Family Holiday #1

In my family we make an annual trip to West Wittering beach and stay in some cottages in Apuldram/Appledram/Apaldrum (it is spelt three different ways). This isn't just with my immediate family, this is with grandparents, auntie, uncle and cousin. I love my family but they are very hard to put up with.

I will start with Auntie Boob-job, she went from very flat-chested to ridiculously gifted in the boob department, doesn't help that she wears the lowest cut tops known to man and a very small bikini on the beach. To be fair it is very entertaining to throw ice cubes down her cleavage when we go out for a meal, my brother and I compete against each other. All this considered, the negatives outweigh the benefits...unless you ask my uncle.

I will now move on to my demon cousin, she is a nightmare, she screams and runs about shouting although this is actually when she is at her most bearable. What is horrible is when she hits me, repeatedly, obviously I can't hit back...despite the constant urge to knock her unconscious. Since she is "a little princess" she does what she likes including trying to drive me insane. It's not even like she doesn't understand that she is driving me mad, I had the following conversation with her:

"Doe (Joe), can I annoy you please?"
"No"

"Well I'm going to."

Little devil, she can say her J's, she just calls me Doe to annoy me. I tried restraining her, politely asking her to stop and finally shouting at her. None of this worked, her parents very rarely stepped in so I took a gamble with another tactic. I played dead. At first this seemed like a bad move, she continued to hit and scratch and move ever closer to my breaking point. Somehow This method prevailed, she very quickly got bored and wandered off, perhaps to play in some traffic. Another small child successfully outsmarted.

Last but not least is Mad Nanny, this may sound quite flippant and cruel but her dementia has got to a stage where all we can do is laugh to stop it getting us down. She has even developed a hatred for my mum (her daughter-in-law) which may have developed recently or been hidden for many years. What makes it even worse is one of her safe-objects (something that helps her remember things) is her cat. It had to be put down while we were away because of bladder cancer. My dad even managed to make a joke of this by pretending to ring my granddad at 1 in the morning and saying "Meow...I've not been feeling too good today" in a very high pitched and cattish voice.

We went to the beach and as usual we built elaborate and enormous sand castles in the vain hope of beating the incoming tide and having a strong enough structure to survive the sea. The usual procedure is some sort of tall structure in the middle surrounded by a very high wall. This is all perfectly logical. What makes no sense is building a moat. This makes the walls more structurally unsound and provides the sea with a quicker way to penetrate other parts of the castle. It makes no sense.

Unfortunately our first castle, complete with walls, central structure, sand-tanks and a sand-dalek was destroyed by the demon cousin before the sea had a chance. My dad, granddad, uncle, friend and I (the architects and builders) were devastated. My half-serious-half-joking idea to fill tomorrow's castle with sharp stones and broken glass was actually considered.

Well that was 4 days in Wittering with my Dad's family, bring on a week in France with my Mum's family