Revenge of the turd monster - new blog post is up

[legalbeagle]

Slightly cheeky putting this in the family room but I know lots of you don't venture into the lounge! I'm looking for an agent or publisher to talk to about publishing my blog - it isn't really a traditional blog, more of a diary, but it's in that form just so that it is accessible and I can show some of my writing easily. I'd like to turn it into a diary and publish in book form, or write it as a regular column.

It's about life, love, marriage, divorce, parenting, singing, some chickens and a Fireman. If anyone is interested to read it and comment, especially on how I can progress the project, or knows a publisher that might be interested, let me know!

I've had some interest from an online magazine and a few other places, but not quite what I'm looking for yet.....

[legalbeagle]

An extract, to give you an idea:

The kindness of strangers

My daughter has created a way of communicating that is all her own. Some would consider her use of language quirky or even inappropriate, but in reality it reveals a talent for comic timing, an extraordinary ability to retain random snippets of information and a cunning well beyond her years.

CRASH. I dash into the kitchen. My son is on the floor, feeding his breakfast to the dog. ?Why did your brother throw his breakfast on the floor??

?Because he?s a monster of depravity.?

Really though. It takes some serious brain power for me to come up with TS Eliot at what passes for breakfast on a Monday in this house, and I?m not five.

These domestic challenges aside, her most recent innovation is to stop total strangers in the street, and let them know what she?s up to, lest they worry for her wellbeing at a later date. At particularly chatty times, I have to decide whether to apologise profusely to confused strangers and move her along, or let her have her interaction with the outside world and just see how it works out. I almost always let her speak. I figure it?s the only real way to learn how others react to your style of communication, and as long as she doesn?t get a hostile or upsetting reaction, where?s the harm. This, it transpires, was not my finest hour when choosing a parenting strategy.

We've popped to the shops, and she's very chatty because she is following me around with her very own little girl?s shopping trolley, of which she is mighty proud. There's even a little seat for her favourite bear. We pause at the milk chiller and in the second I'm looking away, she spots a woman with two kids in a double buggy. The woman is doing her best to juggle her bag, her shopping basket, her double buggy with two kids installed, a pint of milk, and a shopping list. My daughter peers at her victim and concludes this woman is in no position to make a quick getaway. Her eyes narrow. She has something to say, and victim is weighed down with no clear exit. She strikes.

?Hello. This is my new shopping trolley. This is my mummy, this is my little brother, and this is Blue Bear?. Well so far so good. I smile brightly at the woman. She smiles back. Quit while we?re ahead, I think to myself. ?Come along darling, let?s find your cereal?.

But if I think I?m getting her away from a static and smiling victim that quickly I?ve got another think coming. This child has something to say and she?s damn well going to say it. All of it.

?My shopping trolley is new. We have lots of new things.? Victim is looking confused. This is not headed in a good direction. I go to grab my verbose offspring but she?s too quick. She scoots her trolley round the chiller to the bread aisle and takes a deep breath. I can?t reach her, I can?t stop her talking and I know, I just know what?s coming next. We are about to share far too much information.

?My mummy?s got a new car. And a new house. And a new garden too. And my mummy?s got a new friend. He?s her special best friend. He's very nice, but he talks funny because he?s from the north?.

Oh for god?s sake. Some of my closest relatives don?t have half this information and for good reason. I?m sunk. I have yet to talk through huge changes in my life with a number of those I know and love and yet my daughter is more than content to dish the dirt in the baked goods section of the Co-op. I am unutterably embarrassed. To say that I would like to curl up and die is an understatement of gigantic proportions.

And then I am thrown a lifeline by the victim. She looks up at me, flashes a big smile, and looks back at my daughter. ?Well that all sounds VERY positive? she says. My daughter gives a little smile that says ?My work here is done? and we are finally allowed to move on. And then she turns back for one last stab at my total humiliation: ?I?m off now with my new shopping trolley to find some more cereal. My brother fed our last box to the dog after he poo?d on her?.

Keep walking, I tell myself. Just keep walking.

[legalbeagle]

Thanks for lovely PMs!

[legalbeagle]

And I know some of you have heard about this already but what the heck. I'm in a crappy mood so it seems somehow appropriate:

The footballing turd monster

Children have an amazing ability to take you out of your immediate life, and demand that you deal with them right now. Exactly right here and now. This very minute. Even if you are having a coronary arrest. Even if your numbers just came up on the lottery. Even if the four horsemen of the apocalypse have ridden onto your front lawn and are drinking from your birdbath, you still have to stop what you are doing and deal with whatever it is that has just gripped their world with a hitherto unmeasurable urgency. Only the ringing of a mobile phone is as effective in tearing us away from what we were doing with the speed of a man on a promise of a threesome. Now don?t get me wrong, I love my kids and I?m grateful for those distractions, especially now. They take me out of myself and remind me that to live like a child, in the here and now, can be a wonderful and liberating thing. But now and then, just occasionally, I do wonder whether the cure is worse than the disease.

My three year old son can now take his nappy off on his own. I know he can do this because I just walked into my sitting room to find a huge turd on the floor, next to the grinning pantless boy. And before I could stop him, he kicked it across the room. I don?t mean he stumbled over it, or ran joyfully towards me catching it with his foot as he went. I mean he saw it, considered its position, took a few steps back, crouched slightly, and then ran at it with the biggest kick his three year old little legs could muster. I have just finished clearing up the flying sausage, including from down his legs, between his toes, under his toe nails, and the little extra nugget I found 10 minutes later under the TV table when I wondered what the dog was trying to lick.

My five year old daughter was standing next to the offending shite monster, muttering. As I mopped closer to her, I heard the words: "Mummy! Mummy! He?s poo?d on the dog!? In my panic I dismissed this as factually inaccurate, until about an hour later, when the dog came to sit on my lap. To be fair I'm not sure he actually poo?d on the dog. I think it?s more likely he sort of wiped his bum on her as she was passing. She?s a very small spaniel so she?s sort of shitty bottom height I suppose.

When I was pregnant I would ask people how they coped with the poo, and the vomit, the half masticated tepid food, the dribble, the seemingly endless supply of snot. They would smile serenely and coo that I really shouldn?t worry, you get used to it, it?s not that bad, not when it?s from your darling own offspring, etcetera.

A more obvious lie hasn?t been told since man first uttered to woman: ?Put the map away! I know exactly where I?m going!? I hold those liars personally responsible for my predicament. I could have been forewarned. I might have made other choices. I might even have stayed as a finance lawyer and hired an army of nannies. But no. My life is now changed forever, you bastards, and I?m the full time parent of a footballing turd monster. And there?s damn all I can do about it but be a good goalie.

[Belle]

LB if you get a book published I would def buy it, and buy copies for my friends. Good luck!

[legalbeagle]

Thanks! Think I'll need a few more blog readers before that happens but I'll keep going!

[legalbeagle]

Lots more lovely PMs. Thanks! Here's one from when I had just met my boyfriend:

Introduction. Or: ?The time I got lost in the bath.?

Sitting across from him, I smile as he tries to cheer me up. For no reason (which is always the reason), I?ve had a terrible night and a not much better morning. I can?t remember finding anything harder than getting divorced. It?s an all pervading sadness that makes me feel like someone has died, and in fact I?ve read many an expert who will tell you that, whether you chose this path or it?s imposed on you, you do have to grieve. You grieve for a lost marriage, for a separation from a once good friend, for the assumptions you?d made and the plans you?d drawn up; for the category you now find yourself in, for the indignity of failure and for the horrible pain inflicted on so many people, young and old. ?It?s a path of almost biblical stoniness? warns one of my cyber friends. He?s not wrong.

I spent last night and quite a bit of this morning in tears. We?ve taken the dog for a walk on the Rye, and now we?re sitting down for coffee. Fireman says: ?Did I ever tell you about the time I got lost in a bath?? We?ve only recently met. I?m pretty sure I?d remember that story. I smile and raise my eyebrows.

?I went to a house fire? he says. ?There was a lot of very thick smoke, and we were told by neighbours that a family was inside. Two of us went in to find them. I went straight up the stairs, but the smoke was so thick I literally couldn?t see my hand in front of my face. I felt my way along the wall, found a door, and went into a room I assumed was the bedroom. Just inside I felt something hit the middle of my legs. I assumed it was a stairgate, so I stepped over it. I kept feeling my way, but almost immediately hit a solid wall. I had no idea where I was, the visibility was atrocious and I just couldn?t get my bearings. I flailed about, in thick grey soup, grasping at solid walls. Eventually I managed to step backwards over the stairgate and back into the corridor. We searched all the rooms, but no one was found; turns out the family weren?t there after all. When the fire was out I wanted to work out where I had been so I retraced my steps. It became clear that it wasn?t a stairgate, it was the side of the bath. My hand and footprints were clearly visible, all around the inside of the bath and along the wall, where I had aimlessly stumbled about looking for bodies. I quite literally got lost in the bath!? He grins. I know he?ll have taken some stick from the boys for that one, and his capacity for slapstick and for laughing at himself is very endearing ? and it does cheer me up.

Later I pick my son up from nursery. Whatever else is going on in my life, I still have two children to care for and I?m forever grateful that they make me get up and get on with it every day. They are sometimes the only reason I do.

Text to Fireman: I?m sorry for all the tears. I?m trying hard to do this right, I really am. But today is not easy. It feels like I?m lost in a bath.

Fireman: If you can retrace your steps you might find where you got lost. Alternatively, grab my hand.

[radnrach]

What's the blog web address? I'd love to read it!

[legalbeagle]

I've sent you a PM. Happy reading!

[Lochie]

Am sitting at my desk at work eating horrible microwaved soup, reading your blog entries, and need some more, it is addictive!! Can you post up your blog here so can carry on with the read?? Some bits left a lump in my throat!!

[legalbeagle]

Thanks Lochie. I like making people cry, I think it means I write well! Hmmm. Now I've read that back it sounds a bit weird.......

Sent you a PM. I've had lots of requests for the blog link but I'm not sure if I'm really allowed to put it in a thread so if anyone else wants it do feel free to PM me.

[Family Room Moderator]

As I am also loving reading these entries I hereby grant permission to post your blog link :))

[legalbeagle]

Oh bless you. That's kind. But I'd like to make a cheeky request if that's ok. IF anyone has liked reading it, and IF you won't find it a total pain, please become a follower. I'm bombarded with advice that I need:

A. a following not unlike Stephen Fry's on twitter; or

B. to become Jordan

to look even remotely plausible in the non-fiction publishing world.

*Peers at knockers post breast feeding two babies*

That'll be A then.

Start at the bottom and work up. (I'm talking about the blog now, not knockers).

http://beth-multuminparvo.blogspot.com/

[legalbeagle]

Well that's the power of the internet - so far I've had just over 100 reads of my blog from this thread and some new followers on twitter and the blog. Thanks for your support, and keep clicking! New post will be up by the end of the week.

I hope you've enjoyed reading it. And do tell me if you cried. I have a strange compulsion to know if I've made people cry.

[Note to self: That sounds weird. Stop sharing now.]

[brum]

Note from Fireman:

This is just the start....

[legalbeagle]

:))

And just to let everyone who has asked know, I think my "follow me on twitter" button on the blog is now working. And, very excitingly, netmums (fastest growing parents website in UK, so they tell me) has just become a follower!!!

[legalbeagle]

And now MumsRock - new website which I really like - has just asked me to write an article for them! Wooooo Hoooooo!

I'm all excited now.

Writing new blog entry - Admin am I allowed to post it up here or is that enough self publication now?!

[legalbeagle]

Latest blog post is up:

http://beth-multuminparvo.blogspot.com/

[legalbeagle]

Thank you for all the lovely PMs about my last post. I have managed to add buttons to follow me on twitter or facebook so if you want to read my new posts you can do it that way. I know some people are finding becoming a follower on the blog a bit tricky.

http://beth-multuminparvo.blogspot.com/

[legalbeagle]

Very excited to be writing for MumsRock. You might have seen this already on my blog. Thanks for all the lovely support, all the extra reads from here certainly helped!

http://www.mumsrock.com/articles/speed-parenting/rock-guides-to-life/the-poignant-perspective-of-poo

[Administrator]

No more bumping up of this promotional thread please.

[legalbeagle]

Understood.

(Though I have pointed MumsRock in the direction of the forum, sung its praises, pointed out its incredible audience numbers and suggested they advertise on here by way of your VERY reasonable advertising package.....)

[Family Room Moderator]

Sorry LB, partly my fault for allowing the link (which is fine) - I hadn't kept up with all the updates following it. Thanks for your understanding.

FRM

[legalbeagle]

It's fine, really. This thread started off with me thinking that some of the family room might find my stories funny, and then I got to write an article out of the blue, and lots of people were asking me to let them know how I got on with publishers etc so it seemed easiest to just put an update on here as things went along. But of course now someone else's website is in play it's very unfair to those who pay to advertise on the forum for me to keep mentioning someone for free. So Admin is perfectly right.

And that's all I'll say since I've been asked veru nicely to stop putting this thread to the top of the page!

(Though again, thanks for all the support, it has been just fantastic!)

[legalbeagle]

A quick update!

Mumsrock have published my first article, ("the poignant perspective of poo") which I'm really excited about, and they liked it so much I have another one coming out some time this week. Woooo hooo! Can't believe I got published, I'm still very overexcited!

Also, lots of people asked me to keep them updated with my blog. There is another post up here:

http://beth-multuminparvo.blogspot.com

Rather stupidly I didn't manage to keep all of the PMs asking me to keep people updated, so if you are interested in updates either become a follower, or follow me on facebook or twitter, or PM me and I'll PM you when there are updates.

I won't be updating via this thread anymore as admin has to be fair to all the bloggers/writers etc so can't just promote me, and to promote all would cause chaos and isn't really what the lovely family room is for!

Finally, thank you for all your support. I've had literally hundreds of hits on my blog from here and I'm really grateful.