Deja senti.

A recent episode of 'Brainiac', featuring an experiment to test the speed of smell, is the inspiration behind today's blog. If you've never seen this little TV gem, I'd urge you to watch it. Vic Reeves adds a healthy dose of 'Big Night Out' style humour, while co-presenter, Jon Tickle (ex Big Brother), explains the scientific theory. The show has been a source of inspiration for my children too, who run into the kitchen, when the end credits start to roll, and start mixing concoctions with cornflour or making 'volcanoes' out of vinegar and bicarb. The house ends up smelling like a back row chippy for days!

I conducted a little experiment of my own recently; on my son's Nike trainers. Rubbing bicarb into the shoes' inner linings, I was told by my friend (well versed in Kim and Aggies' trade secrets), would eradicate the aroma of ammonia. I'd blamed the putrid smell in my car on them, but the cause of that turned out to be 1lb of raw minced steak which had rolled under the passenger seat during the journey between butcher and fridge. It hid there quietly for 2 weeks, until it's odorant molecules began to murmur, then eventually shout out 'rotting animal!' Well, to be honest, I initially thought it was the trainers, but became convinced that a fish must have escaped its bucket the last time we drove home from a fishing trip. I blamed Pinky on both counts, and I was wrong. Rotten cow. Watchdog announced that Nike had conceded to selling trainers lined with a fabric prone to smelling of cat piss when damp. Not their words exactly, but you get the gist.

The smelly trainer situation remains unresolved as, to receive a replacement pair, I must show proof of purchase. Given that I have 4 months of bank statements, utility bills and tax returns strewn around benches and stuffed into drawers, just waiting to be filed, I fear we'll have to put up the smell of cat wee for a while longer. There is an upside to all of this. After the car mincident, I was forced to have it valeted. When it came back, I was greeted by the smell of Refreshers mixed with polish AND an envelope containing a card and £40 (from the mother-in-law) which had been rescued from a door pocket. Result.

I'm sure that if you'd choked on a Refresher as a child, the memory evoked by the smell of those fizzy sherbets would not be a sweet one. Just a whiff of Pernod takes me back to the night I decided to make my own cocktail of this sickly french pastis, orange cordial and cider (classy, I know). I'll spare you the consequences, suffice it to say that 20 years later, even a hint of aniseed can trick my gag reflex into action. Fried mushrooms, for reasons unknown, have a similar effect. My dad is afflicted with the same aversion to fungi, which he blames on a near 'death by mushroom soup' experience. I wonder if it's passed through the genes?


The jury's still out on whether or not my children have inherited my acute sense of smell, although they have used the sniff test to identify the owners of miscellaneous items of clothing, left at our house. Daniel's jumper had undertones of fried food and smoke, Andrew's t-shirt was a combination of Persil and Lenor Original and Joseph's reeked of eau de dog. My offspring also have the uncanny ability to sniff out my secret stash of chocolate.

I do wonder how my own home smells to other people. At the moment, visitors are greeted with wafts of Winter Spice which helps mask the slightly fishy smell emitted by the new leather sofa. I love the smell of leather - it reminds me of rummaging through bags, belts and purses in the back street shops of spanish towns - but smoked haddock is not so easy on the nose. When we come back from holiday and the house has had 2 weeks to reclaim its own smell, the woody scent is more discernible than ever. If I close my eyes, I can imagine the rooms as they were when we first fell in love with the house, 9 years ago. The smells of that era were baby wipes, nappy sacks, breast milk, danish oil, paint, wet plaster, new carpet and Perry Ellis 360 degrees.......happy smells that remind me of happy times.

For a brief time in the Moo household, the heartwarming aroma of freshly baked bread wafted around the kitchen. Back in the early noughties, I fancied myself as a bit of an Earth Mother, shopping for locally grown and reared ingredients to make healthy, balanced family meals, obsessively recycling, composting and taking pottery classes. The home-baking fad was short lived however, and the bread machine was relegated to the 'appliance mortuary', on a shelf shared with the electric juicer and deep fat fryer. These gadgets seem like a good idea at the time, but, quite honestly, the infrequency of their usage doesn't justify the amount of counter-top space they snaffle. Nowadays my bench tops are home to a mass of bills, statements, newsletters and a basil plant, whose fragrant leaves provide me with another happy smell.

Come to think of it, most of my happy smells involve food; Marshmallows, ginger, mandarin, cloves. Jo Malone, if you're reading this, I'd like to commission you to create a fragrance, containing all of the above, for me. A bottle of that for Christmas would make me one happy heifer!

What's Your Addiction?

I'm in a growing minority. Usually, I'd be proud to say that - I like to be different- but, in this instance, I have to admit to feeling ashamed that I'm still a smoker. There. I said it. I'm a nicotine junkie.

The first step in curing an addiction is to accept that it exists. I just never made it past the first step. Well, not for long anyway. Pregnancy provided a couple of periods of abstinence. I'd like to say that I developed will power for the sake of my unborn babies, but the truth is, my body made sure I didn't indulge my cravings by making the smell of smoke totally repugnant to me.

I tried reading Allen Carr's 'How to give up smoking the easy way'. I was sold by the adjective in the title and encouraged to keep reading as the opening chapter gave me permission to puff away as I digested the book's message. It promised that by the final chapter, I would be a non-smoker. I never read the final chapter.The stubborn ones amongst us know that it's no use telling us we must/should do/refrain from something. We like to work that out for ourselves and do it in our own time. In my case, it's usually at the last minute.

This approach to time management governs many of my actions..........depositing the children at school with 1 minute to spare (an improvement on last year when they ran to catch the end of their line of peers as it gambolled through the school doors), revising for exams, completing my VAT return, packing, arriving for appointments/flights/dates, getting out of bed........Much of this behaviour can be explained by my loathing of waiting around and fear of boredom. Reading between the lines, perhaps I'm subconsciously smoking my way to an earlier expiration date in order to avoid any potential boredom. I mean, it's all well and good living to the grand old age of 97, as long as you maintain at least a modicum of independence. Be that enough to pedal the coast to coast route, or simply the strength to wheel yourself away from the your fellow nursing home residents (or 'inmates' as my Nana fondly called them), huddled around Dickinson's Real Deal.

So, I've established that boredom is a factor in my unsociable habit. I have a busy mind and sometimes my hands need something to do, just to keep up. The Playstation I bought, to help me through one attempt to kick the habit, succeeded until I'd mastered the controls enough to be able to hold a cigarette and navigate Crash Bandicoot through the Egyptian tombs. I once imposed a daytime smoking ban on myself but, by occupying my fingers on the PC keyboard, I ended up with another, less obviously dangerous addiction. (more about that in a future blog)

I'm old and wise enough to know the things that push my buttons. My sister quit after a beauty therapist commented on how her skin was aging. Vanity isn't a big enough motivator for me. A friend used her fag fund to finance the Mini Cooper she'd set her heart on. My husband has curbed his craving by substituting the ciggies with some pills the doctor prescribed. No nasty side effects either, but I worry that because it seems so easy, I wouldn't feel the same level of achievement at the end of it. I'll live in hope that, one day, (preferably before I'm diagnosed with my fate) I'll find the thing that pushes my STOP SMOKING button. From Mad Cow Patter">

Bah Humbug or Ho, Ho, Ho?

Each day I can rely on at least one of my Facebook friends' status updates to make me smile. Today was Sam's turn with, 'Bah Humbug - I hate Christmas!'. I have to admire her honesty. The festive period is supposed to be a time of peace and joy, giving and loving - woe betide anyone who concedes to loathing it. After all, who wants to be likened to Scrooge?

I wonder what the Dickensian equivalent of neon lit cul-de-sacs with animatronic snowmen might have been. Was the average Christmas scene in those days as perfect as the one we now see nostalgically reproduced on cards . ( I say cards, but technically speaking, they're usually thick paper...... you know the type, the ones you receive from people, a) with no taste, b) who hate you c) who buy bumper boxes of assorted designs and run out of nice ones before they get to W in their address books). Chestnuts roasting on an open fire, skating on the frozen village pond, families playing parlour games in front of the freshly felled spruce..............

My contribution towards recreating this idyll for my own brood amounts to a family ticket for the outdoor, man-made ice-rink (curiously located in the gay quarter of town), M & S chestnut stuffing as an accompaniment to Christmas dinner, and an afternoon of parents vs kids on Wii Sport.

I tried to make my own chestnut stuffing once. Thought I'd find I use for the surplus conkers collected by the children and, in the process, almost poisoned everyone. Only a phone call to my mother in law, to ask advice on cooking methods, saved us from death by conker.

I always start the run-up to Christmas with good intentions and have even been known to buy the first of the presents as early as October. However, my smugness melts into free flowing panic when, with less than a week to go, I'm frantically posting season's greetings and trawling the 'net for suitable gifts.

For the last few years, I've been resolute that I would only send cards to family and friends too far away to visit. I think the downsizing of my Christmas card list occurred around about the same time I was forging my children's signatures on cards for their classmates. (58 in total) And their teachers. (2-3 per class)

I justify this decision by reminding myself that a worthy charity will benefit from my donation (it always amounts to more than I'd have spent on cards) AND a small part of the rain forest might be saved. Better still, now that my far-away friends have joined Facebook, I can save on stamps and post office queues by leaving my glad tidings on their virtual walls. If this trend continues, I fear the makers of Blu-Tack may come unstuck. Bah Humbug!

It's hardly surprising that, with 4 pints of Yorkshire blood flowing through my veins and a dad whose colleagues presented him with a Jewish skull cap as a symbol of his 'thriftiness', I'm becoming increasingly cynical at this time of year. 'Buy Bigger, Buy Better, Buy More,' we're urged. Those who do as they're told spill out, laden with Argos and Poundland bags, from the crowded malls. At least if the kiddies have their laptops/ games consoles/ mp3 players, they'll be occupied while the parents are out working to pay off the credit card sharks, cleverly disguised as Goldfish. Eee bahye gum-bug!

This year my children won't be unwrapping sledges and fluffy slippers on Christmas morning because snow and cold feet snow don't feature heavily in the Sunshine State. We'll be celebrating Baby Jesus' birthday with a dip in the jacuzzi, followed by a lunch of barbecued turkey legs and key lime pie. Ho, ho, ho!

Choose Life

No, I'm not about to extol the virtues of Katherine Hamnett's range ethical range of 100% organic cotton T-shirts, nor do I intend to recite the similarly named poem by John Hodge, made famous by Ewan McGregor.

It's quarter of a century since that slogan adorned the chests of neon bangle wearing Wham fans. It spawned a whole new generation of 80s propaganda. Thousands of us wore oversized T-shirts bearing Frankie's command to 'relax', yet how many knew which Frankie our fashion statements alluded to? Frank Sinatra was as relevant to teenagers in the 80s, as Frankie Goes to Hollywood is to a toddler today.

Fortunately, the connotations of relaxing 'when you wanna cum' are also lost on my 13 month old nephew, recently seen sporting a 'FRANKIE SAYS RELAX' top. He's more interested in relieving the recently decorated Christmas tree of its baubles. As fast as he pulls them off, I frantically strive to rehang them. Some onlooking diners smile wistfully, others tuck into their Sunday roasts, oblivious. The landlady shuffles nervously, presumably worrying about an impending law suit. Luckily we're out of view of my sister. Given that she firmly declined my offer sharing my lamb hotpot with her son, on the grounds that it was full of salt, I don't think she'll appreciate me risking his life by allowing him to explore a pub full of tables at toddler head height.

I return him to our table, unscathed, and after a glass of wine, I'm starting to do as Frankie says. It's Sunday and I'm surrounded by the family I love. The four cousins are playing happily, my husband has offered to drive and my dad is paying for the meal. I'm enjoying spending time with my niece and nephew but, at the same time, appreciating the fact that my own two children are now past the age of teething, nappies and stairgates.

I've heard stories of parents having mid-life crises when their offspring finally leave the nest, but for me, this state of uncertainty came about sooner than expected. Unlike many mothers, I'd looked forward to the day my youngest started school. I'd spent almost 5 years preparing her for it and was confident that she was ready to adapt to her new routine. I just didn't anticipate the transition being so difficult for me.

I was so excited about my new found freedom that I failed to anticipate the predicament ahead. All of a sudden I was faced with choices again. The overwhelming mixture of fear and excitement I feel, when forced to make decisions, reminds me of the pained expression worn by the sweet-shopkeeper as he bagged up my 30p mix-ups. I liked value for money, variety and a good ratio of chocolate:chews:junk, so it was never going to be a speedy process.