Humour – Living with Alf

Corona Alf

It’s been an age since I had inspiration enough to string a whole blog together. Don’t get me wrong, it isn’t through lack of material. The lapse of time in between notable Alf-related antics is never that great and I have taken note of many such skylarkings. It is more a combination of my time and efforts required elsewhere and the simple fact that I have become an almighty lockdown bore. Yoga…work…walk the dog…redecorate…repeat. I am loathe to admit that I have enjoyed the simplicity of my days which starkly contrasts with my usual feverish schedule. It hasn’t however been the stuff of fuel for the imagination.

Also, Alf has been locked down in Florida. He assures us he is taking good care, even pushing his shopping trolley from the wrong end at the supermarket to ensure he in using a less-handled area.

Here we are again on Father’s Day and the blog becomes a homage to Alf in lieu of the card that I should have posted a couple of weeks ago. I do not feel over-guilty in this regard since Alf is himself known for his tardy recognition of important dates and he wholeheartedly embraces it. In fact, I have been imagining a time where I announce to my friends and family that I will send cards and messages when I have something meaningful to say rather than when I am overstretched trying to send cards to everyone I love over the holidays and I will give gifts when I see something that makes me think of them rather than when I am panic buying under the pressure of time. In fact, I hereby proclaim that this is my way forward. Comments welcome.

Alf was disappointed not to have made it back to the Island by springtime as in previous years. He has usually spent weeks in the garden by this stage, repeating past successes, making changes to his previously less rewarding efforts and experimenting with new visions dreamt up over the winter. He seemed particularly pleased this year to have sourced some spaghetti squash seeds for me, something which we don’t see in this part of the world. Alf’s absence has been a source of mixed feelings for my husband, I think, who on one hand can usually count on Alf to help manage the garden when it is at it’s most weedy and bountiful but on the other hand he seems to be relishing in his complete domination over the land. Mwahahaha he is thinking as I watch him roamin’ in the gloamin’ in his blue crocks that came with the house.

It was also a bit of blow for Alf not to be getting use of the boat he bought over the winter. It has sadly spent more time in our drive, a breach of our deeds, than it has in the sea. No freshly caught smoked mackerel for us this summer.

Our contact with Alf over this unreal period of time has been via Messenger video for the most part, a medium which has thrown up frustration and hilarity in equal measures.

Unfortunately for me, when the world of video chat opened up for Alf, it cooincided with me having to get to grips with various means over which to hold virtual meetings while working from home. This meant I could be chairing a Group wide HR meeting by WebEx while Alf’s shaggy facebook profile repeatedly takes center stage on my phone while I decline his attempts to call, one after the other turning the air blue around me. Even though I am pretty sure it could not happen, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Alf would suddenly be linked in to my meeting. The temperature eeked upward on the Alfometer.

Thursday night for us has been family night for some time now and we attempted to carry on the tradition by lockdown. This has seen varying degrees of success. Unfortunately dinner time for us means mid-afternoon for Alf so he makes his calls from a tractor in the middle of an enourmous stretch of land.

At best, he is far from the camera. He looks around and we see the blue sky. There were several weeks where we were allowed a view of either Alf’s forehead or his chin. Father’s day love exhibit number 1 is that I refrained from using the word chin in its plural form. I jest really as that particular camera angle could, I’m sure, make even Eva Longoria look like a bullfrog on steroids.

The worst of the supper links with Alf saw him waving a hotdog around in front of the camera, an unsightly scene, his humour, that of a 13 year old, distracting from any potential chance to converse sensibly. My fault. I tried to get him to stop which for some reason inspires Alf to continue more vehemently.

Easter was a particular low, when Alf sent a joyous Easter message involving a photo of what can only be described as a double-fanny-bunny which managed to incorporate both the British and the American interpretation of the word fanny. I was not on the receiving end myself funnily enough, but I had messages throughout the day from those who were. I put myself metaphorically into my father’s size 10-wide docksiders that Sunday morning, to try understand his decision-making as he must have scrolled through his contact list:

Great-niece -heh heh heh, send

Ex-wife – double-fanny-bunny, send

Gorgeous, lovely friend of grand-daughter – double-fanny-bunny it is

Son-in-law – why not

Step-daughter – send

Friends of daughter – worldwide sendings of double-fanny-bunnies

Daughter of neice’s husband – Happy-double-fanny-bunny-Easter to you.

Grand-daughter – Nooooooo. She will lecture me.

Daughter – Definitely not. She has no sense of humour. (I do.) She has a stick up her arse. (I don’t.)

Shout out to my lovely cousin for telling him off on this occassion, in my stead.

My problem in conversation in company with Alf and others is that I shut Alf down while he is still being amusing, because I know that the laughs he recieves will encourage him to edge closer and closer to the line before eventually hopping, double-fanny-bunny style, right over it.

Happy Father’s Day Dad. I love you. Come home soon.

Alf away on Father’s Day

I haven’t posted in a while and I thought today would be an appropriate day to put fingertips to keyboard (definitely not as poetically pleasing as pen to paper). Alf is visiting family in the south of France so we are missing him on the day that celebrates fathers. I am aware that I give mine a hard time for most days out of the year, deservedly so in many instances, but today is the day to put aside all criticism, embrace Alf’s many qualities from which I have benefitted and sing his praises, forte, for all the world to hear.

Fuck that for a game of soldiers. That’s not what this blog is about. I took him out to lunch before he left.

Usually when I post a blog it has been bubbling away for some time and some brief notes have been made but in this case, I’ve got nothing. In an attempt to give some structure I am just going to plonk down whatever memories come to mind from the first that I can recall to the most recent, tattooed in my mind.

I have two early recollections from around the age of four. In one of these I am with my mother in our kitchen and Alf comes in and looks at me solemnly and says carefully “a friend of yours died today”. Oh no! My little brain whirrs. Amy! Lisa! Alf sees my horror and quickly puts me out of my misery. Our dog, Yankee has died. It was by far the worst event of my tiny life to date. Yet, somehow having allowed my mind to travel to unthinkable places with the feared loss of one of my four year old playmates, the passing of my beloved dog paled. I don’t think for a moment that this was Alf’s intention. I think he didn’t think about his opening line and how that would come across in isolation. Much like during his speech at my first wedding when he opened with “Megan is the easiest…” before taking a pregnant pause, leaving my new husband’s groomsman time to stand up and shout “That’s your wife he is talking about!” before Alf finishes his sentence “…person I know to get along with”.

My other early memory of Alf is of him coming home from work on the first day I was off from nursery school with chickenpox. I was very bored having completed my puzzle books and exhausted my surprisingly long attentions to Spirograph. Alf started slow, crouching down, moving his neck and raising his elbows. His eyes widen comedically as he typically embraces his role. By his second circuit around the room, it was clear he was regaling me with chicken impressions. My spots and I dissolved into fits of giggles, which encouraged many more laps. When I come up for air, my mother is standing in the doorway in her apron, smiling and shaking her head.

Birthday parties just didn’t happen for kids as they do now. At least where I live, it seems every child has a party every year. As a parent, you can easily spend half your weekend when your children are young, delivering them to parties and collecting them several hours later. Even worse, when they are very young, you have to stay to supervise! I had only a few birthday parties as a child but my brother and I were allowed summer parties occasionally. We were allowed 2o friends each so they must have been hard work for my parents. They were one hundred percent outdoor events. We had apple bobbing, hide and seek, we climbed trees, rode horses bareback, ate hot dogs and corn on the cob and Alf hosted the original slow bicycle race, the idea of which I confess made me slightly anxious. It was however, a great success with equal degrees of hilarity among my eleven year old friends and my brother’s seven year old pests.

When I got a bit older I was hired periodically to clean out Alf’s truck (the aforementioned semen mobile). I was allowed to keep whatever change I found as payment for my services. Alf spent a lot of time on the road with his mobile semen processing laboratory but it never ceased to amaze me how much I would find. There was loose change everywhere. It was in the cup holders, between the seat cushions, on the floor. I easily made away with more than twenty dollars. I was recounting this to Alf several years ago, so a good forty five years later. I saw something in his face as I retold my story and all at once I knew that he must have scattered all that change in advance. I imagine it would have given him great pleasure.

Once my parents divorced, Alf lived full time on his farm in upper state New York. He travelled the four hundred miles to see my brother and I on alternate weekends. We went to the movies, we stayed in hotels, we had long slow meals in restaurants, we went to the seaside and went beach combing. We were amused that Alf kept finding actual combs. I often had friends with me. In my pre-teens it continued and I would even encourage Alf to take us to the movies where I knew my boyfriend would be. The definition of boyfriend at the time was someone who said the words “Will you go out with me?”, to which you responded “Yes” and then you proceeded to never go anywhere at all together. I can imagine it was gut wrenching at the time to have made such an effort to visit, only to be met with your scheming daughter trying to spend time with someone else. Such is the selfish life of a girl of that age Alf but it is engrained in my mind forever that you carried on as you did and you can take some consolation in the fact that I was happy to be seen with you!

Recently Alf was putting things away in the cupboard behind the kitchen door. It is necessary for the kitchen door to be nearly closed when rummaging in that cupboard. My husband was passing as the dog pushed the kitchen door open further. “Hang on a minute”, shouted Alf. He closed the cupboard to make way for what he thought was a human, when he spots Tuka. “Oh it’s you.” “Jerk”, he mutters.

Over the years Alf has become a bit rough around the edges but he still has a big heart. My daughter is getting married this year and he has offered to forego any celebratory drinks to hire a van and give everyone lifts to and from the wedding. Yes please. Thank you. You’re the best.

Getting better at Living with Alf

It isn’t always easy living with Alf and I know he would say it isn’t always easy living with us. Before Alf came to live with us, I remember him suggesting that we discuss how it would all work before he moved in. We never actually had that conversation. As it happens, I don’t believe we would have been equipped enough to have had that talk then as it is difficult to anticipate how the ebb of one person’s life can imbalance the flow of another when suddenly put under one roof. It takes patience, understanding, empathy, love, acceptance and practice. It takes time. It takes friends who remind me how lucky I am that Alf has enough wits about him still to deliver the repeated smart-ass remarks.

I’m slowly learning not to sweat the small stuff or I wont be able to have his ear for the things that really matter to me.

My husband is learning to abandon his methodical and somewhat measured approach to fixing up the house and garden in order to occasionally work on some quick jobs that Alf finds gratifying. They are fundamentally different, my father and my husband. For my husband, think planning, aesthetics, pernickety and the speed of molasses going uphill. For Alf, it is all about practicality and aesthetics don’t get a look in. Think go, go, go, do, make do, oh shit, huh, ah well, never mind, done. I can imagine that in my husbands engineering career, his particular tendencies were crucial. I can equally see that living on a farm would require Alf’s alternative skills.

Alf is learning that he can’t say “Speak English will ya” to people who’s first language isn’t English without the rest of us taking a sharp intake of breath and wanting to hide under the table. I register 9.5 on the AAA scale and so does everyone else, even Lovely Lady I will wager who has previously seemed unshockable. Thankfully, the waiter on the receiving end of this comment is extremely gracious and he accepts Alf’s rambling explanation. Alf says it is out of habit, meant as a joke as he has, for years said it to people with colloquial accents (to a friend who is from Tennessee; to my husband who is from Glasgow). He has not given thought to how much worse that is for actual foreigners. He tells me he is learning. I take comfort in remembering the words of some comedian or another who said that it was a good thing discrimination doesn’t carry a prison sentence otherwise that would be where our parents and grandparents would dwell.

Alf misses his US friends albeit he is making friends here in Jersey. People are slowly coming to understand him, he says. He has commented that he can’t spread his wings very wide on a 9 x 5 island. When challenged this seems to be about driving on an open road, something he has always enjoyed in abundance. True, I think. Take some trips I say. Take the car on the ferry to England and visit family and friends.

We have introduced a family breakfast on a Saturday morning to talk about what’s going on for each of us. I hope that it will keep us aligned and feeling like we are on the same team. I have asked Alf outright if he would not try to wind me up further for his own entertainment when I am already under pressure. To save my husband’s sanity, Alf needs to take on board that he can’t cope with too many people in the kitchen at once. Family and friends all know and accept this. We tease him, naturally, but we respect his kitchen quirk and when it comes to the final stages of cooking and serving, we file out. We love him and we don’t want him to feel stressed. Alf loves us but he tends to dig his heels in. He feels he doesn’t need to answer to anyone at his age.

Speaking of Alf’s age, since my last chapter, he has reached the milestone of 80 years old. We are all basking in the afterglow of a full-on party weekend. He has said how lucky he feels to have such a wonderful family and great friends. He isn’t short of friends here really. Our friends are Alf’s friends.

If Alf were a Murderer

I sit on the top step of our stairs, exchanging live messages with my daughter via messenger. I am suddenly interrupted by a slurping sound followed by an outpouring of breath. I silently peep down through the bannister to take in an arial view of Alf, sat in the foyer below me, mug of English Breakfast tea in hand.

I know there will be a sequence of three or four slurps and breaths before there will be a break. The front door is opened letting in a mild breeze and he is enjoying a rest after several hours of working in the greenhouse. I abandon my chat for a bit to work out how to take a recording. I wait for the next round. I so hope my phone captures the full effect of what the acoustic of the stone clad floor is adding to an already notable noise. I send the recording to my daughter. No comment is required.

We have raised this before with Alf. He insists that the slurping is a means by which to cool down his tea. We are confused by this theory as one would expect the tea to be cooling as he drinks and therefore the slurping to subside however the Breakfast Tea symphony is always played at Forte throughout. I take 3 further recordings while he drains the rest of his tea which can only be tepid at best.

He puts down his tea to free up his hands to grab a tissue. HHHRRRRRRRPPPPPPPP. Unbelievable. As I am regretting turning off my recorder, missing the foghorn gem, he shouts my name as if I were in the next parish. I jump, recover and look down through the banisters again. Yes dad, I say quietly. He looks up and laughs and says that he didn’t realise I was there. That much is abundantly clear. He is distracted by the arrival of someone coming to buy some of his excess plants. I hear my husband say to our visitor that he is after his father-in-law. Alf walks out on cue remarking that he is looking for the one with hair. Alf never tires of the bald jokes. If only he had an arial view of his own barnet I think, as I do now.

bald alf

If Alf were the murderer in the game of Cluedo (Clue for US readers), he would be Friar Tuck, in the foyer with a foghorn.

Click on the link below to join me at the top of the stairs for a few seconds.

A Lovely Lady

We are invited to our friends house for dinner and as promised (or threatened, depending on your outlook), the invitation is also extended to Alf. There are three couples, Alf and a single lady. The company is good and conversation flows. Not for the first time lately, Alf is Des (the designated driver). I love Alf but I love Des more.

Our single lady is warm, interesting, attractive and clearly loved by our hosts. I wonder what Alf is thinking. I wonder this because in between moments of coherency, I am getting seriously carried away. I can imagine Alf and Lovely Lady together! I imagine Alf and Lovely Lady enjoying a weekend with my Aunt and Uncle. I CAN SEE IT! I imagine them wandering around St Peter’s Garden Centre together. Alf is bidding on something at the auction for her. He is making her laugh while he cooks their dinner. They entertain each other with many references from their rich lives. Hell, I even imagine myself sharing an Insalata Caprese and a glass of crisp white wine al fresco at Relish with Lovely Lady. I have known Lovely Lady for about one and a half hours by this time. I know very little about her, least of all whether she even likes buffalo mozzarella. It is time to rein myself in.

I am very relaxed during this evening. Our friends are great hosts. I comment to Alf the following day that if he keeps up this good behaviour, I am going to have to write about it. He warns me against it with a flick of his hand. He is concerned it will be bad for his image.

Several days later while I am at work, I receive a message letting me know that Lovely Lady would be very happy to meet up with Alf, I squeal at my desk and forward the message to my husband who relays it verbally to Alf ,who never has his phone in his proximity.

I ask Alf daily over the next few days if he has phoned her yet. He hasn’t on the first day. He hasn’t on the second. On the third day, the answer is still no but he lets me know he intends on phoning her the following day. He looks up and says “I don’t….”.

“…wish to appear to eager”, I hazard a guess.

“Exactly”, says Alf.

We laugh. It appears the unwritten rules of the game are the same at any age.

True to his word, he does telephone Lovely Lady the next day. She greets him warmly and they chat amiably. Then Alf asks her if she has read my blog. She hasn’t yet. He gives her the site address and says she should read it and afterwards if she is still happy to see him, to give him a call.

I do not have full confidence in this strategy. I am concerned it will appear uncompromising, implying “This is me. Take it or leave it.” To take it is rather a big ask. It wouldn’t be for everyone.

He hears nothing and I periodically pester him to call again. He feels the ball is in Lovely Lady’s court. My heart sinks.

I console myself with the fact that Alf has at last abandoned his pursuit of growing his hair in favour of a haircut. He looks great. I send vibes across the island to lovely lady…..call now….call now. The love that I send out to friends and family at the end of each hatha session takes the form of colourful swirls in the general direction of Lovely Lady’s parish.

She does call and they arrange a date for dinner. Squeal! Lips in the ooooo position! Nerdy little clap! He will pick her up. He is Des!

There is a bit of concern over whether he will recognise her. A normal pre-date concern, I think to myself. We scope out her house in advance in a non-creepy way so that he knows exactly where to go on the night.

By all accounts, they enjoyed each other’s company. Alf is due to take a trip to Florida and Lovely Lady pays a surprise visit the day before he leaves. Smile larger than Julia Roberts’! Eeeeee sound!

Hands in prayer.

Alf visits Connecticut niece

Alf left Jersey for a spell this year to travel to the US to see friends and family and generally leave behind the island weather for a bit. During this trip, he spent a weekend with my cousin. Alf and her father are brothers. As I grew up in the US and she in the UK, we saw each other some summers and on special family occasions and once we were more independent, as often as we could. We day-dreamed that one day, either I would marry an Englishman or she an American and we imagined enjoying non-stop partying and incessant giggling on a more permanent basis. We made a right hash of our plan as it happens, by both marrying men from across the pond, so in effect, swapping home countries. Despite the distance involved we remain close. When we are together now we still practice a dumbed down version of our partying and the giggling is probably even more incessant.

When my cousin moved to the States, Alf took on the role of her “US father” and as such, she probably has the best understanding of the plethora of good and smattering of otherwise that it is to be Alf’s daughter. Since Alf spent a weekend with my cousin in February, I thought it would be appropriate to invite her to write about anything of note in a sort of guest blog. She came up trumps relaying the following tales in blue which are accompanied by a few of my smart ass asides in green.

As a child growing up in England, I remember that we looked forward to Alf’s visits with much anticipation. Family gatherings always brought plenty of laughter and fun activities but it was always louder, even more fun and much more competitive when Alf was there! For these few days, the language we heard was much more colourful. It was always assumed that these words were not to be repeated, but somehow, when Alf was around, the rules changed. I’m sure this is just the way he wanted it. His recent weekend visit did not deviate from this format. Still larger than life, there is never a dull moment when he is around. Personally, I think dull moments can be grossly under-rated.

He arrived with a very nice 8lb piece of beef tenderloin, some enormous shrimp (for which he is renowned) and two large bottles of vodka. He does not do things by halves. Ahem, apart from the half-price chicken thighs from Iceland that he rocks up with at home. One – nil to Connecticut daughter.

As the weekend approached, I have my cousin’s voice in my head, describing what she calls the AAA scale, (Alf Anxiety Altimeter). It wasn’t until a trip to Walmart, (I told you there were always exciting activities when Alf is around), that my own AAA began to register. He insisted on showing me how annoyed the cashiers get when you spin the plastic bag carousel around really fast. He is correct. They do get very annoyed.

Still in Walmart, Alf takes a call from a friend and he is informed that his friend’s girlfriend works there. Alf makes it his mission to find her. As he does, he approaches her with open arms as if he had known her for ages. He is delighted with himself at her surprise. To her credit, she plays along despite having no idea who he is, She lets him give her a big hug without smacking him or reporting him for harassment.

We went to visit an old friend of his. It is pouring with rain and he calls her on his flip phone while we are sat in the car in her drive. She doesn’t answer her phone. While he is leaving a rude message, she opens the door to investigate the car in the drive. She is not holding a phone and it is obvious to me that she has not been listening to the message yet he is still talking when she realises who it is and jumps in the car with us. Their conversation is easy and many old stories were retold. She was not at all surprised by his constant attempts to shock. I hear my cousins voice again.

We took Alf to a trivia evening at a local bar. We are asked “What part of a man’s body grows up to eight times its usual size when he sees an attractive woman”? Alf has so many options with which to shock us all, he is like a kid in a candy store! The boring answer, pupils, was not among Alf’s suggestions.

We put on a dinner party that weekend. I had read my cousin’s previous blogs so I knew this was a bit risky but figured it would be fine as most of the guests knew him, some of which he invited himself. This is where he has the potential to shine but I have sat around my dining room table with him enough times to know that he can sometimes go too far and I have watched the changing facial expressions of friends and family in attendance. The AAA scale was never far from my mind. Thankfully, he was on good form, funny if loud, and a great time was had by all.

We visit my daughter and her fiance. His father is also there and it doesn’t take he and Alf long to pal up. “I could tell you a few stories about that girl”, started Alf. My daughter looked scared and I attempted to steer the conversation in a different direction, without success. The two of them shared some stories and to Alf’s credit (there is a largely unused expression), he was very kind and well-behaved.

My cousin is absolutely right, it is like having a kid around!

I Skype my cousin and Alf while he is away to see how they are getting on. They are laughing side by side on the settee as she tells me that he came down from the guest bedroom on his first morning and commented that the room was great, it was just missing a window. She pointed out that the window in the guest bedroom can be found directly behind the curtains in the guest bedroom. You were expecting a puppet show Alf?

My husband and I went for breakfast on the north coast of the island one Saturday morning while Alf was away. The view across to Guernsey was stunning and I posted a photo on Facebook. My cousin replied with a shot of my father just surfacing the same morning saying “This is my view this morning. You win”!

Thank you so much, CT cousin for your snippets and even more for your empathy. I hope to drink wine and giggle with you again very soon.

Pimping out Alf

It is time for Alf to meet a woman.

He keeps himself occupied around the house and he visits various people he has met dotted around the island but I’m sure if he had someone besides us to think about, life would be much more interesting. A companion for the cinema, a date for dinner, maybe more, as they say in the lonely hearts ads!

Historically, landing a lady is not an area of Alf’s life where he has had to put in a scrap of effort. We are talking about this at dinner one night and no-one is more astounded than him that this has been the case. He isn’t boasting. It is true. I have seen it over many years. That isn’t at all to say that once he does land them he doesn’t put in any effort but at 79, having to consider how this is going to happen in the future must be quite daunting.

This is where you come in, readers. Let us unashamedly find Alf a date!

I have been doing a bit of research in respect of this cause, starting with taking a look at dating websites to try to get an idea of how to set out his stall, as it were. There is an astounding number of these sites, some of them quite specific:

sugar daddy Alf would be an older man to many and he is in the black, but I don’t think he would be quite what the ladies looking for love on this site were expecting.

veggie date Alf is into growing, cooking and eating veg, but not to the exclusion of a juicy steak.

Meet for older dating (over 40s) Perhaps at nearly double the minimum age, Alf is a touch overqualified?

geek2geek smartass2smartass maybe.

christianmingle Alf recently unashamedly accepted an offer of a massage from two born again healing-handed women at a car boot sale, who did not begin to convince him to see the error of his ways.

tattoossingles Alf doesn’t qualify as yet to my knowledge, but it wouldn’t surprise me.

farmers only I wonder if retired farmers count?

I stole questions from a host of different sites and cobbled together a sort of questionnaire with which to interview Alf:

Me: What do you think are the three best traits you have to offer a partner?

Alf: easy to get along with; fun to be with; up for anything that goes

Me: What are you looking for in a relationship partner?

Alf: Someone who is humorous, friendly, up for adventures, companionship and possible luuurrve. I added that last bit. Hee hee.

Me: What is the one thing you are most passionate about?

Alf: Gardening

Me: What is the most adventurous thing you have done in the last year?

Alf: I went to Canada to be an expert witness in a case involving a bull.

Me: What types of activities do you regularly enjoy?

Alf: petanque, cooking, the sauna, gardening

Me: Who was the author of the last book you read and enjoyed?

Alf: Dawn French

Me: Whats the worst pickup line you ever used.

Alf: I never needed them until now. I’m open to suggestions.

Me: Who has been the most influential person in your life?

Alf: Mark Westaway. He was entreprenurial in the field of agriculture. I did a years apprenticeship for him before going to agricultural college.

Me: What are your three best life skills?

Alf: Cooking, problem solving, entertaining

Me: What is your ideal first date?

Alf: A good bottle of wine, a good steak and a good talk

Me: What, for you, is a relationship dealbreaker?

Alf: constant mobile phone use, especially at the table

Me: What is your biggest regret in life?

Alf: The breakdown of my second marriage.

Me: If you could travel anywhere, where would you go and why?

Alf: New Zealand because of its agricultural diversity. It would be very different to the UK and it would be interesting. I once worked with some Kiwis collecting deer semen.

Me: If you had to choose one world problem to solve for the rest of your life, what would it be?

Alf: Fresh water for everyone.

Me: What are your thoughts on gay marriage?

Alf: Go for it.

Me: Describe yourself.

Alf: 5 ’10”; 20lbs (1.1/2 stones) overweight but working on it; had one new knee and soon to have a new hip and will then be like the bionic man; fun-loving

My evaluation: All of the above plus he needs a haircut.

It is now in your capable hands, Jersey folk! Approach any ladies you know who might like to go on a date with Alf and if they agree, private message me via “email the author” using this site or leave a comment.

Perhaps have any potential dates read my previous blogs so they know what they are in for!

Alf has a lesson in small (Part 2)

I become aware of the AAA sensation, 4.8, 4.9, 5, 5.1.

An extra chair is found and we all slide round to make a space for Alf. A glass of red wine is poured for him and the bottle is settled nearby. 5.2, 5.3, 5.4.

I introduce Alf to the couple he hasn’t yet met. One half works in recruitment and has found me several great colleagues. The other manages our favoured office Christmas party venue. This is the extent of my knowledge of where our tribes had crossed. I forget sometimes that all those hours while I am at work, Alf is amusing himself. He listens. He plants. He pickles beetroot. He plays pétanque. He cooks. He takes himself off for a sauna. He is, as he always has been, happy to help people out. He watches what goes on around him and engages anyone and everyone in conversation. He asks bucket loads of questions. He is a serial wonderer. Curious George has nothing on Alf.

It is always surprising for people when it comes out that Alf grew up in England since his accent is American bar a few remaining nuances. Any attempts to imitate an English accent come a sorry second to Dick van Dyke’s cockney efforts. He talks about his schooling at Highgate. My recruitment friend knows someone of roughly the same age as Alf who attended the same school. There is talk of football and cricket. Inevitably, Alf releases the rugby songs. They are well known and well received. It is fun up until the point where Alf is looming toward the crudest of versus with his scant eyebrows raised over comedic, naughty eyes that hesitate only slightly in anticipation of my objections. 5.5, 5.6. I cut across my filterless father. He has had a new knee from Jelenia Gora and new lenses from Prague. I wonder where I can send him for the fitting of a new filter. A filter would be a very welcome thing in a father, I should imagine. A filter is what gets you on the guest list right from the outset.

There are random moments of hilarity. They seem, at least to be random now, writing about them some time later while under the influence of Rooiboss rather than Rioja. At some stage, Alf claims he has no need to wear antiperspirant. My long time friend takes a trip around the table to put this to the test. We all assume he has passed when she doesn’t flinch.

Amid all the merriment, Alf is guilty of one indiscretion, divulging a reference that was not his to make. 5.7, 5.8.

Not long before this Moroccan evening, Alf told my husband and I of a lovely lady from a local estate agent who he observed grappling with a For Sale sign in the attempt to put it up in the court where we live. After amusing himself watching for a time, Alf went out to lend a hand. Some time later Alf reports that she was back to remove the sign having brought support in the form of another lovely young lady. He chatted to them both. Respectively, they turn out to be the daughter and the girlfriend of the son of our guests.

Over the hedge from our garden is an empty field of agricultural status. On the limited occasions when there has been some activity upon it, we indulge in self-interested speculation as to whether someone will manage to change the status of the field from agricultural to residential. Perhaps this is why, with arms crossed, Alf watches a chap ploughing the field one day, in pursuit of a hot topic over which we can contemplate at dinner. Subsequent to Moroccan night, we learn that the plough was manned by the owner of the field, who also happens to be the boyfriend of our couple’s daughter.

Although none of my friend’s family were the victims of Alf’s road rage, the contacts between these two small families more than substantiate my point about the smallness of our island, I feel. I do not believe this will deter Alf from his natural instincts. Sorry Jersey drivers. Apologies to the clerk at the Social Security office who relayed the rule to Alf that he must produce his birth certificate and that his passport would not do as a form of identification. In fairness to Alf, that is a stupid rule but I can imagine that the messenger did not fare well. I tried Jersey peeps. He is actually very nice. They love him at the bank. If I go to the bank on my own, they rush up to ask me how he is. If I go with him, they hug him before we leave.

As our last friends leave the party at 3:30am, they say they are keen to get this group of people together again, at their house. I may or may not like it, but Alf is very likely to feature, they say. I smile, pleased at the gesture and genuinely delighted that Alf has been a hit.

Now, how to find a way to make Alf relax a little bit less so I can relax a little bit more?

Alf has a lesson in small (Part 1)

Living on a nine by five island brings new considerations for Alf. More accurately, I wish Alf would acknowledge that living on a nine by five island brings a new culture which he SHOULD take into consideration. Namely, it is small.

Out for a drive, Alf has an encounter with another driver and indulges in some minor road rage. I warn him that he will undoubtedly find himself sitting next to that ragee at some function or another in the coming weeks. I am not given the impression that he is overly concerned.

We have had a live-in Alf for seven months when I think that it might be nice for me and my husband to host a dinner party with several other couples. To date Alf has been a part of every gathering. At home, out on the town, Art Society dinners, the invitations have even been extended as far as gatherings hosted by my ex-husband’s family, who I am lucky enough to still call my own. On this occasion, I stop to contemplate the question “Is it acceptable to have a dinner party at home to which Alf in not welcome”? There are several work connections among the other three couples on the guest list, although they also sit very comfortably in the friend category. New friends and old, I am keen for e everyone to get to know each other. Would I relax as the evening unfolds with Alf there or would my vital AAA stats by peeking to dangerous heights? I am in a quandary but in the end I decide it will not do to ban him. In conversation with my husband however, Alf decides that he will take himself off to the movie on that night. Rather sweetly he lets me know that he wants us to be able to carry on with life as usual.

We decide on a Moroccan theme and go all out to set an inviting scene, including hanging tapestries from the dining room ceiling. On the day, as always, Alf is helpful in the kitchen. He becomes rather an expert at taking the pits out of the dates to go in the tagine. He tells me he intends on slipping straight off to bed on his return from the cinema in the evening. I tell him he should come in and say hello to everyone and perhaps have a drink first. I swallow dryly and put the kettle on. We carry on cooking together.

Alf leaves for the cinema before everyone arrives. The evening is fun, right from the. beginning. Everyone is relaxed, our friends mix easily and are all on good form. I was enjoying the evening so much myself that I declare it to be the first of what we will look back on as our Moroccan phase.

Alf makes his entrance after dessert to a jovial household. He is already chuckling as he makes his way down the hall toward us. He is welcomed like an old friend, even by those who have only every read about him. He senses the fun we are having and by the look on his face, he thinks he can at least double it.

Oh yes, thinks Alf!

Oh fuck, think I.

Alfzheimers?

I am fifty percent sure he is doing it on purpose. There ins’t a destination on this island for which Alf hasn’t made up his own name. Either that or there isn’t a destination on this Island for which Alf can remember the name.There are other areas of Alf’s memory that are decidedly selective but I don’t think I am seeing dementia here.

At any rate, I am in no position to judge. I regularly find myself wondering why I started telling a particular story and have no idea where I am headed with it. Usually it is when I am in the company of a good friend or a close colleage, the very people who are likely take the piss of course. Although, I was once speaking to a random man at a party, having a first (and turns out only) conversation with him, when I referred to someone as a celeriac instead of a celiac. He never recovered from his chortling to properly speak to me again after my unwitting scrambling up of an auto immune desease triggered by gluten and a knobbly, odd-shaped vegetable.

I don’t notice Alf forgetting where he is headed in conversation. I do know that if he says he is off to First Castle, he means First Tower. If he offers to drive you to Red Oaks, you will be dropped at Five Oaks, where you were headed. If he talks about Five Houses, read Red Houses.We can easily decipher BQ as B & Q and Hotel Fraaance as Hotel de France. Our early efforts to put him straight were met with a childish “whatever”. For reasons I don’t understand, it is irritating for the island to be called the Isle of Jersey instead of Jersey. I can even empathise with his way of thinking. Alf lived in the United States. If he requested any information from Google on Jersey when he was there, he almost certainly would have been met with a host of New Jersey related responses. It shouldn’t be irritating, BUT IT IS! Don’t sweat the small stuff I tell myself, particularly as I am sure this one is one hundred percent genuine.

When Alf first arrived, he bothered to learn the numbers of all the A and B roads. Unfortunately no one else on the island has, so attempts to tell anyone about his travels proved fruitless. I think most islanders would draw a complete blank if asked where the A2 is. The road going from St Helier to Bel Royal will always be called Victoria Avenue. Alf has since learned not to waste any further time on this but he will still quote the odd road number occasionally with an expectant look on his face. He takes tremendous pleasure in our exasperated reaction.

There are of course the usual US / UK pitfalls into which Alf will still fall. On coming in from working in the garden he declares he needs to change his dirty pants. That one is a big hit. He tells us he bought a rutabaga to cook for dinner. We can never remember what that is so we wait for dinner in order translate for ourselves. Having spent my first 19 years in the States, I remember zucchini, (courgette). I remember eggplant (aubergine). I remember arugala, (rocket). I can’t have had rutabaga as a child. It certaily doesn’t sound like a vegetable but then neither does celeriac. My husband imagines that a rutabaga would be more fitting as a car. It’s true. I would not be at all surprised to come across a 1957 Rutabaga should we ever revisit the Transport Museum in Coventry when we next visit Alf’s brother, Pat. For the absence of doubt, it is in fact, a swede.

It became clear to me while writing this and noting the difference between Alf’s demeanor when he flubs a landmark to when he refers to the Isle of Jersey, that he is in fact having us on. Alf is by now fully aware of the names of these places but what would be the fun for him in not getting a reaction?