Showing posts with label Clare. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Clare. Show all posts

Friday, 27 February 2009

Preamble for a Pram

We're off to Hull tomorrow to get a pram.

Did I mention that I'm going to be a dad? Oh, it seems I didn't. Well, Clare's pregnant and our baby is due in April, so that's why we're off to Hull tomorrow to get a pram.

The reason why I didn't mention this monumental, life-changing, most-important-thing-to-ever-happen-to-me-in-my-life event any sooner than this is because I wanted to tell people about it in person. By the time I finally got around to doing that, however, Clare had already started a pregnancy blog. She's doing such a damn fine job of it that I felt somewhat ill-equipped to discuss our shared experiences on here. Instead, I decided to stick to the subjects I know best, namely, popular culture, low humour and saucy limericks.

The reason why we're going to Hull to get a pram is because we bought it from someone on Ebay who lives in Hull. It's a long way to go to get a pram, I guess, but it does give me the chance to revisit my old stomping ground. I spent three very-fondly remembered years at Hull University, so tomorrow will give me the opportunity to give Clare and Lily a guided tour of my past. No doubt I'll still be writing blog posts about it six months from now.

Anyway, the pram is a black Quinny Buzz and it looks something like this:


As Clare observed, it has "a certain Batmobile-ness about it..."

Being somewhat clueless when it comes to babies, prams and most practical matters, I was surprised to discover that the Quinny Buzz isn't just an ordinary pram: it's a pram that can change into a pushchair. That's impressive - to me, at least. A pram that can change into a pushchair, a pushchair that can change into a pram. I didn't know that sort of thing was possible.

I've already started calling it 'Optimus Pram'.

Sunday, 10 August 2008

What Clare Did

My gorgeous girlfriend Clare has a blog. You can find it here.

I guess that means I'd better behave myself.

Sunday, 18 May 2008

The Howling

So there I was, sitting on the sofa last night with Clare by my side, indulging in a late night telephone conversation with Brother Younger. The conversation was predictably unpredictable, a tangential soup that included Napoleon Bonaparte's exile on St Helena, the inherent wankiness of certain city centre bars and the amount of facial hair in the film Iron Man (which, we agreed, was one of the most heavily-bearded Blockbusters in recent memory).

For some reason - God only knows why - we moved onto the topic of John Hughes' films. Rob was a bit confused by the term, so I endeavoured to clarify matters: "Y'know - those classic Teen comedies from the 1980s. The stuff we grew up with. Ferris Bueller's Day Off, The Breakfast Club, um, St Elmo's Fire..."

"Pretty in Pink," added Clare, helpfully.

"Oh yeah," said Rob. "All that Brat Pack shit."

"That's right," I said defensively but somewhat inaccurately. "Y'know, Emilio Estevez, Rob Lowe, Ally Sheedy, Molly Ringwald..."

"That guy from The Hitcher. Who was the guy from The Hitcher?" asked Rob, instinctively launching into a new tangent spiral.

"The one who wasn't Rutger Hauer?"

"That's right," said Rob. "Or Sean Bean."

"That's what's his name," I said, unhelpfully. "Y'know, thingie. He was in The Outsiders..."

"They were all in The fuckin' Outsiders," said Rob.

"It's on the tip of my tongue," I said. His first name is an initial..."

"F. Scott Fitzgerald? J. Edgar Hoover? J. Jonah Jameson?"

"No," I snarled, "and it's not L. Ron Fuckin' Hubbard?, either! It's C. Thomas Howell!"

And that's when Clare sharply jammed a finger knuckle between two of my ribs and I made a somewhat undignified noise. I shot her a perplexed look.

"I just wanted to see Thomas howl," she said.