That weird dream

Isn’t that dream weird. You know the one when you think you are falling from somewhere and you start to panic and you thrash your arms out to save yourself and they suddenly hit the mattress and you jump up, your eyes open and you realise…wow it was only a dream.

And then you go back to sleep again.

Don't you think that’s a bit weird too.

Well okay, perhaps it’s not all that weird, after all if you were in a deep sleep you’d probably like to go back, but it’s the whole trauma thing I’m talking about.

Let’s take the whole dreaming, sleeping thing out for a second and think about this.

Imagine you actually were falling.

No really, really falling from some tall skyscraper or cliff or something that is, well, umm…very tall.

You might have done a bit of screaming at the start and the decided there was nothing else for it and just closed your eyes and waited. (Or you might have just decided to scream and scream and well, scream.)

And then, in a freak flash of nature (work with me here folks this is a very unlikely scenario I’m trying to paint) some kinda very strong, but still warm and friendly continental wind swirls up the street and catches you at the last minute and you fall to the ground with no more than a gentle bump. (The whole Superman thing would have been just too unbelievable!)

Perhaps I’m wrong about this, but I reckon that while you’d be feeling very lucky, you might also be pretty traumatised by this whole series of events and - unless you were on the receiving end of some heavy sedatives - the last thing you’d want to do is sleep.

Anyway I mention that falling dream because well, it happened to me.

Not the dream, well okay the dream too, but far worse than that - the actual wide-awake falling thingy.

Umm, well falling might be a bit of an exaggeration.

It was more like stepping.

You see I don’t really like ladders, nasty dangerous things, and I’m not really sure why.

People have suggested that it is because I am afraid of heights, but I’m not really sure if that is the case.

I mean I’ve been up in high buildings before and it didn’t bother me looking out the window or going out on a balcony and stuff.

But then you didn’t quite get the sensation that the building might topple over at any moment if there was a gust of wind or if you moved to your right or to your left.

Ladders on the other hand, while I’m certain have been quite useful inventions, are hardly the most stable of working environments.

When I was younger and stoopider or maybe braver, I did go on ladders sometimes – but as I think back on it, probably not without trepidation.

However in recent times, I think the furthest I’ve got is to actually put the ladder once against the wall of the house, get as far as the bottom rung and then step off picturing the whole falling back to earth thing with a bang.

It is perhaps that which has caused me to occasionally have that falling dream, but there are others that are harder to explain.

Like for instance the one where I sit down at a computer and type up all the nonsense in my head…and people still read it...

Sizing things up...

I don’t know what a tracker mortgage is – but I do know what size tee-shirt I wear!

Until recently I thought that most people over the age of say, 14, would also have a fair idea of such clothing trivia, but in recent weeks I finally realised that this is not the case.

At the risk of making a broad sweeping statement, I will now make a broad sweeping statement – I have decided that most women don’t have a clue what size they are.

Umm, or maybe that should be – they don’t want to admit it.

This piece of divine inspiration finally dawned on me last weekend when I saw a nervous-looking guy standing and trying to look inconspicuous outside a store fitting room.

For the record – if I were ever to run for an election – banning these changing rooms would form part of my manifesto, and I’m pretty certain that that would pick me up a few hundred votes from men.

Because here’s the thing folks – men hate these changing rooms.

No sorry, hate is not the right word – detest, loathe, despise – something stronger than just hate.

There are a number of reasons for this – not least is the fact that women who do go into them seem to take an inordinate amount of time trying things on.

I can almost hear female readers of this blog now crying – but men use these changing rooms too – but here’s the thing, except for the rarest of occasions - they never really want to!

Nope, for the most part I’d say men who use these changing rooms are cajoled into using them by a wife or girlfriend who urges them to ‘go try it on to we see what it looks like.’

A man’s brain does not work like that.

A man can see quite well what it looks like when it is hanging on the rack – and providing it’s the right size and the right price – and he actually wants it - he might buy it.

In contrast a female shopper has a much different approach and as a result will often traipse to a fitting room with an armful of stuff, leaving the unsuspecting husband or boyfriend to stand outside shuffling their feet and trying to stare at the ceiling or floor.

Last weekend’s guy was one such unfortunate, and vaguely knowing him from football and recognising the symptoms of the agony he was going through, I decided I’d be the good Samaritan and talk to him for a moment or two.

While standing there I also noticed that a few of the females who were going into the fitting rooms had a number of the same item, in what I can only assume were different sizes.

Now the fact that so many females use these fitting rooms is evidence enough in my court to suggest that most women don’t have a clue what size they are – but bringing several items the same in at the same time, just adds to it.

Over the course of the week this had me perplexed until I finally came to the conclusion that the blouses were as follows – the size she hoped she was, the size she thought she was and finally the size she feared she might actually be.

As it turns out, it was the guy I was talking to that pointed out the woman heading into the changing room with three identical blouses, and as he shook his head in disbelief he explained that he’d been standing outside the changing room for almost ten minutes.

This of course in man shopping time can feel like anything up to half a day and I really could not help feeling sorry for him.

Especially when I saw him still standing there ten minutes later when I was going in to try on a pair of jeans…