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Good idea. I will start on the list now.
Two minutes later
This is my list:
Practise not being mad.
10:35 p.m.
Mum brought Bibbs into bed with me. She was asleep, still clutching her swimming goggles and snorkel. She was also clutching the statue of Our Lord Jesus, or Sandra, as he is now called in his Barbie frock and make-up. He is Libby’s new best “fwend”. I looked at Bibbs in the half-light in my bedroom. She is so sweet when she is asleep. Her little eyelashes are long and curly and her mouth all pouty and pink. I cuddled up to her, and she turned over in her sleep and put her little arms round me. Ooooohhhhh. I said softly, “Night-night, my little sister. I love you.”
And she said sleepily, “Night-night, Ginger. I lobe you.”
Ooohhh. At least she loves me.
Then she whispered, “Ginger, I poo my jimjams, oh dear.”
Midnight
After emergency removal of my pooey sister, I eventually snuggled down into my bed of pain alone. Not entirely alone because there is a bit of a residual pong and Sandra/Jesus is still in bed with me.
2:00 a.m.
Woke up from a dream.
I dreamt that I had a conversation with Jesus. He had the hump because he didn’t like his frock and he said his lipstick didn’t suit his complexion. It brought out the orange in it.
I wonder if it is a message from my subconscious that I must be more religious?
Monday June 20th
8:00 a.m.
The Portly One (Vati) yelled up, “Georgia, up NOW! You’ve got five minutes to get your bum down here.”
Oh, he is so crude. And how dare he take my bum’s name in vain?
My delightful little sister unexpectedly burst into my room to collect Sandra. She was wearing a see-through plastic Pacamac and some tiny tiny pants that she must have had when she was a baby. Or, more likely, she has nicked them from a poor unfortunate child at playschool. I must tell Mutti to remind the mothers not to leave their toddlers unattended when Libby’s around. She came over, quite slowly because the tiny pants were making her walk with small steps, got into bed with me and grabbed Our Lord and started to cuddle him.
I said, “I’m getting up for school now, Bibbs.”
She said, “Snuggle buggle.”
We had a bit of a cuddle and I kissed the top of her head. Is it normal to be able to snack on Rice Krispies from your little sister’s head?
Mutti came bustling in wearing a costume designed for a teenage prostitute. “Georgia, GET UP! It’s ten past eight. You’ll be late.”
I said, “Late for what? Six hours of misery at Stalag 14 being tortured by the Hitler Youth, followed by twelve hours of extreme boredom and starvation at home?”
She didn’t even listen. She said, “Don’t be so silly. You are such a drama queen.”
Is everyone’s life like this?
Cleaning my tushy pegs
Ten minutes later
I wish it was Friday and I could just get it all over with. Masimo comes round and says, “I am sorry, Georgia, I cannot be your one and only one. How do you say in English language? Ah, yes… so long, loser. Loser, loser, double loser, snap snap get the picture?”
Then I could just go back to being ordinarily bored and depressed.
One minute later
I grabbed a piece of toast from the kitchen to ward off death. Angus was happily chewing on something in his basket. He is better fed than me.
On the way out of the front door I heard Mum screeching like a banshee. “Bob, Bob, that horrible furry thing is eating my tights. Stop him, stop him!!! Trap him with that chair!”
Then I heard some crashing and Dad shouting and cursing. Mum hadn’t finished: “Of course you haven’t broken your leg, Bob. Anyway, never mind about that, get him… Oh bugger, now he’s in the laundry room. Oh dear God, he’s doing a poo in the ironing. That is it! They are going, they are going!!!”
8:40 a.m.
Jas was on her wall with Tom when I puffed up the hill. They were looking at something in a brown paper parcel. Jas was talking in a really silly girly voice that she uses when Hunky is around. I swear to God she will be developing a lisp soon. Pathetic. She went, “Ooooooohhh, Hunky, that is soooooo interesting. Look at this, Georgia.” And she held out the brown paper bag.
There was a newt in the bag. How beyond the Valley of the Really Quite Mad and entering the World of the Certifiably Bonkers is that?
Jas said, “It’s got very unusual markings. I’m taking it into Biology to show Miss Baldwin.”
I said, “Yeah, good idea. Crawler.”
But she didn’t even notice that I’d called her a teacher’s botty-kisser because she was so busy being an idiot around her boyfriend.
Tom left us at the corner to go off to college. As he kissed her on her cheek, Jas was fiddling with her fringe so much that I thought she’d had sudden onset of rampant disco inferno dancing. At last they parted. But only after she had blown kisses at him and then he had to pretend to catch them and blow them back for about two trillion years.
She was completely lost in Jasland. “Oh, it is so so so so nice to have him back.”
I said, “Is it nice to have him back then?”
But she didn’t get it. She just started again. “Oh yes, it is so so so so nice to have him back. I could never not have a boyfriend; it would be so sad. Imagine not having a boyfriend. Oh, actually, I suppose you can imagine not having a boyfriend.”
What a cow she can be. I didn’t hit her because I think violence is wrong, and also she was walking too quickly for me to kick. I just said, “You are a very caring person, Jas. It’s almost uncanny how empathetic you are.”
“I know – do you know what? Sometimes it’s like I can actually read Tom’s thoughts.”
“Really, you mean when he’s looking at you and not saying anything, and yet you know what he is thinking?”
“Yeah, like that.”
“Yes, I could read his thoughts today too when he was looking at you.”
“Really?”
“Yes, it was quite clear he was thinking, Hey, I’ve accidentally got a prat for a girlfriend.”
Hobbling into Stalag 14
I’m not speaking to Jas. She is vair violent. I may have to go to a support group for victims of friends’ violence. UNPAL (United Kingdom’s Network for Protection Against Loonies).
Assembly
I am at the far end of the Ace Gang lineup next to Rosie. Not in my usual position next to Mad Dog Jas. She has given Ellen, Jools, Mabs and Ro Ro Midget Gems from her secret stash, but I don’t care because I am giving her my cold shoulders. She’s only got a boyfriend in the first place because of my excellent stalking skills. If it wasn’t for me, she would still be Mrs Sad on the shelf of life.
One minute later
Like me.
Oh God.
Even Rosie doing her shoulder disco dancing during “Jerusalem” failed to work its usual magic. Although when she sang, “And was Jerusalem builded here amongst these dark satanic pants”, I did snap and join in with the laughing attack the Ace Gang had. We had to be shuussshed by the Hitler Youth.
Slim, our beloved elephantine headmistress, was in full jelloid mode. She was wearing an unusually attractive jumper in canary yellow. It must have taken at least ten sheep to make it. When she loses her rag she trembles all over. But each bit trembles independently. Chins, jowls, basoomas. If there was such a thing as jelly wrestling, she would be top at it.
One minute later
Oh, drone on. Yawn yawn. What was she talking about?
“…No loitering without intent in the loos… In my day you were lucky to get a shoe to live in… Only nineteen more days to go till our production of Macbeth – I hope you’re all telling your parents about it…” Blah blah blah. As if.
Then through the dark mists of boredom like a hearing-eye dog I heard my name mentioned. As I drifted back into consciousness I heard her say, “Georgia Nicolson and Rosie Mees to see me in my office immediately after assembly.”
Oh dear God, what fresh hell?
I looked at Rosie and she looked back. I shrugged my shoulders, she shrugged back. I looked at the Ace Gang and shrugged my shoulders and they shrugged back. (The Ace Gang, I mean, not my shoulders. I don’t mean my shoulders have a shrugging life of their own.)
What have we done?
As we were walking out in a Winter Wonderland of shrugging, Hawkeye appeared from nowhere like the Bride of Dracula and barked out, “Stop that shrugging!”
I said to Rosie, “Now shrugging is a capital offence, apparently. Don’t accidentally shake your head, for God’s sake.”
Outside Slim’s office
Ten minutes later
In the waiting room of fear there are Rosie and I and a couple of scaredy first formers playing with their pigtails. Oo-er. Ro Ro said, “Do you remember when the Bummer twins had a pigtail-cutting extravaganza?”
Ah, the Bummers. Jackie and Alison. They had taken bullying to new heights before they were expelled for shoplifting. There was for instance their famous using of first formers as armchairs. And in a particularly inspired moment they had actually superglued one of the little titches to a bench. In their pigtail campaign they used to snip off bits of first formers’ pigtails as they passed by and then hang them on their havvies like scalps.
Rosie said, “I wonder what has happened to the Bummers?”
I said, “Prison with a bit of luck.”
Two minutes later
Slim had the scaredy little ones in first. They came out about five minutes later all red and crying and hiccupping. I gave one of them a snot rag and asked, “What did you do?”
Ginger titch said, “We… we… drew a picture of a vole with a… a… bra on… on the blackboard in… in… blodge.”
I said, “Well done, girls, keep up the good work; we are relying on you.”
Rosie slapped them both on their backs, a bit hard actually. I thought their lungs might shoot out. She said, “Goodus workus, smallus idiotus.” And they went off looking really pleased.
I said, “I like to think they look up to us as examples of womanhood.”
And Rosie said, “Yes, but what you have to keep in mind is that you are bonkers.”
Then we heard our beloved leader shout out, “Come.”
Here we go. A duffing up for something that we quite clearly have not done. Whatever it is.
Slim was scribbling away at her desk. The chair she must have been sitting on (unless she was levitating) was completely hidden from view by her jelloidness. I wonder if she has a specially reinforced chair? There is probably a specialist circus furniture shop where she gets her requirements. Imagine the size of her bath! Oh nooooo, now I’ve got a nuddy-pants Slim in my head!
Slim finally looked up.
What had we done?
“I am returning these to you.”
Wow, this was a turn up for the book! And she handed me a bag. It was the bison horns!!! The return of the bison horns! Yesss! The horns brought back especially from Hamburger-a-gogo land for the Ace Gang. I fondled the horns and thought back to when I had first worn them riding a bucking-bronco bar stool in Gaylords while Rawhide played. Let no one say that the Hamburgese have given us no culture besides Elvis. In fact, as I have said many times to those who will listen (i. e., no one), we have a lot to thank our tiny American chums for – mostly things beginning with “h”: hamburgers, hillbillies, howdy doody, er… horns and so on.
Slim was still rambling on. “Now I like a joke as much as the next person, but there is a time and a place, and wearing bison horns during German is not the place. Ironically, you two are quite bright girls, but you waste your talents on silliness. You won’t get a job as a silly person, you know.”
I didn’t say “Miss Wilson has” because, as Slim says, there is a time and a place for everything and time waits for nomads, etc.
I was pleased to have the horns back and it made me think quite kindly about Slim. She isn’t such a bad old huge elephantine thing, really. When we got to her door to go, I did think about pretending to be a hilarious alien like in Doctor Who and saying, “I offer you my mandible in peace.” But then I thought, er, no.
German
Herr Kamyer seems to have accidentally come to work dressed as a twit. His trousers are so short they are bordering on the Bermuda shorts area of legwear. And there is never an excuse for wearing a sleeveless jerkin with diamond patterns all over it. Even if you have been brought up on a diet of spangleferkel.
I stared at him. He was quite literally a sight for sore eyes. If you looked at him, he gave you sore eyes. He can always be relied on to come up trumps in the twit arena. He blinked back at me. “Guten morgen, Georgia and Rosie.”
We clicked our heels together and said, “Jawohl Kommandant.”
I sat next to Rosie in our comfy seats on the back row. In some of our lessons we are not allowed to sit together for some mad reason that escapes me. Something to do with attention deficit disorder. I got out my chuddie and settled down on my arms to have a little zizz. But I could feel mad beadies looking at me. I opened my eyes. It was Jas. Just looking at me. Look all you want, Miss Looking at Me Person. She soooo wanted to know why we had been to Duffing Up Headquarters and come back looking so pleased. But she will be the last to know anything about me now.
Fifteen minutes later
It is impossible to get a decent sleep in German – you just drift off and the shouting begins. It’s all Achtung! or Schnell! and Raus raus! and more Spangleferkel! Cor blimey. I was awake now, so I might as well do something. I got the horns out. I nudged Rosie awake and said, “Look at my lap.”
