I have a brand new conversation-killing technique.

For anyone who knows me, or knows this island, you’ll know that the most frequently asked question is ‘So! What was your job before coming here?’, implying that what we do here is no job, or just a holiday occupation, or whatever.

My new answer to this question?
“Well, I used to be in video distribution.”
“Oh, Films! What films?”
“Well, Porn, mainly. Some hard-core, but mostly animal…”

I can’t wait for the first guest to question me. I’m prepared.

… but i’ve had a complete F***er of a day.
Some days you feel good about being yourself.
Today’s not one of them.
I really don’t like myself today.
And I can’t even talk about why.
I’m sorry if that’s not very entertaining.
I’m sorry. I know that’s not a great comedy blog post.
‘I dislike everthing and myself today’
sorry.

I’ll give you this.
today I heard a mini-skirt descibed as a ‘fanny-pelmet’. now, That’s funny. I’m not. Not today.

So. Lets talk about the word Scone.

Tell me, how do you pronounce it?

Or don’t tell me. Because I don’t really care.
I’ve heard this conversation half a billion times. Does it really matter? Does it?

Let us consider the following factors.
1. Everywhere in the UK, pretty much, people have a different way of pronouncing scone - either “Skoan”, or “skon”.

2. Every week, we have guests staying here from all over the UK. Nay, all over the world.

3. Every lunchtime, we serve scones.

Therefore, it is likely, or perhaps even a given, that this conversation will happen anything up to 5 times in any week. And I don’t care anymore. It’s a f***ing foodstuff. You can pronounce it “fish-slice” if you want to. It’s meant for eating, not inspiration.

There was one point last year when the conversation started again. For maybe the fifth time that week. For possibly the seventy-fifth time that season. With the added-bonus-point conversation, which is even worse…

“So, do you say Barth, or baeth? What about Larder?…”
etc, etc, ad infinatum.

It had been going for about ten minutes. I was about to lose my rag. I could see b, four seats down the table, on the edge of rag-loss too.

“Anna!” he shouted down the table, “Would you mind passing that Jor of Honay, please?”
“Certainly!” I yelled back, “Might you have any margeryne down there? I need some for my scoon.”
“Would you also like the Strawbarry Jim?”
“Yes I wood. Thankyow.”
“Oh look! I need to refil this jog of wattir. Excuse me.”

And we carried on until they shut up.
Rude? Yes, I like to think so.
Know what? I don’t care. I think I said that already.

How do you pronounce scone?
And how important is it to you?
Is it?
Is it really?

She was just taking a stroll, with her old mum, down the main road of the town where I used to live. I walked past her, said ‘evening’, and carried on along the way, thinking “that’s ace, I must remember to put that in my blog”.

When I woke up, I was thinking the same; “Good lord, I saw the queen. I must tell everyone. I must put that in my blog. That’s a great story. Very impressive. And I said hello. Top…”

It was about 20 minutes until I realised it had been dream, and consequently wouldn’t be a good story at all.

That’s a step forward. Last time I didn’t even manage to stop myself telling everybody all about it. It was a lengthy and intricate dream that led to me walking around for half the next day telling people:

”I dreamt about Margaret Thatcher last night. And she wanted me to tell everyone that she’s very sorry.

Oh – and that she’s a drag queen”.

Wandering round a ‘castle’ today (more a hunting lodge, quite wee, with lots of stuffed animals with stary eyes) I heard the best true story Ever.

The Lady (and believe me, I don’t use that word lightly) showing us around her home was telling us about her husband, some lord of something or other. She told us all about his adventures in the war, and showed us documents to prove it all.

He travelled behind enemy lines, for some covert mission or other. In case of his capture by enemy forces, he was given some false identity papers. His name, on the false identity papers, and I love this, was ‘Ivan T. Bugurov’

You can imagine all the British Intelligence Officers wetting themselves in their offices, going;
‘I wan t’bugger off!
I van t Bugur Ov!
Ivan t Bugarov!
Ah those foolish foriegners! They’ll never get the joke! What Ho, Boys! I say!”

It’s just so horribly British and smug. Not bothering to come up with something authentic sounding, because a bad pun is better value.

And yet, of course, it is also very funny.

Just doing some research for my book on etiquette – first chapter; “when is it alright to be naked?”

As far as I can tell, there are six degrees of naked;
1. Not naked. Not naked at all. This, usually, would manifest in the ‘fully-dressed’ state. No natural colour should be available at this point. One wearing a wetsuit would fit easily into the ‘not naked’ bracket.
One wearing a greased wetsuit would fit even more easily.
2. Nowhere near naked. Most clothing of note still in position. Some tantalising glance of flesh may be available (most likely a wrist, neck or ankle, rather than nipple or buttock)
3. A bit naked. This person could be wearing a few more clothes. But they aren’t. They are, therefore, a bit naked.
4. Rather naked. One of the most dangerous degrees here, as will usually involve kaftans. Never look under the kaftan. Nakedness lies beneath.
5. As Damn near naked as Damnit. ‘clothing’ here will involve string and tassels.
6. Naked. Well, and truly, thoroughly naked. Symptoms including a flesh-coloured skin tone, and an alarming absence of clothes.

So now I have my definitions set out, I’m sitting here trying to think of situations in which it is ok to be in the buff.

I’d say dinner parties are generally a bit of a no-no, etiquette wise. Certainly in the case of the guest who arrives at the party naked.
If, once the party is in full ‘swing’, as it were, and a culture of nudidity would seem to be de rigeur, then it’s probably OK to strip off. Slowly.
Not just to nip out during the main course and come striding back in starkers.
Everyone else might have changed their mind.

Obviously baths are a reasonable situation, but etiquette doesn’t cover baths, I don’t think. It covers mainly social situations. So it might cover the bath if Bath time were a social situation. But if bath time were a social situation, I’m not sure it would quite constitute needing etiquette. I don’t think anyone would care.

Oh, I’m going to have to do some more thinking on this.
Nudity…. Nudity…. Nudity…

I decided (at 3.30 this morning, in a fit of rather dull insomnia) that I’m going to write a book on Etiquette.

I’m not sure how I’m going to do that exactly, but it’s been the closest thing resembling a ‘plan’ that I’ve had in ages. How cool would that be?
Large Gruff Southern Person; “Hello young winsome lady, what do you do for a living?”
Anna (with a flutter of her eyelashes); “Why, I write books on etiquette, thank you very much for asking!….”

I realise that there I may have confused ‘writing books on etiquette’, for ‘being Scarlet O’Hara’, but I think my point is the same. Whatever that point may be.

I also realise that I’m going to have to pull my socks up if I’m going to become an expert on the whole ‘manners’ thing. I’m not bad at the practical stuff, the holding doors open, the saying my please’s an my thankyou’s, the managing not to punch someone if they’re eating an apple too close to me, all that stuff.

But I think there are somethings I should try not to say.

1. I might actually start saying “I beg your pardon?” rather than “Ha?” or “Ugh?”for example. I’ve been trying for years and years and years to change this. Every time I hear myself saying “ha?”, I immediately correct myself with, “I mean ‘I beg your pardon?’”, which would be fine if I at some point stopped saying ‘Ha?’ in the first place. Now it just leads to, when ever I don’t hear something… “Ha?ImeanIbegyourpardon?Damn!” Every single time. Which sounds worse.

2. “This is a complete pain in the nuts”. Apparently, this is not a very ladylike thing to say. Something to do with not having nuts, or something.

3. “Hell’s Teeth!”. I sound rather more Old Sea Dog than debutante.

4. “Make it so” As previously mentioned, this has slipped from a joke into my main vocabulary. No Good.

5. “Totally…”, or rather “Toadally…” Anna, you are not a Valley girl, you’re not american, you don’t even watch Buffy. Give over.

I’m sure there are more than this, well, there’s always the blasphemy and the swearing, of course, but I must admit I’m rather fond of those…

And once I’ve ironed out these small creases, I’m going to write a book on Etiquette.
First chapter - “When is it OK to be Naked?”
I may serialise it. At least it’ll give me something to write about. There’s bugger-all happening around here.

6. “bugger-all” I really must stop this. I could go on forever…

I’m begining to think everyone’s getting a bit too tired for this ‘concentration’ lark. I’m so tired I’m foaming at the mouth (although this can also be a symptom of Epilepsy, Clinical Shock, Infantile Convulsion or Hyperthermia), and biting the ankles of everyone around me (although this can also be a symptom of Dementia, Stroke, or Being a Yorkshire Terrier).

Sitting in the last First Aid training session, we were writing testing situations for each other. I recieved a hypothetical (or is it hyperthetical? I know one’s to do with heat and the other cold…) scenario to solve which read;

‘You are sitting in the common room, when an old man sitting opposite complains of pains in his arm. He is clearly in pain, and has some trouble breathing. Before you have time to run for help, he clutches at his chest, makes a rasping Croaking noise, goes stiff for the briefest of seconds, then collapses back into his chair.

Then his head falls off.’

Apparently, the writer’s reasoning was that it was all looking too easy.

According to the trainer, spontanious decapitation is one of the only situations in which we should assume that the casualty may be dead. So that’s good to know.

And on reflection should probably have stayed there; Number 469 in a seemingly never-ending series.

Watching a family-orientated television programme - some dross ‘pop idol’ thing – trying to unwind for the blood-and-guts day…

Woman 1; Aw, look! Couldn’t you just hug him?
Woman 2; Aye, bless! Couldn’t you just imagine taking him home to meet your mum?
Woman 3 (well, me…); Yeah! Couldn’t you just cover him in peanut butter, only to lick it off again?

Everyone was suddenly staring at me.
Damn it!
What had I been thinking?
Peanut butter? Peanut butter?
How much would your tongue stick to the roof of your mouth after that?
You’d not be able to talk for a week. And thinking specifically of the terribly wholesome, fairly traded, organic peanut butter we have here? The amount of stuff that would get stuck between the teeth is too painful to bear.

Peanut butter indeed.
I can’t believe I said that out loud. I meant Raspberry jam.
Seedless, obviously.

There is only so long you can sit in a small, warm, low-ceilinged room before sleep or hysteria sets in. There’s only so long you can sit and listen to all the vile and terrible things that can happen to people, and the things you can do about it, before something’s going to give. Other people got the sleepiness. In our corner of the room, it was hysteria.

We’ve been in intensive First-Aid training for two days now. Sitting in the same room for twelve hours today, and only slightly less yesterday, with little breaks for food and fresh, cold air.

Luckily, the woman doing the training is very funny, otherwise I don’t think many of us could sit through so much angina and blood loss. After eleven and a half hours, I was pretty much ready to drop. Then we were given a fictional situation to deal with by one of the other groups.

‘You enter one of the guest bedrooms. A woman is lying on the floor next to the bed, clutching an electrical devise plugged into the mains. She is unconscious, but seems to be breathing. What do you do?

Of course, the industrial Vibrator jokes flowed like water. (I’ve just talked to someone, and apparently that shouldn’t have been ‘of course, the industrial vibrator jokes…’ as it wasn’t obvious at all. Maybe it was just the way it was read out. Anyway…) mild hysteria came, and passed, but unfortunately came back when we had to read our findings to everyone. All it took was one small snort from one of the group, one comment from a nice middle-class middle aged lady across the room about how it would certainly save on batteries, and there were five of in a row, holding our noses, rocking back and forth and crying into our practice slings.

As soon as we could, we carried on with the incident report, which went well, for approximately 30 seconds until we hit the section on the entrance and exit points of electrical burns. On being asked whether we had made the area safe of possible further shock, a comment was made later about having to remove the element from the fundament, and, oh it doesn’t matter…
It may all have got a little distasteful after that.

that’s me, that is.

Snow is romantic, snow is cleansing, snow is pure, and beautiful.

Blizzards are not. Blizzards are vile. They hurt. But they do make everything so pretty.
I’ve just walked home from the party in the pitch black with snow spiralling down and smacking me in the face.
It’s romantic, maybe. But not the right kind of romantic.

Secondly - I’ve had the most wonderful evening talking about language. I love my language. And the more accents i come to know, the more I love it. The words we have in common, the letters we have in common, and the million ways they can be used. Three examples of the language conversation;

1. In the middle of the conversation, someone walked past and said “m’aff haim”.
This is ‘i’m going home now’ in the west of scotland. I love that.

2. Someone close to my heart, someone I worked in the theatre with, from Bolton, Lancashire, England, would use the phrase “I’m going f’…” so, for example, when asked what he was doing of the evening, he might say “I’m going f’t’see play”. Literally translated - “I am going for to see the play” grammar unchanged for 500 years. Isn’t that fabulous?

3. I’ve forgotten the third one. But it was very interesting. I’ll put it in when I remember it. It was great, it was kind of like a punchline to the whole post. shame I can’t remember it really. ach well. Oh no, here we are, it’s coming back to me.
That’s right. the conversation on language drifted off into spelling, and someone quoted a limerick of which they could only remember a bit. The point was that on paper, it should rhyme, but in reality, it just couldn’t. The bits she coulld remember were…
‘There was a young lady from slough,
Who had a terrible cough,
dee didly dee
dee diddly dum
but he doctor said she’d pull through.’
If anyone knows the rest of this (the ‘dee diddly’ bits, in case you were wondering. They’re not how the poem really goes. That would be rubbish.) please let me know. It tickles me a lot.

Oh, there you go. Maybe it wasn’t a punchline after all. Or it would have been funnier. Or maybe that wasn’t it. I’ll think of something else. Probably during first-aid training tomorrow, and burst out laughing. Which would be inappropriate. Oh, sod it. I’m aff tae ma bed.

I’ve just been corrected. Apparently ‘deaths warm duck’ is not cute and little. He is 30-foot-tall and mean looking with a scythe.
And he smells.

Quite possibly the sweetest thing I’ve heard in a long time -
My new friend - an intelligent, hilarious woman - until she was about 28, thought that people under the weather described themselves as ‘death’s warm duck’.

The mental picture of the grim reaper and his pet, all wrapped up in a little ducky blanket, is almost too cute to bear.