Hi, My Name is Antipo and I’m a Creative Swearaholic

You know you’re having a bad day when ten things have made you swear black and blue, and it’s not even 9 am…

1) I was so groggy when I woke up that I took the wrong asthma medicine - the one that gives me the shakes, so I normally only take it at bedtime. Oh shitty-shakey-shit!

2) My erstwhile best friend (pink grapefruit for breakfast) burned and stung me this morning, signalling the presence of a nasty, vindictive mouth ulcer. Buggery-fucky-poo!

3) One offspring threw a tanty when asked to clean a birdcage - he has no school for the next two months! Bollocky-cheeky-buggery! I’m going to find a HARD job for him to do every single day. Oh how I wish the chopping of wood was necessary to make the television function.

4) Another offspring got all sniffy when I tactfully suggested an artistic way of arranging the Maltesers on the cake for her end-of-school party. She wanted an elegant minimalist arrangement of just seven or eight Maltesers in the centre of the cake, but I insisted on adding enough so that every child in the class could have one. She accused me of being a soulless philistine, then cold-shouldered me all the way to school. Cheeky-pissanty-drama-queenness!

5) Tarty and vulgar woman in front of me in the queue at the bakery made my nostrils curl up and die with her vast cloud of cheap, toxic perfume. Slaggy-bitchity-toady-slime!

6) French Drivers Part One: Exaggeratedly loud traffic noises – impatient hooting, squealing brakes and aggressive revving of engines hurt my delicate ears on the way to work. Fucky-wanky-macho-shitheadedness!

7) French Drivers Part Two: A huge truck was blocking a narrow alley so completely that even we pedestrians couldn’t get past! Salty-ass-hat-moronitude!

8) Fabulous espresso cawfee machine at work has run out of cawfee beans. Outright vindictive prickdom!

9) Potential new client did not send his order form as promised. I now have only 24 hours in which to find two new clients in order to meet my monthly target. Bastardy-vile-arseholey-dankness!

10) Own attempt at writing light and humorous blog post has come out all bitter and twisted, hasn’t it? Silly-vapid-has-been-bitchness!

Ten Things That Made Me Smile in Paris On Saturday

1) Seeing The Lovely Gabrielle’s beautiful bijou appartement in Montmartre for the very first time. We chatted, giggled and shared our passion for singing Idol TV programmes for two hours solid!

2) Being adopted by Kody, Gabrielle’s deaf, yet dignified cat (it must have been the smell of canary on my hands that attracted him to me!)

3) Sipping mysteriously fruity Earl Grey, munching Custard Creams and Gingernuts (the real thing!), and leaving little crumbs on Gabrielle’s sofa as a memento of my passage. I hope she never forgets me.

4) Meeting up with The Three Ks: Katia , Kyliemac and Kim at the picturesque fountain on the place St Michel, only to discover Kim accosting the Duracell Bunny in public in a singularly vulgar manner that made me blush all over!

Originally uploaded by cutestmidget

Also, Kim came all the way from Normandy just to see me. The fact that she had business at the airport on Sunday has nothing to do with it.


5) Discovering that The Lovely and Naughty Mickelino, who used to be secretly in love with me, is now also secretly in love with many, many other blogging lovelies. We consequently renamed him Fickelino.


6) Learning that those three girls are even hotter and spicier than the burritos and margaritas we consumed. I got burned!


7) Accosting and smooching The Lovely Aussie Lass right in public,

Originally uploaded by cutestmidget

knowing that The Lovely Ms. Mac was stalking us by waiting breathlessly for instant photos sent from Katia’s mobile to her website.

8) Standing on various bridges across the Seine and shouting, waving, and almost showing our bosoms to various handsome strangers on the bateaux-mouches as they drifted past below. My middle name is Maturity. Being let off my domestic leash went completely to my head!


9) Singing Boom-Chicka-Wah-Wah! at the tops of our voices while Katia performed the Full-Body-Thrusting-Sexy-Jiggly-Dance



10) Wondering if too much fun could be hazardous to my health…

Originally uploaded by cutestmidget

Ode To The Hydrangea

(Ideally to be declaimed by myself, clad in dramatic red velvet gown, standing on pub table before adoring throng of spotty, anoraky eighteen year olds studying NZ Feminist Literature 101 and clutching their brandy, lime & lemonades).

Walking home from ballet class 10 pm, newly stretched and aching
During lull between violent pulsating rainstorms
Thunder and lightning have ceased, sky still light
Air vibrant and fresh, thrumming
Clouds part, revealing apricot streaked blue sky
At every garden I am accosted by massive, thrusting bushes of hydrangea
Bearing flowers of profoundest pink
I adore your proud, blowsy, rounded, kindred, womanly, fecund globes
I tremble before your slatternly, potent wantonness
Each tiny fleurette opens its female soul to mine
“In your face!” I whisper



Jesus Christ Almighty and gag me with a spoon – that must qualify as the most appallingly over-ripe tosh I have ever come up with.

I guess I must be ovulating.

Me? A Planner?

I’m hoping to spend a child-free day in Paris on Saturday and issued a general, yet highly personalised, invitation to my fave city-kid bloggie friends to join me for an afternoon of sleazy fun and high-brow, literary wit.

I am sad to report that eager answers have not been flooding in and causing my in-box to combust. (Aimee, Bloomie, Kyliemac, Pat and Beka, you know who you are! Vivi and Kim are excused on account of being geographically challenged. Wendz, you are forgiven because I know you would have bust a gut to meet me, but you are already going on a charity date with some Swiss-Australian floozie with a Scottish accent, and you can’t back out of it now, for fear of reprisals).

However, that Doll Face, The Lovely Aussie Lass, cancelled all her other plans and exterminated her current friends in order to fit me in! I’m hoping The Lovely and Delightful Adult Runaway, Gabrielle and The Naughty Frog With A Blog will also be able to squeeze me



(in).


Aussie Lass strangely asked me “What are your plans?” as if I were a well-known planner, or organizey-type, obsessive sort of personality. I answered thusly:

My Plans For Saturday

- take son to in-laws'
- eat delish French lunch
- get slightly drunk on good wine
- abandon son
- arrive in Paris, meet Doll Face (Katia) and assorted hangers-on
- get taken to China town
- buy green Thai curry paste
- gossip and giggle
- get cup of tea at 4 pm or turn homicidal
- accidentally empty wallet in English bookshop(s)
- eat Tex-Mex for dinner
- get very drunk on Coronas with lime
- more goss and gigg
- roll home in one piece or miss train and sleep on someone's sofa
- arise looking radiant and hangover-free.

That's not too ambitious is it?

Letter To The Lovely Doc

Hey Doc!

I had a warm and passionate imaginary conversation with you in my kitchen while making dinner last night! The double strength margarita I was sipping may have contributed to the smoothness of the convo...

It went like this:

Antipo: So I'm thinking of bringing stuffed mushrooms (garlic, parsley, breadcrumbs, crème fraîche) which are good finger food and taste fiiiiine at room temperature.

Doc: Yum!

Antipo: And how about two New Zealand pavlovas for dessert: one topped with kiwifruit (compulsory) and the other with my preciously hoarded tin of Watties' boysenberries?

Doc: Boysen-whats?

Antipo: Boysenberries! They are a cross between a blackberry, a raspberry and a loganberry. They're lovely, trust me.

Doc: A logan-what?

Antipo: Never mind. Here, have a sip of this.

Doc [slurp]: Mmm, the fresh lime juice is very piquant.

Antipo: And I'm also contemplating halving and stoning about twenty white nectarines, slipping a sliver of almond paste and a few pine nuts into the cavity, grilling them briefly and sprinkling them with rose water. These too are good served at room temperature and should be fairly easily transportable, if I place them on a tray, cover with plastic film, strap one of my children firmly to the back seat, attach the tray of nectarines to his or her thighs with double-sided masking tape and order the child not to move a millimetre upon pain of death, or discontinuation of pocket money for all eternity.

Doc: Yup. Sounds good. Ok, you're invited.

The Ten Things Meme

The Lovely Late Bloomer tagged me to do The Ten Things meme, and I’ve been racking my brians for something noteworthy about myself that I haven’t already splashed over the www. Naturally I immediately turned to my Soul Mate and Bloggie Muse for advice. The Lovely Ms. Mac was no bloody help whatsoever. She wrote: Everything about you is interesting, everything. I would simply refuse to do the meme, citing the fact that it's quite clear that you are interesting from everything you've ever previously written on your blog.

So, back to my own devices. My extensive brians-racking has thrown up (tee hee!) the following thoughts:

My cooking and birthday cakes are already globally famous. My helpless adoration of Ms. Mac is internationally noted. My extraordinary offspring’s every twitch and utterance are tediously documented on the Sweetness and Light blog. What else about me is left? I may have to delve deep into the dark and sordid underbelly of my personality… Here goes:

1) I sometimes wonder what exactly it would feel like to possess a penis. It’s not exactly a fantasy of mine, but I can - by concentrating very hard - imagine how it would feel, not only to possess one, but to play with it, get an erection and ejaculate. It’s utterly fabulous!

2) One of the best shags I ever had was on a canal boat in Lancashire (UK) with a leather-jacketed, motorbike-riding, shaved-headed Lothario named Brett. Ooh, but he was tasty. The earth may not have moved, but the boat certainly did!

3) If I’m ever brave (or foolish) enough to get a tattoo, it will incorporate a peacock, a sunshine and a calf. Hey, I didn’t say it would be pretty or stylish!

4) I clearly remember having sucked a little boy’s penis when I was only four or five years old. It was fairly innocent – no really! – I think I just wondered what it would taste like. He was my neighbour, we were showing each other our naughty bits and we also peed, giggling, into a plastic bucket in his bedroom for a dare.

5) As a little girl, I really wanted to be a librarian when I grew up. Especially during the winter. The thought of spending cold, rainy and windy winter days in the cosy library surrounded by books and perhaps clutching a mug of hot chocolate was my idea of heaven. It still is.

6) Scars and assorted badges of honour:

- chipped front tooth from falling off a horse;
- t-shaped scar in fleshy ball of my thumb from climbing over barbed wire fence when escaping from a Loch Ness monster (but in Karori, NZ);
-linear, but strangely hooked at one end, caesarean scar cunningly hidden by pubes;
- most recent scar: a delicate, trans-naval incision from laparascopic tubal ligation to prevent further procreation.

7) I was very arty-crafty as a little girl. My school friends and I all learned to sew, crochet, hook rugs, embroider and knit. For a while there was a craze for making chokers out of macramé and beads - hey, this was way back in the Seventies when manufactured clothes were relatively expensive! I wish I’d kept the chokers and belts, as they may well come back into fashion. Actually I think they did come back into fashion about ten years ago, but I blinked and missed it.

I was a champion calligrapher and would be a champion scrapbooker now if I didn’t have a job, children, blog, birds, mystifyingly dirty house and Evil Hubby to maintain. I might sell the children for medical experiments, thus allowing me hours of leisure time in which to do scrapbooking. The cold hard cash from the sale of said children would also enable me to buy the expensive materials required. A flawless plan indeed.

8) Hi, my name is Antipo and I’m a hyperbolic. My obsessive and all-consuming passion for hyperbole is not a recent affliction, as I discovered when I flicked through my teenage diaries. At the age of fourteen I complained about having to keep my radio whisper-quiet; the weather was atrocious when the temperature dropped to 8 degrees C; losing my pencil case at school was bloody awful and disastrous; winning two tickets from a radio station to see the Kurt Russell as Elvis movie was really exciting!!! and absolutely amazing!!!, the prospect of sorting out all the clothes and junk in my bedroom was terrifying.

I do it consciously for comedic effect now, but, in my youth it was entirely spontaneous. Ugh.

9) I will forever be cruelly torn between my deep and sincere love of Ferrero Rocher chocolates and my black hatred of picking the tiny chips of hazelnut from between my teeth after consuming them.

10) I am extremely brave in the face of dental pain. Actually I had no choice in the matter, as various dentists puzzled for years over my mysterious resistance to anaesthesia. Giving birth was a doddle compared to getting bridgework done.

One dentist (my favourite!) finally figured out that my body does not contain the correctly shaped receptors to enable absorption of the molecules of regular anaesthesia. He ordered a special anaesthesia just for me, which happily arrived in time for the root canal he performed upon me.


Can I go to (11)? Many thanks.

11) Have already described my exotic South Sea birth, but will cheat and post it again for my newer readers.

I squirmed and squealed my way into the world on 20th February 1965 in the throbbingly tropical South Sea paradise of Suva, Fiji. You always suspected there was a touch of the international woman of mystery about me, didn't you? I was around two weeks overdue, and that turned out to be a very good thing. Draw closer little ones, while I tell you an exciting story.

My parents lived in Matavatacou (Tailevu Province), some 40 miles from Suva. At my due date a hurricane washed away the bridge on the only road into Suva and the maternity hospital. But, by the time my mother actually went into labour, two weeks late, the bridge had been rebuilt! Was that a very early flash of brilliance on my part, I wonder? Could I have possibly sensed that I should stay in my deluxe amniotic hotel just a little longer, thus saving my mother's life, and my own?

My poor mother suffered a long and difficult labour and I had to be pulled out with forceps eventually, amid spectacular gore and suffering. My infant self was temporarily paralysed all down my right side and I still have prominent veins in my right eyelid as a badge of honour that even today I like to show off as a conversation starter at elegant parties. My poor Mum had to have vast quantities of industrial strength stitches. If it's any consolation Mum, I still feel really bad about this. I can't help wondering if, about 14 or 15 years later, you compared the pain of those stitches to the pain of the teenage antics I inflicted upon you...

I Love You Ms. Mac (again)!

In response to my pointing out this amusing typing error:

"This increase occurs despite India's lower import requirement; it mainly results from the higher import requirement for North Africa, as well as higher imports needs in the EU, Central America (particularly Mexico, where imports in 2006/2007 slumped due to the decline in US availabilities), and the Middle Easy (Iraq). "

Stella replied:

"If there's a Middle Easy, does that mean there's a Top Easy and a Bottom Easy? I'm definitely Top easy...... Middle Easy is boring. Bottom Easy is fun but it gets you a reputation. "



Is she not the cat's whiskers of Comedic Effect? Someone give this woman a chat show! Hell, give her the presidency!