Smelly bellies and bleached patios

Last Wednesday, my brother came over for a barbecue. He brought with him a copy of Chat. Is there any better present in the world? So today, I am proud to present to you, The Nonsense From Chat.

First up, a rare occurrence, a story which has been given 10 out of 10 on the shock factor scale.

And I think I know why. This woman, Jonty, has named her children Kai, Bailey, Skye and Hunter. I’m sorry, Kai and Skye? O, and friends of theirs, a couple called Lee-Anna and Liam. Lee…. Anna…. Leanne?… Whatever.

On the random photos page, there’s a lot of good stuff going on. We’ve got a picture of someone reading Chat on holiday, a picture of a baby asleep, a picture of a baby in a sunhat, a picture of a cat and, best of all, a picture of a cake someone got on their birthday, which had been made to look like a copy of Chat magazine! Epic!

Next up, we’ll visit the top tips page which, I’m sure, is your favourite. It’s certainly mine. Our first fabulous tip is to cover an old chair in a pair of jeans. It makes it look better. Apparently.

You decide.

The next tip is, basically, use a small vacuum cleaner to clean the little bits out of the bottom of your handbag. Thank you, D Thornton from Bournemouth. Where would I be without this tip?

The next tip is put bleach all over your patio to kill the weeds. Boy, do I love a bleach covered patio. The smell, the discolouration on your paving stones. What brilliant advice. Thank you, Julia Wakeford from Romford. You have improved my life immeasurably.

Lastly, stick some sea shells on your wall. Check it out.

Good, hey?

To finish off today’s look inside Chat, we’re going to briefly visit the Health pages and one letter in particular. This letter is called ‘Whiffy midriff.’ Already, you know it’s going to be amazing.

It starts with ‘My bellybutton pongs!’ Get straight to it, Ashley, aged 28. Don’t beat around the bush.

‘If I put my finger in and sniff it, there’s a smell like rotting veg!’ Ok, Ashley, 28, what… on…. earth. I’m 28 and I can tell you this for nothing. If I had a smelly bellybutton, Chat would be the last place I’d go for advice. I mean, give Google a try first, maybe? The NHS has a free helpline? Ask friends?

And what is she doing sticking her finger in her bellybutton then smelling it? Unless the bellybutton smell is so strong that she catches a whiff of it while sitting on the sofa then decides to see what’s happening, am I suppose that one day she was just eating her dinner, watching TV with her boyfriend and thought, ‘I’ll quickly smell my bellybutton.’ For no reason. And is that something we all do? Am I the stupid one here, for not jabbing my finger in my bellybutton then inhaling the resulting odours?

She finishes the letter by saying, ‘My boyfriend says he can’t smell it though.’ I bet he’s not your boyfriend anymore, is he, Ashley, 28?

“Smell my finger, darling.”

“What? Why?”

“Just smell it. Go on. Please.”

“Um, ok…. Where has it been?”

“In my bellybutton.”

“And why do I need to smell it?”

“Cause it smells like rotting veg. Don’t you think? Give it a smell. Go on. Tell me what you think.”

“Err… No. It’s fine. There’s… There’s nothing wrong with it at all. I’m just, um, going to nip out. Um. To the shops. Yeh, the shops. If I’m not back in a few days, don’t call me….”

Yaya’s magic trick

A few days ago, I went to see Yaya and his little sister. Yaya was very eager to show everyone something.

“I’m going to do magich,” he said, as that’s what he says instead of ‘magic.’

“Ok,” we said. He brought us all into the front room; Danda, his parents and myself. We sat down and he brought out two small chairs and put four cuddly toys on the chairs.

“Close your eyes,” he told us. We heard some noises and the curtains being moved.

“Open them!” he said and we all opened them and gasped in amazement when the toys were no longer there.

“Now, who wants to go first?”

He hadn’t explained what we would be doing when we ‘went first’ but I put my hand up anyway.

“Ok. Everyone close your eyes. Lauwa, come here.”

I stood up and he pointed behind the curtains to the pile of toys which had once been on the chairs.

“Bring one,” he whispered. So I did. He put it on the chair and told everyone to open their eyes. There were exclamations and shocked expressions of wonderment at this David-Blaine-esque magich trick. How could it possibly have been done?!

A different person was picked each time and everybody else told to close their eyes while that person was instructed to bring a toy from behind the curtains.

Until, eventually, all the toys were out and we were all sitting down feigning surprise.

The finale was Yaya spreading his arms out, hands facing upward, a mysterious smile on his face, saying, ominously…. “How did I do it? You’ll never know.”

And that was Yaya’s magic trick.