Simply the best day ever – with only Big Bad Barry for company
Don’t move. Hold it still. No, a bit longer. Be patient. Right, get ready … NOW.’ ‘Aw dad, there’s nothing on it.’ And there you have a little snapshot of how I spent three hours of my life on Sunday, when, stuck with two bored children and desperate for something to do, we went crabbing.
Now I didn’t even know this was a thing but friends of mine told me about a little boating lake nearby where you can catch the little nippy blighters.
‘When we went our children had the BEST day ever,’ they said.
Now, this expression – along with quite a few other things – really annoys me.
Mums, and it always seems to be mums, seem to say this ‘best thing’ a lot.
For example: ‘Our Emily had the best day ever’; ‘it’s the best thing we’ve ever done’,
‘oh my god it was just the best trip’. You get the idea...
I want to scream: ‘For god’s sake, they can’t all have been the best.
‘By its very definition only one thing can be the best’ – before I then storm off, Marlene Dietrich style.
‘Best’ is up there with ‘literally’ in the category of the most overused word.
Personally, I’d make anyone who says it spend seven days in a maximum security prison, with only their cellmate Big Bad Barry for company.
Right, rant over.
So, we headed to the lake. Once there I gave seven quid (a blow as I could have used that to buy four teaspoons of petrol) to a woman in a little hut sitting beside a natty blue-spotted Thermos, who, in return, gave us a crabbing kit.
This consisted of a bucket, a fishing line (or more accurately a bit of string with a small netted bag tied on the end), and some bait.
On closer inspection the bait appeared to be a few of bits of pork.
This pork was quite lean too – loin, perhaps – and for a moment I considered taking it home to use in a stir fry on Sunday night (well, what with the cost of living these days it’s important to be thrifty).
But alas by this point the kids were quite excited about the thought of being champion crab-catchers, so I selflessly handed the pork back.
We shoved the bait into the netted bag, then picked a pleasant spot at the side of the lake.
By now the kids were high as kites.
Wilf, my three-year-old, was galloping around at breakneck speed while waving his net in the air.
He was shouting ‘me fish, me fish’ like a particularly backward neanderthal caveman.
Meanwhile, his five-yearold sister Mary was singing at the top of her voice: ‘Crabs, crabs, I’ve got crabs.’
Now, for this she deserves credit; after all, it’s not often someone has the guts to broadcast the fact they’ve got a sexually transmitted disease.
After apologising to those around us for spoiling the peace, we settled down to have our first go at catching a crab.
‘Lower the bait into the water and leave it a minute,’ the woman in the hut with the Thermos had said, lowering her voice as if telling us a precious, never-before-revealed family secret.
‘And then v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-ly pull it out… and you’ll have a crab on the end. Trust me.’
We did exactly that and, the first time we did it, before I pulled the line out of the water, I said: ‘Right, get ready kids, here comes crab number one.’
Mary and Wilf huddled close by, their eyes wide with excitement at what was about to happen (you know what’s coming down’t you?!).
But when the line emerged, there was nothing attached to it other than the untouched bag of bait.
We repeated this exact procedure a further 24 times or so before the kids, not surprisingly, began to lose a bit of interest.
‘Dad,’ announced Mary, 45 minutes in, ‘crabbing’s boring isn’t it?’
What made matters worse is that at exactly this moment, a dad arrived with his two children and set up next to us.
I disliked him instantly because he was impossibly goodlooking.
He had a trendy haircut – long on top, shaved at the sides – tattoos all the way down one of his arms and a beard so neat I daresay he trims it six times a day.
The only thing that made me feel better was the fact he was boasting to his son and daughter in a very loud voice about how they were going to catch loads of crabs
I felt a giddy elation that he would soon regret those words.
He dipped his line in the water and I waited with great delight for the moment he too pulled it back out with not a crab in sight.
I turned away at that point to, for about the 55th time, grab the back of Wilf ’s T-shirt to prevent him hurtling headfirst into the lake.
Then I heard a voice say triumphantly, ‘look we’ve got two on one line’.
I turned back to see the David Beckham-lookalike holding his line in the air.
Two huge crabs were attached to his bag of bait, while his kids high-fived him shouting, ‘you’re the best dad ever’. I grimaced.
Mary and Wilf ran over to look and returned saying, ‘why aren’t you as good as him?’ to which I replied, ‘well, at least I’m not a 45-year-old bloke trying to look like he’s 18’.
‘What do you mean, dad?’ they asked.
‘Never mind,’ I barked, with the petulance of an eight-yearold who’s been told he’s not allowed to leave the table unless and until he eats his peas, ‘let’s try a different spot’.
Eventually we did catch five crabs, though three of these were given to us by a woman who had about 14 in her bucket and took pity on us.
I was in a bad mood on the drive home, then Mrs Canavan – who had seemed to really enjoy the whole experience remarked, ‘that was literally the best day ever’.
Give me strength.
By now the kids were high as kites