Gifted and Talented

There are some people in life who are naturally talented. Gifted in ways others can only imagine.  Maybe they’re athletes who simply excel at any sport they try. Perhaps academics who just ‘get it’ the first time they attempt problem solving of any kind.  Occasionally there are those who seem skilled at carving out a career. Or musical geniuses.  Many, many examples. 

Then there’s the rest of us. The ones who discover we can in fact do certain things we never dreamed possible. Not necessarily with the same sort of success. And only if the circumstances are right. 

We’ve all heard stories of superhuman strength in times of high adrenalin- parents dragging kids out of crashed cars, people holding up heavy objects to prevent injury to others, and me, when I saw smoke coming out of our dryer...I was able to fling the thing out the back door (where it landed -ignominiously for it-upside down). Took two men a lot of grunting to put it back in place when they came to assess it (and surprisingly, it works once again, albeit with a few dents and scratches). 

To a lesser degree it’s how I found I could indeed dance Gangnam Style, after stepping on something sticky on the kitchen floor and being entirely unable to get it off simply by shaking the offending foot. So I stepped on it with the other foot trying to prise it loose without the need for me bending down, only to have it stick to the other side. Hence my horsey dance on alternating feet, to the absolute amusement of my offspring. Did either of those offer to assist? They who are much closer to the ground than their mother, and much more flexible? Not at all. 

It’s kinda like the Spider Dance- you know when you unwittingly walk through a web and start shaking all about trying to get any offending insect off. Voilà!  Instant Breakdancer Extraordinaire!  (Or have I just shown my age and should instead say “Twerker”?) And always with an audience when you least want one. 

Or to take the above example one step further, when Incy Wincy decides to drop in while you’re behind the wheel- you suddenly develop precision driving skills akin to any Formula One racer, trying to get off the road quickly and safely in your blind fear of the thing falling in your lap.  Pity the kids are too young to have a license and can’t take the wheel while you’re trying to find where Wincy went. 

Being summertime here, in a country that claims almost every conceivable venomous creature, there are Spider Dances and precision drivers everywhere you look at the moment.  Numerous social media statuses are stating close encounters of the creepy kind, and not all of them end well. Usually the creepy crawly comes off worse. A friend of mine even said the most romantic thing her husband did for her on Valentine’s Day was to hunt down a Huntsman in her car, and remove it. Everybody now: “Awwwww”. 

No one in my house is fond of the things. My Beloved does his best to rehome the non-nasties and ensure quick if not painless death to others. I’ve been awoken more than once by a tremulous voice from the toilet in the wee small hours calling out for bug spray (and you thought “Redback On The Toilet Seat” was just an old Aussie country & western song)!  But my girlchild takes the cake when it comes to arachnophobia.  Whilst perched alongside me on the bed the other evening, she all but climbed out the window when something fell from the ceiling, right onto Daddy’s pillow.  After careful inspection I realized it was a dead Daddy Long Legs (ironic?) and went to get some toilet paper to pick it up. In either her fear or enthusiasm to assist me (the Jury’s still out on that one) she flicks the thing off the pillowcase and sent it flying Lord knows where, so then I –the aforementioned inflexible mother in the story – had to bend down to the floor looking for it lest it is rediscovered during the night. We’ve all had those experiences and don’t need an encore just now thanks. 

But the helpful thing about this episode was that I rediscovered an ability to not only see my toes, but touch them too; a skill I had thought long-gone.   

So there’s something to be said about finding some inadvertent abilities, and while I may never attain the heights reached by some of those outlined at the start, it’s good to know there are untapped talents still hidden within. As long as the dodgy ones don’t show up with an audience around. 

Jx
© February 2014

The offending (and offended) machine

Incy Wincy

I wish my bladder would respect my bedtime.

Not long ago- and not for the first time- there I was, middle of winter in the middle of the night, facing a big and hairy scary thing when I should have been snug as a bug in bed.

I was under the false apprehension that creepy crawlies had gone into hibernation for the wintertime.  And since it had been a mighty cold winter, I, like other ophidiophobes (and arachnophobes) was feeling relatively confident that we wouldn't be crossing paths anytime soon.

My mistake.

On a regular trip to the wheelie bin with some household waste I encountered an eerie little 8 legged critter residing right under the lid I lifted. And despite the chill in the air, and the aforementioned myth that the larger species of snakes and spiders go to sleep in the winter, 

I can assure you, Incy Wincy it wasn't!

I don't know who was more startled- or indeed who moved faster- Mr Hairylegs or me. Might've been a dead heat, actually. Moving in opposite directions, of course.

So you can appreciate my reaction on a night-time trip to the toilet not long afterwards.

I don't know about you but when nature calls in the night, I try not to wake anyone else. I crawl out of bed, tiptoe around to the ensuite bathroom, and ever so quietly slide the door open and shut, lift the lid and go about my business. I even installed a phosphorescent toilet seat so I can be guided by the glow to where I need to go. Saves turning on the light. Saves a bit of my power bill.

There is a downside to this, as I have previously discovered.

My Beloved, on the other hand, has no such qualms. Throws the covers off, rolls out of bed, slams open the sliding door, slams it shut again, flings up the toilet seat, and goes about his business. Then slams everything shut again and bounces back into bed; almost bouncing me out the other side (note to self: we REALLY need a new mattress).

After recent events I won't be quite so diligent.

Usual story, I am rudely awakened from unconscious bliss by my bladder, but being chilly I chuck on my slippers before hitting the tiles. I head into the bathroom when I spy out of the corner of my still half-asleep eyes, a dark fuzzy shape on the floor by the bowl. So, slipper in hand, I most valiantly and enthusiastically kill....my hair elastic.

Yep I well and truly whacked the crap out of a hair band that had in fact fallen out of my hair en route to the loo in the dark. But I am proud to report not a single squeak came from my mouth during the entire episode (thankfully, none of my other body parts betrayed themselves either).

Not that it matters, as my Beloved has been known to sleep through thunderstorms, phone calls, fire alarms, one time he even slept soundly as a neighbour banged on the window right above his head!  And how many times did he wake refreshed in the morning after I'd been up all night with a crying baby. Must be part of the Y chromosome, as it's a skill set most fathers seem to possess (leaving most mothers saying: "Why?!")

It's just as well I am not one of those helpless females who need their white knight to ride to her rescue when it comes to creepy crawlies. Or anything that goes bump in the night, for that matter. Many a time I have ventured forth from the bedroom to investigate a mysterious sound without  a man to hide behind. In fact my man is behind in bed, no doubt being all brave and manly in dreamland!

Yes, yes, I know the number one rule of horror films: don't go out there alone. But sometimes you don't have the choice (and happy to say most times, there isn't any bogeyman waiting in the wings).

Spiders, though, that's another story.

I've often encountered the little critters on their night-time hunting, while I do the protector thing and check on my children.  I even keep a can of spray handy for times I need to defend life and limb as quietly as possible (after all, this is Australia, home to some of the world's most poisonous species).

But I've never had to kill a hair band before.

Chance are, I never will again.

Jx

©2012

Insect-o-cide

Insects outnumber humans by at least 100,000,000 to 1.

And I think that their bid to rule the world has begun. Right here in our home.

If it wasn’t bad enough that I recently had to stop a speeding funnel-web spider heading towards our front door, with just the tread on my car tyre... the rain and changing weather seems to have brought an onslaught of other arachnids and cockroaches into the neighbourhood.

Can I just say I am sick to death of them popping in for a cup of sugar!

I don’t know about you but I think Cockies are the worst. If it’s not bad enough that they pre-date humans by about 225 million years, they’re reportedly going to be around long after we’re gone... quite possibly the only living creature to survive a nuclear holocaust (or an avalanche of trash, if you go with the WALL•E theory).

Dirty evil little critters that they are, they have no qualms about scuttling across the kitchen when one wanders in for a glass of water in the night. And nothing says the kids have spotted one in the bathroom quite like the bloodcurdling scream they’ve both got pitch-perfect (does wonders for tinnitus in confined spaces, I can tell you).

Even my Beloved fell prey to one such killer insect last weekend while working in the backyard… he picked up some sort of shrapnel that had been laying around since the last time he was so inspired, and this rusty-coloured creature dropped straight down his shirt.

Call me cruel but the “get it off me” dance that followed was quite comedic, especially since my Beloved professes to move like an epileptic spider at the best of times. He was most definitely unamused at my mirth when he informs me that the little bugger apparently emptied its bladder on him in its fight-or-flight manouvre.

I shouldn’t have laughed. I really shouldn’t. ‘Cause, boy, didn’t it come back to haunt me.

A couple of days later, there I was in the wee small hours (literally and figuratively speaking) trying not to disturb my significant other in any significant way whilst tiptoeing to the toilet in our ensuite in the dark. I had barely assumed the position when something dropped off the ceiling directly above the commode - straight into my lap.

So startled was I that I forgot where I was and what I was doing and leapt off the lav with an involuntary shriek. The cold feeling of fear was soon almost immediately replaced by the warm trickle of something else. Yes, seems I reacted in much the same way as the bug my Beloved battled just a couple of days before.

However, recovering both my underwear and my wits at roughly the same time, I managed to flick the offending insect off and half squished it as it made good its getaway. I also managed to do so quite quietly as my Beloved slept soundly through the whole scary scenario!

But since it’s apparently true that cockroaches can live for up to 9 days without a head, I will be turning on that light and checking carefully around the porcelain before pulling down the panties, for at least another 5 days yet…

And as for the adult-incontinence thing, let’s just keep that between you, me, and the wall, mkay? We don’t need the insects knowing just how much control they have over us (or, rather, how little we have over our bladders).

Jx
©2010