Papa
My brothers came to visit at the weekend, which provided some discussion about our dad.

We don’t see him that often, around three or four times a year. He’s the type of guy who’s quite annoying and lies a lot. For example, telling us that he was in the MOD, that he was going to get a pilot’s license, that he once played pool with Paul Hogan (this was at the height of his Crocodile Dundee fame; I think dad thought that this would impress us).

But whilst we laugh at him, we also laugh with him. One of my favourites was when he took the boys and our cousin Ted camping when they were younger. Ted was quite a chubby eleven year old, and couldn’t keep up with my dad and brothers on a hike. Rather than slow down to accommodate his young nephew, dad turned around and shouted down the mountain: “HURRY UP YOU BLOODY PREGNANT OTTER”.

Whilst my friends were daddy’s girls and were dotingly called “Darling” and “Princess”, I was called “Sow”. He also that he thought I had Down’s syndrome when I was younger.

He’s been banned from one of the supermarkets in his town for throwing a trolley when he was informed that the checkout was closed.

He used to get a basket load of shopping, and then when he saw the queue had more than five people, he would just abandon the shopping and leave.

He made us do a few dine and dashes when we were younger because the waiter took too long bringing our bill.

If we ever touched the piano, he used to yell: “STOP PLAYING ON THE BLOODY JOANNA”.

I have a home video of my sixth birthday party, and when my mum is lighting the cake’s candles and counting up to six, you can hear dad say “she’s seven isn’t she?” and then: “we don’t want any spluttering on it thank you” to my group of friends.

I love my dad, but I don’t particularly like him all that much.
( awayfromthenumbers, Tue 30 Nov 2010, 11:42, Reply)