Find happiness and joy in the things that usually make you upset or irritated…this is a hard lesson to learn but once you have learned  how to look at little irritating things differently your life will begin to change…. life will be a whole lot happier and take you one step closer to being deliriously happy……

Ann Marie(workingmoms) anessa.me

As I began my usual oration about “when I was young we used to play out”, I realised that maybe it wasn’t such a good thing to tell them that- we used to play out in the streets till it was dark- only going inside for food and water, on most days we would play in the woods behind our house, roaming miles away from our street and finding all sorts of weird and wonderful things- and sometimes people!! Only coming back to inhabited land when we heard the call from one of our Mums, or the batteries in our torches were dead and our night eyes weren’t working properly.

Kids these days aren’t allowed more than two feet away from the parents, and the thought of them being in an isolated area with no supervision is enough to bring on a seizure in most parents. Certainly not able to tell them that we used to play ‘knock-a-door run’ on our long suffering neighbours doors. Kids do that nowadays and they’re most likely to be greeted with a three headed Rottweiler and then a court summons to the parents from the noise abatement society.

We would spend the whole summer holidays being taken to the river by our highly irresponsible older cousins, and return to our homes covered in doc leaves from all the nettle stings, dripping from head to toe and in the first flushes of hypothermia from the freezing river water. We would build impossibly dangerous go-karts out of old boxes and wonky wheels, set up tightrope wires from the garden trees-not a safety net in sight and best of all, get a gang together and build HQ in the garden shed- amongst the lethal array of Dads power tools.

So when my kids go on and on- and on- about how boring my childhood must have been I nod and agree and smile to myself with the memories of all the things we were allowed to get up to- and safe in the knowledge that they’ll never know.

Kids these days- don’t know they’re born!!!

So I said I’d get the essentials- eggs, beans, bread and beef sausage- The Old man has to have beef- no he’s not a Muslim- his reasons for not eating pork are all to do with seeing a boil on a pigs leg when he was 12- yeah right!!

With no time to run down to Sainsbury’s I thought I’d try the local Halal shop. Surveying the meat counter with interest; looked nice and clean and the meat looked healthy. Two types of sausage were down in the bottom corner- one a highly suspicious looking thing that resembled a baby’s umbilical cord and a much more enticing pinkish one.

With not even a hint of a pig in the whole of the shop I confidently pointed at the pink sausage and said I’ll have some of those please. Not quite understanding what the shopkeeper said I nodded happily in my choice of sausage, and didn’t think twice when he began rolling up link after link of the fat chubby meat rolls. As the shopkeeper grinned and wrapped up the parcel he said £7.50- I nearly choked- “what” said I a bit louder than anticipated.”£7.50 for sausage”?. Too embarrassed to admit I didn’t know how much a kilo was, I happily took the £1.50 discount he offered me and hurried outside with the priceless chipolatas.

I left the Old Man cooking- brave I know- but duty called- whilst I picked up the 6yr old who sensibly ate at her friends.

On arrival home a gust of freezing cold air hit me- just before the revolting smell of old socks. There were the Old Man and the 11yr old sitting huddled under blankets back door and windows flung open to relieve the house of the smell of the richly priced sausage. Needless to say we didn’t attempt to taste them!

So if anyone out there wants a kilo minus a few beef sausage from the Halal shop- give us a ring. They’re going really cheap!!