Don't Punch my Child, Please...

c Joanna Topley

Publishing a book is like packing a child off to school knowing somebody will punch it.

I'm working on another piece of non-fiction, though not a follow up to My Tutu Went AWOL. Click here to buy

I did interview some squaddies for the book. Just not this time about war.

I asked folk in what circumstances were they told the facts of life - birds and bees, sex-ed, human biology, rumpy-pumpy, smashing some doors front or back, etc - and what precise information were they given?

I found I could add an unexpected third question - Did you believe what you were told?

(And a fourth - Did your parents after all need to summon the Flour Advisory Bureau?)

I was told:

'Your future husband will deal with that on an if and when basis.'

'No woman has ever conceived while in the upright position.'

'Your stoutest pants will be as nothing, girly, after damp-turn-curfew anywhere near Hereford.'

Stork, Gooseberry bush, Argos deliveries.

Seed packets bearing a picture of the forthcoming child.

How, being the flipside of Manuka Honey, Immac Cream did for one mother.

'When any of those urges overtook me, I was required to go and sit in the privy and sing “Oh, God Our Help in Ages Past” - or similar.'

'On campuses worldwide there ought to be branches of Toys Up Us.'

'Granny said an angel's thumb made my sister's dimples but the Devil Made my Todger.'

Anna the Hulagan said this second time around I don't sound 'into' the publishing process.

Well, I mixed a glass and a half of lovely red wine with ongoing antibiotics, you see.

Forgetting, I no longer drink.

Having fallen down my stair ladder, pas de chat'd too late through the bathroom door, I'm now not into anything other than antacids, fizzy water and dry Melba toast.

Which was only Melba toast to being with because I got my combi-oven settings confused and microwaved the bread.

But let's stay focussed on my new book, please.

Again - don't punch my child.

#memoir #writing #thedevilmadeyourtodger #sexed #humanbiology #sex #fucking

Comments

Some Favourite Books - But Please don't Lesbify Dame Agatha's Denouements

I'm too tired to read anything new so have been round the libraries taking out my default-setting books to read over Christmas. These include: The Pursuit of Love , Nancy Mitford. The blood-stained entrenching tool displayed above the fireplace, child-hunting over Shenley Common, Jassy traumatising the local children telling them the facts of life. The scene at the Gare du Nord where Linda sits on her luggage to cry and meets Fabrice always takes me back to the first reading of the novel, sitting wrapped in my Welsh Tweed shawl, in a tiny bedroom on the eighteenth floor of a high-rise in Kennington. The Pursuit of Love is romantic, hilarious and bleakly eccentric. Confessions of a Failed Southern Lady , Florence King. When I entertained troops on the American base in Kandahar, four South Carolina army captains made me an Honorary Southern Belle. Madame Galina, they said, in all her unreasonable, high-blooded, simpering flounce reminded them of the girls

My Mate Jamie-Ray Hartshorne

I've been noticing that alongside photos of Jamie-Ray being a lead in Altar Boys , creating Change My Body UK TM , working the door at Freedom - and clearly asking people passing by wherever that rockpool may be to snap a double-bicep - this sort of thing is cropping up on his social media: We're in The Diner, Jamestown Road, Camden. He's between tour dates of The Bodyguard, and meetings to discuss sportswear and creatine endorsements. The latter, he says, being all about making his product better. Between sips of his peanut butter milkshake (he's allowing himself dairy today in my honour - I don't quite know how to take that) he says in his soft Brum, 'I've signed up for a major Muay Thai event in Thailand next February. I'm going up against one of the Thai fighters. That's the only real way to gain any respect in the fighting world. That's why you've been noticing the combat photos. I've been going for tr

Where do Babies Come From? How we Learn about Sex...Book Just Launched on Amazon Kindle

Click to buy the book 'My spoken material is about the facts of life,' I was explaining to the Mother Superior. 'I've been asking people what they were told, how they were told it and did they ask questions. Terribly funny...' During my Where do Babies Come From? talk at the Metrodeco Café, Brighton, a superfluity of nuns stopped at the window to listen. In the street later that week one of them glided up and said how much they had enjoyed hearing me sing. ' And we wonder, might you please sing something for our charity evening?' I said, of course, sister. The nun nodded. 'That's very good to hear. But just to correct you: not sister - but Mother Superior.' She then asked about the spoken material in the show, in case some might be included on the night? I explained that I had been reading from my forthcoming book. While on tour I had asked people how they had

Iestyn Edwards Wonders...is it Lumpy or Runny?

Search This Blog