RM column May 9th - Turn that down

Parts of this you may have read before, sorry about that.

RM Column May 9th - Turn that down

Saying teenagers make a lot of noise is nothing new but I have to say the Young Wan has been taking things to new decibel levels lately between her mobile phone, her new ipod and of course the auld stalwart, her music system in the bedroom.

I am being driven nuts. I am actually boring myself saying ‘turn that down’, well actually it gets to the point where I end up roaring ‘TURN THAT DOWNNNN’.

Like most teenagers her mobile phone has become an extension of her hand and she seems to be constantly texting with the very irritating and constant noise of her hitting the number pad.
The straw that broke the camel's back recently was the all-evening click, click, click, click, click, click of her two-handed teenage texting and it began to grind on my nerves. Between the clicking and the tinny sound of her ipod I told her to 'gowan away and play in your room and give my head a bit of peace'.

I have to say that I didn’t think I would ever be saying that to her again, I thought that had passed around the time she stopped playing with dolls.

When she is at home there is a steady noise level in the house normally going on in all four corners, not to mention the obvious drain on the national grid and my wallet. You can bet the music will be left on in her room, the tv is probably tuned to a music channel, the radio will be on in the kitchen, meanwhile she’ll be listening to the ipod and texting.

She appears to be incapable of doing dishes without loud music, loud enough to drown out the telly.

You find yourself saying that she must be nearly done just leave her to it, but like a slow and steady irritation all of a sudden it creeps up on you and you break before yelling about loud music and how it can be heard all over the street.

She will turn it down then leave it a couple of minutes before slowly and surely turning up the volume slowly. This is another one of those occasions where you wonder if your offspring think you stupid and incapable of realising what they are at. Then the yelling ‘turn that music DOWN’ starts again and so the cycle starts afresh.

That has been bad enough but I recently bought her a new ipod and unlike the other one she had I have not been able to turn the volume down on it.

Ipods allow you to set a higher level for the volume on your computer, this means you can set how loud the ipod can be played at which is great in terms of trying to protect hearing from damage.

On another and more selfish level I want to turn down the volume because the level she has it at sometimes can be heard from another room with two doors closed and the television on; still somehow the tinny noise of the player is audible.

It’s funny though because I will give out yards about the noise yet when she isn’t at home you miss it. But don’t tell her I said that.

RM colum May 1 - Closing Doors

RM column May 1 - Closing doors

SOME of you will remember that we have moved recently from a small, cramped and totally inadequate two-bedroom(ish) flat we lived in for far too many years. We have gone from cold, drafty, old and nearly dilapidated accommodation to a snazzy, warm, well-maintained and newly decorated two-bedroom cottage and we love it.

I don’t know whether it is down to a manic-amount of washing machine loads, the thrill of having a washing machine still has not waned and when we first moved in I would say every item we possess has been washed, but our electricity bills have been too high for my liking. As a result I find myself pulling out plugs on phone charges, turning off lights, turning off the electric shower at the main when not in use and saying things that would make my Dad proud.

Things like ‘it is like Piccadilly Circus in here’ in reference to the fact that every conceivable light has been switched on in the house. My Dad said that to us all the time when we were kids and I laughed out loud the first time I heard it pass from my lips.

One of the other amazing things we have gained since moving has been cupboard/storage space.
Now I can buy the more economic bulk items because we have places to store them. For years I was unable to do anything like that, there just wasn’t the room to put it anywhere in the last place.

The funny thing is we have twice as many cupboards in the kitchen than in the previous flat and somehow, God knows how, the stuff I had somehow has filled up the twice as many cupboards with little room to spare.

I have no idea how that happened because I took the opportunity to cull so much during the move, yet somehow my kitchen stuff has reproduced with a population explosion spreading to filling out all the available space.

It would also appear that we have a poltergeist because every time I walk into the kitchen all the cupboard doors are open, so I close them all up again.

This happens a couple of times a night, of course the poltergeist is a 16-year-old who seems to find the closing of doors abhorrent. The battle cry at night time when she goes to her bedroom is ‘shut the door after you’ or ‘this isn’t the star ship Enterprise’ or ‘were you born in a hospital with revolving doors?’ so I suppose it makes sense this ‘born in a field’ mentality follows through to the kitchen as well as her bedroom.

One of the worst things about the other flat was the fact that the first thing you saw when you walked in was her room in all its filthy glory. Now you see into her room as you leave the house and straight into the outrageously messy build-in wardrobe in her room.

Whether I like it or not, the cupboard pulls me like a siren (without the pleasure of course) and before I know it I am tut-tutting at how messy her new room is.

So I offered her a little advice last night, if you even want to pretend that your room isn’t the cess-pit that it is, either close the bloody door or at the very least close the wardrobe door. Then I won’t get pulled in and what I don’t know what hurt me. However I think that is being too sensible so for now I will just keep closing doors.

RM colum April 24 - Bullying

Just going to post up some columns, I'm somewhat behind.

RM column April 24 - Bullying

An OECD survey which is the largest ever conducted in Ireland and researching students’ performance in particular subjects uncovered a staggering 43 per cent of 15 year olds who said they were bullied during the school term in which the survey was carried out.

The bullying part of the survey was not the main leaning as to why the survey was carried out but obviously stood out as something very important that needs to be attended too immediately.
Most parents will be very concerned by these findings and despite the high profile campaigns around bullying the problem seems to be getting worse.

The Young Wan has had her own experiences of this with ex-friends who mounted a vicious and constant attack on her through her bebo pages and on the phone. One of the things that struck me about it at the time was the complete and utter ferocious cruelty in their actions.

Fair enough that they didn’t want to be friends with her anymore, they are teenagers and will drift in and out of friendships but their behaviour around it was just plain wicked.

Personally I was quite happy the friendship was gone with this gang. While I witnessed some of their behaviour I was completely thrown when they constantly rang our house with nonsense messages. We both laughed at most of them until I heard one that made me stop in my tracks. This particular message said that they hoped she died.

The Young Wan was getting more and more upset and I wouldn't let her answer the phone. While she was trying to be brave and handle it herself, thats my job. At the very least she watched me deal with the calls and at various points she even managed to laugh out loud at my side of the conversation. I felt this was important, that somehow I was taking the power those horrible kids had over her and helping her cope with it.

I found it startlingly that they didn’t care that they talked to me, instead they put on dopey Belfast accents trying to imitate me as brazen as you like. They knew I knew who they were so my tact at the end was to keep them on the phone to waste their credit while saying nothing. No point in adding oxygen to their bullying fire.

For the day or so during the climax of their relentless bullying campaign the Young Wan walked around the house holding her tummy complaining of stomach pains. She was dreadfully unhappy and I loathed seeing my normally happy and bubbly daughter like that. Were all these incidents related, you bet they were.

As they were not friends/ex-friends from school, I couldn’t go through the school but I did approach the parents of one of them who were wonderful and supportive and talked to their child. It didn’t stop completely at that moment but petered out over the following days and by that stage herself was less affected by it. Since then the ringleader has apologised and wanted to be friends again. Thankfully the Young Wan has more sense and while accepting of his apology she now knows the cut of their gib as they say and won’t be going there again.

Do I think those lads wanted something bad to happen to herself? Mostly I don’t, but if anything had happened to her, I would have bayed for their blood and would have probably had to be restrained from killing them myself; I saw the effects in the Young Wan to their behaviour and would have happily kicked them up and down the road.

There seems to be a bit of a mob-mentality about it all and little empathy. That’s one thing that I hope I have instilled in herself; being considerate of other people. She may be my princess but I want her to treat people with the respect they deserve.

I think it is very easy to bully now. We have seen how people react on the internet, in fact there is a wonderful cartoon explaining just how over the top people behave, which you can see by going to this link.

While the cartoon is humorously done, the message is the same people lose all sense of manners and decorum on the internet and I would not be surprised if some/a lot of the bullying has been carried out on bebo and by texting. It is easy for messages in these mediums to read worse than intended or easily misconstrued, it is also easy to lose the run of yourself and possibly overreact and become aggressive in ways you wouldn’t in real life.

Now it is time for more to be done to tackle this problem, children are suffering, their education is suffering and in many cases the mental (and physical) scars will remain with them throughout adulthood.

Offenders need to realise the impact of their actions and more must be done to penalise those behaving in this way. Schools must be given the right tools to deal with it, it is clear from this survey that despite everything that is happening in schools to tackle bullying it is clearly not enough.

RM colum April 4 - Picking the Leaving

RMcolumn April 4 - Picking the Leaving

THE TIME has come for the Young Wan to pick her subjects for the Leaving Cert. As important as this is the preparations into it all feels a bit hit and miss to be honest. Aside from the fact that reaching this stage is urrghh, I can already feel the pressure of LEAVING CERT EXAMS starting to rear their ugly head.

I found the pressure of the Junior Cert dreadful and it was only once it was all over that I was able to give a half sigh of relief, the full sigh didn’t come until the results arrived in September. And the thought of two more years of constant fretting about how much work the Young Wan is or isn’t doing leaves me absolutely cold.

Of course the Young Wan was also under pressure but at times you wouldn’t have known it at all.

So now we are at the choosing the subjects stage and the proceedings were kicked off with a parents meeting in the school during the week.

Oh God don’t get me started on parents meetings; the fact that they are held during the day is one of the most ridiculous and lazy things I have ever heard in my life. I have the utmost respect for teachers, I think they have a very hard job, but take a fecking night and talk to parents, believe it or not some of us work and believe it or not it can be hard to get time off work to attend this things.

And in some cases I am quite sure if a parent can’t make it there would be some who think they are not interested in their child’s education.

The Young Wan’s parent teacher meeting this week started at 12.30, so I was in work a couple of hours before I had to leave. It was due to finish at 3.30pm so it is not even a full morning or a full afternoon, it was half and half meaning that I was only in work for about two hours that day as there seemed little point in trying to head through all the traffic to get back into work for the last hour/half-hour.

I am lucky that I am allowed the time to do this, flash back to a couple of years ago and another work place and that would not have been an option at all.

Anyhoo back to the meeting; we sat there as each teacher got up and in English and Irish and explained about each of the subjects.

“Biology is the study of living things…” When I heard that or something similar, I thought ‘shoot me now’ but I sat on and listened to all the different subject descriptions, how much work they have to do and then my ears pricked up at the mention of a lottery.

All the chosen subjects have been placed into three lines with about three subjects in each. Each student has to pick one from each line but nothing is guaranteed. So far two of her preferred subjects are on one line ruling one of them out. That in itself was bad enough, but I understand that.

However it turns out because so many kids are in her year there will be a lottery for some of the subjects. And most of the year seem to be leaning towards biology which is one of the Young Wan’s best subjects and now she will be competing in some nonsense lottery and may not be able to take her best subject!

I understand the school is understaffed and doesn’t have enough teachers to cover all the subjects but if she doesn’t get subjects she has more interest in and is better at I will seriously be re-evaluating whether or not she can stay at that school.

After all surely it is also in the school’s interests to have their students get the highest results they can, but maybe that just makes complete and utter sense to me. I’ll keep you posted…

RM column March 28 - Fashion Full Circles

RM column March 28 - Fashion Full Circles

IT IS funny how fashions come back around. Back in the 1980s when I was a teenager I would have never thought that flares would come back, they were the ultimate bad taste item from the 1970s; how on earth would anyone ever want to wear them again.

Then I thought the same thing when standing in a train station in Manchester in the late 1980s and saw some teenagers walking by in some crazy flared trousers, I couldn't help myself I laughed out loud. They were back, and with vengeance and are still to be seen in one shape/style or another how many years on from their come back.

Of course there are lovely things that come back, such as the sleek and sexy 1940s or parts of the hippy 1970s but at some stage everything comes back, no matter how much we think it never will. Who would have ever thought the 1980s was a fashion time that would be revisited with all those garish colours, back-combing and shoulder pads; yet we have seen puff ball skirts and some of the worse things being recycled in the noughties.

Some of it looks even better than it did 20 years ago, some of it is well eh better consigned to the wardrobes of the past.

From slagging me as a bit of a hippy in my teens, the Young Wan has gone turnabout and now there have been loads of clothes I see the Young Wan go mad over which I had worn something similar as a youngster.

Over Christmas Nanny bought the Young Wan a waistcoat which was practically identical to one I had in years ago. I had many at different stages and the one the Young Wan has came from a man's suit just like my favourites did.

We went even further. From I was 13 to eh a near grown up, the most coveted item of clothing was a man's tuxedo jacket. My pal had a fantastic silk jacket, it was black with this beautiful navy silk lining and we all borrowed it at some stage or another.

You never felt cooler hitting the town than when wearing this jacket.

So now the Young Wan has the waistcoat, all she needs is the tuxedo jacket and we would be like twins at the same age.

She hasn't worn the waistcoat yet because she was waiting to get a large white shirt to wear under it. But she came in with one tonight. She also came in with skin-tight black and white pinstripe jeans and coloured hair extensions.

During the hour and a half it took her to get the dishes done, she had back-combed her hair madly, put in the green, electric blue and pink extensions; and I can't help but think when she gets the waistcoat and shirt on she will look just like Russell Brand, a female red-headed version. She is better looking of course, but still she will look like Russell Brand. I'm eh so proud.

RM column February 22 - Work Experience

RM column February 22 - Work Experience

THIS week the Young Wan has been doing work experience as part of Transition Year and is doing it with the Irish Family Planning Association (IFPA).

Part of me cringes at the thought and part of me thinks it is brilliant. It is not as if there are things that she will learn that I wouldn’t want her to I have always tried to be honest and open with her.

My cringeness is more to do with the fact that she is 16 and I do not want to admit that she is a young woman, she is still my baby but growing up fast.

Her work experience is also testament to how far we have come that her Catholic convent school allowed her to do her work experience there. And she is not the only one a pal of hers a fella is also doing it.

The things they are learning could well put them off sex and bodies for life.

The Young Wan saw the equipment needed for a smear test the other day and came home horrified saying when she grew up she would never have a smear test. I told her that all women must have smear tests but remember don’t cough or you’ll break yourself! After laughing at her even more horrified face I told her the truth that smears are not nice but necessary and they don’t hurt but are uncomfortable more because of the nature of it than how it feels.

Then they had to update the IFPA’s Bebo page and a pamphlet about periods, the fella cringed and repulsed from start to finish but fair play to him and the Young Wan who both seem to be taking this all very maturely while doing their best.

Our conversations in the house this week have been colourful to say the least, lots of talks about STIs (sexually transmitted infections), pregnancy, health check-ups and contraception.

I can imagine some readers may be aghast that I would allow her to go to do work experience in the IFPA but I have always felt that openness and honesty is whenever possible the best way to teach your children.

She was about seven or eight years old when she asked me ‘I know the sperm fertilises the egg but how does the sperm get there in the first place’. So while on one hand I may up to that stage not felt her old enough for the birds and bees talk when your child asks such a direct question it requires a direct answer.

One of the best things about telling her at that age was that she wasn’t embarrassed to talk about it with me, she was horrified at what I told her but she was full of questions.

A few years on would be a completely different story altogether, the last thing kids in their early teens want to hear is their parents talking about genitals and nookie. By then anyway it is too late, they have heard all sorts of things from their pals. I wanted the Young Wan to have the real facts and not nonsense spread by her peers.

The Young Wan has one more week to do with the IFPA and she has really enjoyed it so thanks to them for allowing her to come on board for the two weeks and to her school for being forward thinking and to my baby for being such a grown-up.

RM colum February 8th - It hasn't gone away you know

RM column February 8th - It hasn't gone away you know

Since I started writing my blog and this column the Young Wan’s messy/untidy/pig sty bedroom has featured more times than I would care to remember.

The messy/untidy/pig sty bedroom pops up way too much in reality and much more than I write about but sometimes moaning about it bores me let alone writing about it constantly boring you.

The new house provides some coverage from the bedroom for herself or indeed for me. In the last flat as soon as you opened the flat door you were assaulted by the den of iniquity that was her bedroom. The new place allows me to pretend it doesn’t even exist.

Battles over her bedroom are ones that I try to choose carefully. Being on her back constantly is going to do neither her nor me any good so not having it slap bang in my face as I get home from work has been a blessing.

On top of that Nanny is sharing the room with the Young Wan so she has had to deal with it more than I have. And she has been dealing with for the last six weeks, with little gain made.

So for the last couple of nights off the Young Wan goes into her room, to play music, move stuff from one pile to another, hide some more stuff in places that are blatantly obvious to everyone but her, instead of actually tidying her room.

This has been going on since we moved in. She will spend days at a time doing this.

Nanny actually found a pile in the bottom of her wardrobe and pulled it out onto the middle of the floor ready for the Young Wan to tidy it up when she got home from school. Only the Young Wan went in and shoved it under the bed as if that would not be noticed.

But as I have said before teenagers are not known for their smartness.

In the last day or two it began to sound like actual work was being done, probably because the Young Wan wants allowed out at the weekend and knows she will only cross the threshold if the room is actually clean and tidy.

‘Nanny it is done’ – she roared into the living room so Nanny could go in and inspect the work. Much better for Nanny to do that than me.

Nanny had not even reached the door when she went ‘oh no it is not’.

Teenagers seem to adopt selective sight, she can only see what she wants to see. So she will spend time tidying but fails to see the rubbish strewn about the floor, socks lying her and there and shoes kicked off and left where they land.

It is terrible for me to sit back on this for now but I am relieved Nanny has taken this on. Okay okay she hasn’t taken it on, poor Nanny has no choice but to take it seeing as how she is sharing a room with our untidy teen.

Still and all for a time, a short time I don’t have to crack the whip on this one, I can just pretend that messy space doesn’t exist. Eh what bedroom?

RM column February 1st - Reaching Milestones

RM column February 1st - Reaching Milestones

Children have lots of milestones, first steps and first words are the ones that spring to mind, but there are lots more smaller milestones that can make you happy or sad.

Like the time the Young Wan stopped saying aminal for animal, that made me sad or when she stopped freaking out when she met my Mum’s friend Margaret, that made me happy, well happy-ish.

That was a mad one the Young Wan, who wasn’t ever prone to hissy fits or temper tantrums would throw a freak attack when she would be asked to say hello to Margaret.

Funny thing was when we called Margaret Susan she didn’t freak at all. We had no clue as to why this would be the case but sure children are mad and that was the best explanation we could come up with.

Throughout their lives children have many phases which have their own wee milestones, like actually throwing rubbish in bins instead of shoving it in the nearest place. We haven’t reached that milestone yet but I look forward to the days when we do.

There are other more endearing ones like learning to put your shoes on the correct feet, there is nothing more cute than seeing a child who has obviously stubbornly decided to put their own shoes on and wrongly.

Or the time when they insist on feeding themselves and end up with more up their nose and in the hair than in their mouth, again the Young Wan is still working on getting more food into her mouth than on her clothes.

The tying of shoe laces is another thing that gets my goat, the sight of bedraggled and filthy laces tangling behind her drives me mad.

I don’t think it is a fashion thing, I have seen youngsters with the laces not tied, but tucked neatly into their trainers. But that is not what the Young Wan is doing.

I also find the most common thing I say to her is ‘pull up your trousers’ she seems to have an aversion to belts.

Another thing the Young Wan has not managed to do yet is button up shirts, coats and pyjama tops properly. The bottom button is always buttoned on the second button, giving her an unkempt appearance.
And Nanny doesn’t like it.

The Young Wan will walk into the room and it is such a normal thing for me I barely even notice anymore but Nanny does and she’ll say ‘button that up properly’ to the exasperation of the Young Wan.

So the other night the Young Wan came into the living room to say good night and stood there with her arms outstretched going ‘ta da’ revealing a perfectly buttoned-up pyjama top.
It didn’t last, the next night she walked through and as per usual one side of her top was triangularly hanging well below the other one.

So over the next while I expect there to be another couple of milestones reached, the tying of shoelaces, pulled up trousers and perfectly buttoned tops. Ach who am I kidding I can barely do all those things myself, so I suppose reaching milestones is something that happens throughout our lives and not just when we are young.

RM colum December 13 - Christmas is coming

RM column December 13 - Christmas is coming, fast

(Written last week for today's paper but I'm publishing it here now to draw your attention to the Barnardos Christmas toy appeal which ends tomorrow)

CHRISTMAS is rapidly gaining on us. With our house move and the eh house move I have so far done absolutely nothing for Christmas, at all. Not one present has been bought and a quick mental calculation of my finances reveals that there may not even be money to get presents.
And I refuse to get stressed or worried about this, well not a lot anyway.

I would say this year is the first the Young Wan hasn’t made a list at this stage. She hasn’t asked for anything and hasn’t even dropped the smallest of hints about anything that I have been aware of.

So I asked her the other night what she would like for Christmas and I have to say her answer stumped me completely.

“Ach nothing really, I have everything I want,” she said.

She has an ipod, she has a phone and there wasn’t anything else that she really wanted, well clothes would be nice she added at the end.

At least that takes some pressure off me though I still have to brave the shops and other shoppers to find something to put under the tree. The funny thing about Christmas is all the stress and panic in the build-up to that one day is gone by lunchtime on December 25th for another year. It is always at that stage I think ‘what was all the panic about?’.
I think being in a new house will be Christmas present enough for us both.

Thinking about all the stress and the finance-stretching has made me realise that even though things will be tight, generally it will all be okay and there are many families who cannot say that.
There are families where the kids will get little to nothing and the pressure on those families must be huge.

Last year I meant to get something for the annual AIB Toy Appeal for Barnardos but with all the hustle and bustle of Christmas I missed the deadline and I will make sure I catch it this year.
It is a great appeal where people are asked during their Christmas shopping to buy an extra present for a child who attends one of the many Barnardos services and leave it into a branch of the AIB.

I’m sure as in many things like it that teenagers are often forgotten. After all it is easier to buy toys for younger kids than teens so I decided that I would get something for teenagers.
That’s all well and good but what would I get? So I decided that vouchers are probably the way to go.

Even if I could afford to buy an ipod or MP3 player for someone I couldn’t be sure they would have a computer or access to a computer to put their music on it.

Vouchers definitely seem like a better plan. So I’ll get some clothes and music vouchers.
The closing date for the Barnardos appeal ends tomorrow (December 14th) and if you are able do buy something to make Christmas special for a child and get it to your nearest branch of the AIB before the closing date.

RM column November 23rd - Left holding the baby

RM column November 23rd - Left holding the baby

REALITY TV is about all you can see on the box these days and while I am fed up to the back teeth of it all there’s a programme coming that I will be watching as well as insisting the Young Wan watch too.

It is a British show and will follow a gang of teenagers as they are put into a family situation with themselves as the parents and we get to watch how they get on.

Considering that the UK has the highest rate of teen pregnancies in western Europe there can be no better method of contraception than to place a gang of teens in the harshest parenting situation dealing with everything that being a parent throws at you.

Two of the strongest arguments against having children so young is that nearly a third of teenagers mothers in Britain are living alone with their baby a year after birth and children born to teen mothers are at a greater risk of living in poverty. These are British statistics but we know the apply here as much as over there.

We have seen many different attempts to show our young people just how hard it is to cope with a child when you are little more than a child yourself, from the dolls that cry unless they are being well-taken care of and even when they are not. But at the end of the day it is still a doll and not a live-screaming-gurgling and nappy-filling bundle of joy.

This show will start with a number of young couples aged between 16 and 19 years old. They will be living in a house together, given jobs and will get to experience pregnancy with an ‘empathy belly’. During that time they will have to attend ante-natal classes before being presented with a real live baby.

The babies will then be replaced with toddlers, the toddlers will then be replaced with pre-teens and of course family pets will also feature. As if that isn’t enough for them to cope with the teen couples’ young families will then ‘become’ teenagers before the elderly and infirm grandparents move in.

What a wonderful dose of reality these teenagers will get. No only should they be put off having children before they are ready, and hopefully not forever, but they will eventually have to deal with a version of themselves when their ‘babies’ become teens; stroppy, cheeky and hard-to-live with younger versions of themselves.

All this will take over what will probably be the longest month in these teenagers’ lives and should make for riveting viewing.

Sleepless nights will probably be the least of these kids’ worries, they will be told in leg-crossing eye-watering details of what can happen during birth, they will have to cope with caring for a young baby never mind have an insight into what their own parents deal with when the babies ‘grow’ into teenagers with a mind and mouth of their own.

Letting teenagers play house with your child is one thing (are the real parents mad?) and that aside this is a wonderful social experiment and it makes me wonder how many of the young couples remained couples at the end of it all.

I also wonder if in the coming years how many if any will become teenage parents in the future. Hopefully the show will prove to be a wonderful deterrent; in fact I would even go so far as to say this should become an obligatory subject for both our boys and girls in school.

There is no point whatsoever in this being an issue for girls alone. While we know often girls are left holding the baby, until we teach our boys responsibility too, we are just banging our heads off a brick wall never mind teaching our boys the worst possible lessons in responsibility or should that read irresponsibility.

Parenthood is wonderful, tough but wonderful but it is something that should never be viewed lightly or walked into blindly. I’ll be interested to see what the kids think themselves at the end of it all.

The show will be aired on BBC3 so I’ll have to wait for it to be broadcast on the non-digital channels but it is definitely one to watch.

RM column September 7 - There's no bread

RM column September 7th - There’s no bread…

WITH ONLY two of us in our household you think it would be easier to not run out of things. After all we don’t really do a weekly shop, Jaysus no the Young Wan would have the fridge cleared out in a day, and there isn’t a clutter of kids tearing through the cupboards; so generally I pick things up as we go along.

So you would think it is more manageable to keep on top of everything. Normally it is but establishing a routine after having three weeks off work and a summer where it was only me in the house has proven elusive.

Each night I get home and only when I go to do something do I realise I can’t because there is none left. Like bread…

I went to make herself a sandwich for school only to find a near-empty loaf packet with a slice of bread and a heel, which doesn’t really make for a lovely lunch.

And I wouldn’t mind but I ring from the supermarket and asked herself if there was anything we need.

As far as I was concerned there was bread, I didn’t know that she had eaten it all, so let me know so she can have lunch the next day.

Or shampoo, she knows as soon as she has squeezed the last out into her hand that we need more, so tell me when it’s finished. Particularly when she has a habit of bringing empty bottles into the shower to squeeze them all out leaving me with the illusion that we have shampoo, lots of it.

The amount of shampoo used in our house is outrageous. Okay we both have long hair but I don’t think even Crystal Gayle or Rapunzel would use the volume of shampoo we seem to put away.

Course at the beginning of the summer when the Young Wan was away with her Nanny there was always shampoo. I had to use shower gel the other day and let’s just say the results, while clean, were not good.

And don’t get me started on toilet roll, seriously don’t. Whole rolls can disappear in a few short hours ending up in the bathroom bin covered in creams and makeup. Despite there being cotton wool for the same purpose and despite all the face washes, etc that she has.

One of the ones that really annoys me is milk or lack of.

The other evening I got home and started to make dinner and needed half pint of milk. As I had bought a litre two days before and I thought she hadn’t used any, I didn’t pick up anymore.

I opened the fridge and pulled out a near-empty carton of milk. She protested that she had left me enough for a cup of tea which I suppose is a major step forward in comparison with before. Then I would have a cup of tea ready for it’s milk only to pull out an empty carton from the fridge.

I don’t get that empty carton, packet, container being left behind fooling you into thinking that you don’t need to restock. One little moment of absolute slovenly laziness could prove disastrous later as the Young Wan found out to her dismay on the milk night.

So for now it is back to a check list when I call from the supermarket, milk – check, bread – check… you get the idea.

RM column August 31st - Get to bed

RM column August 31st - Get to bed

A SUMMER of late nights, lie-ins and taking it easy have now come to an end and it is time to try and get a routine whereby the Young Wan won’t be completely wrecked getting up for school in the mornings.

Like most of us the Young Wan when allowed can sleep for Ireland, and watching late night telly hasn’t helped with the lie-ins. Course over the summer there’s no such thing as bed time anymore, well certainly not like days gone by when B.E.D would be spelt out at 9pm on the button and off she’d trot.

If I was to do that now, she’d just laugh at me.

However now school is back she will be told to get to bed at a reasonable hour, well that is the plan anyway. I am not under the illusion that she will fall asleep straight away but it is important to get the head down and chill out from the day.

Recent research in England has revealed how one in three teenagers are surviving on as little as four hours of sleep a night and are going to school exhausted.

That sounds crazy to me; how on earth are they only getting four hours sleep. But to find the answer to that we only need to look at computers, television and games.

I never really felt televisions are a good idea in bedrooms. In addition to that there was never really the room for such extras in our flat. Now that she is older I wouldn’t have the same objections but I would be annoyed if she was staying up later and later watching nonsense on the telly.

And I would also be concerned with what she is watching. If I am still changing channels with something risqué comes on, why would I give her free rein all the time in the privacy of her own room?

A quarter of the teenagers surveyed said they fell asleep while watching the TV, listening to music or with some other electronic items running.

Never mind sleep depravation, think of the carbon footprints!

A third of the 1,000 polled 12 to 16 year olds were only getting four to seven hours sleep instead of the necessary eight hours.

One of the experts behind the research, Dr Chris Idzikowski from the Edinburgh Sleep Centre said: “Teenagers need to wake up to the fact that to feel well and look well, they need to do something about their sleep.

“This is an incredibly worrying trend.

“What we are seeing is the emergence of junk sleep – that is sleep that is of neither the length nor quality that it should be in order to feed the brain with the rest it needs to perform properly at school.”

Being deprived of the proper amount of sleep will leave a teenager not able to concentrate in class leading on to a poor school performance.

Not only that but teenagers release hormones essential for their growth spurts during sleep, so not getting enough sleep can make you small.

While it’s easy for me to go on here about how herself will be in bed, she’s a divil for being told to get ready for bed. She then disappears and I’ll get busy doing something else and forget about her until she reappears an hour later having gone and listened to music. Course she is neither ready for bed or indeed sleepy.

But I’m onto her, she won’t get away with that this year…

RM May 18 - Long 'Hot' Summer

RM column - May 18th - Long 'Hot' Summer

The countdown to change is getting closer and closer and I don’t mean the General Election, I mean the Junior Cert. As each day passes we are getting nearer and nearer to the Young Wan’s first foray into State exams, her first official getting older moment.

With work busier than ever thank God for Nanny being here to cover me when I am working late, for making dinners, lunch, eh beds, you name it in the flat and Nanny has had some part in making sure it is working, clean and tidy, cooked, mended and studying.

Once the Young Wan’s exams are over Nanny is whisking her off for the summer. The holidays are too long here, three months. I’m sure our young people don’t agree, or indeed our teachers, but I do.

It is so hard for them to get back into the swing of things following such a long break. Never mind what do you do with them for that length of time.

Luckily because the Young Wan is now 15 being looked after isn’t an issue, though at times you wouldn’t know it and think back to the days of childminding with nostalgia.

In fairness though I trust herself not to be going bananas if I’m not there and I could not have said that last year. Last year I never knew what I would find, you know what I mean, gangs of kids smoking, messing about and once the brats opened up one of my little bottles of beer. Jaysus they must have thought they were the business. Well until I came home and hit the roof that is.

However, that was last year and I know she wouldn’t mess about like that now. Not to say I 100 per cent trust she won’t mess about hence my need to know policy that I talked about here before.

And in fairness what would she do that wouldn’t end up in her being completely bored. Course I could take time off, like many parents I already leave my holidays for the summer time anyway. And like many other parents I do not get three months holidays as lovely as that would be so it is inevitable that they will be at home bored, watching telly all day.

The Young Wan is too young to work which could be good for her, get a bit of responsibility and earning your own money. We live a good bit away from most of her pals and I wouldn’t be comfortable letting her roam around where we live without me being there too.

But what to do with her for the summer is a worry, only Nanny has stepped in and off they will go once her exams are over.

Only I panicked the other day, flights are already booked for the day after the exams finish. And I was not content until I saw the timetable myself and knew for sure that yes the Young Wan is definitely finished on the 14th.

I had the awful foreboding feeling that the Young Wan had read the timetable wrong rendering the flights an awful waste of money.

However, I sold her short in this one and she had the dates properly read. So the two of them will head off immediately after her exams.

I will be more than a bit lost over the summer with an empty house and just the doggie and me. And Eeekkk what will I write about, though I am sure I will find plenty.

I do hope to join them and then I can bring her home and have some lovely summer time with her.

RM May 5 - Three weeks and counting

Just catching up on a few columns here, bear with me. This is from the start of May when the countdown to the Junior Cert stepped up a notch.

Three weeks and counting

Three weeks and counting, no, not the election, the dum dum dummmmm Junior Cert. There have been deadlines for projects, art exams, last minute preparations, stress (mostly from me) and studying, thank God.

There has also been some last minute expenses, such as paying to register for the exam and more than a little snottiness from the school.

Apparently the Young Wan asked me sometime ago to get the past papers for History. I promptly forgot. When she has asked me to get stuff, I always tell her to remind me when I am in work, because I will and have forgotten.

Apparently her teacher threw a wobbler on Monday and herself and a gang of non-History past paper holders were told to leave the class.

The school then phoned my home, despite constantly being told if they want to talk to me to use my mobile, where they talked to Nanny.

Well they actually scolded Nanny like a bold child, why do teachers adopt this tone? It is not as if I am going to ignore what they say and reward herself for bad behaviour. If she is in the wrong I will and do take the necessary action.

So I do not appreciate ever having a teacher give out to me for the Young Wan’s alleged bad behaviour.

To make matters worse Nanny then phoned the Young Wan who was now in her next class setting off her mobile phone, a hanging offence in her school.

Course when the school phoned and said she had been put out of class Nanny thought she was put out for the day so she called her. While her phone was on vibrate, the Young Wan was caught frantically trying to turn it off.

So now the Young Wan’s phone has been confiscated as she was caught trying to turn iut off and if we are to get it back I must fork out €20. I am refusing. While she shouldn’t have had the phone on, the incident was preceded by the school’s behaviour.

When I phoned up they told me she was texting, I said she wasn’t texting but I didn’t have the full information of what happened until I got home.

So when I eventually got back onto them and told them so they stuck to their guns, so I told them to check the phone logs and they can find out for themselves.

I also complained about the tone the teacher used when talking to my Mum and again the school saw nothing wrong with this.

Well I do, I am not a bold child, my Mum is not a bold child and if the school wants parents on their side they should drop the patronising and ‘you’ve been very naughty’ tone.

Notice the way I haven’t yet ranted about the wisdom of barring a child from your class weeks before their first major exam, way to go to be supportive Teacher!

Now this is where I lost the plot with the Young Wan. When I was told of the incidents there was no mention of ‘Mum you HAVE to get me those papers’, I thought it concerned something she had already and didn’t bring to class. Nothing to this effect was said when I told her at this stage she really needs to be more organised.

No I was clueless until she was put out of class again two days later. Seriously. That’ll teach her, not.

Once again way to go Teacher.

I know it was my fault she didn’t have them and this has now been rectified but I still feel this was way too heavy handed, petty and frustrating.

The sooner this Junior Cert ordeal is over, the better.

RM column May 31 - Don't Panic

This is from this week's column and I just thought no better time to publish it here than today because exams have started and also considering the amount of junior and leaving certificate search queries hitting here. So good luck to all our Junior and Leaving Cert students, remember don't panic and worse things have happened at sea.

Oh and for tips and all sorts check out Skoool.ie, Leaving Cert stuff is already on the front page while the Junior Cert tips are here.

Don't panic

Darling, by the time you read this your exams will have started. They are the first of many exams you will sit over your life. And each time you have exams you will think they are the most important thing in the world. At this time, they kinda are but in the bigger scheme of things, they aren't really at all.

For now though the Junior Cert is your first big academic milestone, well if you don't count starting school in the first place or indeed secondary school. As big as those moments are, the first time you walk into the exam hall and see the evenly spaced tables and chairs, the vigilators, and feel the tense and nervous atmosphere you wont forget it.

Getting you to study has been hard and stressful on both of us and about a month ago I came to the complete realisation that nothing I said or did would get you to study in reality. I could shout, roar but at the end of the day unless it comes from you it won't happen.

Instead of panicking I have chilled out a bit and you appear to be studying and I say appear because we all know that you could be sitting there with all the books in front of you, making what looks like notes, flipping the pages of a text book and in your head you are singing 'Smells like Teen Spirit'.

Time will tell on that.

Besides I am constantly being reassured by people that the Junior Cert is more about scaring the hell out of students in time for them to knuckle down for their Leaving Cert. I don't know if that's true not having been through the education system here. But I know we will both be disappointed and devastated if your marks do not reflect your ability.

However at the end of the day once these exams are over, they are over, nothing to do until the results come in. And once you start the Leaving Cert course, the Junior Cert ceases to matter really. That's the way of exams once you do others above the last ones you have, the previous ones are pretty much defunct.

The main thing to remember over the next weeks is don't panic. Even the worst case scenario isn't the worst thing in the world. As I was told myself as a child, worse things happen at sea. Exams can always be resat, disappointment can always be overcome. Stress on the other hand can make you sick. So forget worrying just get your head down and do your best, that's all any parent wants their kids to do, their best. I couldn't ask for more.

This is not only to my darling, the Young Wan but it is also for all those who might read this column who are about to sit or have sat exams.

Remember don't panic, don't worry, do your best and worse things happen at sea.

RM Column - April 5 Sugar Plum Teenager

“Tell her she can get any clothes she wants for easter and I’ll pay for it,” Nanny told me. With instructions like that the Young Wan didn’t need to be told twice.

The plan was seeing as how she was off school for the week and was in with me in work, that when I had a meeting she would head off on a clothes hunt in town.

For most of the morning I felt like the parent of a toddler again, there were lots of ‘is it time yet’ a little reminder to the ‘are we there yet days?’.

At 4.30pm she burst back into the office gushing about finding the most perfect skirt ever.

“Oh it is soooo beautiful. I HAVE to have it. AND it is reduced from €50 to €25,” she told me.

I then asked what’s it like?

“Well it is red and black, kinda like a tutu, but not really. It comes down to here (points at her knee) and it is gorgeous. The woman in the shop said it is gorgeous on me too.”

Yeah cos people who try to sell you things never lie… How and ever off she went €25 in hand to buy the wonder skirt.

She came back, pulled it out of the bag to an audience of work colleagues whom she had all told about the item. They cooed appropriately as I went ‘that’s too short’.

It’s not a skirt at all it is a belt as they say, seriously. Oh and it is a tutu of the sugar plum fairy type, a short one. While it is certainly very pretty and cool it is still a belt.

So when I got back home she was trying it on in all its glory.

Now I have a rule which has been adapted from that fashion rule, the higher the skirt, the darker the tights.

Only mine is the higher the skirt, stick on some trousers. I am not talking about big mad trousers, I am talking about her Capri trousers which look beautiful under little skirts and mini-dresses.

You see I think she doesn’t move right in miniskirts, she forgets she is wearing one and can reveal more than decent.

She matched her skirt with her massive big hoodie sweatshirt, holey patterned tights, and her big boots.

She even managed to sit down and move about with the skirt on without revealing anything of concern.

Then I noticed the skirt was sitting longer on her than I thought. Trouble was she had pulled it down to her hips, and would not have any top that would sit right with a skirt pulled that far down.

So it would appear that even she didn’t want to wear it that short. So I think I might take a trip to buy some black net to lengthen the skirt and make it a decent length.

If I don’t I will just turn into an even bigger nag than I am already and I will not feel comfortable with her wearing it. As if that would be a change...

RM April 13 - Need to know basis

A FUNDAMENTAL part or rule of my parenting has been ‘on a need to know basis’. What the Young Wan didn’t need to know she didn’t.

This has been very handy over the years particularly for the ‘are we there yet’ scenarios. If they don’t know they are going anywhere they won’t be asking now will they?

Some of my friend’s children are at that stage where they don’t fully understand time and this is where ‘need to know’ becomes very important.

If they know they are doing something fun at the weekend and it is only Monday, the wee dears will do the ‘is it Friday? when is it Friday’ about every five minutes.

Why put yourself through endless questions that have the same answer.

I used to do this for everything from weekends away, trips to the cinema, the time I got preview tickets for the first Harry Potter movie of which the Young Wan has been a massive fan.

So not only was my head not done in by endless questions of when, where and how, but the look of wow on her face when she realised what we were actually doing was something else.

You can also have a bit of fun with it. That night of the Harry Potter movie, she would have been 10 or 11 years old, I bet her as we were ‘ahem going into town, (not to a movie at all)’ that she wouldn’t wear her big witches hat.

I am sure she thought that strange but she did it. When we got to cinema I asked her to stand in one place while I checked times of the Harry Potter movie which was officially opening the following week.

She told me afterwards she was thinking ‘oh all these kids are going to see Harry Potter, why is my Mum torturing me like this’.

The excitement from her when she realised what was going on is something that still makes me smile.

I once even managed to pack a weekend bag, got the two of us onto the airport bus before I told her we were off to spend the weekend with my friends in England.

At one stage she liked Justin Timberlake and unknownst to her I got tickets for his Point Depot concert. That night we went to dinner with pals and despite one of them blurting it out by mistake, the blurt went unnoticed. Later on I asked herself ‘wouldn’t it be lovely to go for a walk?

She agreed and when I asked her where she thought would make a lovely walk, she answered ‘by the river’.

Perfect my cunning plan was working out even more according to plan.

So off we went in a taxi down to the Point Depot beside the river where we got out and she saw all the people.

Everyone with us all welled up when I pulled out the tickets, she was ecstatic.

I am telling you the need to know rule is massively important and even more so now she is a teenager.

I have had a few occasions when I have been working late and decide not to let her know. It is probably better than teenagers do not have time to prepare for the coveted ‘free gaff’ and why broadcast the fact to them.

While a little amount of organisation is involved, making sure her dinner is prepared or at the very least there is money for the chipper, I will let her think I am coming home as normal.

Only I am actually not in the office, I am not even in Dublin sometimes. But as long as the Young Wan thinks I am just about to walk in the door, fantastic.

I’m telling you, its on a need to know basis.

RM column March 23 - There's nothing to do

‘There’s nothing for us to do’ is a frequent cry from young people and in fairness to them there is a lot in that statement.

As a Dub blow-in I am tempted to say ‘try being a teenager in the 1980s in Belfast’ but I don’t think that will hold any kudos at all.

It is hard being a teenager in Dublin in 2007, what is there for them to do? Not much really that doesn’t bring them into temptation’s path. Being a teenager is hard enough without having to say no to things, without having to go against the grain of teen pressure, can we expect them to always have the courage and balls to say no to the things we hope they will? Come on, you were a teen once, be honest, you know it can be hard.

When I was a teenager there was an amazing live music scene in Belfast, with bands made up of other young people I knew. While the only place to play was in bars, one of our favourites was a place called the Orpheus.

When I would say ‘we’re off to the Orpheus’ my Mum or Dad would tell us about the bouncing dance floor the original Orpheus club had. The springy dance floor allowed them to jive like bajaysus. However in the 1980s incarnation of the Orpheus there was no such thing but it was an amazing venue for live music as a teenager.

While the regulars would be drinking downstairs in the Orpheus all the young ‘uns would be upstairs enjoying the music.

The point is while there was frig all to do in Belfast we did have somewhere to go. Some of my pal’s parents would have been horrified if they knew their precious offspring was in a bar, but generally we were safe and with people our own age. Besides which if we somehow managed to get a drink we didn’t have the money kids have today so we would nurse our half pint of cider and blackcurrant all night.

I suppose the point there is that generally we were doing something we technically were not supposed to be doing but it was something and something generally good and wholesome, well apart from the cider that is.

So far I have been lucky drinking hasn’t been an issue with the Young Wan, yet… But I know it will be and I hope I will be cool, calm and collected about it all. In fact I hope I can be a lot cooler with that than other rites of passage that have taken place in our house when there was much weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth, from me.

I was talking to someone who has a 13-year-old and they intercepted text messages from them which talked about hidden poteen and smoking and they were worried and rightly so.

However as mad as it sounds and maybe it is easy and naïve of me to think that was a rite of passage, they’ve been caught (well done Mum), sure drinking has an allure for young people so they are bound to do it. It is not like they will be able to do that every night of the week, certainly not if you are about and watching. Smoking however is another matter and more worrying for me.

But don’t get me wrong, I am well aware and worried about how much our young people are drinking (as I have said here before), it is just that the first time getting drunk is kinda a rite of passage. If you spend enough time with your child you should know, will know, and will find them out.

People should lay off teenagers particularly when they are just hanging out, I did it and I am sure many other parents did it too.

I can understand the fear of some people when confronted with a gang of teenagers hanging outside a shop can feel uncomfortable, sure I feel that walking home on a dark night when a man is walking behind me, but that doesn’t mean they are up to mischief. So is it so bad they have somewhere to go, somewhere they find cool and not somewhere you think as a parent they will find cool, cos well they won’t.

Regarding drinking all we can do is keep talking to our teenagers and hope something is getting through the layers of peer pressure they are under, oh yeah and watch them like a hawk.

To counter the ‘there’s nothing to do’ scenario do more with your teen. Find something you will both enjoy and try to do it regularly. Now this is a practice what you preach moment and something I have to make time for myself.

Myself and the Young Wan are not out every weekend playing ten pin bowling or going to the movies, but now is the time to make sure this time is sectioned off. Because for now I am lucky in that she is not old enough to say ‘Nah, I don’t want to do that’ and before she is I want to ensure we have this fun time together. Besides it is during those times she will probably talk more about things that are actually going on in her life that she may not have mentioned before.

So it is bowling this weekend. What about you?

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RM February 15 - Trail of Destruction

Trail of destruction/it began and ended with trousers

I've been done, screwed over and made a complete and utter eejit. This morning I have left the entire flat in complete and utter chaos and had little to do with it.

Hurricane Young Wan has wrecked havoc and left a trail of destruction in her wake.

This has all obviously been building up slowly until one little thing upset the uneasy chaotic balance levered by herself until it all came down on me this morning.

I suppose it began and ended with trousers. I had a do last weekend and she was coming with me so I wanted her dressed up to my liking not hers.

Knowing the stress a request for this normally gives on previous such occasions I told her well in advanced what I wanted her to wear and I told her to find the outfit days before she needed it,

From experience I have to do this. I can't tell you how many times we have discovered just before leaving the house that she can't find a shoe, her coat, therefore my mind.

And it isn't surprising when you consider the hovel that is her room.

So the night before the big event I asked her had she gotten everything sorted.

"Yeah, but I can't find the trousers!"
"Well you may, I told you days ago, I handed them to you, find them."
Ten minutes later:
"I can't find them"
"Young Wan, this is non-negotiable. I warned you, I told you, You had time to sort it out, Get them."

This happened over and over again for two hours until she pulled every item of clothing off every shelf and from her clothes rail onto the floor.

She sat on the pile and delved, she stood back and pulled at things. More energy was spent not finding than finding.

Then she came in and informed me, they weren't in her room, she didn't know where they were - she just couldn't find them.

Well that was it for me. I went in and immediately regretted having done so.

I started at the top of the pile and moved things one by one until the pile was moved to another corner of the room.

Still no sign of the trousers.

I then lifted up her chairbed thing and there were the offending items, lying on the floor (with a sponge chair on top) discarded from when I had given them to her to put away only days before.
That only took two hours and the entire demolition of the bedroom.

And so it has stayed demolished all week.

I have been on her back between the serious lack of studying and the bedroom, all the while trying to turn a blind eye to the real horrors of the bedroom.

The straw or should I say trouser incident that broke the camel's back took place this morning.
I was looking for a particular pair this morning that I had left on the table two days ago and which had obviously been 'put away' by herself in a futile cosmetic brush-over pretend to tidy the living room exercise.

So before she left for school I told her to get me them. She huffed and puffed because we had slept in and she didn't want to be asked to do anything by me.

But tough she put them away, somewhere, I didn't know having looked in obvious spots like my wardrobe.

Before booting out the door she shouted they were on the chair and bye bye I'm off to school.
When I went to get them. It wasn't them at all, so I had to go a-hunting.

They were finally discovered in her room, in the middle of the pile. Nice.

Anyway there will be some seismic activity in our house tonight as she will whether she likes it or not be sorting all this out. Wish me luck.

EDIT: I wrote this last month and at no stage yet has the room been done, but Nanny arrives tomorrow and it will be done by then if it kills her or me or both. Arrhhgggghhhhhg.

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Red Mum in The Echo

THE Echo carried a piece on my reaching the Irish Blog Award's shortlist. Here's a (bad) rendition of the article which was entitled ' Echo's Red Mum goes for gold in blog awards.





Sorry I can't seem to make these readable, you can read them here and here on Flickr.

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