Misunderstood sayings

Although the number of names and classifications for this kind of phenomenon grows at about the same rate as the internet, I'm not sure if there is a word for the mingling of two sayings into one hideously confusing phrase. Some of my favourites are:

Too many chefs, not enough Indians

The sky's my oyster

Bite the bull by the horns

It's not brain science

Other people and the unpleasantness of dealing with them

A couple of weeks ago we went to see Tony Joe White at the Jazz Cafe, which once again proved that it attracts one of the most appalling audiences of any venue I've ever been to. The support act they had 'chosen' was not only one of those rubbish whiny girls who sings in a pseudo sexy voice which bears no relation to their speaking voice and drone on endlessly about their feelings, but also actively bad, so once she had buggered off we went to find a suitable spot in the crowd. It was sold out, so there were loads of people there, and it was a bit of a crush but we found a spot which wasn't behind too many gargantuan specimens from which we could almost see the whole stage.

Unfortunately for us, we were also immersed in the 'crowd' meaning that we were forced to endure the unpleasant habits of those who share our taste in music. The first was a guy who was standing behind me, so closely behind me in fact that I could feel his breath on the back of my neck (which, due to the methods of my childhood optician gives me the creeps anyway) and almost every part of my body was being touched by his. As if that wasn't creepy enough, he then interrupted a conversation that the Boy Wonder and I were having to begin an annoying chat with the Boy Wonder about his previous experience of seeing Tony Joe White.

He actually apologised before interrupting, which demonstrated some understanding of the social convention of accosting a stranger, but when the Boy Wonder said that he wasn't surprised that he was a little late he started grilling him on every time he had been to see him and how late he was each time. The Boy Wonder gracefully extricated himself from the situation, but I was still left with this guy leaning on me, until after the second or third song the Leaning Man managed to hit me round the head whilst clapping and I asked him to move back.

He seemed strangely put out that I had asked him, despite the fact that it must have been obvious that I couldn't actually move properly with him basically standing where my shadow should have been. But, having removed one source of other people's hideousness, we were still subjected to downright horrific personalities of several hundred other people, from the 'I'm so crazy' guy behind us who couldn't shut up to the group of twats who found themselves completely incapable of just standing and enjoying a gig without constantly rearranging themselves.

Tony Joe White was awesome, but once again we were reminded that UK gigs seem to attract the scrapings from the bottom of the barrel in terms of other attendees. There are quite a few gigs coming up over the summer that I'm really looking forward to except for the fact that I suspect there will be other people at them, ruining them and making me cross, which in turn makes me feel like a fun-hating old crone which makes me even more cross. Is it really so much to ask that people get a drink, find a place to stand and then do so quietly and without moving too much for the whole gig? Or do we really have to go back to New Orleans to find a good crowd?

Knitting

Four days ago I took up knitting - I watched a video of a lady showing you how to do it, and I managed a fairly passable bit of knitting. I then knitted the next day and the day after, finding it at once compulsively enjoyable and incredibly satisfying and this morning I woke up with a constant pain in my right hand which seems to have developed as a combination of my extensive weekend knitting session and my tendency to sleep with my hand scrunched up under my chin.

I'm quite annoyed about this - not only was I enjoying my knitting, but I distinctly remember both my grandmothers knitting almost constantly well into their later years apparently without ever suffering.

Admittedly, they had both been knitting for years, so I obviously need to build up some stamina before I can even begin to compete on their expert level. In fact, my paternal grandmother lived in what appeared to my juvenile mind at least to be an entirely knitted house. She could knit almost anything, but mostly chose to use those skills to produce bizarrely coloured, excessively huge woollen extravaganzas which were apparently designed for children of much more unusual limb configurations than my brother and I.

So, although I am a mere beginner and clearly should expect some discomfort in the muscles that apparently I only use for knitting (presumably these were in a state of near atrophy until four days ago), I am a little aggrieved. What I thought would be a foray into the world of 'stitch and bitch' where people without grandchildren reclaim the art of knitting in a terribly trendy way has actually turned into a rather nubbly rectangle of knitting and a pain in my hand which makes me feel like I should be paying more attention to cod liver oil adverts and trying to include bran in my diet.

Thumb Pick X-Factor

Having experimented over the years with different styles and playing positions, the Boy Wonder has developed a process for creating the perfect pick. First he imports thumb picks from the US, because even with shipping it's somehow cheaper than buying them in the UK. Then, every couple of months he goes through a process I have christened 'Thumb Pick X-Factor' which is an emotional roller coaster.

The first round involves a very literal whittling down of the entrants - each thumb pick is trimmed to fit the Platonic (Boy Wonderic maybe?) ideal of a thumb pick, and we start to get to know the contestants and learn a little bit about them. Occasionally the trimming involves an injury on the Boy Wonder's part which makes it easy to work out which one has the tragic but heart-warming tale of adversity well and truly overcome with which to engage the audience's sympathy.

Round two is an exercise in polishing the product - the picks are filed down to give a smooth playing edge and checked for uniformity of shape.

Round three is gruelling for all the contestants - each pick is scored several times across its inner surface before having ground up bow rosin pressed into the grooves.

Round four is the most competitive part of the process - each thumb pick is tried out, with a chance to be used to play for a short period to ascertain whether they are fit for purpose.

Round five is the makeover - it's very rare that any of the contestants don't make it through the final round, but there is always a pecking order, and this is where the makeover comes in. Each pick is decorated in a unique design picked out in permanent marker, so that the Boy Wonder can identify his favourites when examining the contents of his hand after scrabbling in his pocket for a pick. The favourite is used almost exclusively to start with, and the others follow suit until, through loss or overuse, they are all deemed impractical and the process begins again.

Not surprisingly, this exercise would usually be of little or no interest to a spectator, which goes some way to explaining why I can often be found providing interesting facts about the contestants while he works. It stops me getting bored and makes me feel as though I am supporting all aspects of the Boy Wonder's musical career.

The social awkwardness of not liking cake

After several years of expressing the opinion that I'm an over-sensitive flower of a person who should just suck it up, the Boy Wonder has recently conceded that it is socially awkward not to like cake. I just don't like it, never have and probably never will. It's not as though it makes me want to throw up, but of all the ways to ingest an unhealthy number of calories that exist in the world, cake is a long way down my preferred list.

We went to a birthday party a couple of weeks ago at the end of which was produced an incredible looking cake. Three layers, three types of filling/icing and a host of exquisite decorations made from two types of chocolate.  The sight of it left everyone entranced, but I had a sinking feeling which was only shaken when the chef realised that it contained nuts. I was relieved that I wouldn't have to eat any, and surprised that for once my nut allergy had actually helped me out a little.

Unfortunately, the moments when I am glad of my allergies are few and far between as I have often been confronted with a cake specially acquired to accommodate my dietary needs, making it even more impossible to refuse a slice. That night, after we had returned from the party, the Boy Wonder and I were talking about the incident and how he had been pleased on my behalf when the cake was revealed to be a potential killer, at which point (having apparently stored up some degree of resentment for his offhand treatment of my mental anguish over the cake situation) I triumphantly pounced on him and forced him to admit that his previous stance was only possible to maintain if you genuinely don't mind offending people.

It is a fairly hollow victory - although it will be nice to have someone to commiserate with when these cake-tastrophes occur, there is no way to avoid them cropping up occasionally (although not working in an office helps) and I have never managed to work out a way of handling them which is genuinely foolproof. Even claiming to be on a diet is inappropriately pious when someone has actually procured a cake for your birthday, so although it does occasionally work (admittedly only on people who have never seen me hoover up a family pack of crisps) there are some situations where you just have to eat some cake and try not to pull a face.

My Non-absorbent tongue

I have noticed recently that my tongue is strangely non-absorbent. Whenever the Boy Wonder and I eat something highly coloured, his tongue seems to change colour instantly whereas mine only ever musters up a minimal colour change at best. I had previously assumed that this was down to my tongue piercing, for vague reasons involving the potential black hole effect of the piercing itself, but since removing it almost a year ago I'm coming to realise that this can no longer be considered a viable explanation. For some reason, the Boy Wonder's chameleon-like tongue really makes me jealous (possibly because I find it surprisingly hilarious when his tongue changes colour) so I resolved to find out if this was a common problem. A quick bit of Googling revealed the following:

1. No, people are not flooding the internet with similar queries

2. There are some weird things going on in people's mouths including a condition called 'hairy tongue' (a defective desquamation of the filiform papillae, wouldn't you just know it).

3. Looking at photos of those weird things will make you nauseous almost without exception

4. References to 'Non-absorbent tongue' seem to exist only in the context of porn, training shoes and flooring.

So my thirst for knowledge remains unquenched and my annoyingly non-absorbent tongue seems destined to remain tongue coloured for the time being.

Census

I have just had the census form through the post, and although I am not one who is particularly bothered by providing the kind of general information about myself to the government, I am a little surprised to find that question 17 on the census form is apparently 'Intentionally left blank - go to question 18'. Why would they do this? The most annoying thing is that I'm sure there's probably a good reason, but without knowing it I am forced to assume that they made a list of all the questions they wanted to ask and someone left out number 17, but because all the other questions direct you towards the next relevant question they decided it was too much of a faff and so just decided on this solution.

ETA - apparently it's about the Welsh language and hence has been redacted from the English census, so I withdraw my confusion and proclaim the census relatively simple.

Books that sound more exciting with the last letter of the title knocked off

In a tribute to the game played on Cabin Pressure, I though I would put my mind to a list of books which sound more exciting with the last letter removed

Charlie and the Chocolate Factor

Adam Bed

Of Mice and Me

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fir

A Dance to the Music of Tim

The Day of the Locus (this actually sounds less interesting, like a maths textbook)

The Invisible Ma

The Sound and the Fur

White Teet

My guilty pleasure

One of the reasons that I used to like helping my Mum with the family grocery shopping is because it gave me an opportunity to indulge my guilty pleasure of touching food. Not in a perverted way, although I'm guessing Freud would have plenty to say about it, but just in an inappropriate way for food which I have no intention of buying. The first memory I have of enjoying touching food was when I was little and I used to beg to be in charge of getting the mushrooms. I never actually liked mushrooms as a child but I really liked the feel of them and enjoyed ferreting out the littlest ones, even though my Mum always tried to encourage me not to.

Since then, the variety of foods that I like to touch has broadened and now includes things like Scotch eggs, vacuum packed meats, bread, pies and cheeses. Pre-packed snacks are also a treat as they are generally soft and pliable and something about pressing them makes me happy. I know it's wrong - I wouldn't necessarily want to eat something that someone else had poked, although I always poke through wrappers, never with my naked finger - but I don't even care because I'm just going to carry on doing it whenever the urge takes me.