Being right, lunar cycles, and learning to speak Australian...

There is a general rule in our house:  In almost all circumstances -- whether it’s a choice between the pasta-dish or the 'Catch of the day' on a meal out, or a debate about the virtues of a minor road versus a main road -- should DH go against my advice, he generally turns out to be wrong.  Put simply, I’m always right. 

Triumphantly I will point out to him (or increasingly my ten-year-old daughter aka Exorcist impersonator): 'If only you had listened to me! I am always right. In all circumstances. As in ALWAYS'

Except in one particular circumstance.


Let me give you an example.  The other night, after a couple of glasses of something suitably pungent, I found I was suddenly irritated at the sight of DH; slack-jawed, dispassionate, and staring with a glazed expression at the TV (yes, the eulogising has most certainly worn off at this point) and started flexing my argumentative muscles. 

Not generally truculent, I nonetheless felt pretty aggrieved at my inability, after several fruitless attempts, to get him to engage in a meaningful discussion about our relationship/future/a dress I spotted in Monsoon, preferring instead to watch a movie featurning Jean-Claude Van-Damme.

Never one to be drawn into an argument that doesn't involve hand gestures to another driver (from within the safety of his car) or someone under ten-years-old, DH calmly ignored my probing, slowly sliding to the right in order to get a better look at the television.  This pushed me over the edge: 'You have no feelings! You're an empty shell!' I cried, throwing back another mouthful in what I hoped was a Sue Ellen-esque flourish.

He ignored me, Jean-Claude was making some moves.

I tried another tack ‘You didn’t miss us when you were alone in Abu Dhabi, you LOVED not having us around!’ That should push his buttons (I knew I was being spectacularly unfair).

Still nothing.

-‘Well go back to Abu Dhabi, leave us here, we don’t need you anyway!’ I spat, glugging back another glass.

-'Are you on the blob?' he suddenly enquired, eyes still on Jean-Claude.

-‘What??? How dare…. No I am NOT as you so rudely put it “On The Blob!” I exploded, apoplectic with self-pitying rage.

-‘Well you soon will be’ he calmly replied, not taking his eyes off of the TV.

'How DARE you!' I spat, 'Why do you always justify your bad behaviour by turning it back on me? This has NOTHING to do with me and EVERYTHING to do with your inability to engage in meaningful dialogue or to care about anything other than yourself, Playstation and whether you'll get laid later on!!'


I flounced out of the room.  Then as an afterthought returned with the devastating final blow -

'DON’T DARE COME TO MY BED TONIGHT!’ I declared as I slammed the door on my way out.

Shaking with rage at the unfairness of it all and wondering if those 'do-it -yourself' divorces were any easier than putting together a peice of IKEA furniture (because if they're not I might need a lawyer which I just can't afford), I took myself off to bed where I sobbed in a haze of wine-infused self-pity for some minutes before the alcohol silently but firmly comatosed me into a death-like slumber.

I woke alone -- but for the sprawled baby beside me -- the next morning, hungover and trying to recollect and re-ignite my rage. Ah yes, I recalled, I hate him and I want him to go back to Abu Dhabi and be treated badly by people who think that slave labour is reasonable and where you can be jailed for saying that god doesn't exist. How dare he ignore me like that, to reduce my every feeling to an hysterical over-reaction to the cyclical harmony between the moon and my cervix.  Bastard!

Pottering out to the bathroom it soon became apparent that he was, once more, correct in his assertion: I was, as he so eloquently put it 'on the blob'.  Annoyingly DH is always right on this one and is better aquainted with my cycle than I am, the monthly arrival of mensus always being a complete and utter revelation to me (there is of course a correlation between this monthly shock and my prolific birth-giving: my inability to keep track of anything on either a daily, weekly or monthly basis ruled out the pill and daily papers for me long ago).

Learning Australenglish...

Anyway, after that I decided it was time to rule out my nightly tipple for a while as I plan our escape to Oz. To this end I went out and purchased the Lonely Planet's pocket-sized ‘Australian Language and Culture’ -- a curiously small publication given the size of the country -- and I’ve been busily learning Australian English, a quaint and rather infantile version of the original, the rule of which seems to consist entirely of using a vowel after the stem of every noun in order to make it sound like something from Cbeebies.

For example: a biker -- a leather-clad, knife-wielding menace to society -- suddenly becomes the Kindergarten-friendly ‘bikie’.

Similarly, a lipstick becomes ‘lippie’, an electric blanket becomes ‘leckie’, a mean person becomes ‘meanie’ and an old person becomes -- astonishingly – an ‘oldie’ (I'm not sure that our friends at Lonely Planet aren't having a bit of a joke with us here....wonder if they'll give me a job...)

Will I ever be fluent?

I don’t think I’ll ever get the hang of it...

I guess this spectacularly unimaginative take on the English language explains why I can only think of one Australian writer (Peter Carey in case you’re wondering, a writer so engagingly gifted that -- contrary to popular belief that my eldest son was named after Oscar Wilde -- was rather named after the male protagonist in his novel ‘Oscar and Lucinda’ (and I was at one point hoping for my never-to-appear second daughter, Lucinda, to complete the pair).

However, it is the rhymning slang that really caused me to chuckle.  Who would have thought there was a slang word for cancer, or should I say ‘Jimmy Dancer’, which is much more fun I’m sure you’ll agree.

Leafing through the few pages devoted to ‘household names’ I was not surprised to see that I recognised only a handful of names, including Kylie Minogue, Paul Hogan and, comically, Russell Crowe who is in fact from New Zealand, but who cares about the small detail of nationality; certainly it never stopped the English from claiming, among others, our old friend Oscar Wilde, Peirce Brosnan and even U2 at times (actually, they can have that last one).

But I’m not criticising Australia: if anything, I’m charmed at the idea of being on a continent so far removed from the rest of the world that they have their very own cultural reference points to which the rest of us are generally not privvy and where a devastating and terminal illness sounds like a children's TV presenter.  


However, my absolute favourite of all the Lonely Planet's paltry offerings was the 'Local Lingo' page which featured inside the back-cover.  Try, if you will, to decipher this phrase into it's English equivalent - 


Ahem: 'pressies for the kiddies at Chrissie'


Yes, you've guessed correctly: 'presents for the children at Christmas'.  


Yep, it'll be a struggle, but hopefully we'll be speaking fluent Aussie within three and a half minutes of getting off the plane.  


Hooroo!

Ah, now this makes it much clearer....