The grass will be greener

You know what shocked me the most when I moved to this country? The dandelions. Here I was living in a place reknowned for neatness and orderliness and doing things The Right Way - and everyone had dandelions in their lawn. Along with a heap of other weeds. Laziness and unkemptness everywhere.

I tried to get over my Australian aversion to weeds. I did. I really really tried to like dandelions. And actually, the flower is quite pretty. Plus kids love the puff.

I thought I'd done it (although I still baulked at liking dandelion salad) ... and then I got my own garden. My own, dandelion weed filled garden.

I've spent a lot of time weeding lately.

The dandelions were dealt with pretty quickly... but as I inspected the lawn, words came back to me from my father. Grass names. Couch, kikuyu, paspalum.

Hmm, paspalum. We seem to have a lot of it. I'm pretty sure dad said it wasn't a good grass to have. And it sure is ugly.

So, in the afternoons after work with the kids helping, and late into the summer nights with the swallows calling out above, and for entire weekend days as the village passed by and teased me about wanting an English garden*, I've been pulling out paspalum.

Bucket-load after bucket-load after bucket-load. (Along with bucket-loads of stones) (And with some interference)

The photo above with me in it shows the extent of my paspalum-pulling obsession - I'm not on our side of the garden. The thought of weed-free lawn on our side and paspalum-infested lawn on the other was too much to bear.

Which added urgency to the weeding, because people were starting to visit the other half of the barn, with an eye for buying. And while C's godfather seemed to be OK with me ripping up the grass, I couldn't be sure the new neighbours would appreciate it.

My obsessive side was pretty sure my shy side would win if I didn't finish before someone moved in. So I stepped up my efforts, even weeding by feel in the fading evening light.

And I did it. I pulled up the last clump of paspalum just before my family arrived for 4.5 weeks.

Our new neighbours move in 2 weeks after my family leaves. Which just might be enough time to fill in all the holes I've made in their lawn...

* Just to have in writing for C's family, who continue to tease me: I'm not aiming for a perfectly manicured English garden, just one with pretty grass and no weeds.

So here's an odd thing

Discovering YouTube was a hallelujah moment - there I was with a heap of videos of Téo, and no way to easily show them off to my friends and family on the other side of the world. And then voilà, there was a way. Thank you YouTube!

So I uploaded a heap, sent a few links, videos were watched in the next few days, and that was that.

Except that was not that. Strangers are watching these videos too. And for some reason, two in particular seem quite popular. Nowhere near the league of Charlie biting Harry, which has been viewed something like 53 million times (I'm not exaggerating) and spawned a heap of remakes and even got the stars on TV, but still, way more popular than I'd ever imagined. Or can fathom.

One is of building the train set that Téo got for his second birthday. 486 views to date. Um... why? It's a nice reminder for us, and maybe the family liked it 2 years ago, but who is watching it now? I imagine the people who find it in a search click away as soon as they realise what they're watching.

But people are definitely watching the other popular one, of my niece making shortbread. Someone gave it a five-star rating! Two people have left comments! Recently! And it's not my brother watching it over and over - it already had over 300 views before he even got around to taking a look. Again I don't get it - it's cute yes, but not interesting for people who don't know us, surely?

And all the time, my all-time favourite Téo video has only been viewed 43 times.

It's all very odd indeed.

Another cute video

(At least, I think so...)



* 38 sec: I once saw a lilac cat (but not in Scotland)

* 1 min: he usually asks why the dog is in the darktime, and I say it's because it would be hard to see a white dog on a white page. This is the first time he's checked that other colours would be OK to see a white dog.

Singalong

Just to counter the negativity of the last post:

Weary

So I'm back for a bit... but feeling very weary after two short trips as a single mum in two weeks.

On the first trip (to the Matterhorn with mum) there was whinging and screaming in the car on the way there and back, Lukan was sick and screamed every night for hours, and Téo's behaviour was less than exemplary most of the time. Things were better on the second trip (to Luzern with my brother and his family) - and the kids slept in the car for most of the way there and back, thank god - but it was still tiring. Plus there was much screaming at bedtime after we got home last night.

And C doesn't get home from a work trip until midnight tonight, so there's no chance of a break today.

We weren't so lucky with the weather on Mount Pilatus

Back from the mountains

We're back from a short trip to take mum to see the Matterhorn.

Not allowing women to advance

I've been thinking about this for a while now, but I'm not sure how it will go as a blog post.

Anyways, here goes.

The week before our holiday in Scotland, C was the the UK for work. So I flew to Edinburgh with the kids, and he met us there.

To me this was the sensible thing to do: why waste money and time (and CO2 emissions) on unnecessary plane trips when I could perfectly well manage on my own? But several of the people C met with that week said their wives would never have allowed them to do the same.

Would not have allowed them?

Would not have allowed them??

I just can't get over this.

I understand not being able to fly alone with two little kids, and also not wanting to fly alone with two little kids. I have no problem if people in this situation choose, as a couple, to instead fly together as a family, with one party coming home from somewhere else to be able to do this. But the not allowing makes it sound as if the husband is getting away with something, or breaking some principle. And I just can't see what that something or that principle would be. It seems completely irrational. And also unfair.

I couldn't help but think of these women as controlling princesses, or else as wane 19th century type women who have to take themselves off for a lie down all the time and are never expected to be able to do anything for themselves.

And this got me thinking... is this type of behaviour in some women today setting us all back? The men C met with were all professionals, probably managers. Does having a wife who doesn't allow them to do perfectly sensible things if that means the woman has to do something by herself colour their view of women as a whole? Does it make them believe that women really are less capable, or else irrational and demanding? And does this consciously or unconsciously prevent them from giving female subordinates the same chances as male subordinates?

I know that there are other factors behind women not making up 50% of top management, and not being paid as much as men on average. And while I believe in equal rights, I'm not sure women will ever make 50% representation everywhere, at every level - being the ones that bear the babes is not something that's easy to get around, or even something that necessarily should be gotten around.

But still, if there's a lot of these not allowing wives and girlfriends, it can't be a good thing for women as a whole.

What do you think?