Tag Archives: little sister

Don’t tell people your dreams, no-one cares

I had an unsettling and unpleasant dream last night, but seeing as the only thing more boring than people talking about their dreams is people talking about their food allergies, I won’t mention it again.

Except to say that I know exactly why I’m having these anxiety-producing dreams. It’s my little sister’s fault. We’re moving in together this weekend (it was meant to be Wednesday, but she forgot to hire a van), and she has given me a single job. She is in charge of the move itself, kitchen appliances, setting up the shared bank account, finding our 3rd flatmate and so on, but I am in charge of the important things. I am choosing our internet provider.

‘This will be easy,’ I thought to myself smugly when she told me. ‘I’m really good at the internet.’ I popped out to dinner with some friends. (Brasserie Zedel- it’s very good, you should go. Though the portions are fine, so there’s no need to eat 2 bread baskets, as I did, and have to be wheeled home). ‘Now,’ I said importantly. ‘We need to discuss internet providers.’ My friends looked at me, thrilled. (Sometimes I find it difficult to interpret other people’s facial expressions. It’s like a much less severe case of ‘The Man who mistook his Wife for a Hat’. But still socially awkward).

‘Who do you use?’ My friends mumbled something about not knowing/ caring.

A lesser person would have dropped the subject, and allowed their friends to enjoy their meal. ‘Look,’ I said sternly. ‘This is really important. I am basically in charge of making sure this entire move doesn’t fall apart. I need you to really think about your internet service provider, and if you would recommend them. If you could also consider upload and download speeds, as well as cost-per-month and potential ‘downtime’, that would be much appreciated.’

From the look on my friends’ faces (even a broken clock tells the right time twice a day), I had inadvertently stumbled across the other thing more boring than talking about dreams.

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Ecstasy: The movie

She doesn’t know it yet, but I’m taking my little sister to see ‘Ecstasy: The Movie’. This is because her favourite author is Irvine Welsh. I know this, because ‘If you liked school, you’ll love work’, one of his post-Trainspotting novels, was ostentatiously left out all over our house.

I personally did rather like school, and was well aware of the biting sarcasm the omnipresence of this book represented. (I am unsure if my little sister attended enough school to determine if she liked it or not).

Anyway, I am excited to take my sister to this Ecstasy movie and prove my cool credentials once and for all. (I would like to mention here that it was only after I read ‘Trainspotting’ that my little sister began to read Irvine Welsh. I found the book distressing and uncomfortable, but that is by-the-by. In a bid to overcome this, I gave a pre-GCSE book report on ‘Trainspotting’.

I was meant to read an extract from the book and then explain why I liked it. I cannot tell you how long I spent searching for a readable extract. This was the best I could do:

Ah switched the box oaf at the handset. – **** waste. That’s aw it is, a **** waste, ah snarled at the ***, the **** irritating ****..
He flings back his heid n raises his eyes tae the ceiling.
Ah’ll gie ye the money tae git it back oot. Is that aw yir sae **** moosey-faced aboot? Fifty measley ****pence ootay Ritz!
This **** has a wey ay makin ye feel a real petty, trivial*****..

(Where you see ****, I paused in front of the whole class, and made frightened rabbit eyes. I then continued to read. I made no concession at all to any accents, and read the entire thing sounding like Mariella Frostrup. It was scarcely comprehensible).

‘Well,’ I continued afterwards. ‘You can see that these people are from a different social class because they are worried about 50p, which is not a lot of money’. (In my defence, I was 14 years old).

I like to think that ‘Ecstasy: The Movie’ will give me a second chance with Irvine Welsh.

I have spent some time on the movie website. ‘This is a fantastic movie!’ Someone has written. I am delighted. Oh- it’s a quote from Irvine Welsh, Author. I personally believe that in the hierarchy of critics, the person who wrote the book the film is based on comes pretty far down. Possibly above ‘Heat’ magazine (who I have never ever forgiven for recommending ‘Iron Man 2’), but certainly below everybody else. ‘Perfectly captures the chaos and chemistry of the dance floor,’ Simon Morrison, MixMag. I think I’ll let that one speak for itself. Only I won’t, because I’m now going to point out that apparently ‘Ecstasy: The Movie’, is a replication of that awful, drunken  dance floor dancing and lunging that everyone tries to forget. Perhaps the sequel will be called ‘Ingredients: the kebab’.

I’m being desperately unfair, of course, because I haven’t seen the movie yet (it comes out on 20th April). And because even the mention of Irvine Welsh reminds me of how much cooler than me my little sister was. And how I had to ‘talk to the teacher’ after that book report.

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Visiting my little sister

I’ve agreed to go visit my little sister. ‘Lucy!’ she yells excitedly down the phone. ‘I have the best thing to do for your visit! It sounds weird, but just listen.’ I wonder if my train tickets are transferable. ‘And then we’ll sleep there, and then go to the grandparents!’ My little sister continues. It seems she has been talking while I have been on the Virgin train website. I decide to bluff my way out. ‘Great,’ I say neutrally. ‘OK!’ My little sister shouts. ‘So just transfer the £34 to my account, and it’s all sorted! Brilliant!’

We hang up, and I wonder if she’s been helping herself to the medicine cabinet whilst on her hospital rounds. I also wonder what on earth we are going to do. Because if my little sister thinks it sounds weird, I’m in trouble.

This is a person who spent 4 months of our childhood crawling around the floor pretending to be Conrad the cat. Once she went out without any knickers, a fact which was only noticed when she hung upside down on the jungle gym. A pet bird once died in her room and was discovered weeks later, rotting gently in an enormous pile of soft cuddly toys. She has been known to do the underwater dance move non-ironically.

(You hold your nose and pretend you’re underwater. It was big in the 1960s). I’ll let you know how it goes. (If you do not hear from me by Wednesday, please send help).

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Guests

Someone has eaten all my hotdog rolls.

I don’t want to point fingers, but I’m pretty certain it’s my little sister, who came to visit this weekend. I normally quite like visitors. They bring gifts, and make one look popular, and are an excellent excuse for daytime drinking. My little sister is a different matter. ‘I’m just going to my dressing room,’ she announced loudly. I ignored her, accustomed to years of her impenetrable oddness. I wandered into my bedroom to pick up a book. ‘Aaagh!’ I shouted as my hand touched warm human flesh. ‘What on earth are you doing in my dressing room?’ my little sister asked, perplexed. ‘This is my bedroom,’ I told her firmly. ‘And I think those are my tights.’ I had to take a shower, so I left my little sister to finish getting dressed. I marched back into my bedroom. ‘There’s something I need to explain to you,’ I said crossly. ‘The bathroom floor is not part of the shower.’

‘It’s very wet on the floor,’ my little sister said cheerily. ‘I should probably not have kept popping in and out of the shower. It’s just that I forgot things.’ I look at my shower. Body Shop seems to have thrown up inside it.

‘How is it at all possible for one person to need 8 bottles to take a shower?’ I asked, exasperated. ‘Well,’ my little sister replies smugly. ‘Not everyone thinks all you need to shower is shampoo.’ ‘That’s because everyone else are idiots,’ I tell her. ‘Anyway,’ my little sister says, unperturbed, ‘I’ve found a stash of sweets in my dressing room, so I’m just off to eat those.’

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