I'll Be There For You (but not really)

The season of festivities is upon us.  I know this because I've spent the whole day nursing a hurty head that keeps ninja jumping at me out of nowhere just when I think I've finally rid myself of the bugger.  I've also spent more time horizontal than upright to allow ease of access for any cheeky naps looking to ravish me, despite the fact that I was tucked up in bed and snoring (probably.  Drooling too, should imagine) by 11pm.  

What? The party started at 3! Valiant effort, I reckon.  I deserve a medal.  Or at least a calming hug.  I'm so very tired.

So today's been a bit of a non-day, punctuated only by naps and frequent feedings.  I'm really craving a chicken kebab as we speak.  One with peppers on it.  And sweet onion sauce like the stuff they've got at Subway.  

Oooh...Subway!

Anyway, TV got me through a tough time.  I don't do it often, but I love the odd lazy day where I do sod all and let my eyes turn square.  Today, I've watched Modern Family, American Horror Story and Friends.  Comfort telly to go with my comfort food.  Apart from American Horror Story. Didn't know until today that I'm actually a little bit scared of clowns.  Especially murder-y ones with no bottom jaw.  Who'd have known?

Friends, however, will always be my go-to binge watch in times of sloth.  Even though everyone on the planet and their parrot knows the sitcom line by line (which is why they need to make that reunion movie, dammit!! Why haven't they done it yet?!), I still find it just as funny as the first twenty billion times I watched it.  Like many people, I grew up watching the show, fully believing that Friends is what adult life would look like.  

...Up until last week, when my sister and I were watching The One Where Rachel Turns 30, and sibling dearest pointed out

"Isn't it weird that when we used to watch this, we were teenagers, but now this is about people around your age?"

Naturally, I freaked the fuck out, because 

1.  Holy ballsack!  For all intents and purposes, I am an adult.  A grown-up.  Yuck!!
2.  I have been duped.  My life is nothing like Ross, Monica et al's.  What is this evil trickery?

I've since forgiven the Central Perk gang, though.  They still make me happy, even though they are pedaling filthy lies.  Here are just a few of the reasons why I believe that Friends is a touch unrealistic as a depiction of the lives of your "average" 20/30-something year old:
  
1.  It crudely suggests that people can afford to visit coffee shops several times a day on the average salary.  Why do you think Starbucks pictures are always being Instagrammed in real life?  It's because that poor hipster had to sell their nan for a cup of delicious twitchies, and the least they could do to mark the occasion was document it.

2.   In Friends, everyone is thin and beautiful, despite not having a spare second in between "working" and coffee drinking to have a workout regime (except for Phoebe, with her beautiful flail-run that I believe I successfully emulate).

3.  Babies can apparently be had and then only feature in episodes where their presence is key to the story's plot.  When not required, they can be turned off and stored away, much like a Furby.  I'm looking at you, Rachel and Ross.

4.  Spells of unemployment are experienced by (I think) all in the show, but lack of income doesn't appear to be much of an issue.  They might be there for us when the rain starts to fall, but how long would they stick around if the bailiffs came a-knockin'? Hmm? 

5.  This one probably has more to do with me personally than the general public, but, much as I love my friends, if they were always in my house, eating my food and talking at me when all I want to do is have "shh, leave-me-alone" pyjama time, I would probably have violently turned on them and/or changed the locks.  I cherish my privacy, and have discovered as I get older that I'm programmed only to socialise a predetermined amount of time before I have to run back home to my cave and recharge.  I was on a busy, fun work's do last night, but I could probably cheerfully spend the next three days interacting with no one now that I've had my fill of merriment and talking and such.  Not even with Wilson off of Castaway, charming as he is.  It frightens me how easily I could become an actual hermit if society was a bit more accepting of it.  Hell, click and collect food delivery and Amazon makes it so easy these days.

Sigh.

I love you, Amazon.

What was I talking about again?

 

So no one told you life was gonna be this waaay-eee!

(clap clap clap clap!!)

In Defence of the Humble Nap

My name is Becky, and I am a serial napper.  There, I said it.  Nice to get that off my chest.  

In fact, I just sprang up from a stealthy half hour right now. So stealthy that even I didn't know it was coming.  Seriously. I have the hair to prove it:

Exhibit A:

p.s That's not a snazzy earring.  I just hang my race medals on a curtain hook.  Happy accident.

pps.  No, I don't have curtains. What? It's out of principle, okay?  God.

I am writing this post today to reach out to more of my kind.  To let others know that napping is not a pastime reserved solely for infants and the old and infirm.  Napping is a human RIGHT to those of all ages.  Yes, they may stain our pillows, desks and significant others with drool, and yes, it might look a bit rude when you're snoring throughout something that your sofa buddy finds inexplicably interesting (*cough*football*cough*).... But dammit, naps make us feel refreshed and happy (aliiiive!), and therefore they make us better people to be around.  After the initial "Where am I? What year is this?" confusion upon waking anyway.

As napping is a fundamental human right in my eyes, I feel (nay, know) that there need not be any excuse to have a nap...

Okay, well maybe sometimes you need an excuse.  Like in the middle of a meeting at work or while driving.  Probably not appropriate then.  Regardless of this, I have compiled a list for the more tentative dozers - for those shy of sneaking a little daytime shut-eye into their day.  I want to let them know that napping is okay.  More than okay.  Admirable!

These reasons for napping are valid and non negotiable.  Read on, my sleepy bretheren:

1.  It is warm.

2.  Food has recently been consumed.  Digestion is a tiring process.

3. You are comfortable.

4.  You are being forced to complete a task that you absolutely do not want to do, but your socks are already paired, dishes and laundry done, and all household pets including the goldfish have had a bath.  A nap is one last, valiant bid at procrastination.

5.  You have attended work today.  You brave soldier.  Have a cheeky twenty.

6.  Sport is on the TV.

7.  That programme where the men talk about football you can't see while watching TV sets themselves is on.  Does not compute.  Must nap.

8.  You have somewhere important to be... in a bit.

9.  You have a Pavlovian response to being in your pyjamas.  Jammie time = sleepy time.

10.  You have just partaken in any kind of physical activity.  Yes, this includes reaching for the biscuits on that very high shelf.  That was a treacherous mission and you deserve a reward.  Maybe just finish chewing that biscuit first, though.

11.  You are drunk, and the cubicle wall is nice and cool on your face.  Just sit and be for five.  You'll be right as rain in a b- zzzzz....
 

It's nice to spread awareness.  Am a veritable activist, lady Jesus type.  You could even call me a hero, if you wanted to.  

You could, you know.  If you wanted.

Now, go forth and nap!  Make the world a happier, slightly-more-awake-for-the-rest-of-the-day place to be!

Huzzah!!

  

Cheers To The Freakin' Weekend...

Today's lead me to believe that I should do the diva thing and beg my boss for 3 day weekends.  It took me well over half a day today to get over the stress of having a whole 24hrs to myself. 

This morning, I "accidentally" bought some new-old-faithfuls (high-ish heels).  For nights out, I usually select one pair of black heels to wear until their lop-sided, beer stained deaths.  My last pair were mortally wounded when a man took it upon himself to fall on and temporarily cripple me by landing smack bang on my knee cap.

Thanks, guy!

Then, I embarked on a 10 mile run.

I made it to 2 miles.  Just about.  My legs felt like they were seizing up - I'm not sure why - and the muggy heat just made me inexplicably angry.  I looked like a pasty hulk, tantrumming my way back up the beach to the car.  I fretted over what to do with my afternoon since it was suddenly going to be devoid of any physical activity.  Socialise?  Write?  Do work?  Drink (under the umbarella of "socialising" - I wasn't  quite stressed enough to be necking wine on my kitchen floor at that point).  That's what Brits do whenever the sun makes a fleeting appearance, isn't it?  Get plastered in a lovely, lovely beer garden.

Mmm...beer garden.

Overwhelmed with all the possible activities that lay before me, and my brain seeping anxiously out of my ears, I got home and made a sandwich.  Then I promptly took an aggressive nap in front of Peep Show.

And aggressive nap, in case you ask, is like a normal nap, except it's very sudden and you have no choice about whether or not you are going to do it.

...And here I am!  I'm feeling effing marvellous now!  Blogging and rocking some serious bed hed hair and heels (what?  Like I'm going to wait for an occasion to wear the new things? Pshuh!) .  It's taken all sodding day, but it's now occurred to me that one of the very best, tried and tested by people less...affected...than me - ways to spend a Saturday is this:

Doing Sweet Fuck All!

Happy Saturday, Internet!!

So.....

Heeeey guuuuys... I promise you that I was going to write an awesome, mind-blowing blog post tonight, I really was, honest.... But I've just found out that I am the last person on the planet to discover how brilliant 30 Rock is, and I am now in some kind of weird Tina Fey vortex thing, and I can't stop eating frozen yogurt, sooo...

...yeah. There's that. Picture evidence?

I Can't Walk

More on that bombshell tomorrow.

SMARTIES!!!

Whose stupid, idiotic and just downright INSANE idea was it to go to the gym this morning?! Getting up TWO HOURS earlier than needed before work. Who in their RIGHT MIND would actively choose perspiring and panting on a treadmill like a sweaty hamster over sleep?

Oh yeah! Me. Knob End.

Before today, I've been gymming it for the last three nights pretty successfully (for me). I'd even venture as far as saying I've been enjoying it. Gasp!

I've enjoyed being anonymous in a big organism made of whirring machines and human movement, disappearing into my own little world (even more so than normal).

But who was I to kid myself that I'd enjoy doing that in the MORNING?!

Mornings are for hugging, foraging clumsily for food and muttering demonically into mugs of coffee. Sometimes watching reruns of early Batman episodes if you can muster up the energy to watch Adam West run around in Lycra. But that's it.

My body refused to put in any effort this morning. Despite my brain screaming at it to stop glaring angrily at my reluctantly shuffling feet, it insisted on behaving like a tantrumming toddler being dragged round the shops.

"Come on, we're going out."

"No. Don't want to."

"Well, we're here now, just a little bit further..."

"NO! Want Smarties!"

"It's eight in the m-"

"SMARTIIIEEEEEES!!!"

And you know what? I don't blame you one bit, you poor, hungry, confused, sleepy body. I truly don't. People who go to the gym in the morning are either freaks who don't sleep so they don't have to deal with the horrors of waking up, or they're robots. Robots designed by the gym to make us flabby little muggles feel terrible about our burning desires to lie in and mash left over pizza into our faces at 7a.m.

Well, I refuse to be sucked in! From this day forth, I shall only exercise when I've built up a nice, big mound of anxiety related stress, accumulated by spending a whole day pretending I'm nicer than I am to people I've never even met on the phone (my job - not something I do with the Yellow Pages and too much free time) before I even make eye contact with a treadmill. I will only move a muscle when I'm feeling suitably killy. That way, I will be getting healthful benefits and protecting wider society from my stabbiness.

Now, then, body. Let's go find us some breakfast.

*hopeful squeak* "Smarties?"

Fuck it, why not? Smarties.