor or train conductor simply one of those that waves a white stick at violins. Every time I turned around he was there beside me muttering, “Paradoxes. I’m fascinated by them.” I suppose the only french paradox I am interested in is the one bandied about, you know, How can French people drink so much wine and eat so much cheese and red meat and have one of the lowest heart disease rates in the world, les bastards! I have never really gotten to the bottom to this but make sure to eat my body weight in camembert and drink red wine for breakfast just to keep my heart healthy ya know.

Now at this particular barbecue I decided not to get pissed. Partly because it was 90 degrees F and I tend to get sunstroke when I mix wine with heat but also because I get a loose tongue and a) tell everyone’s secrets in a very loud voice b) pick a pointless argument with someone. So maybe had I been drunk I would have told French Paradox where to stick his paradoxes but I was really kind of stuck with him because there were two groups at the party both of which were unbearable bores. There was one huge table of braying lawyer/doctor types who weren’t sagging too much because they were childless or pregnant – needless to say they were so boring you didn’t want to start anything with them. The other group was a bunch of happy clappy granola mums and dads who all looked knackered – you know the types – co-sleepers which means everyone sleeps in the same bed and no one gets any sleep let alone sex. Their kids don’t get to watch TV and instead have to spend the evening doing circus tricks on dad’s feet – yes this was something that was demonstrated at the party. Some of the kids at the party had never seen a TV let alone a commercial which was fine but I didn’t necessarily want to talk to those parents either who seemed to be having an argument about whether they should do ‘hot compost’ or ‘slow compost’ this summer for their back street garden.

So instead I listened to French Paradox witter on. “It is such a paradox that the British sense of humor is the finest in the world, the people are so refined and polite and yet you have these crazy football hooligans.” If drunk I would have pointed out that most of the TV comedy programs imported around the world are written by Oxbridge graduates and consequently not representative of the British masses. Then he was on about “Why are the French known as gourmets when they have the highest rate of McDonalds in the world?” No flipping idea mate. Also, “Seattle, it is a place where the rules are strict, if you jaywalk you get a fine and yet they have the highest rate of car crashes in America. Why is that?” Buggered if I know. And on he went. He was a harmless innocuous type so I let him ramble on until it was time to go.

On the way to the barbecue we had travelled on a route that was truly horrendous. You know you are going through a terrible area when you see “Free HIV tests today” and churches advertising “HIV symposium today – must be over twelve!” Then there were three boys taunting a bull dog no doubt getting him ‘ring ready’ for a dog fight. There were groups of toothless red baked alcoholics with not a tooth between them staggering across the road. There was a hunchbacked woman carrying her shopping on her back and a squirming group of filthy toddlers on a stoop apparently chewing on the grey foam insert of a cushion. They should maybe do tours through here 'The Real Baltimore' – quite interesting I suppose but I couldn’t help wondering if on the GPS system where they ask you to choose between ‘minimize freeways’ and ‘direct route’ they might also want to include a ‘no social deprivation route.’ As no such option currently exists I closed my eyes on the way back. I started thinking about paradoxes. Do they exist – I mean surely you can take two opposing facts about a country and place them side by side and they look like a paradox. Can you actually think of any actual paradoxes? What about if Emma is so mature now that she doesn’t drink at parties then why is she still bored shitless?