‘This is crazy,’ I said. ‘Surely you’ve done enough?’
But no. He had to finish. Then we hit another problem. The only printer in the house is attached to Adrian’s Mac laptop but said laptop is with Adrian in Wales (or it may be London by now, I’m losing track). So James attached his laptop (with half the keys missing) and tried to get it working. No joy. So I tried. Wouldn’t play ball. Yeah yeah, added new printer, checked all settings...the whole caboodle.
At this point, I was feeling like a Hindu deity with about eight arms thrashing wildly around... running him a bath, doing the washing, refereeing the evening dog skirmish, ignoring the phone, trying to fix the fecking printer. And, yeah, okay, so I was sort of online and listening to stuff about Libya on the radio as well. But really.
This isn’t an isolated incident either. Take the bloody Temple of sodding Jerusalem which hung like a....oh I dunno, hanging garden of Babylon or summat...over the entire half-term. I thought we’d got off lightly, having been right through junior school without having to construct anything larger than a Scottish croft.
‘I’m despondent about it,’ said James, despondently, when we came back from Wales.
‘Rubbish,’ said I, clicking on Google images, heart sinking fast. Except. Okay, so that looked vaguely do-able. Basically lots of cubes of various sizes interconnected by walls.
‘Let’s do it.’
'You're sure it is the Temple of Jerusalem, Mum?'
'Yeah, well, that's what it says on the tin. You're not doubting St Google?'
'Just that Timmy Bander built the mosque instead, and got a crap mark.'
Oops. And, really, what a dozo. Who'd go for a mosque (necessitating blowing up balloons) when you can do a nice straight-lined temple?
So build it we did. Papier mache and gold paint and all. And it wasn’t bad, if I say so myself. Until I went on Twitter in a sense of smug achievement.‘You wanna put on PVA glue and then sprinkle sand over it to add texture,’ said Lulu, veteran of many ancient edifices.
‘Ooh yes. And have you used modeling clay for the detailing?’ added Milla (she of the Temple of Diana and a mott and bailey castle). Detailing? What detailing? Feck off, my erstwhile friends. ;)
Actually I’d just sort of left James to it, muttering words of encouragement in an overseer-ish sort of way. Well, children have to learn, don’t they? My main contribution was to mix up a tasteful blend of Craig & Rose for the paint job. No Temple of Jerusalem is leaving this house in shabby old Dulux, no sirree.
Eventually it was done. ‘Damnit, that took forever,’ I said, heaving a sigh of relief and pouring myself another coffee.
‘Yeah,’ said James. ‘Three days, basically. My divinity teacher said it should take about an hour.’
WTF?
Dear teachers. Could I just beg you, when you’re dishing out prep, have a heart? Not just for the poor sprats that could do with at least half an hour’s downtime before bed, but for their poor demented, arm-thrashing parents.
