Everybody deserves a little holiday. Just wanted to say that I’ll be afk for the next few days visiting with some in-bound friends who are coming to stay on our little floating domicile. We haven’t actually figured out how it’s going to work yet, with 4 people living on the boat, but it’ll be a mini adventure.

Just for the record, The Rock Star is sitting behind me singing Zepplin’s “Immigrant Song” as Fozzy Bear. I love my life.

Just a little fun for the holiday weekend. What is your favorite ever angry album?

I don’t know why I got to thinking about this today. I’m not particularly filled with rage at the moment. But my all-time favorite throwing shit (not literally, of course.) at the wall, kicking the pets, letting it all out kind of album has got to be Pretty Hate Machine. A high school boyfriend gave me the album when I was 16 and it’s been my complete hate-favorite ever since.

Interesting sidenote: The boyfriend, I was told, became gay for a bit after we broke up, then decided he wasn’t actually gay, but MUSLIM, married a cheerleader called Brittany and named his first born Luke Skywalker. I don’t think any of that had to do with the music, though. I wouldn’t blame you if you think I’m lying about any of that, but this is the kind of thing that happens when you cross my path.

When I was a child, my mother used to read me a book which I’ve long since forgotten the title of. It was about a classroom full of children on another planet, far in the future. On this planet, it rained every day except for one extraordinary day every 20 years when the sun came out for 1 glorious hour. The story takes place on the afternoon of the event: One child in the class, Margaret, had been born on Earth and told her classmates how beautiful it was to see the sun. The children all believed she was lying and locked her in a closet. Suddenly, their teacher gathered them together and led them outside just as the sun broke through the clouds. For one hour, the children frolicked, laughed and basked in the completely alien, warm orange glow. But as suddenly as it had come, the sun disappeared behind the clouds and the rain began to fall again. The children cried as they came back to their classroom, saying, “Margaret was right. It WAS beautiful.” A horrible realization stole over the children. Margaret was still locked in the closet and had missed the sun.

This is a wholly depressing story to read to children. If it didn’t depress me then, it sure does now. And it DEFINITELY did today as I had my nose pressed up against the cold glass windows of Purgatory watching all the people in their lovely spring clothes basking in the sunshine. If you were one of them, chances are I was hating you a lot. If you were sunbathing in the privacy of somewhere other than the range of sight outside of the shop window, then you were exempt from my hatred, but it’s best not to tell me what a nice day you had.

This happened last week as well. Friday and Saturday- like a new Eden; warm with the promise of much budding and fertility. Two guesses where I was for these most magnificent of days. Sunday- like a scorned woman; bitter, chilly and unpredictable. I was ready to throw myself off of my front porch, but it takes a concerted effort to drown in 3 ½ feet of water and quite frankly, I wasn’t willing to put in the time. I’m hoping to catch the weather off guard this week by working unusual hours. I’ll let you know how it goes.

I feel compelled to share with the world an extreme culinary experience that I had this weekend. But, keeping to form, you get to hear another story before I get to this one.

The village we live in, up until recently, has been pretty small. Land is a premium here and when the powers that be knocked down the old cement works, (they blew up the last chimney on Christmas Day the first year I was living here. It was a very weird Christmas morning; out in a field with about 200 other people watching something blow up. Happy birthday baby Jesus. BOOM!) a housing company snapped up the land and put roughly 2 million 5 x 5 foot square houses on it. The Rock Star and I went to have a look at one on the pretext that we were a young, married couple intent on buying. (Two out of three isn’t bad.) Of course, the show home was overwhelming at first, especially to two people who have been living in a 6’x 58’ tube for the last 5 years. But then we started to notice that all the fittings were chipboard and worst of all, the toilet in the upstairs loo had been installed so close to the shower, you couldn’t open the door. Mmm.

What I’m trying to say, in my own charming, roundabout way, is that our village is small apart from the new estate full of miniature houses. So one wouldn’t expect to find a four star restaurant hiding out nearby. However, we are blessed with The King’s Head.

The King’s Head is a beautifully converted carriage inn and is run by a rather distinguished French gentleman called Georges de Maison. (My mother in law, however, is convinced that he’s actually called “George House” and from the east end of London, but that’s just her little theory.) The food there can only be described with the rather pretentious term, “divine.” It’s a definite “special occasion” kind of place due to the fact that it’s “vastly expensive.” Luckily for The Rock Star and myself, we were “not paying.” My in-laws kindly treated us.

It’s one of those places that you know is quality from the moment you walk in due to the vast and puzzling array of cutlery surrounding your place setting. (I don’t know about any of you, but tiny knives and spoons that look like they can’t possibly have any sort of culinary purpose make me distinctly nervous.) But the pre-dinner champagne cocktails (with a sugar cube and a shot of brandy in the bottom that send you straight to the ceiling) tend to relieve the performance anxiety a bit.

The signature dish of the place is the Aylesbury duck, which m.i.l and b.i.l enjoyed heartily. I’m a fairly recent duck convert, and still have some reservations about eating the same animal that sits on our jetty every morning and eats out of my hand. I hope that someday the ducks that float happily around our barge will forgive me for thinking that they taste awfully nice with hoi-sin sauce and spring onions.

I personally went for the beef medallions with brandy, cream and peppercorn sauce. I like cows too, but they don’t stare in my window every morning, so it’s a little easier to tuck into a steak.

The Rock Star enjoyed desert particularly due to not only the amazing brandy snaps, but the rather attractive, French, desert cart dolly. (We both have regional accents that make us go particularly gooey; for me, it’s Scottish and for him it’s French.) “For desert, I do ‘ave ze sherry trifle, ze shacolate mousse, ze souflette…” I went for “ze meringue” myself and nearly melted under the table due to its unbelievable amazingness. To top it off, I think French Girl tried to make up for the fact that her accent was charming the pants off of my husband; she gave me an extra strawberry.

The only drawback to our infrequent visits to the King’s Head is to feeling decidedly inferior when trying to prepare dinner the next evening. Especially if one does not actually own a table. The Rock Star and I will be having cod fillets, cous cous and broccoli on our laps this evening, if anyone cares to join us.

So, it’s St. Patrick’s Day.

Bit of a funny one, this holiday. The celebrations traditionally associated with the day of Ireland’s patron saint seem to have little to do with his accomplishments. I’d like someone to show me the illuminated manuscript that tells of the sacred downing of the liquid tar. Perhaps the sacred weeing in the alley behind the pub? Or even the holy act of copious regurgitation?

And lo, Saint Patric did sey unto hys mates,“Thys round’s on me, lads.”

Ow.

I had a nickname in college. Nicknames are rarely unfounded. William “Refrigerator” Perry did not gain his moniker at random; he got it by squashing people as flat as they might have been trapped under a Whirlpool. My epithet was equally founded..

They called me Bump..

I have NEVER been graceful. A while back, we were at dinner with some people and the husband of the couple we were dining with mentioned that his little girl wanted to take ballet lessons. “I think we’re going to try to steer her away from that,” he said, “She’s a complete klutz.” His wife kicked him under the table. But this brought back a rather early memory of begging my parents to continue in gymnastics and getting steered into a children’s drama course instead. When I was a teenager, I assumed they just didn’t want me to get into the weird world of bulimia, creepy, old guy coaches and not getting your period for the first time until you’re 26, but looking back now…I’m thinking they were more worried about me falling off the parallel bars and cracking my skull open..

Nursing a bruised knee from the snowboarding session with The Rock Star and The Girl yesterday evening, I am compelled to make a list of my Top 5 Bump Moments in ascending order of comedy factor..

5. Almost Joining the Long John Silver Society- Mel Brooks once said, “Tragedy is when you cut your finger. Comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die.” Some people go a funny color when I tell this story, but there is always something inherently funny about injuring yourself and living to tell the tale.

Right, here’s the thing about skiing: As children, which among us has NOT been shouted at for running with scissors? And yet, upon clipping our feet to ski bindings and hurtling ourselves down a hill, we are handed two long, sharp pokers. Pokers which I managed to use to great effect when I fell down on the slope and jammed one directly into my eye.

“Aaaaaa! Not funny! NOT FUNNY!” I hear some of the more squeamish among you cry. Keep your pants on, I’ve still got my eye, but at the time it happened, I was completely convinced it was somewhere in the snow due to the large amount of blood that I saw on my glove. (From a cut below my eye, it turned out.) I asked my boyfriend at the time to help me find it and it took rather more convincing than it should have for me to believe it was still in my head.

Lasting Damage: A black eye for a week and a slew of “cross my heart and hope to die, stick a ski pole in my eye” jokes, but other than that, none.

4. Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb- You would have thought that after my first skiing experience, I might have though twice about strapping myself to two planks of wood again, but you’d be wrong. I was EAGER to get back on the slopes.

This time, my downfall (literally) upped the ante and sent me to the emergency room with a dislocated thumb. The same boyfriend accompanied me to the local ER where we met a host of other injured skiers and a man who was so impaired by alcohol that he whizzed on the nurse. And they wonder why they have to BEG people to work for the health service.

Lasting Damage: At the risk of sounding like your grandfather, “It gives me trouble when it rains.”

3. “I’m Lovin It…”- A fairly recent addition to the list. While dining at probably one of the poshest McDonald’s in the UK in Leytonstone, I was leaning forward against the arm of a couch to illustrate a point to my better half when the tread of my boots let go of the floor and I ended up face down between two of the cushions with my legs in the air over the side. Wearing a skirt was what catapulted this onto the list. At least I was wearing my “ROCK” pants.

Lasting Damage: Only the knowledge that The Hairy One, who was sitting behind me, probably now knows I wear “ROCK” pants.

2. Man Eating Foliage- This one wasn’t really my fault, and doesn’t sound it, but it rated highly for its comedy potential. While walking along a completely pitch dark street with friends, I completely disappeared under a pile of leaves that I hadn’t noticed was right in front of me. I mean, I vanished. They looked back and I just wasn’t there. It was a pretty big leaf pile.

Lasting damage: Anyone ever get covered in slugs? It’s good for waking up in cold sweats for many years to come.

1. I’m Gonna Live Forever- There is no one who has not wanted to crawl into a hole after trying to do something cool and utterly failing.

My introduction to the world of professional theatre was a summer season working on a showboat moored on the Ohio River which will remain nameless. (But it’s in Marrieta, Ohio, has a great restaurant and sounds a lot like “Leaky Snatcher.”) The ensemble, who numbered about 20 (14 of us lived in one house. Yeah, it was EXACTLY like you think it was.) were bound together by a mutual loathing of our executive producer and we spent a lot of time sitting around bitching.

The conversation had turned to old TV shows and for some diabolical reason, I decided to stand up on a folding chair and announce, “I’m from the Fame School!” I then attempted to do the rather famous split legged leap up into the air, but being a complete dork, this was not to be. One of my socks slipped on the chair and brought the whole thing crashing down on top of me in a tangle of arms, legs and metal. I have long since forgotten which of my compatriots made the comment, but I will attribute it to my good friend, Ms. Pixy: “Hey, if that kind of thing happened on the show, I would have watched it all the time!”

Lasting Damage: to my Pride: inestimable.

The Rock Star and I are hitting the slopes again this evening. Gently, I hope.

 Snowboarding at Xscape in Milton Keynes has been slightly anti-climactic after having been on REAL mountains. Going from this view at the top to this one was a little disappointing to say the least. However, it is pointless to complain about being close to a place with snow in southern England, and when you think about it, it was a fairly decent engineering feat to create an artificial mountain in the middle of a concrete jungle. A big bugger it is, too. We live roughly 30 miles away and can SEE the damn thing from the top of Ivinghoe Beacon on a clear day.

We don’t fall quite so much anymore. Our spills now come from overconfidence (the fastest way of breaking something) rather than ineptitude. I know that my parents still worry about me when I go, though, so I usually tell them after the fact.

The Green Fairy has devoted her most recent column to her discovery of the work of one of Christianity’s literary visionaries, Jack T Chick: A man whose obvious insanity and slim grip on both reality and effective conversion tactics have brought to life some of the most hilarious religious tracts since Martin Luther nailed his grievances to the church door at Wittenberg.

My personal favorite is “Dark Dungeons” which rails against the evil practice of geeks worldwide; playing Dungeons and Dragons. In the third panel, the Dungeon Master, a woman who’s obviously been to the Silver Ravenwolf school of witchcraft, tells her young apprentice, a gamer called “Debbie” that since her character has achieved 8th level, she’s going to teach her how to “REALLY cast spells.”

Now, I’m going to admit to something and nobody better laugh. (This feels rather like standing up in a circle in a village hall on a Tuesday night and saying, “Hi, my name is Galetea and I’m a recovering….”) I played D&D myself in college. (Not only that, but I also admit to having a rather substantial “Magic” card collection.)

It was kind of a survival thing; the group I fell in with consisted of a great number of folks who’d grown up locally and spent a lot of high school together, fighting orcs, slaying interdimentional beings and hanging around in imaginary taverns, starting fights. If I wanted not to be sitting in my dorm room on a Friday night, twiddling my thumbs, I learned that I had to suck it up and buy a 20 sided dice. (Hi, my name’s Galetea and I own a 20 sided dice. BUT I DON’T KNOW WHERE IT IS, so that should count for something.)

What I would like to get my hands on are some figures regarding the percentage of D&D players that use role playing as a springboard for the occult. My guess is that 99.999999% of all gamers are in more danger of Jolt Cola poisoning, light deprivation and senseless arguments about whether or not the DM should allow a Chaotic Evil character into the party (Hi, my name’s Galetea and I’ve been involved in an argument about whether a Chaotic Evil character should be let into the party) than becoming entangled with the forces of Satan and “all his little wizards.”

You, my secret brethren, I know you’re out there. And you know who I’m talking about.

I experienced lust this morning in the high street.

A few months back, we were visiting some friends when I saw something on their wall that I literally wanted to rip down and run away with. It was a clock, with little multi-colored pills at the number stations. This doesn’t sound particularly interesting, but in my tiny little magpie mind, it was SHINY. And, as I bitterly accepted that theft might endanger our friendship, I vowed to discover the source of my obsession.

Today, while hurrying up the high street to begin a day of toil in Purgatory…there it was. SHINY SHINY SHINY! RIGHT IN THAT WINDOW! RIGHT THERE! THE SHINY THING CAN BE MINE, PRECIOUS, ALL MINE!

Reason did not enter into it. To be honest, I’m not entirely sure why I’ve got such a hard-on for this clock in the first place other than SHINY that it SHINY really caught my fancy. So, at lunchtime, I left my compatriot in charge of the shop while I went to satisfy my craving for the treasured timepiece.

Upon closer inspection of the window display that featured my lovely clock was a surprise. ANOTHER clock, more shiny and delectable than the first! Lovely, juicy, happy colors in a swirl that might potentially be bad for the eyes, but I cared not for trivial optical concerns. The shiny must be mine.

And now that it is, I have to ask…where on earth did I think I was going to put a clock?

Believe it or not, I was actually searching Google for this, which, by the way, is very funny. But this little Ebay sidebar made my evening.