The Witty Ways of a Wayward Woman

Silly Olympian Thoughts

Do you remember Mrs N? She’s my friend who is also a tennis mum and who ages ago set me this challenge. Now she has set me another challenge – which is to write a paragraph about a picture which was doing the rounds on Facebook during the Olympics. Take a look: Break out the champers, Ladies. If your over 50yrs it maybe a long time before you see one this size again. Impressive. I can be succinct at times. Not often, I admit. But this is one of them. However, I think Mrs N was imagining more than a one word paragraph so I’ll have another bash. Actually, I should point out that I’m pretty sure this picture wasn’t photographed during the 2012 Olympics and was probably taken in Sweden (the clue is in Goteberg on his kit) which is the country where they wear funny hats and clogs and talk in strange voices –

janeturley 15 August 2012 2 Comments

I’m all right, Jack.

One of the things I have noticed as I get older is that I become less tolerant, particularly of incompetency which I witness in increasing frequency. There is, I believe, a clear difference between incompetency and an error caused by a mistake. We all make “mistakes”, have accidents and make errors of judgement. I believe most of us have the capacity to forgive such “mistakes” – without compassion we would be a lowly race. Incompetency is a different issue altogether though and as the years tick by I’ve noticed that I experience more and more “incompetency” which has often been the cause of much aggravation and heartache – this varies from the smallest tasks such as not receiving the letters from school to my father dying an early death from undiagnosed and untreated cancer. So yesterday, after another such experience I have thought about the reasons why levels of incompetency are rising. Here are some of the reasons I consider to be the primary causes in the UK; 1. Education. The level of education

janeturley 14 August 2012 2 Comments

Pencils Away!

It was Master Jacob’s fourteenth birthday yesterday. A few days prior to the great event, he told me that he did not expect any pencils or pencil cases for his birthday. Apparently, they are boring. How can this be? Every child needs pencils. I simply cannot see the attraction of an Xbox 360 game over a set of HB pencils with gorgeous yellow and black stripes or even some of those glittery ones with the rubbers stuck on the top or, even better, those pencils with the replaceable leads! I always encourage my boys to buy pencils when we visit tourist attractions so they come away with something really useful. I mean – if there’s a choice of a sparkly pencil for 99p or a fluffy duck wearing a military helmet emblazoned with Desmond’s Wildlife Farm/ Military War Museum/House of Horrors for £12.50 what sane mother wouldn’t encourage their child to buy a really useful gift? Pencils are the

janeturley 4 August 2012 6 Comments

The Insanity of Vanity

Apparently, some women have been reported as spending seventy dollars on sparkly green nail varnish which is the current fashion rage. Don’t these women know you can get the same effect with PVA glue and a tube of green glitter? And, if you buy a job lot on the kid’s glitter, you can also have sparkly blue, red and gold nails. How cool is that? Today, I will be mixing up all my glitter tubes for a multi-coloured glitter effect at the total cost of about ten pence. I like to consider myself a trend setter, you know. Now just to enhance this piece of vital news I was going to insert a video of the infamous nail varnish from You Tube. However, I like to view videos before I use them and on seeing all the relevant videos were horrendously long (like 7- 10 minutes or so) I quickly

janeturley 25 July 2012 No Comments

It’s the Holidays!

Notice that exclamation mark, Readers. They’re cunning little things aren’t they? You put one of those on the end of a sentence and it changes the whole meaning. Now if you look at the title above it kinda looks like I’m really happy and cheerful that the school holidays start at 12.35pm today. Precisely at 12.35pm. And not a minute before. However, if I’d written; It’s the Holidays You may have thought it was a pure statement – or even perhaps that poor Mrs T has wrapped a large coil of rope around the branch of a nearby tree and is straining her neck towards the sky. You would be correct on the last assumption. Oh the sweet joy of the school holidays. God, I love irony. So over the next six weeks I will be doing my best to persuade my boys that; a) Haircuts really are a good idea. b) They really do need

janeturley 20 July 2012 2 Comments

Not In My Back Garden

Yesterday I pulled up my drive at 5pm. This is quite a busy time of day for me. This is the time when I am either coming in from afternoon tennis, going out to tennis or refilling the Young Masters stomachs in-between tennis. Yesterday it was the refilling the Young Masters’ stomachs. So anyway one of my relatives (I hasten to add on my husband’s side) turns up to collect some eggs but clearly also has the intention of telling me some very important news. We are in the kitchen. I am making the obligatory cup of tea that I do on all social occasions. (Unless it’s coffee obviously.) “Have you heard?” says my relative in a flat, monotone voice and a face of deep gravitas. “Oh yes,” I say, thinking she is referring to something else. “Mr T told me several days ago.” “No… have you heard what I found in the back

janeturley 4 July 2012 4 Comments

At least my pants stay up

I know I’ve been slack with my blogging lately. However, I’m not so slack as William Shatner’s pants which apparently fell down at LAX airport. Now that’s the kind of news I like. You just gotta love that guy. Eighty one years old and still whipping up a storm. By the way, I’m over 20,000 words into my new novel. I’m not sure if it’s any good. In fact it’s probably in very bad taste as so far I’ve managed to squeeze in everything a publisher would probably hate: lots of gags about The War (sorry), A German matron (sorry), An elderly woman with Alzheimer’s who believes she a famous screen actor, a Scottish romantic novelist, a care home, and a mother of three who’s just quit her job. Now I just have to get in the telephone sex, the comical deaths, The Sound of Music and a whole host of other bizarre happenings and

janeturley 29 June 2012 2 Comments

Sympathy, Please.

I’ve done my back in. Twice in three weeks. Now this is a first for me as I’m a robust kind of gal and rarely suffer from aches and pains. Even in pregnancy I don’t remember any significant backache. (I remember a hell of a lot of other ghastly things about it but I won’t divulge them I don’t want to discourage anyone from having children even though you won’t have a decent night’s sleep for about ten years, you’ll look like Donald Pleasance in drag until they leave home at 18 and question your sanity everyday for the rest of your life.) So the first time I awoke in the night with pain in my hip. “That’s odd” I thought, “Has Mr T been trying it on without my knowledge?” ( He hadn’t but it’s the thought that counts.) Then by morning it had spread to a stiffness in my whole back and

janeturley 4 June 2012 6 Comments

Music Monday: I Gotta Get a Message to You

It’s been a while since I did a Music Monday post but today with the sad news of the death of Robin Gibb it seemed very fitting. In the end he just couldn’t hold on – but he sure left a wonderful message.

janeturley 21 May 2012 1 Comment

Stop Fecking Swearing!

Bad language catches your attention doesn’t it? Do you think people who swear profusely think it makes them sound more important or cool or contemporary? Or do you think obscenities are so engrained in the modern psyche it’s of no consequence if language is littered with them? Is it considered awesome to swear? You see, as I’ve been surfing the net lately I’ve come across even more bad language than normal and I’m really beginning to find it quite unpleasant. In fact, I have no desire to visit those particular personal websites again. Sure, I can tolerate a few vulgarities and sometimes when they’re used cleverly it can be a useful tool for comedic effect or to really hammer a point home – but every other sentence? I just find it fecking tedious. Worse, vulgarities can make you sound like a fecking idiot with a limited fecking vocabulary. Know what I fecking mean? You do? Awesome. I’ll admit

janeturley 18 May 2012 10 Comments

Too Much Information!

Have you ever experienced one of those moments when someone says something they shouldn’t? Or perhaps you’ve read an article, a Facebook status or seen a picture that you would really rather not see? Yesterday, that happened to me. I was reading an article on Yahoo which was curiously titled “Japan faces “extinction” in a thousand years.” and a very interesting article it was too on the decline of the birthrate in Japan. Well it was – until I got to this sentence: Unicharm said (on) Friday that sales of its adult diapers had “slightly surpassed” those for babies in the financial year to March, for the first time since the company moved into the seniors market. UGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH. That I do NOT need do know! I am trying to stave off old age here! I do not need an image of the entire population of Japan wearing diapers shoved into the forefront of

janeturley 12 May 2012 2 Comments

A Formal Complaint about Schools

Right, what shall we talk about now that I’ve got my formal complaint about spots off my face. (See previous post.) I know – let’s talk about the massive plank of wood that fell off the school gymnasium wall today and hit Master Ben on the head and knocked him to floor. So shall I or shan’t I ask for a copy of the accident report and the last health and safety check on the school gym equipment? Hmm. Now let me think – the school have already got it in for Master Ben because I’ve brought it to their attention that certain members of their staff couldn’t organise a piss up in a brewery – let alone mark a book. I may become even more unpopular than I already am but, more importantly, so might Master Ben who is already dispirited by the turn of events of the last year or so. Hmm… I wonder

janeturley 10 May 2012 No Comments