Another year, another round robin …

Sickeningly smug greetings from picturesque Smuddland where robins perch on
spades outside the door and every day the winter sun rises above a blissfully
happy and successful home. So, …

Let us Bray!

2010 has been so eventful and so packed with achievement it’s hard to know
where to begin the list of personal triumphs, but I know you’re all so keen to
know everything so I will try! I hope I don’t leave anything out! If I do,
I’ll put it in next year’s Xmas card…

Remember last year I told you how Old Smuddy’s colostomy bag gave out
during Smuddette’s kazoo solo in the Asbo-Leavers’ Music and Movement
Christmas Special? Oh, how we laughed!!! Thankfully, he’s got to grips with
his new one which finally arrived at the end of March and since then we have
had almost no leakage at all. We’ve treated ourselves to some lovely new lino
throughout the house and I’d never choose anything but ‘wipe-clean’ again! The
rest of Old Smuddy’s back teeth finally fell out after all those toffees last
Christmas but the front three seem to be hanging in there. Just one more to
go, then his grin will be symmetrical at least.

Great news about my glass eye, though! After enduring 3 years of what
experts describe as “a baffling inverted-swivel situation” I’ve now been
fitted with a lovely new one which stares almost straight ahead and is only a
few shades off a total match. They’ve even blood-shotted the white so it’s
virtually impossible to tell which one is the “Columbo”! I can’t tell you what
a boost it’s been to my confidence and I’ve started attending the village
rug-tatting circle once more. It’s lovely to be back among other overweight
and partially-sighted friends and a steady gaze has helped me cope with my
otherwise relentless ill-health. I’ve been at the doctor’s almost constantly
this year and finally I’ve been told that I have a very weak intellect and a
vivid imagination. Apparently this is an unhappy affliction and nothing can be
done but at least it’s nice to have a proper diagnosis.

Smuddette has had a lovely year, not least because the police finally
lifted her curfew and she’s been able to spend a lot more time with her
friends, both outside the Off-Licence and on-line. She’s started yet another
school and so far it hasn’t burnt down and she hasn’t been asked to leave!
She’s gained her Grade 1 on the ukulele (third time lucky!) and has also been
put on ‘The Watch List’ by the headmaster! Result! She seems to have a natural
talent for creative writing, judging by the heap of letters explaining her
absence that I was called to the school to verify! Academia aside, having yet
another infected ring through her lip doesn’t seem to have put her off and
she’s applied to do her Work Experience in Ted’s Tattoo & Piercing
Parlour. She’s designed some lovely skull-based tattoos and will be happy even
if all they let her do is apply the TCP. She’s a lovely girl and doesn’t plan
to be pregnant for at least a year.

Smudd Junior is still really interested in Law and we’re always amazed to
hear how much he knows about it! He’s forever being invited to attend the
Magistrate’s Court and just recently he’s been selected for something called
Community Service which I think is a bit like College but without the
lectures. He’s also making quite a name for himself in the field of art; Old
Smuddy and I very rarely drive anywhere without seeing Junior’s ‘Tag’ on some
underpass, bridge or shop front! He must be very good with those aerosols now
because he’s forever in the garage giving a car a re-spray! I do wish he’d
leave the door open when he’s doing that but he’s adamant that he has to work
with the door firmly locked and is only in there between three and four in the
morning (something to do with his creative flow he says!). I’ve never seen any
of his ‘spray-jobs’ either because it seems that the cars’ owners can only
collect them before 6.00am and of course I’m in the middle of my beauty-sleep
by then! For the sake of his lungs if nothing else, I’m glad he’s persisting
with his market-garden venture in a few of the Nissan huts on the disused
airfield just down the road. He’s seen a gap in the ‘tall, five-pronged-leaf
lettuce’ market and I’m with him all the way! “It’s Hydroponics, Mum”, he said
to me only last week, “It’s Hydro-bloomin-ponics and it’s my ticket outta
here.” His business must be going so well he’s started bringing some of his
exotic, tall lettuce plants home and putting them in a specially-lit room.
Ultra-violet light seems to be the key and hermetically-sealed doors are
vital. He’s always been very good with science and biology and the like and
now it seems he has a business head on his shoulders as well! Mustn’t ‘crow’,
though, must I? Gets right up people’s noses, doesn’t it???!!!

Ah well, I must away and finish hand-making all my crystallised cherries
for my sugar-crafted festive cake!

Wishing you all an envious Christmas and a thoroughly-trumped New Year,

Your friends (although we haven’t actually seen each other for the last 27
years) and competitors,

Gloria, Old Smuddy, Junior and Smuddette