SHORT ORDER , ORDER

Order, order! The right honourable gentleman John Bercow has clambered up on his soap box about heightism this week, probably with the aid of a step ladder.

But before you start composing your witty retort to my impudence with that opening statement just let me reassure you that I’m more than qualified to be mounting my high horse on this particular subject , however in my case the towering stallion is possibly more of a Shetland pony .

For I too am one of the vertically challenged and at just 5ft know of the trials and tribulations that being a member of the petite party brings.

In my 39 years I’ve been the butt of many a short person joke, compared tediously and unoriginally to an oompa loompa , one of snow white’s diminutive gentlemen friends and a munchkin dancing with Dorothy down the yellow brick road .

At many an important meeting I’ve sat desperately trying to look grown up as my feet dangle inches from the ground like a toddler on a swing and can regularly be seen intrepidly scaling high rise bar stools in pubs or clubs to reach the seat at its summit.

I’m the fresh faced party goer turned away from a friends nightclub birthday celebrations and told to come back when she’s finished school despite the fact she’s just turned 21 and 8 years later being id-ed for being underage on the eve of her 30^th birthday.

The midget who lurks in the supermarket aisle waiting for someone to help her get something down from that elusive top shelf or expertly devising a plan on how best to traverse the height herself to grab what she needs. A plan that often ends in the purchase of an inferior item because the one she wants is just too far away for her t-rex sized arms to reach.

That said though there are some upsides to being quite a bit below average height, we fit quite well into those small spaces on packed public transport, we never have to mind our heads in those historical old houses with the small front doors and low ceilings and no matter where we get seated we will always have plenty of legroom.

Being small is also associated with youth so a lot of us shorties are often mistaken as being much younger than we really are which is a bit of a downer when you are young and trying to buy alcohol but a real ego booster once you’ve passed the age of 30!

A pint sized stature also makes it easier for you to hide in crowd which is perfect when you’re trying to avoid that person you really don’t want to see or those sales people trying to stop you with their clipboards on the street. If you’re particularly youthful looking and get caught by one of these a quick “I’ll have to ask my mum or dad first “tends to put them off trying to sell you anything I’ve found!

So it’s not all bad being one of the little people Mr. speaker , if you pardon the short pun ,i find it’s best to just rise above it ,even if you do have to invest in a pair of stilts.

MEDWAY MESSENGER - GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN COLUMN

OK, I think I'm finally up to date with all my column uploading now ! hurrah !

 

 

NO NOTICE , NO COVER UPS

I don’t make a habit of agreeing with anything Michael Gove has to say but one thing I do think is a great idea is the proposal of no notice Ofsted visits.

Having seen first hand in my time as a cleaner the smoke and mirrors that a school goes into when they receive warning an inspection is imminent I think it’s the only way you can prevent schools presenting a version of themselves that isn’t entirely truthful.

From hiding stuff in peoples cars to staff coming in at the crack of dawn to complete paperwork, charts and wall displays that should have been done daily or weekly just hours before the visit isn’t a fair representation of what a school is really like but a fairy story to make it seem to be running perfectly and if they have time to conceal all that what else could they be making sure the inspectors don’t see.

A no notice visit would put a stop to that and give us a more truthful insight into what’s really going on behind the school gates when you leave your child in their security.

GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN COLUMN - MEDWAY MESSENGER .....Summer 2014

PANIC AT THE SCHOOL GATE or HOW TO STRESS YOUR MOTHER OUT IN ONE EASY STEP

Standing outside the gate you wait for your child to appear after finishing their after school activity so you can make the journey home.

They told you it ends at 5 o clock and you’ve arrived with 10 minutes to spare so here you stand eager to get back so they can start on their homework and you can get on with dinner.

Groups of children emerge from the building, climbing into parents cars or onto the school buses parked outside the entrance.

The vehicles pull away and small groups of chattering pre-teen and teenage boys start to disperse and walk away.

But you’re still standing there waiting, no worries you think , he’s probably just stopped to chat to someone or is making sure he has everything he needs for this evening

He’ll be out in a minute you say to reassure yourself but as 5 minutes past 5 ticks over into 15 you start to sense maybe something’s not quite right here.

A member of staff driving out of the gates asks if you’re ok and you explain who you’re looking for but this being only their 2^nd week, the name isn’t familiar.

“I don’t think they’ve all come out yet” they say” I’m expect he’ll be along soon” and promise to look out for him and send him back if they see him on their way after being given a rough description of him and his rucksack.

You wonder if maybe he came out a bit earlier than expected and has wandered  round to  your usual end of the day meeting place and whether  you’ve missed seeing him as you’ve come from a different direction  because you chose to catch the bus back but a walk round  there proves unfruitful .

So with your heart now beating frantically as panic starts to set in you hurry back round to the school gates where a group of boys sit waiting for their parents on a tree stump and ask if they know whether the after school event is over to which they reply “ yeah, ages ago “ .

Seeing the worried look on your face one of them sensibly says “maybe you should go and ask at the office “and quite by a stroke of luck one of the office staff happens to be just on their way out of the gate at that moment.

Despite being loaded down with all the items she is taking home, she listens to what your predicament is and advises you to stay put while she goes and has a good look round the school to try and find him for you, even putting a call out across the tannoy in case he is still inside.

Then with almost perfect timing as she walks back to tell you she can’t find him and what you could maybe do next, your mobile starts to ring and there is the elusive ones name flashing up on the screen who upon you answering the call innocently explains that he’d thought as you weren’t there when they’d come out a bit earlier than expected that you weren’t coming and had assumed that meant he had to walk home by himself.

You are cross with him for about a minute then you let the feeling of relief flood over you and rush home after expressing your gratitude to all those who had come to your aid.

So this is a thank you from me to them.

Thank you to the boys who told me what was the best thing to do, my brother who looked after my other son while I was out searching and most of all to the lady from the school office who went out of her way to try and locate him for me.

Thank you to you all from this grateful mum, it was much appreciated.

GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN COLUMN - MEDWAY MESSENGER 22/09/14

 

DON'T STAND SO CLOSE TO ME

Your basket is full, every item has been ticked off your shopping list and now you’re proceeding in an orderly fashion to the till.

The items are unloaded efficiently onto the conveyer belt and you wait patiently for them to be scanned through the checkout.

But what’s this happening to your rear, clearly worried that they might lose their place in the queue the space invader is making sure no one gets ahead of them by tailgating you through the entire experience.

No gap is left to chance as they repeatedly ram their trolley into your backside with every shuffle forward and no matter that the chip and pin area is there for you to make your payment in privacy they’re going to stay right by your side lest someone creeps in.

They function under the misguided apprehension that this will make you go faster but I have news for them.

If anything it will make me go slower on purpose ,so if you want me to get a move on in the words of Sting whilst he was still in the police.

“Don’t stand so close to me “

GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN COLUMN – MEDWAY MESSENGER 22/09/2014

ITS MY BIRTHDAY .....

Today is June 30th and that can mean only one thing, it’s my birthday!

It’s a special one this year though, for 2014 is the penultimate year of my thirties and this time in 2015 will mark the dawn of a whole new era for me as the body clock of my life ticks over into 40.

Of course you know you’re starting to advance in years when your childhood heroes and icons either start passing away or getting arrested for dubious reasons and although I know some of you quietly dread that landmark birthday that signals we’re just not that young anymore, but I , myself am secretly quite looking forward to it.

For while these days a night out will require a week’s worth of recovery and any overzealous dance moves could possibly result in a month spent in traction there’s a lot to be said for starting to get on a bit.

When I look back at the shy and self conscious young woman I was in my teens and twenties it’s hard to believe she’s even the same girl as me anymore.

The girl who would do anything to please everybody except herself, who wanted no hassle so just agreed to anything to avoid any confrontation because she knew she could be reduced to tears if she did.

Who was so afraid of humiliating herself in front of others she would go out of her way to avoid any situation in which she might do that and in doing so prevented her from ever feeling truly happy with her life and self .

However she’s just a thing of the past these days because sometime during her thirties something changed and that poor little weedy thing ceased to exist .

I don’t know what caused it or whether perhaps the “ don’t give a monkeys what other people think of me anymore “ fairy fluttered down and delivered it one night when I was asleep along with the grey hairs and wrinkles but I’m pretty grateful wherever it came from.

For that timid little thing gradually started to wriggle and emerge from the cocoon of her old self to reveal a much stronger , confident and sure version of herself than she had ever been before.

She started to express her own opinions and stand by them , stopped letting everyone walk over her and as for bursting into tears that only tends to happen in really sad situations or when observing anything that involves children or cute wildlife now.

 And as for the confrontation, she gives as good as she gets these days and should the suggestion of humiliating herself even be made to her over anything she or someone else think she’s incapable of she takes that as a challenge to prove she can do it.

 

So if the sight of that big 4-0 looming over the horizon is getting you down and you think that all you have left to look forward to is the menopause swiftly followed by half price fish and chip suppers and free bus passes think again because as far as I’m concerned if my thirties have been this good to me then I can’t wait to see what my forties will bring.

And if things haven’t worked out quite as well as you’d hoped they would ,just remember you still have time to change it, after all isn’t that what the mid life crisis was invented for !

I am my hair ....

You’d think i would have learned my lesson by now wouldn’t you?

Having been hitting the bottle since the age of 13 you’d think I’d know what does and doesn’t work well for me.

But before you start scrabbling around to find the number of the local A.A meeting ,don’t worry, for my addiction doesn’t lay in the bottom of a bottle of gin but in the pursuit of finding a new way to accentuate my beautiful plumage .

At birth I emerged from the womb with beautiful strawberry blonde peach fuzz on my head that my dad jokingly enquired of our red haired milkman if he had anything to do with!

 There’s no need for a Jeremy Kyle D.N.A test here though because as I bloomed into a walking talking madam of a toddler my fine thatch gradually lightened into the white blonde that he had had as a kid confirming once and for all that indeed he was my father.

Fast forward about ten years though and that angels halo of wispy white hair has darkened into that shade so boring it’s named after a member of the rodent family, mouse.

There’s a moment of hair excitement around the age of 11 as during the summer holidays I decide that I want to start secondary school with a completely new look and cut off the Status Quo style mane I’ve been cultivating for the past decade into a crop just like the one Keren from Bananarama was sporting in that week’s smash hits but then it’s another 2 years before the real hair experimenting really starts to begin.

As I enter my teenage years I’ve become obsessed by the 1950s and especially Marilyn Monroe, so I want to be as much like my idol as a 13 year old grammar schoolgirl is allowed to be .  I don’t go for the full on platinum blonde just yet but as my mum lightened my hair for me that summer I felt like I looked a million dollars. In actual fact paired with the worst home perm kit 80s money could buy I probably looked a bit more like a crumpled old tenner but hey, it could’ve been worse at least I never experimented with Sun In !

And that is pretty much my hair regime for the next 4 years but once I’ve left school and am able to afford my own dye that’s where the fun begins.

Over the course of the 90s my hair takes in varying degrees of the colour spectrum from platinum blonde to pillar-box red to the shade of deep purple that shocks the manager of the shoe shop I work in so much that I’m banished to the stockroom for the week. Chilli red , chocolate brown and the dark auburn shade that caused one young buck to try and chat me up with the line “ooh you look just like a swan vesta match “.

On into the noughties and leading up to present day we’ve had some badly executed attempts at blonde that turned a violent shade of ginger and yellow, an attempt at red that turned me into Ronald McDonalds twin sister and a gothic stage where my preferred shade of choice was that of the raven.

 However about 2 years ago, I finally cracked that perfect shade of Marilyn inspired platinum and decided this was the hair colour i was going to stick with apart from brief forays into mrs slocombe inspired pastel rinses.

That was, until last week.

Feeling a little bored with my appearance I decided that maybe I needed a change and turning to my latest girl crush of choice Christina Hendricks I decided that copper red was the way to go.

In my mind I would have everyone’s heads turning as i sashayed like her Mad Men character Joan around the area where I lived...In reality though they were just gawping at my head lit up like a belisha beacon.

It won’t be around for much longer now though it’s been issued an ultimatum by my other half; it has to be gone by next Tuesday as he’s refuses to take me to his friend’s funeral like this.

“Anything’s got to be better than that “he says “even pink “.

Pink? Hmm, now there’s an idea!

GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN COLUMN - MEDWAY MESSENGER

 

DISHWASHER BLUES

After a week of puddles on the floor and lacklustre cleaning this week we finally conceded it was time to buy a new dishwasher.

The delivery date was set for Monday and i waited excitedly at the thought i wouldn’t have dishpan hands anymore due to excessive washing up and that the old rubbish dishwasher would be taken away in the process.

Or so i thought until the delivery driver took one look at my appliance and announced “sorry love i can’t take this away, it’s still wet inside, i can only deliver it , you’ll have to sort that out and then get us to come back out unless you can find someone else to do it.

Which is fair enough given after a few hours of indignant whinging the small print on the website  did indeed reveal this was company policy.

However it did feel a little like double standards when on unwrapping the new machine to fit it ourselves with help from a good friend we found that the inside was still damp from where it had been tested !

Girl fom the neck down column - medway messenger

THOMAS WAGHORN - AVANT GARDE ICON

                                IT'S ALL ABOUT THE CONE SHAPED GLOVE THIS SEASON FOR MEDWAYS BIGGEST FASHION ICON

Thomas Fletcher Waghorn  - Postal pioneer who revolutionised the mailing system by developing a new route between Great Britain and India.

Or for those of a Medway persuasion a.k.a “that bloke with the cone on his head “

 Rarely does a week go by without him sporting his jaunty head attire or adornments that would give lady gaga a run for her money in the avant garde fashion stakes.

 Why, only last week he was seen modelling a rather edgy piece of arm candy in the shape of a roadworks barrier and if my memory serves me correctly I believe one Christmas his usual orange and white titfer was replaced by a jolly Santa bonnet  .

While being a leader in experimental style and letter delivery may be rewarding enough in itself there is one job he does that means far more to those who pass him by on their way to or from Chatham.

And that is putting a smile on even the saddest of faces, so thanks Thomas, I really needed that last week and apologies to the old couple who clearly thought I was quite mad when I burst out laughing at the sight of him!

WHATS IN A NAME ....

When my mum back in 1975 decided to name her newborn daughter after her father’s favourite female singer she could only see it as the beautiful name it was.

Nina, a name meaning little girl in Hebrew, strong and mighty in native American, mother in Swahili and beautiful eyes in Hindi.

It’s a lovely list of things for a name to mean and almost worth all those years of being teased by people doing ambulance impressions at me not to mention asking where my 99 red balloons are, for the sake of having a name that’s a little bit different to everyone else’s.

I do wonder however after reading that given his popularity in I’m a celebrity some parents are naming their kids not only after Joey Essex but also some of his “vocabulary “ if little Reem and Creepysick are going to thank them some 18 years down the line when they have to fill in their first job application form .

MEDWAY MESSENGER -GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

NOW, you know me, I don’t like to rant.

Well, maybe just a little but this particular subject has really wound me up this week so I’m going to do it anyway.

Ub40, now they’re not really my cup of red, red wine but to a close friend they’re pretty special. For not only are Ali and the boys one of her favourite bands but were also that of her late brother so when she heard they were going to be playing at Rochester castle concerts this year she and her family could think of no better way to commemorate his birthday .

It’s like a sign she said, he would’ve wanted us to be there and eagerly awaited Friday 14^th March when the tickets were due to go on sale.

Unfortunately with the tickets selling out within an hour of the box office opening, her plan to go and get hers after she’d finished work meant she was left empty handed.

Knowing how much getting one meant to her though I promised to keep my eyes and ears open for any that might become available.

Spare tickets were a bit thin on the ground to start off with and it looked like this homely girl wasn’t going to be able to see her beloved band after all.

However 2 weeks before the gig though suddenly every one in ten Medway social media posts suddenly seemed to be offering ub40 tickets up for sale.

Now, while I believe some were genuinely being sold on by  ticket holders unable to attend, there did seem to be the smell of an awful lot of rats in kitchens trying to  line their own pockets with other peoples desperation .

Tickets that had originally been bought for just £ 35 were now being offered for twice that amount and should you have the audacity to call any of them up on their vast rate of inflation they would retort with “well if you were a genuine fan you’d have made sure you got a ticket on the day they came out instead of trying to buy them on here, wouldn’t you?”.

Seriously do you not think that was something they tried to do?

Unfortunately for them though the person with the pound signs in their eyes instead of music in their soul managed to get to the front of the queue before they did.

And as for “being a real fan” , don’t you think someone who genuinely loved the band would only want the tickets face value back if they had to sell it on not expect a bit more with added interest .

Chances are, if you’re one of those people who bought more tickets than you needed  just with the intention of satisfying your own greed at this particular moment you’re reading this thinking “yeah what do you know about it, stupid columnist lady” or possibly something ruder depending on how annoyed  you are with me  .

But it’s not just me who feels like this as the band themselves favourited my ranty tweet about this very subject over on their official twitter page last week.

So maybe you supposedly “genuine “fans if they really are your favourite band that should give you some “ food for thought “ indeed .

GIRL FROMTHE NECK DOWN COLUMN FOR THE MEDWAY MESSENGER on ticket touting cretins taking advantage of other peopl

 

THEY DONT MEAN ME , JUST EVERYBODY ELSE SURELY ....

You’re running a little late, the kids took forever getting washed and dressed and now it’s a game of beat the clock on the school run.

They have to be in by 8.45 to stop that late mark going down in the register then you’ll have to burn some rubber to be sure that you’re ready to clock in at the right time.

You read the letter asking politely for  parents to be a bit more considerate with their parking ,  pointing out that dropping off as you stop on the zig zag lines at the school crossing was very dangerous and agreed that people like that were very selfish  and should know better ....but this is extenuating circumstances , surely the lollipop lady would understand if you did it just this once to save yourself a bit of time .

However those precious saved seconds aren’t going to be much use to you if your child doesn’t see the car pulling out behind them and ends up in casualty , are they ?

 GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN - MEDWAY MESSENGER COLUMN

STREETS LIKE A JUMBLE ......

The street is a wasteland littered with the battered carcasses and discarded leftovers of the weekend roast.

Tin cans roll like tumbleweed down this quiet cul-de-sac  as the heart of the black bin liner is ripped open and Mr Fox and arch rival Kitty Cat drag their loot from this bountiful swag bag leaving its innards and guts strewn all around like a scene from a horror movie.

By way of payment for your magnificent hospitality, a generous deposit will be left in the middle of your driveway or path as a tip albeit less of a monetary, more of a squishy kind.

And as the sun rises our party guests will vanish quietly to whence they came and pedestrians will  pick their way through the debris of the banquet that raged just hours before , cursing those who couldn’t leave putting their rubbish bags out till bin collection day dawned .

GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN - MEDWAY MESSENGER COLUMN

FOR WE MAY NOT BE THE YOUNG ONES VERY LONG .....R.I.P RIK MAYALL

Back before mortgages, budgets and bills were of any interest in my life, the family I was part of could have read like the cast of The Young Ones.

The cool older brother who I looked up to and yearned to be like, the peaceful chilled out middle one who liked calm and serenity and the slightly anarchic youngest of the brood who had a penchant for doing his own thing no matter what trouble it got him into.

And then there was me the person who tried so hard to fit in and be popular whilst only ever succeeding in making myself look like even more of a prat than I already did.

Yet unlike the inhabitants of that houseshare back in the 1980s we got on harmoniously and whenever we watched the works of someone  who was well acquainted with those dysfunctional students of Scumbag College ,any differences we had would fall from us like a Double Decker bus hurtling  through a Cliff Richard poster  before plunging headlong  into the ravine beneath.

And the creator of those shows and characters that bought us so close together was Rik Mayall.

Through characters like The Young Ones would be anarchist Rick we glimpsed a comedy version of ourselves and our struggle to be taken seriously as we made the giant leap from teenager into adult hood. His desire to be seen as different and weird , going over people’s heads “ like an aeroplane , Mike “ reminds us of how hard we sometimes try to be someone other than ourselves whilst not realising everyone sees through that fake hip facade to the as square as a four sided quadrilateral could be person he's so desperately trying to disguise underneath .

In bottoms hapless losers Richie and Eddie we encountered the sad cases we could become if we didn’t get our lives sorted and the dashing Lord FlashHeart in Blackadder reminded us that if we want something badly enough we should damn well make sure we take it....within reason, of course.

And I’m pretty sure no-one could deny they wish they’d had an imaginary friend as fun as drop dead Fred. Fred’s influence on my life even stretches so far to me knowing I’d made a friend for life even before I’d had a conversation with somebody when i saw they had that DVD in their collection

Maybe it’s that childlike humour and almost youthful exuberance of rik that endeared us to him and made us all take a gasp of disbelief when we heard of his sudden death at 56.

His jokey take on life even making fun nearly losing his in the quad bike accident in 93 saying ” I was dead for 5 days , Jesus was only dead for 3, so i beat Jesus 5-3” makes you realise how too serious about life we can all be sometimes and that we forget to have fun once we turn into boring grown up adults. And he must have been onto something good because he got another 16 years out of his life with that positive outlook on mortality.

So let’s remember Rik not with sadness but with joy and laughter at all the ways he made us happy. Made us realise life is not just about how much money we have in the bank or what car we’ve got its about the fun, the comedy and the slapstick that goes on around us everyday .Not forgetting he provided us with some of the best catchphrases with which to live a fulfilled life with or at best wind people up with as you recite them word for word over anything they are watching.

So rest in peace Rik, thank you for making me laugh and teaching me you don’t have to take life too seriously, this girl from the neck down and her family and friends will miss you .

MEDWAY MESSENGER COLUMN -GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN

TIME FOR A CHANGE

(APOLOGIES THESE AREN'T IN ORDER, HAVE GOT A BIT BEHIND IN UPLOADING THEM ! HERES A MEDWAY MESSENGER COLUMN FROM JULY )

As my boys return to school this Monday, it’s hard to believe that this is their final term at junior school.

It doesn’t seem like 5 minutes ago that I was dropping them off at nursery with their little lunch bags and picking them up at the end of the session proudly carrying their latest finger painting.

 A couple of years later it was off to “big school “as they joined reception class at our local primary . There were more than a few tears shed that day by parents as they walked out of their little offspring’s class so they could start their first day of education.

As the months on the calendar have passed we’ve watched them go from wearing uniforms that they could “ grow into “ to cursing having to buy new trousers after a growth spurt when there’s only 3 weeks left of the school year so that they aren’t wearing “ ankle swingers “.

And as a succession of school photos and the height chart on the kitchen door frame reveals they have gone from baby faced cherubs clinging to my legs to lovely polite young boys who have started to tower over my 5ft frame at the age of 11.

As this year’s summer holidays approach though it’ll be a time for change for them and their friends for when that last day of term arrives in July this year they won’t just be saying goodbye for a couple of weeks for some of them it will be the last time they ever see each other again.

The little red uniforms will be thrown away or passed onto a younger sibling and taking its place will be the blazer and school tie that represents a whole new beginning as they start secondary education.

There’ll be a trip to the school uniform shop to make sure we have all the correct required clothing which reminds me of my own visit to Eric Thomas school outfitters to purchase hockey boots that gave off a perturbing whiff of fish and a green science overall that when I started at grammar school came down to my ankles and by the end of my time there was somewhere near my knees.

There’ll be new pencils, pens and maths equipment to buy as well as P.E kit and we’ll be doing trial runs at the walk to the new school to see how long it will take to do so we know what time we are going to need to get up in the morning.

We’ll have as much fun as we can this school holiday because mum knows this is probably one of the last few years they will want to do anything with her and she wants to cherish that moment while it’s still here.

And she’ll be right there for them after the gates open in September if they need her but she’ll keep a low profile so their new mates don’t take the Mickey as the time for hard work and new adventures to begin and as they go from being mummy and daddy’s little boys to amazing  brilliant young men.

SUMMER HOLIDAYS

The met office issues a severe weather warning that can mean only one thing, the bad holiday weather jinx has struck the family of Page / Coleman once again.

Not that I’m complaining but it does seem to have become somewhat of a tradition that while others pack sun cream and swimming costumes for their summer hols, ours seem to require cagoules and wellies .

That’s the hazard I suppose of holidaying almost exclusively within the United Kingdom and it might seem like I’m exaggerating but we do seem to cop for that one week of the year when “phew what a scorcher “descends into torrential down pours and gale force winds.

In fact one  year on a trip to Butlins, it rained so heavily that we awoke the next day to find ducks paddling in the massive puddles that lay outside our chalet door.

So as we prepare for a weekend that bares a strange similarity to Perkin Flump under his cloud on a bad day, I’ve been reminiscing about the holiday memories of my childhood to brighten my day.

Now we may be about to spend a weekend in a luxury gold rated caravan in Romney but back when I was still in knee high socks, it was a much simpler affair.

Every summer holiday the brown and white Eccles caravan would be hitched up to my granddads wine coloured Austin maxi and he and my Nan would take my brothers and I down to Swalecliffe for a fortnight to give my mum and dad a break from parenthood .

Days were spent at the park on the campsite or learning to swim on the nearby beach, bobbing up and down on the water in our yellow and brown dinghy or raiding the camp shop for sweets.

Evenings would be dinner prepared over the little gas stove in the caravan or maybe fish and chips for a treat. Then we’d play the James Bond game where you had to shake the right numbers on the dice to spell out the nations favourite spy’s name or draw pictures with the pack of Paddington bear crayons on the back of old computer paper my grandparents( recyclers ,way before it became the thing to do ) used to bring home from G.E.C  Avionics.

And when it was time for bed a transformation of epic proportions would take place as the small dining area was turned into a bed for us kids and nanna, while granddad and anyone who could fall into a deep sleep despite his snoring set up camp beds in the awning .

In the morning you’d visit the toilet block where you’d pay 2p for a bucket of hot water and go into one of the curtained cubicles to do your ablutions.

Then it’d be back to the caravan for breakfast. Toast with butter or cereals in brightly coloured Tupperware bowls. Granddad one day makes the mistake of mixing up which bowl is the sugar and which is the salt and much hilarity ensues and makes me happy even now to think how something so simple could make so many people smile.

So despite being immersed in a world of electronic gizmo and gadgetry, I hope I have instilled at least a few lovely holiday memories into my kids that they can recall like mine.

And if that means i have to get up on the stage and gargling water to the tune of Gangnam style like I did last year then so be it. 

 

 MEDWAY MESSENGER COLUMN 25/08/14

WHAT WOULD YOU DO ?

Do you think with your heart or your head?

Interesting question, huh?

And difficult to decide which is the better organ to make your decision with for the best outcome in the long run.

The head has a tendency to be sensible, think logically and listen to what those in “ authority “ have to say, taking it as gospel that it’s the right thing to do .

The heart, soppy old thing that it is, is far more likely to be reckless make choices that might not be seen as the right ones by those set in their ways but that may ultimately be for the best if given the chance to indulge.

So do you go with the sensible option because those who are experts in it must be right that that’s the only way?

Or go with the feeling inside that says something else is worth trying no matter what cost to you because ultimately it would make you happier because at least you tried everything.

Put in a situation where you have to decide with either heart or head, in the heat of the moment, do you know what you would you do?

MEDWAY MESSENGER COLUMN 8/09/14.

I was thinking about how different peoples reactions were to the Ashya King story and wondered if we really would know what we'd do if we were put in that situation

 

I LOVE BUSH ......KATE, THAT IS

There was a time when the pirouetting brunette in the red floaty dress or black cat suit warbling about her homecoming to lost love Heathcliff was known by a less than flattering name in the Page family household.

My granddad Jim, less than impressed by what he deemed her caterwauling on TV one evening proclaimed he wished to she’d go back out and lose herself on those wiley windy moors once again then promptly christened her with the moniker with which she has been referred to jokingly by my family ever since, that of  Kate “Bloody “Bush.

A name which stuck so vividly in my 3 year old memory  that it wasn’t until i was a good few years older  that I realised she didn’t actually in fact have a very interesting middle name starting with B.

So it’s fair to say through the power of family influence I probably wasn’t one of Kate’s biggest fans growing up.

In fact around my teenage years she was probably like Annie Lennox, George Michael and Simply Red, one of those artists that I constantly bemoaned got nominated for a Brit award regardless of whether they’d actually done anything.

But as the years started running up that hill and hounds of love drove away any peer pressure of who I should pledge a fans allegiance to, I started to notice that her music has a real wow quality to it.

And not only that , in reading and watching programmes about her in the run up to her sell out gigs recently I noticed just how similar in personality I am to the lovely miss B.

For on one hand you have the Kate stage persona that we all recognise that’s outgoing, over dramatic and outrageous, wildly putting on a show, acting out the characters in her songs so you can see the story that she is telling you.

Then in stark contrast you have the quiet reserved little lady talking modestly about the things she’s achieved in her life and who chose to shy away from the spotlight at the peak of her career to bring up a son who meant so much more to her than whether her latest album was number one this week.

And in some ways i can relate to that dual personality with much affinity.

In real life as just plain old Nina page I am a very shy almost timid person in some social situations, put me with people I don’t know and expect me to make conversation I go to pieces until I really get to know them or them me, ditto standing up and speaking publicly in front of a crowd .

But give me an amazing outfit, a set of d.j decks or a computer keyboard and different persona and suddenly i don’t mind being the centre of attention in a room full of people I’ve never met before.

And along with dee vinyl, my dj alter ego  who behind her amazing outfits and cracking tunes can be the first on the dance floor and last to leave , Girl from the neck down is the far more articulate and fluent version of myself that I struggle to convey as I stutter and mumble along as the real life action Nina.

Maybe one day though she’ll have the confidence to take centre stage on her own and my , what a comeback that would be. 

THE UNEDITED VERSION OF MY " GIRL FROM THE NECK DOWN " COLUMN PIECE FOR THE MEDWAY MESSENGER ON 8/09/14