I had suggested I was looking for a 2014 project, something to distract me from the ghastliness of the forthcoming General Election campaigns.
Since she had been whipping up batches of jelly, jam and lemon syrup for gifts and I had been making jam, ginger beer, tarting up some tatty cushions, painting, and delving into dark and dirty corners of my dishevelled dwelling, I thought perhaps we could take over from Nigella on the domestic goddess front.
Breast implants, collagen pumped into the lips and a brunette wig would be humiliations I would be prepared to endure for such a good cause.
The OSM was more cautious. She was not sure we should adopt Nigella as a role model, pointing out she didn't have enough money to send the hired help out with unfettered access to her credit card.
My instinct was to ask her when she got these hired helpers and if they had something to do with Santa, but I thought I might have missed the point. Instead, I dropped the goddess idea, conceding my credit card would be limiting too and, while I had plenty of the offspring's old CDs,
I was a bit short of spare bank notes for snorting the icing sugar.
Also, I am not sure the offspring would take kindly to having their mother propelled into the media spotlight. It's likely their cookery skills outdo mine anyway. Goodness knows how Nigella and Charles' young 'uns are coping with all the prurient attention the family has been exposed to.
At the time of writing, it seemed the police were considering investigating Nigella's drug use, following admissions and claims in the recent court case involving the hired help. Imagine the outcry if charges result when Charles got off with a warning for the hands-round-the-neck incident.
There are many other things I could pursue in the new year, I am sure. Republicanism perhaps? Possibly not a winner in the year we are going to have those royal superstars Wills and Kate on our shores with baby George dribbling over a buzzy bee. Maybe I could run a sweepstake on how many politicians will inject themselves into a photo with the royal threesome.
I could continue to futilely rail about the ability of the Office of the Ombudsman to undertake investigations within a reasonable time of complaints being laid.
All parliamentarians, if they truly care about the place of this office in our democracy, particularly in an election year, should be concerned about this. I know the office must prioritise its cases because it is under so much pressure from the sheer number of complaints, but is it acceptable for it to take more than six months for an investigator to be allocated to some cases?
It needs more funding and more staff if it is to manage its ever-increasing workload without burning out existing staff.
The time it takes for some investigations does, in my view, allow government departments and other public bodies to cynically refuse to release information on grounds they know are spurious. They can gamble that by the time the outcome of any investigation is known, even if it goes against them, it won't matter because by then the original issue is likely to be a dead duck.
Another aspect of the new year I am already steeling myself for is the overkill (no pun intended) coverage of the 100th anniversary of the beginning of World War 1. I am expecting much that is mawkish about heroism and the shaping of the nation (what a novel way to build a country - having
thousands of young men slaughtered in a war which had nothing to do with them).
What did our involvement in that war truly illustrate? The dangers of jingoism and group-think?I wonder how much attention will be paid to Archibald Baxter, the pacifist and conscientious objector who was shipped to the front line against his will and subjected to brutal treatment.
It's not looking hopeful. When I searched the official New Zealand World War 1 commemoration website, the only reference to him I could find was within a message from someone who was trying to get funding for an opposition-to-conscription poster series.
A campaign to acquaint the masses with the heroic story of Baxter and friends would be timely but, such is today's celebrity culture, my domestic goddess makeover might be easier to arrange. Time to consult the OSM.
Elspeth McLean is a Dunedin writer.
