Giving up seats for pregnant ladies on the tube

I went into town today, it's only three stops on the tube, and Squirrel tends to kick, wriggle, knit ~ whatever it does in there ~ quite a lot these days so I wasn't too bothered about sitting down, in fact I didn't want to sit down because I knew I would be sitting down all day.  A very sweet young man touched my arm and offered me his seat as soon as he saw me get on, and when I said 'oh thanks but I'm fine really, it's only a couple of stops' he seemed quite offended and flabbergasted almost and sat back down, looking around as if to say, did you see that? Offer a pregnant lady a seat and she refuses it, honestly!

Then a young German couple got on and when a seat became available instead of taking it the man asked me if I would like it, 'oh thanks but I'm getting off at the next stop I'm fine thank you though!'  More puzzled looks and whispering to his girlfriend and some odd looks from other passengers too.  I was quite happy perching on the cushioned rest, reading the man's paper next to me, then his mobile as he checked his very important messages about meeting with the Moroccan ambassador and Princess Laila and then looking around as if I wasn't reading it whenever he looked or the man on the other side of me caught me looking. Yes it was a fun journey indeed, but I did feel guilty, not just for reading the man's texts but for offending two very kind gentlemen who offered me seats.

After a very long, uncomfortable day I got back on the tube, desperate for the loo, hot, tired, hungry, and nobody offered me a seat, but I didn't really mind for it was only a few stops.  Then a gentleman excused himself past me to walk to the middle of the carriage, to stand and wait for a seat, saw me, then grabbed the young man sitting in the end seat and asked him to get up for the pregnant lady, the young man was instantly apologetic and grabbed his things together and gave me the seat, which this time I very gratefully accepted, and thanked the older gentleman too.  Sitting down, I suddenly felt overwhelmed with gratitude, a mixture of feelings welling up inside about accepting and declining seats and the whole protocol of it all and felt a huge burst of tears building up, but looked up and shut my eyes and let a small trickle of exhausted frustration run down my cheek quietly.

Dressing Up

Last year Jam and I dressed up as a 'What is it' for Halloween. We were originally a bug of sorts. We'd cut two head-sized holes into a double duvet, dyed it black, although we didn't have quite enough dye and so it didn't take properly and came out a dirty grey, stitched straggly bits of black wool randomly onto it, attached some shiny black material to the lower half of it to represent our stomach, painted our faces blue for the eyes, had one arm hole each and wore black stripy tights – it was a frightful concoction and people were completely baffled and amused by it as we walked down the street and got on the tube.

'What is it?' we heard, a few too many times, and when someone plucked up the courage to ask us, we said in strange bug-like voices, 'We're a What-is-it!'

We were joined together, all night, at an all night party in our friends ubercool factory space, that they had done up with a web of string and ghoulish things hanging from it. They all nearly died of laughter when we turned up, which was the desired effect, sort of, well, we'd come to expect that after the tube journey and we had a fantastic night, although we had to get away from each other towards the end of the night, which entailed me running away to the graveyard crying, drunk, upset by something Jam had inadvertently said, meeting a stranger there who consoled me and told me I should go back and that everything would be all right and my partner would probably be worried and looking for me, which surely isn't meant to happen in a graveyard in the middle of the night when a man meets a distressed girl, half dressed, or rather half not dressed up, but it did happen like that and I went back, much to the relief of Jam and everyone else.

So this year, we thought we'd try something a bit more separable, but still on the together theme, seeing as though we'd been married since the last year's party. I wanted to go as a fly caught in a spider's web, with Jam being the spider. He thought we should go as 'Zomberina's' and borrow a friends all-in-one shiny suit and make skates out of foam to hang on our shoulders. Not a bad idea, although, borrowing the shiny Lycra suit on second thoughts would probably not have been so tasty! We had quite a lazy day on the Saturday and didn't manage to find any suitable dancer outfits, so we opted for the spider and fly outfit instead.

A fellow boater from the next mooring along had come down our way to paint his boat red, we know the chap quite well and offered him and his friends soup and cheesecake after he'd finished. He moored up alongside our boat and we all sat and ate soup and cheesecake as dusk began to fall. We told them of our outfit dilemmas and ran through our final choice, Jules said it was all about the eyes and we needed to make big bug eyes. Time was also of the essence and I pulled out a pair of green glasses which he then proceeded to draw gold honeycomb patterns on to create the bug eyes.

It worked a treat. I dressed all in green, wrapped myself in grey wool, with a knitted-on-large-needles wool band around the head, hair in two buns with twigs of rosemary sticking out of them and attached myself to a large spider's web, which I had crocheted onto a hula hoop, attaching a mummified skeleton and bat!

Jam wore all black, tucking a pillow down his pants at the back to make an abdomen, cutting legs out of foam and stuffing them into various pairs of my black tights, making a hole in one end of a leg to attach a ball of the wool which was attached to me as well – there's the togetherness part – a lot more practical – we could escape from each other when needed!

Even more hilarity on the tube ensued, this time people saying 'oh you're a dream-catcher', then spying the spider and saying 'ahhh I get it now!'

We went to two parties that night, the first, a birthday party in Richmond and the other, the same factory in Bow as last year, opposite sides of the district line, so a long time was spent on the tube, in which lots of people came and spoke with us, admired our costumes and even asked for photos! I wonder how we will top that idea next year?