Ten ways I knew I’d finally become an adult.

I’ve always maintained that eventually you do have to become and adult, but you never have to become a grown up.  The difference is of course, that being an adult is being responsible for yourself. As well as willingly, even enthusiastically, owning you actions, thoughts and words, no matter how embarrassing they may actually be.  While being a grown up is the generic equivalent to being the horrifically untrendy geography teacher, who somehow still thinks he is trendy.  You know the guy, he called everyone dude, threw slang around like it was going out of fashion.  But he did this while wearing a patterned hand-knitted jumper and smoked a pipe when he wasn’t in class.

But lately I’ve realised that after thirty-three years of knocking around the planet I’ve somehow gone and become an adult.  Yup that’s right, I’m now a responsible human being.  But unlike my geography teacher in school I’m still hip. I play PC games, I make chainmail, I still play Dungeons and Dragons, I play a ukulele goddess damn it! Anyway, while coming back from a trip to a knitting shop earlier today, I got to thinking about the signs that made me realise that I’m no longer an overgrown kid.  This post is the fruits of those thoughts.

So here are the ten ways I realised I had become all grown up.  Enjoy.

10. I not only have a last will and testament, but I realised I needed to update it in order to account for changes in my circumstances.

9. My own birthdays mean almost nothing to me anymore, but making my friends and families birthdays joy filled affairs mean everything to me.

8. The phrase “Amanda is going through a troubling period in her life, hair has started growing where there was no hair before, and she’s started to notice girls in a new way…” has started to have meaning again in my life.  I found a hair, a big-ass curly one at that, growing out of the centre of an old scar.  And I’ve started to notice just how annoying girls in their 20’s can be.  Seriously if I hear one more high-pitched cackling laugh from a gormless twenty-something dressed like a chav reject from the television show “Misfits” I may actually be able to claim temporary insanity for my subsequent actions.  This is a sad state of affairs, since I used to just find younger women hot.

7. I have a medical condition which always seemed to me to be the embodiment of what we shall call, a person of superior maturity.  I have a hernia.  It may only be a hiatus hernia, but still…

6. Where not long ago I would have eaten it by the fistful, I now avoid fried food because I like my heart beating inside my chest, instead of it being dissected by a future dentist.  (Ten points to anyone who recognises that reference.)

5. I now actively look for computer games which have enthralling stories, preferably including some biting social commentary.  Needless to say I’ve yet to find many of those.

4. My last birthday present from my partner was a coffee grinder.  Not a new piece of revealing leather wear, not a shiny new strap-on, not a boxed set of horror movies.  A coffee grinder.  To make things worse I asked for it.

3. In my teens, and early twenties I looked at other women’s bodies with unrestrained jealousy. In my late twenties I looked with envy at other people’s gothwear.  Now in my thirties I gaze longingly at other people’s houses and find myself imagining what I would have done differently with the decor.

2. Once the thought of sex, involving multiple positions, toys, whips, chains and preferably a third person every single night was heavenly.  Now I just want sex every other night, after all it’s so nice to snuggle up to someone, cuddle them to sleep and then read Terry Pratchett ’til the wee small hours of the morning.  Though the third person would still be very welcome.

1. Finally the most damning sign of the oncoming personal apocalypse, I no longer think longingly of eating chocolate morning, noon and night.  In fact often weeks go by with my having eaten absolutely no chocolate at all. What’s happened to me? I used to think of chocolate the same way I thought of sex, often and usually intermixed.

Well I guess there’s nothing left for it now but to buy a beautiful coffin and prepare for the inevitable. By occasionally sleeping in it and making a gorgeous coffee table/sex toy case out of it. I did say adult, but screw ever growing up. (Ten more points for identifying the coffin reference)

Oh and just to add a little point of interest, my friend Rachel turns 24 today, so happy birthday Rach.  I’m dedicating this one to you, you’re still a young one so don’t be getting all down in yourself.

“…as the bishop said to the actress!”

I’m sure all of you have heard, or at least read the classic punch line “…as the bishop said to the actress.”  It’s the punch line to a joke that never really gets started purposefully.  I literally can’t begin to count the number of times myself, or a friend has ended an unintended double entendre with that phrase.  So I thought I would do my top ten favourite set ups for this classic sort of joke.

To take part simply recite “…as the bishop said to the actress!” at the end of each example.  Hope you enjoy, and of course, please feel free to comment and add more.

10. I was having blood taken and the nurse said “Ah sure, it’ll just be a little prick.”…

9.  Oh I was walk in the woods and I fell arse-first onto a tree root…

8.  *speaking of a small pet dog* Oh don’t way any attention to that little prick…

7.  …and they were the plumpest, juciest plums I ever sank my teeth into…

6.  …and they were the biggest, firmest melons I ever laid my hands on, even if they were a wee bit veiny…

5.  Now look, it’s far more scared of you, than you are of it…

4.  I bet you’ve never held one that big before…

3.  So how do you use one of these properly?

2.  …so there I was with it half in me pocket and half in me hand…

1.  Get your lips around that and it’ll do you the world of good…

So now it’s your turn.

Top Ten Signs of an Irish Summer

Apparently Summer has arrived.  In fact, it supposedly arrived several weeks ago.  Did you notice?  Well neither did I.  But then I remembered, I live in Ireland.  A country where a good Summer is assessed by a slightly different scale of measurement.

10: You find yourself woken at 5am every morning by full daylight streaming into your south-facing bedroom.

9: But that daylight is diffused nicely by the thick dark grey, leaden sky.

8: Nothing says “Irish Summer” quite like hundreds of thousands of pasty skinned Irish people, all trying to get a tan from the sun which lies hidden behind that leaden sky.

7: The membership of Dail Eireann inform the nation that we should all holiday at home.

6: The membership of Dail Eireann climb onto passenger jets and take their holidays in the south of France.

5: Instead of wearing 6 layers of clothing, you strip down to a mere 3.  Way to go near nudity!

4: You catch the  neighbours cat eating its third swallow in two weeks.  Said cat is unapologetic and looks to be getting decidedly plump.

3: Someone releases a terrible food based dance song…(see these  two particularly bad examples from the past, you’re welcome.)

2: Every day of every week throughout the entire Summer, the news warns of imminent water cuts.  Despite it seeming to  rain several hours every single day.

1: Though it must be said of that rain, that it falls nice and vertically rather than near horizontally.

P.S. I admit this list is probably not up to my usual standards, my apologies.  Lack of sleep is my only excuse.

Top ten signs you might be a – World of Warcraft player.

Many of us play or have played this addictive MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game).  For most, like myself, it’s a fun game we play for relaxation. For others though it constitutes a genuine full-blown addiction.  So what are some of the signs that you might well be addicted to this game?

10: You have the regular and collectors editions of every expansion, just you know, to have it.

9:  You not only pay your subscription, you actually pay for a full year in advance.  Because you know you’ll still be playing the day they shut down the servers for good.

8:  You buy the pets and mounts that cost real world money.

7:  You have one character for each race and class combination spread across several servers.

6:  You play all of those characters, with precisely the same people in every server.

5:  You actually know who Leroy Jenkins is. (also a recognised sign of YouTube and compter addiction in general)

4:  Your real life partner is your in game partner as well.

3:  And ye had an in-game wedding.

2:  Ye invited all your family and friends to.

1:  This all leading to you naming your first son Thrall and your first daughter Sylvanas Windrunner.

Top ten signs that you might be – a computer addict.

Ah the humble computer, but do you have a problem?  Well let’s see, you might have a computer addiction if…

10: You occasionally wake up your partner, by typing on their back in your sleep.

9: Your keyboard cost more than any three pieces of jewellery you own.

8: Your mouse/trackball is a collector’s item worth more than all the rest of your computer put together.

7: You learned to touch type not in a course, but due to uncountable hours spent chatting with people you don’t even like in chat rooms.

6: You’ve ever had a nightmare that ends with your computer being stolen.

5: The first thing you do in the morning, even before you put a pair of panties on, is turn on your computer.

4: You find it incredibly easy to conduct a romantic relationship online, but find it almost impossible to do in reality.

3: You actually know who Leroy Jenkins is. (This is also a good sign that you might have a World of Warcraft addiction, but we’ll get to that.)

2: You can’t remember what day/month/year it is without looking at your desktop.

1: You don’t just own a computer, you actually collect ancient laptops and old computer components, because they’re cool.  (Oh crap I do this one. Ah feck it, have I told you all about my Compaq Aero Contura?)