Weird Day

On Sunday I went to the filming of a Pet Shop Boys video, which London Rollergirls were starring in. They needed people to be in the crowd while they shot bout scenes. If there are any crowd shots in the video I should definitely be in them as there were only about a dozen of us. We kept having to move around the hall so it looked like there were more people. I’m dressed exactly the same for all shots so I dunno how much we’re going to fool people. I do a very lame cheer, over and over. It got a bit boring after a bit. Sitting with us was a middle aged woman who had come along because she’s a PSB fan (they weren’t on set), so we had to explain derby to her. It was all very surreal.

The video is for ‘Winner’ and features a man dressing up as a woman to play roller derby. I don’t know much else about the ‘story line’, other than at one point his girlfriend was played by one of the rollergirls. Anyway, he couldn’t skate. At all. I’m guessing it’s one of those ‘can you do this?’ moments actors have and they say yes to anything. There were many moments I had to hide my eyes because I was expecting the worst, as one hit would have broken him, but he seemed to come through unscathed.

It was good fun to watch anyway. And then I came home, getting drenched on the way, expecting to eat pizza with Max and watch bad Sunday telly. Instead, a photographer showed up to take pictures of Max for a magazine*. ‘I told you about that,’ Max says. No, you told me they’d asked you to wear chinos and have your photo taken, not that it was happening today. I’d have cleaned up! It took about an hour or so, with furniture moved and 200+ shots taken of him sitting on the sofa and then on the bed. I made a cup of tea (in a very flowery mug, ha) for a prop (Max doesn’t drink tea, the weirdo) and there were discussions about wardrobe and poses. Did I want to be in the shot, even just in the background? No I bloody did not, thank you.

So yeah, very unusual Sunday for me. We’re such a fame hungry couple, clearly.

 

*He’s in an article about Fifty Shades of Grey, the magazine wanted a man’s perspective. I haven’t read the book, other than the first few pages to see how dreadful the writing was, and don’t intend to.

Domestic Interlude

When I moved in with Max his mum sent me these cute post it note things with text like ‘Looking for this?’ and ‘It’s here!’ written on, with big green arrows. I forgot about them until the umpteenth time Max couldn’t find something that was right in front of his face. He sort of accuses me of moving things without really accusing me, even though I can plainly see what he’s looking for and it hasn’t moved from where he left it. Recently he lost his nail clippers. I hate the things so it’s not surprising he thought I might have ‘accidentally on purpose’ lost them. But I hadn’t. Days and days this went on, ‘I can’t find my nail clippers!’ Too bad, you’ll have to turn into Wolverine or use scissors like the rest of us. But not my sewing scissors!!

Anyway, I was tidying up the other day and I found the clippers. Not hidden anywhere, just sitting on the shelf under the coffee table, minding their own business, as they probably had been doing since the last time Max used them. And then I remembered the post its and this was the perfect time to use them. I stuck them on the mantelpiece like so:

I was really looking forward to the moment he saw them, and then I could laugh at how funny I am. I basically live for those moments. But then he came in and chatted to me and walked past the mantelpiece half a dozen times and he didn’t see them! Why I’m surprised given how this whole thing started I don’t know, but he was robbing me of my moment. So then I had to point out that I was waiting for him to notice something, which sort of defeats the point, and finally he got it. I count it as a victory, even though I wanted more.

And this is how we live, with point scoring and one-upmanship*. Isn’t that how all the great romances lasted?

*To be completely fair to Max, it is more how I live, and he just puts up with it. Because he’s a lovely patient man who lives with a lunatic.

Meltdown Redacted

In the continuing adventures of Living With a Boy, this week sees our heroine overreact slightly to a messy house, bewilder her boyfriend and try to come to terms with the fact that hey, people are different. Some people like bins to be emptied when they are full, and some people can either ignore the fact that they are full or just plain not notice it at all. Some people like washing to be placed in a laundry basket, others are happy to have it spewing all over the place in IKEA bags. Some people like to get the boring and annoying chores out of the way before relaxing, others prefer to play Skyrim. It’s a mad mad world full of opposites, and sometimes you end up living with one.

It’s cool, the meltdown is over, we are back to liking each other again now. He’ll try to do better with the chores, and I’ll try not to care so much. We can all blame my mother for raising a child that cares about a neat and tidy house. Did you hear that Mum? It’s all your fault! (Not really. I love you. Don’t hate me. Thanks for bringing me up right.)

Moving on from domestic (non) bliss, today is my last day at work for THREE WEEKS. I am immensely giddy about this. (So much so that it took me four attempts to spell immensely correctly. Ye gods). Hardly anyone is in the office today and in half an hour I will be the only one left, so work? HAH! I shall eat all my advent calendar chocolate and that is that. I may also drink quite a lot of tea.

I’m really looking forward to Christmas, but then I always do. Time off, good food, surrounded by loved ones…it’s great. I shall be going to Yorkshire next week to spend the festive season with my family. There are two turkeys in the back garden waiting to be eaten. I don’t know which one gets to be ours. Maybe I could pardon one, like they do in the States?

I might post again before the big day but if not, Merry Christmas all!

Who Lives in a House Like This?

Hey! Who would like a tour of my flat? You would? Well aren’t you in luck then cos here it is!

Part One is the living room and bedroom.

Part Two includes exciting things like the kitchen! And the bathroom!

I know, try to contain yourselves.

I Know, I Know, This is Such A Big Deal

No, we still haven’t got internet at home. I can’t even remember what I’ve been doing the last two weeks. Mostly attempting to organise the flat while being stupidly busy and not often at home, which is difficult. We don’t have a microwave and I’m getting strangely fond feelings for things like mixing bowls. I need to bake. It’s my age right? I’ve been to roller derby practice (another girl broke her leg, ouch) and home to Yorkshire for a weekend for my grandmother’s 80th birthday.

But I’m not here to write about any of that. I’m here to continue to show my pettiness when it comes to my bed. Remember last year and the good pillow? Nothing has changed much since then, and moving in just means Max can’t escape to his own ‘perfect’ bed any more. The problem this time is my duvet. Max has issues with it. I got rid of his in a fit of consolidation, because it was old and thin and, well, gross, and mine was just nicer. Girl stuff is, isn’t it? But then he moaned about mine not being as big as his, to the point I actually laid them both out to prove that they were in fact the exact same size. Point to Carrie. It’s still not right he says. I go away this weekend and at some point in one of our exciting conversations he tells me he’s ‘fixed’ my duvet and it now covers his feet as it should. Great. I get home to see it laid cross ways on the bed, so the buttons are on the side. I really really hate it when the buttons aren’t at the bottom, but decided if it made him happy and covered his damn feet then so be it. I’d change it around properly when I had a minute.

Problem (such as it is) solved right?

Cut to last night and getting in bed and Max is getting comfortable and then sighs and says again that the bed is wrong. He turns the duvet around so the buttons are at the bottom (where they always had been when I make the bed) and says ‘That’s better!’ and turns over to go to sleep.

OH MY FUCKING GOD.

Now, I know that in the grand scheme of things this is not the end of the world, and I’m sure somewhere there’s some wise person going ‘Pick your battles’ and this would not be one of them, but for god’s sake. That’s how it has always been! I say. You put it the other way with the goddamn buttons on the side and said it was fixed. No, he says, you must have moved it when you made the bed. Oh so it’s my fault is it? Welcome to Midnight at the Overreaction Palace.

I swear to god he does this shit just to wind me up.

Up next in Living With a Man Chronicles, we visit how Max owns four t shirts and five hundred thousand pairs of white socks.