For those of you who aren’t in the know, Big Tone is my long-suffering father, the butt of many of my jokes and the main man in my life. His Yorkshire accent, claims to authority on EVERY subject and constant name-dropping bring my brothers and I constant joy and make for excellent material when doing impressions of him. Don’t feel too sorry for him though. I am what you might call ‘a chip off the old block’ and my own penchant for embarrassing him and myself pales into insignificance in comparison to his own desire to do the same thing. As a child, it was just about manageable. Watching films with him meant being prepared for any sex-scene to be accompanied by his tapping me on the shoulder and asking ‘What are they doing Emilie?’ or making sloppy kissing noises. Trips to restaurants entailed both of my brothers squirming with discomfort as their middle-aged father flirted relentlessly with the (usually completely horrified) waitress, making jokes about their acne and asking deliberately provocative questions. He still does this now…
And as we ascend into middle age, Tone’s desire to humiliate us has only increased. So, at the weekend, whilst sat at the dinner table with my sophisticated French cousin and my very well to do uncle and aunt, my Dad suddenly started laughing and declared that he had ‘a present’ that he had brought back from the Lake District for me. Delighted, I asked him what it was. “Well…it’s not really a present” he giggled “it’s more a case of me returning something to you”. I racked my brain as to what it could be and came to the conclusion that he was going to give me the rucksack and tent that I ‘borrow’ from him to go to festivals every year and which he has never actually used himself. Dad had asked for said rucksack to be returned before his trip to the Lake District “in case I go walking”. It was therefore a logical gift. “Are you finally going to give me the rucksack?” I ventured. Again, Tone started to chuckle to himself and took a moment to check that everyone seated around the table was listening before he made his big reveal; “No…not the rucksack, love…just something that you left in it”.
Now…any other father, on finding a pocket full of jonnies nestling amongst his daughter’s things, might decide to spare both her dignity and his own, by NEVER MENTIONING IT. Tone, however, cannot resist the opportunity to raise a blush on his daughter’s face. “You didn’t get lucky at Glastonbury then?!” he shouted “nice to see that you’re keeping safe though love” he giggled. “A little bit ambitious weren’t you? 10 condoms?!!”. Sadly for Big Tone, he has to try much harder these days to make us even remotely uncomfortable; the conditioning of our upbringing has forced us to pretty much take anything on the chin and expect the worst. Like the time he mistook my buzzing electric toothbrush for a vibrator when packing my bag into the boot of the car to go on holiday and frantically started shouting and motioning for me to come over and turn it off. “I didn’t want your battery to run out” he chirruped. Or the time, when I was 15, that he shouted up the stairs to me and my petrified boyfriend “this is not a fooking knocking shop!”. Or the time that he hid behind a lamp post and jumped out on my brother (aged 16 at the time) and his first girlfriend, shouting “I’m Alex’s Dad”. Alex, old for his age, responded in much the same way as I did at the dinner table; with a pitiful shake of the head and a raised eyebrow.
Bless him.
Stuff I liked this week
Wish I thought of this myself: http://failblog.org/
A steal from someone else’s blog- but made me happy: http://www.thetoyfactory.org.uk/fancy.html
My friend Shenoda interviewed online: http://www.datatransmission.co.uk/viewnewtalent.aspx?ID=101
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