Spring cleaning......

Every year it's the same, the temperature starts to rise, the sun comes out and I get this urge to de-clutter.


 I'm no minimalist, I like a cosy home but sometimes I get the distinct feeling that I'm disappearing under stuff. For years I've gone around muttering William Morris's 'have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.' I do try to live by it but, then again, I'd probably have to chuck myself out if I did. 


I've always been ruthless with my wardrobe and have a rule that if something hasn't been worn for a year then out it goes. Whoever came up with the idea of those charity collection bags is a genius in my book, I can have a clear out and feel I'm helping worthwhile causes at the same time, guilt free de-cluttering. 


I have a one in, one out rule for everything else (apart from the kids, they were both allowed to stay) and it does help keep the place reasonably under control, but there's one area that drives me mental - the attic. I just know it's been full of crap for years. 


The problem is I can't get up there as I'm hopeless with heights, stand me on a stool and I get vertigo. Fortunately though, son number one is now tall enough to go up for me so I've embarked on Operation Clear Attic although I'm beginning to wish I hadn't.


It appears there's enough clutter up there to fill another house. There's the stuff you'd expect to find in most people's loft - the artificial Christmas tree missing a few branches; dodgy looking suitcases; concert programmes, old school reports, photo albums, baby memorabilia.


I also have an antique standard lamp with an authentic silk covered flex that would undoubtedly electrocute me if I were mad enough to try to use it, bucket loads of soft toys and lurid pictures that I can't believe I would ever have hung on my walls. 


What I hadn't expected to find was a tent. A two room, four person tent complete with bed rolls, awning and groundsheets. Never used. I'd completely forgotten buying it. It was one of those hair brained moments, you know the ones, when an image pops into your head. Mine was completely deluded - a happy family around a campfire on a warm summer's evening, having a great time out in the open air in a beautiful campsite overlooking a gorgeous beach.


I know I'm not the only one. Friends bought a tent and set off with their two kids for a fortnight's camping in Lyme Regis. They lasted three days. Another friend said she fell for the flowery Cath Kidston fantasy of camping but managed only one night before packing up and coming home. I'm sure there are expert campers out there, I just haven't ever met any. 


I completely blame that fantasy, because that's exactly what it is, for buying the tent. I should have known better and let reality kick in before I handed over the credit card, because reality would have reminded me that my one and only experience of camping was as a Girl Guide and I hated every minute. It rained; a friend fell in a nettle patch within minutes of arriving; the tent leaked if you so much as brushed a fingertip against it; we had to make shoe stands out of twigs for some bizarre reason and the loos were.....well, the less said about them the better. We quickly learned not to stand downwind of them. 


I remember now that I did give the tent a trial run and put it up in the back garden. Well, tents have certainly changed since my days as a guide when it was all hefty cream canvas, guy ropes and thumping in tent pegs with a whopping great mallet. At least you know where you are with a tent peg and a length of rope. This tent was virtually pop up and held together by lengths of elastic that ran through channels. Needless to say it took bloody hours. We were just standing back to admire our handiwork when the next door neighbour sauntered over (she being one of those practical RAF wife types), took one look and asked in a slightly amused voice 'is there any reason why you've put it up inside out?'

Smile please, we're British.

Times may be tough, it's still a bit nippy and spring seems a long way off, the economy's shot to pieces and the next series of Mad Men has been snaffled by Sky (another reason to loathe Murdoch) but, blimey, does it really mean we have to all go around like utter mannerless miseries?

Twice in the last few days I've been snarled at by two separate women drivers because they had to wait, oh all of a few seconds, while I reversed into a parking space. Then I held a shop door open for a guy and he walked straight through, completely ignoring me. No chance of a thank you, obviously.

I'm sick of hearing people moaning. We Brits have long been obsessed by the weather and boy, didn't everyone bang on about the recent snow? Well what do you expect in winter? I was inwardly sniggering when the whingers went on and on about how treacherous their journey was, how their lives were turned upside down by a mere couple of centimetres of the white stuff. I'm remembering Bill Bryson's great comment that real snow is when you can't find your car until spring.

I was recounting all this to a friend and she told me that she'd been at Bath railway station and a bloke had spat not just once but twice on the platform in front of her. Honestly, what is going on, is Britain becoming the land not just of the negative but of the pig ignorant?

I'm just back from New York and a few weeks ago I was in Paris, two cities with long standing reputations for rudeness. It's been almost obligatory to be ignored by waiters in Paris where they evidently work to the premis that the customer is always wrong and you'd never dare order soup there, just in case..... Then there's New York, the city that never sleeps, and where being rude is steeped into the psyche.

Well.....no actually. Three days in Paris and a week in New York and my only encounter with brusqueness in either city was an extremely verbose cab driver in Manhattan who moaned about anything and everything the entire trip. The irony was he couldn't have been more chatty with me, it just happened that he was slagging off everything about the city, but he was the exception.

From hotel staff to shop assistants, waiters, cabbies (bar one), tour guides, even a couple who sat alongside us in a coffee shop in Times Square and heard our accents, everyone was not only pleasant but friendly. Even the immigration officer at JFK who not only smiled but joked with us! That's how much things have changed.

It was actually a bit unnerving and I kept waiting for someone to slam a door in my face, ignore me, short change me, mug me, try and run me over as I crossed the street so I could sigh and say 'yep, that's more like it, that's rude old New York', but it never happened.

So come on Britain, we used to be known for our manners, our quirky sense of humour, our stoicism, our ability to look on the bright side. Can we stop all the moaning and bad manners now please?

I've had enough of all the negativity so I'm operating my own one-woman charm offensive. I go round smiling at everyone, I'm making eye contact, holding doors open and letting cars into traffic. Ok, I'm in danger of being considered a raving nutter but so what?

Isn't it more pleasant to smile rather than snarl? And do you know what? Nine times out of ten, if you smile at someone and acknowledge them, they smile back. It's definitely better than moaning.

The art of flirting

I've just been told I'm an incorrigible flirt. It was clear from the tone with which this pronouncement was made that this was not at all a good thing to be. So it probably didn't go down at all well when I laughed and said 'goodness, thanks.'

I don't mind admitting, I'm all for flirting, in fact, I'm convinced that it's in very real danger of dying out in this bland politically correct world in which we now live. It's time to revive the art of gentle flirtation in my book.

Obviously there are rules, I'm not advocating the bimbo version, where the subtext is all about sex, all those long sideways glances, licking of the lips, chest stuck out, crossing and uncrossing of the legs and extravagant flicking of the hair. No, I'm talking about the style of flirting that leaves both parties having enjoyed a harmless episode of brief mutual admiration, without having felt the need to rip any clothes off.

After all, what is wrong with a bit of harmless flirtation? The very word is light, fluffy and smacks of fun. I've realised that I flirt virtually every day in some way or another, today it was with the courier who delivered my repaired laptop, just a bit of banter than made us both laugh.

This week alone I've flirted with two 16-week-old males who responded with lots of eye contact, gummy smiles and giggles and a chap in his 70s who called me 'young lady', told me I had a great smile and thanked me for a lovely chat. This guy was a flirting pro, he knew the rules and that I no more wanted to jump his bones than take up carpet bowls.

Maybe that's why flirting is fast becoming a thing of the past, it's become too associated with sex. Perhaps modern flirting has become shorthand for foreplay but that's not my kind of flirting. I like the subtle, innocent kind.

I'm not sure when flirting turned toxic. When did being a natural flirt become something bad, something to be viewed negatively? When did being a bit of a flirt become synonymous with asking for trouble, for being regarded as a woman who's 'up for it'? Probably about the same time that judges started making odious comments that rape victims who wear short skirts deserve what they get. Naturally there are boundaries that it's sensible not to cross, never flirt with a man who's had a few for a start as you're liable to get your tits groped.  

In the days when there were bank managers, flirting was always worth a try when you needed to get the overdraft extended, it certainly worked for me a few times. Maybe flirting is just really all about using our womanly charms to our advantage, subtle manipulation.

I'm a feminist but I'm guilty of having exploited men through flirting, usually by playing the helpless woman when something has gone wrong with my car. Then again, I really am a helpless, hopeless female when anything mechanical packs up. If it means I never have to change a wheel, then I'll carry on flirting.