Verbal High Fives

Is there much in this world that is worse than a diet? Sure musicals, Donald Trump, traffic jams on the highway, anyone wearing lycra-based clothing garments in public for purely social activities, and Super Villain attacks are right up there on the list, but only Covid and a few other truly heinous things suck worse than a diet, right?  I only ask because I recently embarked on a new, let’s be generous and call it a “somewhat restrictive” diet in which you try to cut out most lectins from what you eat. As we all know, lectins are a type of really toxic carbohydrate-binding protein that exists in plants so they’re basically lurking in almost everything we eat and cause all kinds of havoc inside our bodies. This means I’ve had to cut out any vegetables that contain seeds, as well as all fruit, beans, soy, legumes, grains, bread, pasta, potatoes, rice, cereal, dairy products made from cow’s milk, GMO foods, seeds, some nuts, sugar, pastries, and anything left that’s even remotely fun...

I visited Stonehenge for my birthday because nothing makes you feel more alive than looking at some immense, ancient mossy rocks that are arranged in a mind-blowing fashion, right? Seeing the Stonehenge World Heritage Site has been on my bucket list for ages so I figured, what with Covid seriously cramping our social lives at the moment, going to Stonehenge would be a fun Covid-approved experience that we could enjoy on my birthday - and by that I mean a safe outdoor-type activity in which my husband and I could spend vast quantities of time totally ignoring Stonehenge because we were worrying about whether or not we were controlling the virus by standing 2 meters apart from all the people surrounding us.   As soon as we parked the car and walked into the bustling Visitor’s Centre, my immediate thought was not, “Wow, let me get my camera to take a photo right now” – it was “Wow, let me get 10 more face masks and some gloves to wear right now” because it was heaving with people an...

Congratulations men, women and children; you have made it to May in The Worst-Case-Scenario Olympics that has been the year 2020! That means you have survived bush fires; multiple floods; the worldwide spread of the Covid-19 Pandemic; the implementation of Lockdown and being forced to spend a sanity-threatening amount of time cooped up at home with your loved ones, and Murder Hornets. And so I’m wondering - as I’m sure you are - what fresh dread awaits us next month in June (also known as the 6th level of Jumanji)?? Maybe it will come in the form of an asteroid, the loss of gravity, a new Teletubbies album, or sharknados .  Oh, you think shark-infested tornadoes converging on land to deliver seawater teeming with nature’s deadliest killers ready to dine on mankind sounds a tad far-fetched, huh? Well, you probably also thought that there would never come a time when humble items such as toilet paper and hand sanitizer would become more valuable than money, and then April ro...

I live on a university campus. The recent February floods cut off all of the university's main access roads to our town, leaving just a single country lane to serve as the only route onto campus for thousands of the students. This same lane has to be traversed by those of us who live on site but work elsewhere. We are the unfortunate souls who must routinely imperil our lives to travel like salmon against the flow of student traffic along this narrow country lane.  The posted speed limit for this lane is 20mph but the students tend to view this as more of an optional, casual suggestion rather than the law. They hurtle down that lane, flooring it as though they have just heard breaking news there is actually toilet paper back in stock at Aldi and they’re trying to get there before it all sells out. My main issue with them speeding on this lane is less about them breaking the law and more about them potentially breaking my face with their car. There are only two places in t...

Many people think that Christmas is a stressful time of the year and it is; what with black ice on the roads, unprecedented exposure to Carollers, the strain of gift shopping in a recession, and the alarming increase of grown adults dressed as Elves - replete with green tights and short shorts - appearing in our Shopping Centers. But the main problem with Christmas is not the challenge of wrapping Christmas presents successfully without getting your hamster/cat/Chihuahua stuck in the wrapping tape. The REAL problem with Christmas is raisins. Christmas is the time to survive on Goodwill To All Men. And raisins. In fact, the term “Merry Christmas” was originally taken from the term “Feliz Navidad” which is Spanish for “Who needs more raisins?” That’s because raisins, never content to just sit around in a dark cupboard at Christmas, feel the need to go out and infiltrate Festive snacks in some kind of world domination way.  For years now, most Christmas related foo...

Christmas can be a stressful time of year; what with gift shopping, long queues everywhere, and prolonged exposure to relatives and/or Brussels sprouts. So to bring a bit of merriment to the situation, we thought we’d go carol singing as a random act of Christmas kindness.  When planning to go Carol singing, one must consider The distance you want to travel on foot The probability of people actually opening their front doors to you If you should go for modern or more traditional carols And whether to undergo comprehensive voice box surgery weeks beforehand.  But the most important consideration of all is presentation. And by presentation, I mean festive jazz hands.  In the end, we decided to go Caroling at local retirement centres because w e believed the elderly would truly appreciate festive jazz hands. Plus t hey are the generation least likely to unleash vicious dogs on us if they think we’re rubbish. As we gathered in the retirement centre di...

It is less than 1 week until Christmas; that curious time of year in which most humans of the masculine gender have yet to dedicate much mental activity to the topic “Christmas shopping.” The alarming spike in women receiving shower caps, air fresheners, or car windscreen wiper blades for Christmas can be traced back to modern man's last-minute approach to Christmas shopping - when, at around 10.30pm on Christmas Eve, many men initiate their shopping experience by driving to the nearest chemist or petrol station to purchase items that they think qualify as Christmas gifts women actually want . Ladies across the globe are already working themselves up into an advanced state of ire over the situation as they feverishly wrap the 72.5 Christmas gifts they bought (way back in October) for family, friends, neighbours, work colleagues, the postman, the cat, the dog, and gifts from the cat and dog too.  Women don’t understand why so many men seem to be unable to commence their Christm...

I was off to visit the zoo. It had been on my ‘To Do’ list for ages because I am from Africa and have therefore never seen real animals in captivity before. I've rather been forced to wrestle them out of my swimming pool (snakes), out of my kitchen (monkeys), and away from my quad bike (lions) in direct mortal combat. Frankly, I was looking forward to admiring them in a more controlled environment where I was not at imminent risk of being poisoned, bitten, disfigured or otherwise morbidly neutralised. First we "saw" the lions. They were massive. They were majestic. They were completely ignoring us by hiding in the bushes and facing the back wall in a manner that openly communicated, “I care nothing for the £14.95 you paid to objectify me.” I was initially concerned about how small the lion cage was (thinking that you couldn't even swing a cat in such a confined space) but then I remembered DreamWorks’ factual animated documentaries, Madagascar 1, 2, & 3, which acc...

There are certain words that can strike fear into the hearts of the most courageous adult. Words like recession, war, Tsunami, cellulite, paisley, and telephone pole. I used to live in a world that did not include any strong feelings regarding telephone poles but then something happened on a sunny Saturday afternoon in Shropshire and I now seem incapable of restoring a state of mind in which I can walk down the road, look at a telephone pole and not fearfully crumble into the foetal position. It all happened on a weekend work retreat that included team-building activities. If you haven’t been traumatized by these before, they are basically random scenarios designed to help you “face your fears” by subjecting you to bizarre situations that you could never realistically expect to encounter in your normal, everyday life without being a professional stunt person. The first thing we had to do was put on a crash helmet in order to protect our brains from the inconvenience of being ...

This year I’ve found myself engaged in a lot of home-improvement type activities: you know - painting walls, constructing lamps, potting plants, and successfully building an Ikea flat-pack chest of drawers and matching wardrobe without burning the incomprehensibly ridiculous cartoon instructions in a blind rage. Last Saturday I was at a dinner party with 3 other women when someone suggested we attempt to re-mount a fallen curtain rail in the main bedroom. Now we didn’t have the benefit of a ladder, or tools, or even a man  with a Swiss Army knife on the premises (I would be lying if I didn’t admit that wine was a factor in the decision-making process) but I was not deterred because even professionals will tell you; when it comes to DIY, the most important thing is not technical ability but to appear confident . And my confidence was at an all time high because I had a pretty impressive DIY track record inasmuch as I have never been trapped inside a flat-pack wardrobe I myself w...