Chez Spud

Awww, look at us, the happy couple…enjoying a joke. Michael is amusing me with his legendary sense of funny, and he’s looking pretty tickled too. Or is he laughing at my dodgy growing out hair? No matter, I’m sure whatever it is he is laughing WITH me at not at me.

Me and my 'other' husband

We’ve been together for 24 years now, since I developed a lasting and stonking crush on him as a teenager. Naturally, like any couple, we’ve had our ups and downs but in the end we love each other very deeply and will be together forever.

There is the ‘slight’ knotty issue of his wife and family, and MrSpud and my boys, but the course of true love never runs smooth does it?

I’ve never actually met Michael Palin, I will admit it. I have come very close on two occasions, both book signings. The first time, early 1990s, he was doing a signing in Selfridges and I got as far as the lift before my heart started pounding so fast I thought I was going to faint so I had to go home. Waaaaaah!

The second time I took reinforcements in the shape of various colleagues from work. Got to Waterstones, same thing happened, I was completely frozen to the spot. Someone shoved me forward and, squeek, HE LOOKED AT ME. That was it, I turned on my heel and ran back to the office, completely overwhelmed.

Recently I read an interview with ‘my husband’ and the interviewer commented on the longevity of his marriage, and how rare that is in celebrity world. Michael said that someone had caught his eye once or twice, but in the end family is more important.

HE MEANT ME!!!! HE LOVES ME TOO!!!

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Gosh, getting deep already and it’s only secret 4! By secret 30 I may be forced to reveal my former identity as a biker called Dave.

I lack intellectual curiosity

I’m reasonably smart, I’m well read, I’ve passed a host of exams and even have a good clutch of letters after my name and have had a successful career. But, here’s the thing and sssshhhh – I have absolutely no intellectual curiosity whatsoever beyond the very narrow areas of my natural interest or those which my work requires me to entrenched in. It’s not that I’m not capable of understanding the issues, I choose not to as it bores me. I’m shallow like that.

Politics, current affairs, business, the economy, history, science, technology…no thanks, I’d rather file my toenails. As a result I have a very loose grasp on some fairly fundamental issues and I regularly have to deploy my dazzling wit and charm to steer conversations away from the vast, gaping holes in my general knowledge. Any bets on how many years it is before my children discover that their mother is a bit of a thickie?

Poor MrSpud despairs of me, and continues his valiant attempt to broaden my mind with a daily flurry of excited emails with links to some tedious new scientific development or archaeological discovery and his seemingly unquenchable appetite for Time Team.

I’ve watched approximately 759 episodes of Time Team and haven’t enjoyed a single one of them. Or learnt anything. Or even developed an inappropriate crush on Tony Robinson or any of his bearded chums which would, at least, have made the wasted 759 hours of my life slightly more pleasurable.

Drink in knowledge? I’d rather drink in wine, since you asked. Cheers!

If you liked that, you might like this ...

• Another day…another secret…I bought my husband on the internet
• Settle down, settle in and pipe down….welcome to chez spud
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Not such a big secret, but it was at the time. I met MrSpud in 2001, in the infancy of internet dating when it wasn’t as usual or acceptable as it is now. My grandfather recommended it and, encouraged by the success of Cousin Julie who met her fireman husband (takes a moment to consider Men In Uniform) on the WWW DOT, as my grandad calls it, I decided to take the plunge.

So MrSpud was my first ever ‘for real’ internet date, although there had been a lot of chattering and, frankly, flirting with others before MrSpud ‘had me at hello’ with his tales of his love for gardening and his lack of stature.

Sneaky Kiss for MrSpud

“I’m 5 ft 5 by the way” was possibly the second thing he ever told me. He just laid it out like that, and said he knew his height was a problem for some [clearly crazed] women so he wanted to be upfront about it. I love that, a little bloke with no chips on his shoulders about it. Perhaps he’s too little to bear the weight of the chips? Perhaps the chips have crushed his spirit? Perhaps he ate the chips? Did he have ketchup with the chips? Who can tell.

We met on a deceased dating site called, cringe, www.woohoo.com. Oh the shame. I met him during my one month free trial. He’s paid £30 for his full year’s membership, clearly expecting lasting love and fulfillment to take a little longer than a month. He still claims I owe him £15. He’s funny and a little bit picky like that.

I was so embarrassed that I’d met him on the internet that, at the time, I told people I’d met him in a bar. Makes me hoot that I thought that picking up randoms in bars was somehow more acceptable than picking up randoms on the WWW DOT.

Mr and Mrs Spud

If you liked that, you might like this ...

• Settle down, settle in and pipe down….welcome to chez spud
• Secret 4 – I lack intellectual curiosity
• The Gallery… Mustachioed
• Chez Spud on Facebook
• Housekeeping

Creeps in quietly and looks around … is there anybody there, said the traveller, knocking on the moonlit door etc etc..no one? In the meantime I’ll just whitter on to myself. I’m an only child, I’m used to it. Also, I remain sure in the knowledge that there is no one more fascinating in the universe than myself (I’m an only child, did I mention that already?)

Secret 1 - I have double jointed elbows

Welcome to chez spud, home to random ramblings, chitchat, old fashioned yarns, hopes ‘n’ dreams ‘n’ fears, a lot of chat about children all washed down with a gallon of tea and cake. Any takers?

I’m not going to bother with a tedious introduction about myself, what films I like, what books I’ve read, my hobbies and other dreadful trivia.  Let’s bypass all that and assume I’m a regular normal person yadda yadda yadda, I watch the stuff you watch, I read the stuff you read….let’s cut to the chase and get intimate (no not like THAT, it’s far too early, and I’m British remember). So here is the first of a series, 30 secrets in 30 days…30 little known facts about me and a photo or two to boot.

Listen and learn…

Secret 1…I have double jointed elbows. Well, I don’t as there is no such thing but that’s the phrase most of you normal jointed folks use. My elbows hyper extend, see freaky photo and you’ll get the idea. They also then rotate kind of back on themselves too, hard to get a shot of that. Every now and again my head spins round too….and I have this strange 666 marking on my scalp…

Alas there is no useful purpose to my flexi arms beyond sheer entertainment value. In a previous job I was made to ‘do the arms’ for all new members of staff, as part of their induction. Kind of, ‘Here’s the photocopier, here’s the stationary cupboard,  oh and here’s our resident freak…go on, do the arms’. And then some poor person would have to politely watch me do my party trick and attempt not to vomit.

Random musing – I have finally worked out who I look like with my new, dodgy growing out hair style. Imelda Staunton. This came to me during pilates this morning whilst admiring my downward dog in the mirror. I caught a glimpse of myself from the side and, trying to ignore my big red face, it finally clicked. Imelda Staunton, and not in a good way either.

If you liked that, you might like this ...

• Another day…another secret…I bought my husband on the internet
• Secret 4 – I lack intellectual curiosity
• The Gallery… Mustachioed
• Chez Spud on Facebook
• Housekeeping