Stanker

Tonight, I am, once again, a STANK. I am stanky for opting for evening routines and bedtimes instead of unlimited Cbeebies, and Stanky for banning another repeat of Justin's House, and very very stanky for insisting that hands are more or less wiped with a flannel to at least attempt to remove some of the glitter paint used at Rainbows. And I am a stanker stanky stinkstank for wanting Mog to be able to enter the sitting room instead of being parked blocking the front door. But I am also apparently a lovely precious Mummy and MY Mummy and I need endless kisses.

Turbulent times. I'm not looking forwards to the teen years.

Happily, Mog finds this entertaining. Which is good, because she'd otherwise get lost in the battle. I am after all the biggest stank of all for taking "GO AWAY AND LEAVE ME ALONE" as a cue to go and get Mog sorted and into bed. How unreasonable of me.

It's been one of those afternoons. And I can't help thinking that actually, I probably am a bit of a stank, even if not necessarily a stanky stinkstank. Because most of the stankiness could have been avoided. tLP was expecting to come home to a sausage sandwich. I didn't make (or buy) bread, so she had sausage and potato instead. Change bad. Sweet potato even badder. If I'd moved a little faster on the way back from Rainbows, she wouldn't have run into the backs of my legs, and I wouldn't have shouted. If I hadn't been grumping about having just been run over, I would have been able to pre-warn tLP that her next move was to park her chair and hop into the bathroom. She needs warning of imminent lack of Cbeebies. Change, as I may have mentioned, bad.

And if I'd spent the day differently there would have been nicer things waiting for her. If I'd spent the hour she was at Rainbows differently, then at least evening drugs would have been drawn up, evening feeds set up properly, and the long distance Take your jumper off/YOU ARE A STANK cycle could have been swapped for a friendlier, more cooperative getting ready for bed closeness. But instead I mooched around and made "waiting in for deliveries" into an activity in itself rather than doing anything vaguely useful whilst waiting. And Mog had a music and bubbles day - pleasant for her, but perhaps a waste of a nice awake without attention-grabbing sibling day?

And now the girls are in bed, and the stankiness of the day was relieved somewhat by the snuggliness of the evening, and huge and vast sighs of relief all round at jobs done, routines over, and the gentle hum and whirr which passes for silence in this house. And I'm sitting here stewing over my own inner stankiness, frustrated that one of the deliveries didn't turn up, and annoyed that I think I've recycled one of the smaller deliveries without actually removing the delivered item from the packaging first. Is that stanky or just stupidity?

And I'm thinking that four years ago today we buried Goldy today. And we've tried to commemorate her life in various ways. Friends bought us a tree - it died. We bought some cats which linked to other parts of Goldy's life - and one of them died, and one of them is now not stanky but decidedly stumpy. And there wasn't even time or thought tonight to eat a Goldy Pizza. And I know she wouldn't care - if she wasn't eating it herself then there wasn't much point to it. My purple-headed pizza eater, we have for the past few years enjoyed troughing doughy slabs in her memory. I think perhaps forgetting her funeral pizza might count towards further stanky behaviour. It's also just possible that deciding to move her out of our house and into the supported living placement which ultimately caused her death is pretty stanking too.

So there you have it. A few of the reasons why I am in fact a Stanky stinkstank. Mog could, I am sure, add to the list. I'm reasonably certain she think's it's very stanky of me to object to her midnight singing. I think tLP is right. I am a stanky stinkstank, a stanker and a stank.

Which is precisely why I am so thankful for this

Stankfully yours,
Tia