Wednesday 24 September 2008

I’m So Tired…

What happened to the joie de vivre from yesterday? This morning felt like surfacing from hibernation, regardless of the early night last night. What’s going on, body clock? I think it’s SAD. The winter months will see me gradually become more mole-like. God forbid I end up living in a country that only sees a smidgeon of daylight, like Iceland. I’d be barely awake – and as productive as ant in a swimming pool.

Talking of ants… I used to give ants swimming lessons when I was a nipper. There was a pond in my friend’s garden and I was worried the ants nearby might drown, so I filled a bucket with water and put little floating things on it like leaves and twigs, and then dropped ants in and tried to get them to swim to the floating things. Unfortunately they just sank…so far from helping the ants, I just drowned a few instead. I do feel guilty about that, but I was only little and full of the joys of swimming lessons…

Talking of swimming lessons, do they still make you dress up in naff pajama’s to jump in the local pool and rescue a brick? How to embarrass a range of children all at once – everyone shivering in nasty flannelette, sniggers of laughter at the ones still dressed in Winnie-The-Pooh print… and all in aid of a poor brick. I’ve never yet had to use my skills to jump into a canal and rescue someone from drowning (or indeed, a brick) , but it’s nice to think that I can be a heroine when dressed in flannelette.

Talking of flannelette, does this material still exist? And what did it mean – ‘like’ flannel? So flannel, but not quite?

Sigh… get the feeling this is a long day?

7 comments:

idil o. calvero said...

i got it!
but you can never hide your joy haha :)

Jayne said...

:)

I try not to!

Unknown said...

Yes they do still make you jump in the pool in your pyjamas to get a brick, but they're rubber now and bounce if you throw them at the bottom of the pool, though it sometimes cracks the tiles and we have to evacuate the pool until the little shards of ceramics have stopped floating around, just in case we swallow them or something..... It is also very painful to be hit in the face or stomach by a bounced rubber brick. Still, the blood flowing from the head wounds of your classmates (or, with luck and aim the netball teacher would be proud of, those of the swimming teacher) makes the pool look very pretty as it swirls, hypnotically..... Of course, that might be the blood loss.

Unknown said...

Also, everyone knows what flannelette is. It's a baby flannel, like a piglet is a baby pig...duh!

Tina-Sue said...

Giving ants swimming lessons...that brought great imagery to mind.
Great post, thanks for sharing.

Jayne said...

Hello ediamond - flannelette being baby flannels makes perfect sense! And the bricks were rubber in my day too, although I am sure a few swimming teachers wished they could have just heaved in a breezeblock and be done with it. But then shards of breezeblock, ceramic tiles... it would have been very messy indeed :)

Jayne said...

Hello Authors Promoting Authors! I'm glad you liked it - those poor ants, I was very dismayed I couldn't teach them a front crawl. Ah well, live and learn...except if you're an ant. :)

And just been to your blog, what a good idea, I'm sure one of the hardest things is self-promotion. I wish you tons of success with your own book too - 'No Shadows Left Behind' by Tina-Sue Ducross (available from here: http://harrisinnovationspublishing.com)

;)