A wonderful day....

Despite being beyond hot two things have happened today that have really made me smile.

Do you remember a while back I told you of the letter from a Yours reader about her granddaughter the lesbian and the fact that she couldn't bear the thought of attending her wedding - if you need a reminder you can read it here.

Anyway - we printed the letter on our problem page with a reply from our resident wise woman Marion Clarke - this is what she said:

This is a problem that really highlight the generation gap and how much attitudes towards gay relationships have changed in the past 20 years or so. While you and your husband are not comfortable with your granddaughter's sexuality, it's clearly not something that troubles her friends or even her parents.

Before turning down the invitation too hastily, ask yourself what is to be gained by not attending the wedding? Your absence won't alter the fact that your granddaughter is gay or persuade her to change her mind in any way. The only thing you are likely to achieve by boycotting her big day is hurt her feelings - something she (and her parents) might find hard to forgive.

You are lucky to have a granddaughter who feels she can be honest and open with her family.

A wedding should be a joyous occasion that brings together all the different generations to wish the couple well. So go on - buy a nice new hat and be glad that she has found someone to love and who loves her in return.

Today we has a reply from the lady in question - who's name - for the record is Lyn.

Dear Marion

I would just like to say thank you for printing my letter about my granddaughter being a lesbian and getting married. I feel much better now about accepting your advice and her invitation. I love Yours and would never miss a copy.

Thank you again

Lyn.

Now there's something to warm your cockles - I'm glad that somewhere out there some other bride will now have her grandma at her wedding.

Item number two of the things to make my day is that my very good friend Miss Nancy Bostock is going to stop saving lives in Malawi (she's a doctor don't you know) to come home for our wedding. I haven't seen her in months and I'm so excited that she will be there on our big day. Hurrah. Yay, Excited.

The Hen

I'm home from my marvellous hen weekend and you'll be pleased to hear that I did not have to get dressed up as a devil/french maid/cowgirl/hooker, and I did not have to wear bunny ears, a net curtain on my head or L plates.

Instead the wonderfully crafty maid of honour made me a beautiful sash - that I shall treasure forever and that I wore with pride. We lost many pennies betting on horses that had a tendancy to come in last, drank champagne, tried canned pimms and G&Ts (who new such things could be gotten so conveniently?) and daintily sipped a few cocktails.




Everyone looked beautiful in their matching corsages and we danced on into the night to the most amazing Michael Jackson tribute night. I'd like to apologise to all those who had to witness my version of "Thriller", to those who had to hear the maid of honour and I sing (read wail) "Ben" at the tops of our voices down the length of Regents Street. And also to anyone who was slightly confused by Mrs Silva Medd telling them in no uncertain terms that Mr Jackson is indeed alive and well and is currently resident in the Castle spinning a few of his favourite tunes.

I would also like to make a few excuses for my hair - you see it doesn't really mix with humidity and spent most of the weekend toying between going frizzy or incredibly flat and greasy looking - despite my best efforts.

I slept not one wink (well for about an hour) on Saturday night, but jumped up bright eyed and bushy tailed for our punting trip. The only bone of contention of the entire weekend was caused by my refusal not to take charge of the punt. I felt that I'd done more than my fair share of dares - including niftily whipping off my brassiere without removing any other item of clothing, while seated at the dinner table in Browns (I'd like to apologise to my fellow diners for this unsavoury display of hen like behaviour) - and having watched our expert punt guide teeter on the very edge of a ducking twice during our ride, I didn't much fancy giving it a go.



Post punt our picnic was very kindly delivered by Mr Birkett-Smith and we tucked into a rather tasty lunch of crostini, salad and salmon, topped off with socnes, cream and strawberries, whipped up by myself and my culinary side-kick. Recipe requests will follow at a later date.

I had a lovely time and I'd love to thank my hens (including those who were unable to physically join us) for their lovely gifts - the cds of songs that remind you of me did bring back some memories and Mr Jones and I will look forward to trying out all of your favourtie recipes very soon. Thank you so much to Mrs Everard and my lovely sister girl for their hard work in putting it altogether with so much thought.

Hen do = t-2 days

I'm becoming slightly twitchy about the old hen weekend - not least because winding me up about it seems to have become everyone's favourite past time. I am trying not to rise to it, or believe any of it or start to panic about it. But it's getting rather tricky. So I'd just like to say this to all those involved - a friendly reminder if you will:

Your favourite hen is a control freak, she is not a fan of surprises - especially of the naked man variety. She hates anything tacky and abhors the thought of parading around Cambridge dressed as a bunny girl/cow girl/angel/devil/burlesque dancer or any other hen do incarnation. She didn't find the Beck's B*&%es t-shirt joke funny. She also upholds the right to refuse to play along and will get stroppy if coerced.

That said I am very much looking forward to dressing in my best frock and heels, drinking pimms, champagne and many a cocktail, winning lots of money on the horses and possibly having a good dance if anyone is able to find somewhere that plays enough cheese (I don't do cool music so don't try to make me dance to it - if you don't like cheese do keep in mind that it's my hen do and I'll "cheese" if I want to!).

I am sure Mrs Everard has kept the rebel factions of the hen do committee under control and that I am worrying unnecessarily. I do hope I'm right. xoxo

Curses

After being beyond excitement about the fact that Mr Jones had found a saxophonist today we have been disappointed. We'd chatted to her about music, she was happy to lower herself to Take That and I was dreaming of walking down the aisle to the notes of a saxophone on the summer breeze. But alas it's not to be. Clearly an airy fairy artistic type (who doesn't have a brain for dates and times) the poor dear has suddenly discovered that she's on holiday from 17th-24th August. Typical.

Luckily this has happened this week and not last - when my mental state was teetering on the edge of insanity and there was a lot of crying. I fear for what might have been had I had to meet with this disappointment during one of my very Victorian periods of nervous anxiety. However going slightly mental does seem to have had some form of effect on Mr Jones - on Sunday he helped to make place tags and do a provisional seating plan without one word of complaint - it was lovely.

Mr Jones gets drunk....

Last saturday night I went out with the girls and Mr Jones went out with Mr Medd. My evening of girly chat was disturbed by the sudden and rather unstable appearance of the aforementioned gentlemen (or drunken blackguards depending on your perspective).

Mr Jones, grinning inanely, presented me with a piece of paper - "Look - I got a girls number!"

There's an audible gasp from the assembled womenfolk. I look at him. wondering if his self esteem has taken a knocking recently and this is his way of dragging it out of the gutter, or whether he really is that drunk and that stupid that he thinks that I will in some way be impressed by this show of his manly prowess. I raise one eyebrow.

"This number is going to score me so many points, I won't get into trouble for ages," he boasts.

I am swiftly coming to the conclusion that his brain is indeed addled by gin. The eyes of all around the table are on me, I'm starting to wish that the toilets of the bar would provide a more ameniable refuge - I weigh up my mortification with the possibility of holing myself up in the urine and toilet roll filled cupboard with a cracked mirror and a couple of teary Stamford school girls who have been similarly treated by their boyfriends. (I'm not that mortified yet).

Mr Jones doesn't seem to have noticed the storm clouds of rage gathering behind my eyes and is barrelling on with his story.

"We were standing at the bar chatting and drinking and the barmaid was talking to us too," (Oh god - a slutty barmaid - brilliant). "I asked her what she did..." (other than serve drinks to drunken idiots and try to steal other people's fiancees?) "...and it turns out that she's a music teacher just out of university..." (The clouds start to clear). "...so I asked her if she plays the saxophone - and she only bloody does." He grins at me inanely as I sit there open mouthed. "And," he says proudly, swaying dangerously to one side. "She'd love to play at the wedding as you walk down the aisle."

I have to admit that I am impressed and give him a big kiss to say thank you. As a precautionary measure I take the number for safe keeping.

Mr Jones was, however, wrong about one thing - that putting me in possession of a saxophonists number would absolve him of all future wrongs. You see, drunk Mr Jones and relatively sober Mrs Jones-to-be don't like each other all that much. So the night ended with a row, followed by Mr Jones being violently sick, followed by him apologising profusely and asking me to make him feel better.

On Sunday we didn't speak much. Mr Jones recuperated on the sofa and I proved that gardening is indeed a panacea for stress and anger.

On Monday morning I gave Mr Jones the barmaid/saxophonists number and asked him if he could call her. He looked blankly at the piece of paper - "what's this?" - then after a few seconds "Oh yeah - I'd completely forgotten - how cool is that?"*

*Mrs Jones-to-be would like to remind all her readers to drink responsibly and doesn't recommend that anyone try getting this drunk at home.

Le Bonne Maman

I am the proud owner of 19 Bonne Maman Jam Jars - thankfully Mr Jones and I didn't have to eat all the jam ourselves. Most of them were donated by kind Freecyclers - a marvellous lot. If you haven't tried it, do - you can swap all sorts and all for free.

My friend Miss Simkins spent a jolly afternoon cycling round South London collecting jars from various lovely freecycle folk (thank you ever so much Em) and the Mother of the Bride and I took a trip to Oakham for more. The Ladies of Rutland do seem to like their Bonne Maman.

We're still after more, so if you have any do get in touch.

PS for those of you who are reading this via Facebook - my notes are linked to my blog - for the real thing visit http://becomingmrsjones.blogspot.com/

Knee update

Today I can walk pain free - although it still doesn't do stairs. The other knee however is a spectacular shade of green with purple highlights. It's beautiful to behold.