Just call me scrooge
2002-12-01 || 9:50 a.m.

so let's make this something akin to a diary entry rather than yet another daily whinge.

Four of Rebecca's male friends turned up at 6 o'clock for my party on Friday - totally drunk. They fell into the room and basically scared the dog shitless and crashed round the house, throwing themselves down the stairs, pushing each other over and insulting other people. They broke my front fence which I am going to have to mend today. Rebecca was extremely angry with them and very embarrassed but to be honest they really were not that bad and like Lindsay said, if it had been us, at their age, we would have been vomiting on the carpet in addition to the other things.

Cathy came from school along with her husband and two children and the disgust on their faces was a sight to behold. Along with their obvious dislike for my rather shabby house. They stayed for about half an hour. It was pretty horrible.

Soo just kept lecturing me and I just wasn't listening. I try to talk to her but she just doesn't hear me and I don't know why.

The music situation was funny. Rebecca's friends kept putting stuff on and Steve kept taking it off and putting old punk stuff on. It was like battle of the generations. Barbara said 'I wanna dance, I wanna dance' so I put the Pixies on but then she said, 'not to this'. So I danced on my own.

I have masses of stuff to do today. All of it boring. I have to clean the rabbits out, mend the fence, buy some food, do my numeracy, literacy and foundation subject planning, put all the stuff back in the front room, do all the washing and I have a shitload of marking to do.

The dog has this real freaky toy. Its one of those horrible mutant type card shop cuddly toys that someone bought for me some years ago. I'm not a 'cuddly toy as an adult' type of person anyway. I like Zeppy, my dog that I've always had but that's really about it. Anyway I gave the dog this mutant toy dog thing but I was worried about the eyes and stuffing and him choking etc, so on Friday at the party people took the eyes and nose off and then we took all the stuffing out and he now has this 'dog skin' toy which is really rather nasty.

Yesterday I really needed to talk to someone in particular but they just won't talk to me. I wouldn't say I was upset or pissed off or anything at all - just resigned.

Oooh, time to open my advent calender. Ha, you can't beat tradition can you. What did I get today? A toy soldier. And it's waving at me! Loads and loads of people have got their Christmas decorations up already. I can't understand that. If it wasn't for the fact that Rebecca's birthday is December 13th I wouldn't put them up until Christmas Eve. But I do put them up on Dec.12th now specially for Rebecca. Although she did say this year, 'oh let's just not bother with Christmas decorations, what's the point?'

Let's hope I don't have another tree disaster this year. If there's one thing I can be relied upon its being able to pick the one tree that will really FUCK WITH YOUR HEAD. You know, the trunk's too big for the base and you spend 5 days sawing it into pieces in the front room. Or it won't fit in anyone's car, or all the pine needles drop off the next day and you have a pot of decorated sticks. Fuck, my Christmas skills are about on the same level as my social skills and my Golden Jubilee participation.

And whilst we're on the subject of Christmas decoration rants, poor, poor Rebecca, subjected every year to having to make paper chains because I FUCKING HATE THOSE SHINY ONES. I have a totally unjustifiable hatred of all those things that other people put up: shiny garlands, things that hang and look like a Star Wars battle on your ceiling, artificial Christmas trees, waving lit up snowmen or anything with lights on in the front window, those fucking appalling rotund plastic things that people put on their roofs, people that spell out the word 'XMAS' in lights across their house. AARRGHH.

What I do like: real Christmas trees with wooden decorations or things that I choose like stained glass balls with a few lights and a ribbon or star on the top, not a fucking fairy. Paper chains, balloons and one bit of tinsel on my clash picture. Oh, and advent calenders that don't contain chocolate. Although I have bought two of the chocolate variety for my class.

Happy blooming christmas.