The Apprentice

Tags

Alan Sugar, Amish, apprentice wizard, besom, boot camps, dyslexia, Fantasia, given the sack, Goldberg, Harry Potter, internship, Lord Sugar, Mary Poppins, Mennonites, mysordering, Rechabites, Shakers, Sorcerer's Apprentice, The Apprentice, tough love, Ugg boots, University of York, You're fired!

 

Carrie sank into a leather sofa that was as distressed as she was.

What’s up now? I enquired, trying not to sound too unsympathetic.

Tiger-Lily is throwing her weight around, but because she is stressed

with exam preparation, we all have to tiptoe around her.  It’s like

walking on eggshells.

But she’s going to get A*s for everything, isn’t she?  So, what’s the

big deal?

She wants to make a good impression so that she can secure an internship.

Unpaid work, I sniffed.  It can be a con.  Anyway, unless she is going to

work for Alan Sugar for some astronomical sum, she’d be better just finding

her own feet in her own time.

But sometimes I fantasise about getting her out from under our feet for

a while, admitted Carrie.  She is driving her brothers mad.

That’s why young people used to be sent away, I said, browsing the

beverage menu and pointing out my tea of choice to a young girl who was

earning more in tips than any intern.

Sent away!  I wasn’t meaning anything too drastic, recoiled Carrie.

Well, in 14th century Florence, Paolo Somebody-or-Other said: ‘Give your son

to a merchant or a close friend.  He will not mend his ways while he is with

you.’  I read something about it on-line yesterday.

Hmmm. It’s probably true, Carrie granted, but who would take her in?

Don’t look at me!  I said.  It was somebody from the University of York,

possibly called Goldberg, who was saying that it used to be recognised

that people other than parents could teach unruly kids a thing or two.

Contracts were made with merchants and so on who would educate

youngsters and give them a trade.  If they didn’t behave, the training

period could be doubled.  It suited the merchants as they were being

paid and the kids were cheap labour. 

How long were they away from home?  Carrie looked interested.

Could be seven to fourteen years, it seems.

What kind of bad behaviour would lead to such a severe extension?

Gaming, cards, harlots and something vague called ‘mysordering’, I answered.

Carrie didn’t want to go there.  ‘Mysordering’ was probably dyslexia… 

..which apparently doesn’t exist according to the latest..I interrupted.

The firm line reminds me of boot camps on the telly- you know where druggy

brats are sent to live with Shakers- not movers and-..the other kind, in

America, Carrie expatiated.

The Shakers were kind to the kids they sent them as far as I remember,

I corrected her.  Some of the young people were attracted by firm

boundaries and tough love.  At any rate they respected their mentors. Maybe

their hosts were Mennonites, though.  Or Rechabites.  I can’t remember

the differences.

The thing is, excused Carrie, Tiger is hormonal.  If she didn’t have her home

comforts, she wouldn’t be able to cope.

Yes, but even boys in the 16th century were writing home to complain that

their washing wasn’t being done and the food was terrible.  One mother is

recorded as sending her son three clean shirts in a sack.  She suggested that

he should keep the sack to put his dirty laundry in.

I wonder if that’s where the expression ‘being given the sack’ came from?

mused Carrie.

What- being nagged by one’s mother?

No, being kicked out along with your laundry bag.

I think Alan Sugar would just point a finger at you nowadays and would utter

his immortal: You’re fired!

Carrie looked thoughtful.  Tiger had the most awful tantrum because her

favourite top hadn’t been ironed.  She’s a besom, as her Scottish grandmother

would say.

Besom?  Isn’t that an old-fashioned word for a broom?

Yes.  Maybe I should get her to sweep the patio for her impertinence.

Ah! recollections of Fantasia, I smiled.  Maybe the brooms would subdivide and

youth and inexperience would be taught a lesson, as in The Sorcerer’s

Apprentice.

A bit like Harry Potter being an apprentice wizard who can’t control the magic,

I warmed to the theme.

Agreed, nodded Carrie.  These kids still need their elders and betters to take

charge, no matter how sophisticated they THINK they are.

So, you’ll  ignore her slamming the doors?

Just until the exams are over, Carrie said, and then I will be slamming some

myself and if she doesn’t wisen up, she’ll be visiting Amish for a long vacation.

Is that her Scottish uncle? I wisecracked.

No, you know what I mean perfectly well, Candia.  I mean that she’d better

not be getting too big for her Ugg boots, because she’s about to find out, in

the words of Lord Sugar: Mary Poppins I am not!

 

 

In the Doghouse

Tags

Alliance Francaise, Bernard Ingham, Black Bun, Crunchie, Dewlap Gin, doghouse, Hogmanay, Jumelage, Maggie Thatcher, Memory foam, multum in parvo, NASA, Pet Nappers, Richter scale, Sherpa Bone pillow, shortbread, Slumberland, snorterino, Top Paws Fashion pillow, Tupperware, Ugg boots

Pooh-Bah, Algy and Humbug, the Brewer-Mead family pugs, were

snoozing on their new Tempur-pedic loungers and nothing was going

to persuade them to move for a post-Christmas waddle through the

churned-up byways of Suttonford.  Once they had settled on their

Memory Foam, it would have taken something about point seven and

above on the Richter Scale to displace them.

Santa had been over-indulgent.  They had their Top Paw Fashion

Pillows (chewable-resistant) and the odour of polyurethane was

already fading.  They should have thanked NASA for their new-

found comfort.

Mrs Hatch-Warren, the femme-de-menage, as Carrie called her was

on her two week break, so Gyles was clearing up in the kitchen while

his wife and sister, Victoria were hitting the sales.

Victoria had travelled over from The Charente, where she ran a

reclamation business, but had been stuck for sixteen hours on a ferry

which couldn’t berth.  She was stocking up on items which were difficult to

find over there and was seeking next year’s Christmas cards, in particular.

She would sell them to expats at Alliance Francaise parties next December

at 100% profit.  Sante!

Gyles checked his ninety plus mother who was ensconced in the sitting

room, finishing her e-book.  Her carer, Magda, was visiting her predecessor

in Normandy.  Ola had bagged the remaindered widower on the Jumelage

Exchange between Suttonford and Bric-a-Brac.  Magda wanted to see their

new baby, Georges, born at the same time as The Little Prince.

Ginevra, Gyles’ mother was awaiting the visit of her old friend, Sonia, from

High Street.  When she arrived they could progress through the Maggie

Thatcher spectrum of drinkies as reported by Sir Bernard Ingham-ie/

opener, brightener, lifter, tincture, large gin and tonic without tonic; snifter,

snort, snorter and snorterino.

Tiger-Lily walked into the kitchen.  Hi, Dad, she smiled, uncharacteristically.

Take those muddy Ugg boots off before your mother goes ballistic, Gyles

cautioned.  I’ve just washed the floor.

Chillax, Tiger muttered.  She balanced one hand on the edge of the granite

island and tried to kick an Ugg off.  Dad, in despair, came to the rescue and

tugged.

Three yapping pugs leapt out of their Pet Nappers, discarding their faux-fur,

ultra-plush throws and formed an excited circle round the extended limb.

Gerroff! Tiger shouted in an extremely unladylike fashion, which only

encouraged them.

What’s to eat? she addressed her father directly.  She started to open tins

and Tupperware containers.

The boys finished the Christmas cake, I’m afraid.

Great!  I didn’t even get any, she complained.

Well, Grandma Morag sent us some shortbread, but Mum’s keeping that

for New Year.

Hogmanay, corrected Tiger, who knew the difference.

Whatever, said her father,  And don’t eat the Black Bun.  She’s keeping

that too.

Tiger surreptitiously helped herself to a Crunchie from her brother, Ferdy’s

Selection Stocking.  He’d never notice, she reasoned.

Go and speak to your grandmother, Gyles suggested.  She’s in the sitting

room.

Do I have to?

Gyles threw her a meaningful glance, so she went.

Ah, Tiger!  Would you like a Dewlap Gin? her grandmother asked

immediately.

I’m not allowed.

Oh, I forgot.  Well, could you top my glass up, darling?

Tiger hopped back into the kitchen, still wearing a single Ugg.

Humbug! she yelled.

A naughty pug crawled out of her fleecy boot and leapt back onto

his monogrammed coverlet, putting his little head onto his Sherpa Bone

pillow.

Tiger retrieved her Ugg and found it curiously heavy.  She turned it upside

down and a mass of black currants and pastry crumbs cascaded onto the

clean floor.

Dad! she screamed.  Dad!

But Gyles had retired to the marital Slumberland mattress which was

more than a decade old and considerably less supportive than the

deep dish slumber divans on which the pugs reclined.  He was fast

asleep and snoring like one of his brachycephalic pets- or like all three of

them together.

There was nothing for it but to sweep the remains of the Black Bun into the

wheelie bin and she just hoped that her mother wouldn’t notice.

Tiger!

Drat! Coming, gran.

She took a little swig of the Dewlap Gin for Discerning Grandmothers.

Yuck!

And through the haze of the unaccustomed fumes, she saw her grandmother

in a new light.  They said that owners sometimes began to look like their pets

and, to be sure, Ginevra was very wrinkly, short-muzzled, not to say, stubborn

in character.  Tiger had read that the breed were often described as multum in

parvo  and, thanks to her GCSE Latin. she knew that this indicated that

one got a lot in a little package.  Certainly Ginevra had a

remarkable personality for her size and, though lovable, like the pugs, she

was definitely high- maintenance and attention-seeking.

Actually, that sounded very like the implications in Tiger’s summative end-of-

term report from Miss Fotheringay.  Golly!  Maybe she was inbred!

Drrring!

Oh no!  That must be the other old biddy.

DRRRRING!!!

Yip, that must be Sonia.