Solly as a Rock!!

Tuesday evening. Groups of women gather around the TV. Drink wine, preferably rosé, and watch dramadies – dramatic comedies – like Ally McBeal, Gilmore Girls and most importantly: Sex and the City. These TV-evenings have been an excuse for young, intelligent women to escape their busy lives and carriers. Once a week they can be just girls and chat about girl stuff with their best friends – only during commercial breaks, we don’t wanna miss a thing!

Tonight the last episode of Sex and the City will be aired… (I know, I know, the show has finished a year ago in the US, but TV-show-wise we’re a bit behind in this tiny country.) It’s the end of an era. Off course, the evening will be filled with other dramadies, but it will never be the same… *sighs*

Tonight me and my bottle of wine will be on the sofa of my best friend Anne. For the last time we will tell Miranda to be a bit more sensitive, Charlotte to be less romantic, but to remain hopeful, Samantha to stay with Smith ’cause he’s so cute and fight her cancer and Carrie… we will like her outfits – or laugh about them – we will tell her to leave New York and Big behind… though we started to really like Big. I have a bet with my mom: I say Carrie will live happy-ever-after in Paris with Petrovsky, mom says she can’t live without New York or Big. Anne doesn’t know yet. She says we just have to wait and see… and not spoil the fun! (I haven’t read it, I just copied the link)

A friend of a friend, her ex in fact, committed suicide last week. A shock, off course, yet very surreal. First of all because I heard it by phone in the IKEA, next to a pile of bright colourful pillows. Second, because I did not think he was ‘the type’. He seemed very stable, down to earth. Happy with himself, content with his life. Maybe stuff did not always go according to plan, but I never thought he would… Never a hint, never a cry for help…

He did not leave a farewell letter, yet in his journal he said he was not happy with his life, nor with himself. I guess I just did not know him good enough, he was ‘the type’. Maybe he hinted or cried for help, maybe no one listened…

The funeral is this afternoon. I’ll go, for two reasons. One: to support my friend. Two: to get answers. He could have gone to a therapist, yet he choose to leave this life. Why?

Solly: “I’ve prepared your breakfast and poured you two cups of coffee, without you asking for it. You never bring ME coffee!”

MyLove: “Would you like some coffee then, sweetie?”

Solly: “No, but that’s not the point!”

Our babybird Mango can’t fly properly. She’s not paralysed, it’s not a birth defect (like little Nemo’s flapping flipper), we did it to her… We clipped one wing.*

She must know by now that she can’t fly. She has tried and crashed a hundred times by now. But she is or stupid or really stubborn, cause she tries. Really hard. Most of the times, we place her on the floor, and after walking around for a bit, she’ll start running and flapping her wings really fast. She’ll take off alright, but crashes normally after reaching a height of 20 cms… Sometimes we place her on the wicker roller blind, with the others: Porgy and Ober. She happily climbs up and down with them, helps with deconstructing the blinds in order to get pieces of reed for Ober’s nest, tsjilps to the others, they tsjilp back and after a while, Porgy and Ober will fly away. Uh-oh. Nine seven out of ten times we can reach her in time, but sometimes we are to late to catch her. She’ll try to follow the bunch. She flaps her wings fiercely. She takes off. She flies!… for about a second and then she crashes. One meter down onto the slippery laminated flooring, so she’ll often slide under the cupboard after her crash. We try not to laugh, but it is so funny! After we pick up the slightly disoriented bird we cuddle and comfort her and tell her – again – she can’t fly. Then, we place her back with the bunch and pray we’re on time for to prevent the next crash… Hopefully her feathers will grow back very soon!

*(Before anyone accuses me of cruelty towards animals: a crash course (LOL) in taming a Lovebird. If they are very shy, like Mango was in the beginning, its better to clip the wing, so she won’t fly away from your hands every time you try to pick them up. Now she can get used to hands. Anyway, the wing itself isn’t clipped, the inside feathers of her left wing are clipped unevenly. This way, she is unable to fly distance or great heights. By the time her feathers are grown back – yes, they grow back – she will be a tame Lovebird that we can pick up without frightening her).

He sat on the sofa, staring at the black TV-screen. Every minute he sighed softly… I recognised the signs: MyLove’s in love with another. And I’m fine with it. Don’t worry, I’m not the understanding type and we don’t have a so-called free relationship. It’s nothing like that. I know my man. It’s never about a woman, but about an electrical gadget. Again…

I sat down next to him and asked him what’s the matter. He sighed and looked up to me. “She’s so pretty… and petite… and fast…” After a few minutes of silence, words and sentences suddenly started tumbling from his mouth. He needed her at work and DJ-ing and he could not live without her anymore. I was confused, that position had already been filled for a while. What was wrong with her? He looked away. She was getting old, slow and out of energy within minutes. She was holding him down in his professional and musical career. I could understand his feelings, but I wasn’t sure if he could support a younger model… He admitted he couldn’t, and looked at me with his puppy eyes. MyLove knows I can almost never resist those. I know, I’m weak, but I like to see him happy… and he was so happy when I gave her to him for our 81st month-anniversary today… I was kissed and hugged and moved aside.

I know my man. He will be under her spell for a while. I give it a week, and he’ll be back with me.

Blonde jokes are set to be banned in Hungary after blonde women staged an angry protest outside parliament. The protestors handed in a petition claiming they were being discriminated against in every walk of life by bad taste blonde jokes. And spokeswoman Zsuzsa Kovacs said: “Blondes face discrimination in the job market, in the workplace when they get a job, and even on the streets. “People are banned from discriminating against Jews, or blacks, so why not grant blondes the same protection.” (source)

What happened to good old self-mockery?

Personally, as a naturally blonde, I can laugh my a*s off if I hear a good blonde joke…

I woke up this morning with the delicate sound of drilling… Nice. After 15 minutes of trying to shut out the noise using 2, 3, 4 pillows, I got out of bed. I took a shower, got dressed and made coffee. All with the relaxing sound of nextdoor drilling. The minute I sat down to drink my coffee – very grumpy by now – the drilling stopped. It remained silent since then. I have been tempted strongly to go back in bed, but I’m pretty sure the neighbours will sense that, and get back to their noisy destructive activities.

What a night, what a night. I am still tired, though I’ve had my eight hours of sleep. I’ve lost my voice from all the cheering I did. My feet, my arms and my legs hurt, ’cause I danced my ass off at the pounding techno of the collaborating DJ’s Chris Liebing and Speedy J!!!

It’s my grandparents 63rd wedding anniversary today. 63 years together. Can you imagine? Waking up next to the same person for 63 years? They have spend the majority of their lives – 70 percent to be exact – together. They are completely grown together. I don’t think that if one of them dies, the other will live much longer.

Anyway, for them, today was a day like any other day. He brought her tea, she made him breakfast. They don’t believe in giving each other gifts anymore – ‘we have everything’. They say they won’t do anything special on this special day… They lie, they do. She bakes him an apple pie and he buys her yellow carnations, just like he did on their wedding day. Thoughtful and sweet. Then the daily routine continues: a cup of coffee, lunch, she starts cooking diner. The routine is only disturbed by visiting children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

I once asked them for the secret to their success. Grandpa answered: ‘It’s all about compromise, argue whenever you want – don’t bottle everything up – and make up as soon as possible.’ Grandma added: ‘Don’t give up too soon. We’ve had our share of difficulties, too, but people nowadays file for divorce as soon as things get rough. Fight for your marriage and don’t fall out of love with each other at the same moment.’

No appointments for today, nowhere I have to go and nothing I have to do. Finally I have several hours of me-time ahead, yet I’m not sure how to spend them. I am actually having an internal discussion with myself.

Part of me wants to block out the outside world, especially the rain. Just turn on the heater, curl up on my sofa, wearing my warm slippers. Read a book, listen to R.E.M.’s Automatic For The People…

Part of me wants to go outside and feel the rain. Put on my raincoat, rubber boots, umbrella. Go to the forest, splish-splash across the muddy paths, while listening to R.E.M.’s Automatic For The People on my walkman…

I could make a deal with myself – the key to a peaceful relationship: compromise! First I’ll go to the wet, muddy forest, and then I’ll get warm again on my sofa and a cup of hot coco. “We” will have a nice day!