Up. Down. November 2, 2009

Item – well, we went to the sushi and movie extravaganza. It was fun-fun-fun.

Item – Minx and her bestest friend had a running squabble and had to be forcibly separated on multiple occasions. This was tiresome. This made me think uncharitable thoughts about Trouble’s parenting skills.

Item – My sister had told bestest friend’s mother I was a super-special snow-flake on the basis that said woman is a midwife and might have some advice. I’ve never needed a sodding midwife. What the hey, Trouble? As it was, said woman was embarrassed as I was and we politely Spoke Not Of That.

Item – At one point I lost my tiny mind and found myself carrying a sleepy Minx back to the car-park. Now Minx may be a small, slender, fine-boned six-year-old but she is still a six-year-old and after a few steps the Voice of Reason tapped me urgently on the shoulder and spake thusly: ‘May, you’re going to pass out. Put the kid down before you both crack your skulls open on the pavement.’ So I offloaded Minx onto H and staggered around a bit until what was left of my blood got back to my brain. And was very subdued for the rest of the evening.

Item – Up was, well. It was good. It was enjoyable. It was funny, and scary, and moving. The famous opening sequence was much briefer and more subtle than I’d expected (I was almost disappointed by this), but it was well-observed and felt sadly familiar. The house and balloons turned into the most beautiful and elegant metaphor for the burden of grief I have seen in a movie. It wasn’t one of Pixar’s best, and seemed to consist of two plot-lines violently bashed together until they stuck, which did the two main themes something of a disservice. It was very, very beautiful to look at. So, you know. Why not go? Unless large dogs scare you anyway (at one point of maximum tension, I heard Minx, several seats away, bellowing: ‘Bad doggies! Bad!’).

Item – Because of how the seats were booked in advance, H ended up taking the lone seat a little way away from the rest of us. I still can’t work out if he did this out of politeness or out of a strong desire to actually not sit next to any restless children or infuriating in-laws.

Item – My brother-in-law is a Fucktard. As is my younger sister’s boyfriend. Oh, they said nothing to me. They just are boring, self-centred wimps who find it perfectly acceptable to leach off their partners and their partners’ family. Am I the only one of the whole damn clan with any taste at all in men?

Item – This naturally leads to the extremely bitter thought ‘why can they have children while I can’t…’ and we shall stop that right there, as it gives me indigestion and makes me unreasonable towards inanimate objects.

Item – I think it was because there were children present (and acting like cocaine-fiends) and we were in public places and I was very quiet anyway, as I felt very tired, but Trouble did absolutely no hand-holding or bawling at all. But did do an infuriating ‘I know something special about you that the others don’t know’ act, asking me if I was really really OK, after, you know… in front of the others right after I had answered their questions with, ‘I’m fine, really.’

Item – OK, it was probably dumb-arse to say that, as I was, according to H, both ashen and waxen. Don’t panic, I look better today.

Item – Pffft. Bit of an anti-climax all round.

Does this sound lunatic to you? October 31, 2009

So, a few days before I knew I was pregnant (hah! Pregnant, indeed), I called my sister Trouble about my niece Minx’s upcoming 6th birthday. Was there a party? Was there a plan? And Trouble thought it would be nice for us all (i.e. Minx, her daddy Formerly-Known-As-Fucktard-With-An-Option-On-The-Nickname-Being-Reinstated-If-He-Doesn’t-Grow-A-Pair-Sharpish, Trouble, Diva, my brother-who-doesn’t-have-a-stupid-nickname-because-he’s-too-nice, my Mum, my step-father, Minx’s bestest friend, bestest friend’s parent, H and I) to all go to a sushi bar and then to see ‘Up‘.

(Yes, I did say Minx was turning six, but seriously, the little eccentric adores sushi with the same fervent passion her mother and aunts do).

I thought it was a lovely idea. H and I both wanted to see the film, family outings with raw fish emporia in them are good (we always behave better in public. Like most toddlers, really). And, secretly, I was hoping that the famous opening sequence, which is about infertility (infertility! Dealt with sensitively and In a kids’ cartoon! I know! I was so pleased!) would perhaps assist some of the more relentlessly clueless family members to, umm, get a clue. Or possibly not, but it’s harder for them to argue I am making a fuss if the almighty Pixar thinks I most certainly am not.

And then… And then. Yes. Arse.

I was all prepared to pull out, because a) I am tired and sore and still a little feverish, b) there is a good chance I will bawl hysterically during the movie, c) the six-year-old’s birthday treat is, um, not a good place for bawling aunties and d), well. Family. Duh.

Anyway, I did some pre-emptive ground-laying by calling my mother and just right-out telling her what had happened (novel tactics!). To her credit, or, possibly, to my credit, I did not feel the violent urge to reach down the phone and rip her a new one. We’ve both learned. She has learned not to be such a colossally insensitive runaway juggernaut of Stupid Things To Say. I have learned that I won’t get much support and understanding from her. Love, concern, generosity, gifts, hugs, and mothering, yes. But she had three easy, easily-come-by pregnancies, three full-term easy labours. She does not get it. And, I suppose, never will. (My MIL, on the other hand, burst into tears when H told her the news. But then, she lost a baby between H and his younger brother, so. Poor MIL).

Mum’s one stupid remark of the conversation, just to prove she hadn’t completely lost the knack: ‘I know it’s hard for you, but it’s actually quite exciting that you can get pregnant!’

Err. No. Not if they keep dying.

But at least she acknowledged it was hard for me.

Anyway, there I was, all braced to back out, when Trouble called to finalise plans. And I realised Mum had not shared the news with her at all (WTF? My family normally elevate gossip to a vocation). So I did. And, to my shock, my absolute shock, Trouble said all the right things. She said she was sorry. She said that it sucked. She said that she understood if I couldn’t face family and movie. She asked anxiously if I was OK now, and recovering. She asked how H was doing. She sympathised about all the rushing in and out of hospital. She laughed at my jokes, especially the one about having mastered getting pregnant, so, now, how did staying pregnant go? And we talked about my mother’s relentless jollity in the face of disaster, with daughterly wry amusement.

So, you know, I thought I might go after all. Especially when Trouble said we could hold hands and bawl at the first part of the movie together.

Now you are just messing with me October 23, 2009

So, this morning, my temperature was down. Ahhh, fuck it, I thought. Fuckitty fuckitty fuck. Arse. And then I went and put lots and lots of tampons in my bag, along with the mefenamic acid and the tranexamic acid.

H, meanwhile, had tonsils like scarlet golf-balls and couldn’t speak above a hoarse whisper. I left him at home in his jim-jams in a sort of unspeakable heap.

And the day wore on, and I had no cramps, and I had no spotting, and I sat in the loos at work staring at the blank white toilet paper and thinking, I am going to a concert this evening. Planning on turning up then with a whoosh, are we?

And I sat through the concert, still cramp-free, and I went to the loo afterwards, nada, and I came home, nada.

So, you know, at the very least, I can be pleased I now have a 13-day luteal phase instead of a 12-day one.

H was looking and sounding better when I got home as well.

I don’t know if today comes under ‘damnandblast’ or ‘not so bad, really.’

Dear Universe,

WHERE THE FUCK IS MY PERIOD?

‘Kthnxbai,

May

Smell of burning October 20, 2009

I am cold. It is cold. But I am cold, in that my temperature was down (aaaaaaaagh) this morning. Positive Thinking Fairy is pointing out that I had a temperature dip about this time on the One and Only Pregnancy Cycle, hurrah hurrah. Bitter McTwisted, who is, I think, a sensible woman, points out day 10 is about time my temperature starts slowly tumbling back towards normal, to meet the rising Crimson Tide.

*sigh*

I had an anxiety attack at work, you know. I made a teeny weeny simple mistake, realised I’d made it within five minutes, corrected it (which took, ooh, 0.2 of a second), and carried on with no one else in any way affected or in the least aware of it. And then spent my entire tea-break talking myself down of the Ledge of I-Am-A-Cretin-And-Don’t-Deserve-To-Be-Employed. For a mistake the like of which I make at least once a week and usually correct but no-one cares if I don’t. For a mistake over which I normally don’t so much as waste the bat of an eyelid. Yes. Indeed. That’s what I thought.

(I wish being anxious didn’t make me feel so… contaminated. Ahh, me and my hang-ups).

Anyway, I am frazzled to buggery (less fun than it sounds) over work, writing course, almost certain lack of indwellers, uncertainty regarding almost certain lack of indwellers, course (did I mention course?), and suddenly highly active and entertaining social life (I have a social life? How the hell did that happen?) giving me very little time to work on writing course, aaaagh first assignment due in next week aaaaagh, oh, and the bathroom needs cleaning.

The smell? Is my brain melting. Disgusting, isn’t it?

I’m on fire, I tell you. October 12, 2009

Item – spent weekend rushing hither and yon like a humming-bird hawkmoth on speed. Concerts, seminars, plays, craft-shows, restaurants, family. It was all the most colossal fun, I was happy as Larry (who the hell is Larry?), in top form, witty and charming, and generally a wonderful addition to any social circle.

Item – Therefore I feel awful today. I woke up in the middle of the night with a burning sore throat. I actually woke up because H was snoring, but H says I was snoring too, so there, so I don’t think I’m actually allowed to kill him in case he claims equal rights and kills me back. On the other hand, 3 am is not a good time to get pedantic about whether a cough-sweet counts as a throat-sweet or not. Just give me the damn sweets. Thank-you.

Item – So I am having the day off work. Hey! I can do my creative writing homework! After I’ve watched some Star Trek, naturally.

Item – Satsuma is, I think, a reformed character these days. I am pretty sure she popped on Saturday afternoon. Which was day 18 of this cycle. Which is like, ya know, normal? Like real women do? And is the fourth time she’s done it solo since she amply proved that Clomid could kiss her perky derriere. Please, gentle readers, kindly cross your fingers that this is indeed so, and that she is not indulging in mere chicanery for the further derangement of my fragile mind.

Item – Assuming Satsuma is not messing me about, we will be flattened by onrush of the Crimson Tide on or about Friday the 23rd.

Item – Yes, H and I have been *cough* busy. Nobly busy, in the face of a great deal of run-down tired meh. But I refuse point-blank in any way whatsoever to be hopeful, as I think being hopeful is a jinx. H can be hopeful if he likes. It cheers him up. I shall sulk and glower and stock up on tampons and chocolate. That cheers me up. Only, not really.

Stabbity October 8, 2009

Hello again. I am a grouchy May at the moment. I will now bitch and snivel some more. Sorry about that.

I saw the acupuncturist again on Monday. She was disappointed that the last surf on the Red Menace sucked (hey! Guess what! So was I!). And then she was mystified that the last surf etc. had sucked, because my belly is noticeably warmer to the touch. Warm bellies don’t get prolonged and violent cramps, you see. They’re too busy being all warm and mellow, unlike cold ones, which have blockages and are stagnating (sounds disgusting). I did not laugh. Nor did I mention Ben Goldacre or randomised double-blind trials. I am a gentlewoman.

She then proceeded to stick me all over like a pineapple hedgehog and set fire to me again (we will warm this belly, we will warm it to heck). Some of these burning needles were to stimulate ovulation, which was fine by me, as Monday was Day 13 and not only was Satsuma playing dead, but the old undercarriage was remaining resolutely sterile, hostile, abandon hope all sperm who enter here. And then the acupuncturist amused herself by needling me in the wrist – allegedly to aid the anxiety and insomnia – which really fucking hurt, to my woeful astonishment. Not only that, but when I got home, I found one of the wristy-stab-points had grown a deeply, lavishly purple bruise. WTF?

Anyway, I haven’t slept at all well all week. Not impressed. I think she borked my meridian.

On the other hand, on Tuesday Satsuma sat up on her velvet cushion and gave notice she was considering things. And whenever I think she has forgotten and dozed off again, she gives me another quick jab in the lower abdomen and orders me to have faith. So. We shall see. On past form, it normally takes her an absolute minimum of a week to go from hibernation to pop. I’ll get back to you on this after the weekend.

This does, however, mean that H and I are, as we agreed, having lots of sex. Hurray, I’d've normally said. Unfortunately, this month (it’s probably being tired that does it) I am having to a fight a low-grade persistant urge to snarl ‘get off me‘ everytime H dutifully snuggles up in bed. At least, I hope it’s being tired that does it. I’m normally the one taking flying leaps at H from behind doors and interfering with him during phone conversations while he stoically tries to pry my hands off his trouser-buttons without squeaking. Current state of affairs surprisingly mortifying. We soldier on regardless. And if, after all this anxst, Satsuma is playing me false, I shall have her resectioned. HA.

And I have started my creative writing course. I spend all my time at work wishing work would go away so I could play about with my writing exercises, and all my time at home watching TV and wishing I was asleep. It’s going brilliantly. Pass the Kalms.

Don’t mess with Mister In-Between October 4, 2009

I read, marked, and inwardly digested what you-all said, bless your dear kind loving hearts, in answer to my last (deeply whiny pissy boo-hoo) post. And, do you know? I think my attitude sucks (loud cheers from the Positive Thinking Fairy, Bitter McTwisted breaks open the Jägermeister).

I am going to attempt (attempt, mind you. This could be a short post) a list of things I actually really like about my body. And then we shall cheer the fuck up and get on with our creative writing homework. OK? OK. Here goes:

• I have good teeth. OK, so one is missing and my smile is slightly skew-whiff, but the teeth themselves are hard and sharp and permanent as marble. I have not one single filling. Not one. The only tooth-ache I ever had was dentist-induced. And I lost the missing tooth to a malignant orthodontist when I was 13, not decay or gum disease. My teeth rock.
• My ears are pretty. I think I have mentioned this.
• Ummm….
• Oh, come on, you can do better than this. What about your hair, you daft woman? Your hair is lovely. Except when it’s being a mass of split-ends and frizz, which is this month’s look of choice, for some reason. But by and large, good hair. Right? Right.
• H is madly fond of my bottom. He will no doubt go pink to the ears when he reads this, but it’s true. He assures me that, despite its ample proportions, said bottom is up there with the Rokeby Venus’s. And nothing at all like that of the Willendorf Venus. I have my doubts, but H is adamant, and anyway, I can’t get a decent back view of myself in any of the mirrors in the flat (probably a good thing) and prove him wrong. So I shall have to like my bottom.
• I can hike Alps while yattering nineteen-to-the-dozen. Under the suet, there must be some quite good muscles. A few years ago, I am quite sure there was nothing but boiled spaghetti in there. So, I like having muscles. Just don’t ask me to run anywhere.
• My clever hands, that can knit and crochet and sew and massage and slice onions to paper fineness and mend books and give massages and have such long artistic fingers (and knock coffee-mugs over and trap themselves in cupboard doors a lot, when I’m not chewing the nails to the quick, but we can’t have everything).
• We’re doing quite well, now, aren’t we? Go May!
• *Stalls abruptly*
• There’s another bit of me I like very much but I absolutely shall not talk about it in public.
• *Ahem*
• Can I go now?

What I Did On My Holidays, by May Aged 34-and-nearly-a-half October 2, 2009

It’s me! I’m back! I’m alive and everything! In fact, I got back on Wednesday night, and have very rudely ignored the internet altogether while I dealt with the Great! Big! Annoying! issues that were waiting on the door-step for us. Here, for example, we have a letter telling us our water was being cut off, because we are, apparantly, to my astonishment, moving house. Cue me falling to my knees and wailing ‘but we only went to Switzerland for a week!’ while H does all the sensible things like calling the water company and repeating to them over and over and over, ‘no, there’s been a mistake. We are not moving. We are staying here,’ until some tired call-centre jockey in New Delhi confesses that an utter numb-nut had entered the wrong address on the internet database. And here we have a letter from my creative writing course people, asking me to enroll and pay my fees, you know, the fees I paid over a week ago already, also, I am totally enrolled, and I have a tutor and everything, I have emails from said tutor, and a work-book, and lectures on CD, so, seriously, WTF? And we had tickets for two concerts on Thursday. Oh, and laundry. We’d been hiking for five or six hours a day, for a week. Hoooo, boy, there is laundry.

Anyway. To Switzerland!

Holiday High Points:

• Let us begin with the Red Menace, as I could concentrate on very little else for the first two days of the trip. The tranexamic acid worked. I bled a decorous medium-heavy amount, and brought most of my sanitary supplies untouched back to Blighty. And I did not faint or vomit at any point at all. I was feeling pretty fine by Friday morning. But see also low points.
• Swiss public lavatories. They are so clean. They smell nice. They have toilet-roll and soap and hand-towels and air-freshener. Even on top of a freaking mountain. Even in a freaking train (though the sight of the sleepers rushing away at the bottom of the toilet-bowl is… disconcerting. As is the breeze when you sit down).
• The old centre of Zurich is very, very, very pretty. Very. And clean. We saw one (1) sweetie wrapper lying in the street. We actually stopped and stared at it. And the swans on the lake are as white as driven snow, unlike London swans, who are usually on the Tallulah Bankhead end of the driven frozen water products spectrum. We then looked into the lake, and realised we could see the bottom. Ah. Well then. Blimey, this place is clean.
• The view from the balcony of the Chalet of Terror. Oh. My. God. Every single time I walked past the window and caught sight of it, I’d stand transfixed. The chalet is built on the knees of a mountain, looking straight down an alpine valley dotted with little steep-roofed barns and geranium-lined farm-houses, and dinky nearly vertical patches of meadow in between the cliffs and pine-forests. At the end of the valley, a snow-white medieval church with a spire stands tiny and perfect against the blue-green slopes of the distant alps.
• The Chalet of Terror itself. It is very nice and very swanky, and my step-Dad has thoughtfully filled it to the brim with books.
• Hiking down the mountain for a couple of hours, to a village of enchanting prettiness, collapsing in the garden of a beautiful old hotel, begging for cake, and being bought a slab of plum tart the size of a roofing-tile, smothered in a mini-alp of collapsing whipped cream.
• Swiss cakes generally.
• Despite which, I lost three pounds.
• My Mum and I got on very well indeed, and apart from a brief tantrum because I needed the loo and she needed to look at boots in shop-windows, we were thoroughly pleased with each other.
• Being woken every morning at dawn by cow-bells as the herds go out to pasture.

Holiday Low Points:

• My period. Though I bled much much less, the cramps were still pretty much in Torment of the Damned league. The mefenamic acid did, I admit, take the edge off, so I could walk upright and talk, but failed to restore my sense of humour, or sense of proportion, or fresh rosy complexion (I looked like curdled milk for three days. So adorable). Every time I made the mistake of thinking the mefenamic acid was a total con and a barrel of shite, it’d wear off, sometimes hours before I could take the next dose, and I’d slowly curl up like a dying leaf and stop talking altogether.
• H and I had a Discussion, alas at about 1 am, when we were both too tired to make any sense at all. But this one probably needs a whole post of its own. (We’ve kissed and made up, don’t panic).
• The morning I woke up after a three-and-a-half hour descent from the top of the peak opposite, all down a 4:1 grit track of extreme skiddiness, and realised I couldn’t straighten my sodding legs as my calves had seized up completely.
• There were moments when I am not sure what prevented me from running round the living room shouting ‘will you all just go away and stop talking to me!’ These tended to occur mostly when I was trying to read a book and my In-Laws treated this as an invitation to tell me all about how they haven’t had a cold for two years thanks to the power of, possibly, smugness (I can’t be sure. It may have been healthy living and Chinese herbs. I was trying very hard not to listen).
• Also, that little tantrum I had when on a day-trip to the nearest big town, because Mum and H were cheerfully ignoring my increasingly desperate pleas for a) a pee and b) lunch and carrying on photographing random street-corners and cooing over shoes. I am a little ashamed of just how tantrumy and adolescent said tantrum was. Nobody over the age of 21 should be allowed to say ‘no one ever listens to me!’ in public, especially not in that tone of voice.
• Being woken every morning at dawn by cow-bells as the herds go out to pasture.

Holiday WTF Moments:

• Swiss teenagers all carry guitars. And when school is over, they sit about in the square or on the train and play guitar at each other. However, nearly peed self laughing at sight of three youngsters playing ‘Knocking on Heaven’s Door’ quite loudly but singing the words in teeny tiny little shy embarrassed voices. They were almost inaudible and they even had a mike. Ohhhh, bless.
• Waking up at 3 am every single night, in a muck sweat, despite lovely fresh air wafting in from the window and absolutely everyone’s reassurance that the heating really didn’t come on in the middle of the night. My Mum has the exact same thing, but, people, she’s menopausal.
• Seeing Boris Becker sitting at the next table when we stopped for tea in Zurich. Really! He was even limping (BB has recently had a hip operation). We acted all classy and smooth and pretended we hadn’t a clue who he was. Except for all the excited whispering and long thoughtful stares.
• In German, I can say the following: ‘Bitte, Danke, Toiletten, Kaffee, Scheiße.’ As you can imagine, I was a conversational rock-star in Switzerland.
• Being woken every morning at dawn by cow-bells as the herds go out to pasture.

So, I think, Red Menace 1, Chalet of Terror 0.

Red Menace versus the Chalet of Terror (with extras) September 22, 2009

Item – Yeah, well, this cycle blew chunks. Hello cramps, hello blood. Come along for the ride, why don’t you. So, no, I am not going to come back ‘pregnate’ from vay-cayyyy-tion, urban myth be damned, screwed, buggered and dismembered.

Item – We catch a flight to the Alps tomorrow morning (‘ray). We have Swiss Francs (‘ray). We have new toothbrushes. (‘ray). My mother has called, emailed and texted us nine hundred and forty three times to check our flight-times (boo). As has FIL, who is not meeting us at the airport, or even arriving at all until a few days after we do (grr). I have packed my clothes (‘ray). I have packed all my ugliest black knickers and enough sanitary towels to make a double bed out of in a crisis (boo). I am having a weight-limit-of-luggage book-to-take emergency (boo). H is enduring said emergency with wry amusement (harrumph).

Item – We are going for a week. Can you live without me for a week? Of course you can. You’ve all got lives and everything.

Item – After much hanging about waiting to hear back from the Open University re: creative writing course, and a fair bit of phoning them and leaving messages and saying ‘bah!’ a lot, in between panicking that now, oh, now, that I finally have the courage to do it, it’ll all go tits up, I actually did speak to a human being this evening, who is my new best friend, and all is sorted and I am totally registered and doing the course starting next month *hyperventilates, falls over*.

Item – Just to make sure today did not contain so much as one electron of relaxation, I also had my annual PDR (Personal Development Review) this afternoon. Even though I think it went pretty well, and even though Alpha Boss was nice as pie through-out, and even though she hadn’t a single criticism to make, I was bricking myself. And now I can’t have a drink, as alcohol plus mefenamic acid plus tranexamic acid = holes burnt right through the stomach lining. Allegedly.

Item – Yes, I decided to take my drugs this cycle, despite the shock discovery that mefenamic acid and, in fact, most strong NSAIDS are implicated in ovulation problems, as well as being maybe, possibly, teratogenic (I knew that bit. I don’t touch anything stronger than paracetamol and pre-natal vitamins after ovulation. I’m so good). Agh. On the other hand, vomiting, fainting, and bleeding all over an aeroplane, or train-carriage, or God forbid a Swiss hotel room, not acceptable. But I shall be going back to Doc Tashless and berating him on return to these shores. Be-RATE-ing him. Because, seriously, does he know NSAIDS possibly inhibit ovulation? If he does, can I hit him with a chair? Do I have any alternatives to sterilising agents of death? Are they only an issue around ovulation and/or the two week wait? Why won’t Google tell me?

Item – I overthink everything, don’t I?

What is it now? What? September 19, 2009

Item – We are preparing for our voyage to the Chalet of Terror (as HFF so fittingly named it), for the In-Law Extravaganza. So far the preparations have involved me accidentally finding the sun-screen, and having a panic-attack about my passport (when I, apropos of nothing at all, suddenly muttered ’shit!’ and hurled myself towards the study, H leapt after me shouting ‘your passport’s FINE.’ And then he claims he is neither observant nor empathic. LIAR). We set off on Wednesday. Ample time for dithering about trousers and which of the 97 books I wish to take will actually fit in the suitcase. Ample.

Item – I admit I am in a bit of a state (my God, you mean your last post was a clue?). This culminated last night in me losing it with H for not having done his teeth yet, inconsiderate swine that he is, and rapidly passed through the ‘and another thing!’ fringes of disconnected lunacy before landing with a tearful squelch in ‘And My Entire Life Sucks’. And then I looked up at H through red and puffy eyes and said ‘This is PMT, isn’t it? I know you’re thinking the same thing,’ and his ears went absolutely scarlet.

Item – The thing is, I really don’t like my job. Not because it’s a bad job, or at a bad place, or among bad people. Obviously, there are frustrations and the odd work-place loon, because that’s standard and how work just is. But I don’t like it because it’s not what I want out of my life. At all. I thought perhaps getting a professional qualification and a proper full-time job like a real grown-up would help. Actually, it’s making me feel increasingly trapped and dear God I am so bored. If I had a private office, hell, a private cubicle, and if I had more flexible hours, then I think I could take it, as the work itself is interesting and I am good at it. But, as any fule kno, Hell is other people. Even when they are harmlessly humming to themselves or slurping Cream of Pondweed soup at the desk next to me or peering over my shoulder to ask who I’m emailing and why I’m emailing instead of cataloguing those DVDs on the urgent shelf. (We in Britain spell cataloguing with a u. Because it’s French, apparantly, but when we first adopted the word in the Middle Ages we spelt it without the u, by and large, so this is mostly affectation. But it’s our affectation, so it must be right).

Item – Anyway, I am in a bit of a state. Is it very noticeable?

Item – Furthermore, today is 10dpo. For the past few days I have been having odd cramps and twinges. Yesterday (9dpo) my temperature dropped, bastard temperature, possibly not helping with the ‘My Life, Suckage Of’ crisis, as I thought this cycle was a bust. Today, however, temperature was higher than ever. I mentioned this to H (well, he did ask what my chart was doing, so…) and he gave me a hug. I was impelled by Mysterious Forces to say ‘and the last and only time my chart did that…’ but H interrupted, saying ‘I know‘ very firmly indeed, earning himself several brownie points for observation (again, when he next insists he’s not very observant, one of you set fire to his pants for me, would you? Because, LIAR).

Item – And I went bra-buying today. After much wrestling in and out of various confections of lace and elastic and wire, I bought another copy of the rather plain and menopausal bra I got last time I went bra-buying. Because seeing my squashed nipples through the mesh of a sort of frilly shrimping-net was depressing me. Also, bra-shopping with noticeably enlarged and painful breasts is a very very silly idea. I am an eejit. I need more bras. Arse.

Item – So, basically, I am pissed off with my job, and Bitch Hope is tearing holes in my trouser-legs, and I only have three Internet Pee-Sticks of Doom left. I had two batches, which ended up in the same box. One batch is labelled 25 mIU, and the other isn’t labelled at all, so is probably more of an ‘oops, you’re crowning’ mIU. I have two of one and one of the other. I am pretending I have none at all, and this is all nothing to do with me, and on Monday I am going to the Big Chemist near work to get my prescription for mefenamic and tranexamic acid, and lots of sticky-back duvets, and I am not going to go and look at the pregnancy tests at all, oh no, absolutely not, so there.