O my love is nothing like a rose ( with apologies to Robert Burns)

Rosa gallica

O, my love is nothing like a rose,
That is newly sprung in June.
O, my love is like the melody,
That is played quite out of tune.

Discordant notes mark well our life

O Married as we are,
But I will love you still, my Dear,
Even though it is bizarre.

Even though it is bizarre, my Dear,
And we wonder what we’ve done!
O I will love you still, my Dear,
Because we’ve had such fun.

We’ve fought all night my darkest love

We’ll fight again tonight

But I’d rather fight a thousand fights

Than lose you from my sight

With apologies this St Valentine's Day to Robert Burns whose poem "My Love is Like a Red Red  Rose" inspired this piece of doggerel....

St Valentine's Day - When you get it wrong really, really wrong…

My God I think he got it, he really, really got it! Last night he cooked dinner, a beautiful dinner. OK, not the three course thing and it was served on trays in front of the telly or would have been if there was anything decent on. I persuaded him to eat at the kitchen table and well it did. Who needs candle light or even a table cloth?
We had baked potatoes, salad out of the bag and beef olives – which were just scrumptious. He proudly told me he’d only just got to the butchers on time and Mark was closing up but agreed to serve him as he’d got his foot in the door before they officially closed. I was impressed.
He said he was too as he’d got a great deal on the beef, two for the price of one as they were a special St Valentine's Day recipe that would not keep. He enthusiastically said we’d have the second lot on Monday.
I have a feeling my husband and I are just not connecting, we’re a little out of sync. I don’t remember it always being so but after ten years and two children perhaps my memory is a little fuzzy.
It’s not as if we don’t try, we do but not together. Take last night, before the estimable supper, for instance. I’m having a bath; he’s putting the boys to bed. He’s already totally flummoxed me with not one, but two beautiful bouquets and has served me chilled Bouvay La Dubay. I am feeling Gooooood. He comes into the bathroom.
Him: “Hey is the bath still hot? I really need a bath.”
Me: “Sure come on in!”
Him, looking a little startled: “I think Bog Boy needs you to kiss him good night…”
I get out of the bath and drape a large fluffy towel round me and saunter off in the direction of my youngest’s room. Ten minutes later I return and slip into the bath with my husband.
Him: “Whoa! The water’s going to go over!”
Me: “No don’t worry about that. I’ll sit down slowly.”
Some where along the line it doesn’t work quite as I had planned and instead of going slow I splash, fall back on my husband ooofing him somewhat and probably totally negating any chance of us ever - even if we wanted to - having another child again, water goes everywhere and I find myself alone in what suddenly seems to be a very, very, big bathtub.
Me, looking up at him surprised, as he snaps a towel round his waist: “Oh you got out!”
Him: “Well, I am rather tired…”
As he walks out the bathroom I think isn’t that meant to be my excuse?
And then, of course, we have the dinner and I am truly touched. We seem to have drifted sort of, certainly over the last six months, maybe longer, I forget. There’s always so much to do and things to get on with. I suppose I hadn’t noticed. I feel a little guilty of my neglect because I have neglected him. Just as much as I feel he has neglected me. I determined to try again.
So tonight I do my best, but my best sort of fizzles out probably because my timing sucks. If you want to seduce your husband don’t do it when your kids have just gone to bed and are still trying to persuade you that they are NOT tired, don’t opt to retire to the coldest room in the house even if it is the furthest one from the aforementioned children, don’t forget to feed the dogs, don’t forget to lock the door and most importantly don’t forget to relax..
Suffice to say he was sweet about it all even when the dogs goosed him when he wasn’t expecting it – hey it would put the best off their stride. He said he loved me and I wondered if he really did. For whenever we try to get it together well it just doesn’t seem to happen I mean when I get it wrong, I really, really, get it wrong!

Picture shows: "Candle lit dinner for two" from Lady & The Tramp, Disney 1955.

My mistress’s eyes are nothing like the sun…a St Valentine's Eve lament

My mistress's eyes are nothing like the sun...Well, at least that’s what I think he thinks. To be honest I wouldn’t have a clue he’s not one for romantic eloquence. The best I get is a grunt, when prompted, which I like to think means: “That’s nice Darling!”

He forgot my Birthday last year, actually I didn’t remind him, perhaps that was a bit masochistic of me as I know he’s not that good on dates unless it’s for things like the Six Nations.

But it’s not as if he doesn’t buy me things, I am very lucky. He has bought me little bon motes over the years when prompted or when I say he has. It’s got to the stage when on Christmas Day I exclaim over a beautiful cashmere scarf: “Darling how wonderful just what I always wanted!” You should have seen his face it was a picture as he’d never seen the aforementioned scarf in his life but knowing he’s sort of forgotten he had to pretend he had – Mum and my sister think he has exquisite taste.

And as for Valentines Day? Well I don’t hold my breath -although this year owing to the fact that I let him forget my Birthday I am not feeling Laissez faire about the whole thing.

Actually in normal circumstances I feel the St Valentine’s Day thing is a bit of a rip off.

However, he DID forget my birthday…

So ever since they started the M&S St Valentine’s Day Eat in for £20 that’s what I’ve been nudging him to do and I only mentioned my Birthday once.

Of course in true husband/wife form I can’t actually tell him outright can I?

“Darling I want to you to take me out/make me supper on Valentine’s Day.”

That would be letting the side down I think. I need him to feel well bewildered, slightly uneasy. I need to see him actually using his brains trying to work out what has got into me, his normally perfectly unprepossessing wife.

The slight unbalance in his usually straightforward life will do him the world of good. It might even make him actually pay attention – to ME!

Because come on that’s all I really want just a little bit of attention, a little bit of thought. I don’t want a great deal really…

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun (Sonnet 130)

By William Shakespeare

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damasked, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.
     And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
     As any she belied with false compare.

Picture shows: Jamie Roberts (Wales) fighting off the Scots in the Wales vs Scotland RBS 6 Nations Rugby match on Saturday 13th February. It was a Welsh Victory (31-24)

Puppies!

The wonderful Mud in The City has tagged me to show the fourth photo in my picture file on my computer - it was surprisingly painless.
I would like to say I was honest about it but I would be lying and suffice to say I'm a bit shy so will hope instead that this from the fourth folder in My Pictures will suffice.
It was taken when the puppies (L to R: Molly, Pica, Shadow, Mia and Gemma) were five weeks old or thereabouts. A moment of calm when they had probably been fed and were just falling asleep. Puppies like children are at their most endearing at this stage in the day.
For those not in the know and for whom puppies like babies all look a like these are whippet puppies and were Tattie's first and more than likely only litter as she's going to be seven in March and I feel that, well, like me, she's in Middle Age and should not have to deal with the sleepless nights anymore!
However, her daughter Gemma, who is now three, is off for an assignation on St Valentine's Day no less and I hope a week before the Flora London Marathon to really annoy my husband by saying whoops sorry dear the dog is about to whelp and I've got a 20 mile training run to do . So if you don't mind this one's on you... well I wasn't allowed to get out of it with my own kids. In fact all he did was loiter with intent in the corridor while I did all the work. Maybe that's a bit harsh, I think I actually suggested he leave but not quite in those terms. It was more forthright I fear at the time.
I tend to do a lot of husbandry on St Valentine's Day. Before I was married it tended to focus around neutering, I'd like to say that those days are long gone but Dear Charlie failed to inform me that he would be out tonight ...
Rules of the game are to tag a further four, so in turn I would like to tag the following (having never done this before many apologies in advance...)
MOB at http://menopausaloldbag.blogspot.com/
Pondside at http://pondside1741.blogspot.com/
Pam at http://textilosophy.blogspot.com/
Elizabethm at http://welshhillsagain.blogspot.com/