Monday 3 August 2009

All cake'd up...

Home again, home again, tiddlypom...

The South of France (near Carcassone if you're interested, and if you want details watch this space over the next few days) seems a long way away, as do relaxed afternoons by the pool, gentle meanders around fragrant markets, and scrambles up steep hillsides to visit Cathar castles.

And actually, now I think about it, that's probably because the South of France IS a long way away. I can tell you this because we drove there and back, mad fools that we are. Probably for the last time. Or at least, if I have anything to do with it, for the last time in a car without air-conditioning...

And yes, I know, for those of you living in the US, Africa or Australia, a 12 hour drive is no more time than you would spend on a trip to the beach, but to us namby pamby North Europeans? A twelve hour car journey is a BIG DEAL. Especially when it miraculously telescopes out into a 16 hour drive as a result of traffic jams, speeding tickets awarded by French policemen who quite frankly have no business looking as trim as they did in their tight jodphurs and boots (bearing in mind that they do nothing but sit in their cars in laybys aiming their speed-guns at foolish British motorists trying to reach the beach as fast as possible), and torrential - no, make that biblical - rain storms. Both ways.

Anyway, as I said; more details of our trip to follow. In the meantime though, we're back in the normal swing of things.

And I knew that this was definitely the case when I returned from the gym this morning, and instead of finding the two tidily dressed small boys that I had left gently playing with trains and a husband tap-tap-tapping away on his laptop in the corner, I was greeted by a cacophony of shouts and roars through the front the door as I searched for my key. When I opened it, I saw Boy #2, bare-chested and brandishing a wooden sword almost as large as he is, herding his older brother (wearing only a lion mask and a pair of dinosaur pants) through the undergrowth of toys and books that had sprung up around our dining room table in the 50 minutes that I had been away, whilst Husband sheltered in his office reading the papers, catching up on e-mails, and generally being important.

So for now, the details of our French idyll will have to wait as I can't stop long; I have about 50 cakes to make. Oh, alright, not 50. 6. And all for my mother's birthday. (I wouldn't mind but I'm not sure she even likes the stuff. Or at least, not as much as I do...). This is extremely inconvenient timing wise; I'm supposed to be on a healthy eating regime right now. You know, the sort of thing you come up with on holiday when you're sitting by the pool glancing enviously at your friend who is 4 sizes smaller than you and for whom bikinins are not just a distant memory.

In any case, I've only just finished making the first cake, and I have already overdosed on raw batter that I scooped guiltily out of the bowl on the end of my fingers in the misguided belief that if it doesn't arrive in my mouth on a wooden spoon there are miraculously fewer calories.

Which brings me to this poem on Powder Room Graffiti. It's not mine, but if you've ever planned for a future day when you're a smaller size than now, you might find - as I did - that it rings so very true...

10 comments:

  1. Love Carcassonne! I also had to get to the gym after our holiday, so I know how you feel.

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  2. When I'm thin I'll be a little old lady, unable to chew her food...

    It's nice to have you back, PM, and your rambunctious children, I'm glad to hear that everything is normal as ever in the PM household. Wouldn't want it any other way. Boy # 2 is quite a ring leader, isn't he?

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  3. A 12 hour drive? Are you mad? I've been here 19 years and I still don't sit in a car for longer than about three.

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  4. I have to agree, even in Australia 12 hours in a car without aircon is a hideously long way!!!

    I love cake mix. I was always under the impression it held no calories until it was actually made into the cake.

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  5. you mean that calorie thing ISNT TRUE??!!!

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  6. Back in the comments box, hurrah!

    Mwa, it's gorgeous, isn't it?

    Irene, re: Boy #2 - you have no idea... (which is a yes, btw)

    EPM, oh. Right. Well, I guess that at least it's not just me that thinks undertaking that kind of trip is just MADNESS then? I must tell Husband the next time he suggests it...

    Mummy M, see my previous response!

    Screamish, I hate to break it to you, but...

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  7. Awesome poem you shared. Am feeling very much that way at the moment. Not likely to happen any time soon though :> I am an Aussie who for a short time lived in Manchester. I am very impressed at your driving holiday efforts. We did a fair bit of driving in our short time there. Some of the locals (not all) had travelled to Spain but never more than an hour from home. We seemed very well travelled in comparison.

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  8. Welcome back, and I've never spent 12 consecutive hours in a car, unless to sleep in one. But then, I have never driven a cricket score box to France either.

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  9. Hi Sandra, thanks for commenting, and it's amazing isn't it how some people just stay put?

    SPD, is 'cricket score box' a veiled insult about our skoda? A friend called today and gasped in horror when she heard that was how we travelled. I can't think why. Maybe it' just that she doesn't like the colour...

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  10. Cake overdose is surely the prefect way to deal with post-holiday-blues. Make a few rubbish ones on purpose so you have to eat them. Next years' holiday is AGES away. As for 12 hours in a car - with a handsome man maybe; with kids - NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.

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