A little help from dad

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I get knocked down but I get up again and nothings going to get me down

I'm not a "my pint is half empty" person. Come to that I'm not even a "my pint is half full" person. I'm really a "woohoo!!! A PINT!" sort of person. So when the eldest came out in horrific chickeny poxy spots two days into our holiday, it wasn't the end of the world.

M'laddo had a bad night with the pox and woke up with an awful lot of spots. During the course of today they've multiplied and some of them have popped and crusted over. There are some spots in places I wouldn't wish spots on my worst enemy. Horrible stuff, so we decided to call it a day and head home.

We're responsible parents (even our 3 year old covers his mouth when he coughs) and there were a lot of kids around in North Norfolk generally and Wells Next the Sea specifically, so we felt it better to come home to our creature comforts to sit the illness out.

As Wifey points out, the complete cost of it all is probably around £1,000 in holiday expense and lost childcare already paid for but to my mind thats already paid for so its an historic cost. Theres nothing we can do about it now, its in the past, let it be.

We've both been looking forward to this holiday for ages. We really needed it to be honest, we both work incredibly hard- Wifey mixes work with childcare without a break or any time to herself and I was doing 12 hour days in the lead up to our holiday to ensure I had everything done in the office. Gutted is a word that fits rather well.

But theres also perspective. We're lucky to be in a position where we can afford (with sacrifices) to go on holiday. We're lucky its just the pox as well. One chap I know had a poorly wife, less than a year later he was a widower with a young lad of his own to bring up without a mummy and they'd both had to watch the cancer eat her alive. Even the owner of the lovely restaurant we had our wedding reception at died recently at 37. Next to suffering like this, I want to say, "Woohoo!!! We had two fantastic days at the beach!"

A pox on you!

So here we are two days into our holiday, the sun is shining and all is well in the world. Wifey has only had concussion of the head (minor) and concussion of the foot (major), so she's doing relatively well.

I've been up and out of the house at 5.15am with fifi- a nice trip to the beach as a reward for getting up ere Dawn had cracked.

So obviously into this idyllic scene has come the chicken pox like a plague of damnation from on high. We are currently at the stage where M'laddo has come out head to wissey in spots. No sick, no puss and no tears yet, we have instead seen an inordinately good display of scooting and some very good climbing. Yes, we are in that period of limbo before it all kicks off.

Wish us luck.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone on the move!

Here comes the sun, doo doo de dooo

And it makes sitting in an office a right pig. Especially when the little ones are apparently on the rampage. They went down the splash park yesterday afternoon and will no doubt spend this afternoon running around the garden like loonies.

Even though the Germany-Serbia match is running on my secondary monitor at work (it's still lunchtime- honest), I'd rather be at home pottering around in the garden finding the hiding places of all the nefarious snails.

Oh well, back to work I suppose!

Me wissey

For reasons best known and never divulged, M'laddo has decided to rename his willy. This is of more import now that he has toilet trained himself because his willy is out and about quite a bit more. So he no longer has a willy, he has a wissey.

This was highlighted to great effect on Sunday afternoon when we were doing some hardcore gardening. We were turning the corner of the vegetable patch that was full of stones and prunings into a bed suitable for some runner beans. This meant digging over the soil and getting rid of the old clods of turf I'd dumped there.

This proved to be a veritable cornucopia of wild life, all of which had to be picked up and shown to Mummy. We found centipedes, a newt, a caterpillar, many many worms, and lots of woodlice. I'm not fond of centipedes crawling all over me but I don't mind woodlice. M'laddo however wouldn't go near the woodlice. His reason? "They might go up me wissey."

*Prod*Prod*Prod

Last night we were rudely awakened at 4.50am by the young man.

"Bring him in with us" wifey muttered half asleep so I obliged.

Due to the extra person in bed with us I was thwarted from sleeping on my back or front so I had the choice of either side. Back to the boy failed as he kept on prodding me in the back until I turned round. Facing the boy failed as well as he put his head to mine and stared at me unnervingly whilst sucking his bunnys ear noisily.

That was that then. The silver lining was wifey got up with the wee lass when she woke up at 6ish, as the boy would have wanted to come down to play create havoc too and I wasn't really up for the carnage that would have created.

Still, mustn't grumble I suppose as this sort of night is now the exception rather than the rule.

Here comes the weekend

It's our 6th wedding anniversary tomorrow and to celebrate I've organised a kick about with some of our lads versus the Americans.

Whilst this is happening, and all attention is diverted elsewhere, we shall to slipping out to our favourite Italian for a nice dinner. It will be nice to go out for an evening together if we're well enough. Having two small children does often bring with it exhaustion and a tendency to pick up illnesses that a genteel life and plenty of sleep would see us hardened against.

It's funny really, when we got married people automatically assumed we only did it because we wanted to start a family immediately. And from what friends have done this does seem to be the norm. But, for me certainly, I wanted to get married because I was head over heels in love and wanted to give a public declaration of that love and commitment. Didn't stop everyone asking wifey if she was preggers for the next 6 months though. She blamed the cake.

6 years later and two small bundles of joy, frustration, exhaustion and love later, I can firmly say I'm still head over heels. Hurrah!

The Garden

Another attempt at Josies writing workshop this week. Based on the premise of the Garden, have a shufty and then let me know what you think. Cheers :)

"De de de deee, de de de deee, dede, dedededeeeeeeeeeeee!" wailed the electric guitar in a close approximation of Guns N Roses Sweet Child O Mine. Jim stood in a magnificent rock pose, legs akimbo and guitar hung low in a proper Rock God manner. The effect was only slightly spoilt by the garden fence directly behind him, the budleigha off to the left and the summer house to the right.

Colin looked on fondly at his sons band, as they mauled their way through yet another cover version. The fondness was genuine but aided by several lukewarm beers that the summer day and the volume of rock music required.

The vegetation took the sonic pounding in it's stride, which was something the audience could have done with a little bit of help with. It wasn't aided by the eclectic mix of Jim and his band, the Shangri La Airforce, school mates and the mostly elderly neighbours who made up the impromptu audience. The presence of the elder had come to be expected; rather than suffering from their gardens had sought refuge at the alcohol stuffed cool box that Colin always provided for such occasions.

Not for the first time when his son had asked at short notice to abuse the garden in the name of heavy rock, did Colin wish he'd got round to sorting out the garage. A garage band should play in the garage, it's a rite of passage but the problem, as Colin was all too aware of, was the passage in question, namely in and out of the garage, was baulked by accumulated junk. You'd be lucky to get a 5 year old with a uekele in there, let alone a double kick drum and rather too many guitarists he thought mordantly.

Colin was blessed and cursed in equal measure with his 160ft garden. It meant in summer he could duck behind the shrubbery off to the side of the summer house and retire to his potting shed for a bit of Radio 2 and some home brew with a nice book. But it also meant that the Shangri La Airforce flew into town rather too often for his liking.

Not that this seemed to be bothering old Mr Green from two doors down. He was sipping Stella straight from the can, nodding his head appreciatively at the buxom figure of Kate, the bassist, with both his hearing aids turned right down. When you're 83, you have to take your enjoyment as you find it, and Mr Green was never shy of an offer of free drink.

Colin turned round to glimpse his wife Jane pottering ominously in the kitchen and decided it was time to head her off at the pass.

The muffled wailings of Led Zeppelin drifted through the double glazing as Colin attempted to stave off a potential situation.

"If you really want a repeat of the Nobody-understands-me-or-my-music-you-just-want-to-humiliate-me farrago of last month, by all means go ahead and pop those sausage rolls in the oven." said Colin, "Because that's what will happen, rock and roll and sausage rolls don't mix."

"Well I'm worried if we don't get some food into Mr Green he might get arrested for sexual assault." countered Jane.

Colin sighed, she did have a point. "Okay, we'll pop your sausages on a tray by the cool box but no plates, and no special robot napkins."

Disaster, if not averted, then postponed for a little while at least, Colin headed back to the garden. He briefly considered locking himself in the toilet for the duration but decided against it. Someone would only get caught short and end up weeing in the borders and he wasn't sure if his perennials were that hardy.

The drama and the drumming of feet

Aside from the acts of random violence, like punching me in the goolies in front of the head of the friends society at the Chiltern Open Air Museum, me and the boy get on very well. We have a sort of laid back father/son thing going on which is fine with me.

The dynamic of this has changed a little in the last week though as he's turned into a right little sod at bed time. He's always gone to bed really easily but now it's a fight to get him undressed, a fight to clean his teeth and a fight to get him to stay in his bedroom let alone go to sleep.

Nothings changed and he's definitely tired but it all culminated in the worst nights sleep in years on Saturday night. The screaming and crying started as soon as we put him down. The drumming of the feet on the wall started shortly afterwards and then the shouting. He woke his little sister up twice and by the time we put him in bed with us at 2.30am I had thoroughly had enough. We'd tried reasoning, threatening, cajoling with him and none of it had worked.

And to cap it all, his little sister decided that 4.20am was absolutely the best time to get up. I'm still recovering.

Alice in Wonderland on Blu Ray

Alice in Wonderland is one of my very favourite childrens books. I've lost count of how many times I read it as a child- I certainly know it better than almost any other book. I'm also a huge fan of Tim Burton and Johnny Depp, and Tim Burton and Johnny Depp working together too. Sleepy Hollow is in my top three films of all time ever, and whilst Icabod Crane isn't exactly honest to the source material, it is a cracking yarn.

So Alice in Wonderland, my favourite childrens book, coupled with my favourite director and leading actor should have given me the goosebumps and possibly lead to some sort of swooning.

The film has already courted controversy, one cinema chain threatened to boycott it entirely because the studio wanted to get it out on to blu ray and DVD rather sooner than is the norm and, horror of horrors, its not a straight adaptation of the book, rather a pseudo sequel (ignoring Through the Looking Glass) set thirteen years later.
Fortunately this doesn't stop Alice in Wonderland for being a rather excellent film. My initial dismay at the lack of reverence the source material was given was soon dispelled by the fantastical world that Burton has created. I believe it's his most CGI'd film to date but it doesn't really intrude that much. In fact the visual effects are often playing second fiddle to the costumes which are fabulous. The wifey tells me that ASOS even did a whole range of clothing inspired by the costumes! Special mention must be given to the Mad Hatter and his apparel- and to his eyes which change colour to reflect his mood- he looks magnificently bonkers as Alice would say.

In fact you can see how bonkers the Hatter is here.

The film follows Alices return to Wonderland as a faux adult at 20 years old. Wonderland is a decaying mess under the tyranny of the Red Queen who is both wonderfully and disturbingly played by Helena Bonham Carter. Matt Lucas is great as Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee, albeit coming across as a little more simple than I thought they should have.

The world is pretty vivid, both in terms of absolutely gorgeous colours and also larger than life characters- a typical Tim Burton world in that sense then.

I think the only thing that stops it being the film I really wanted it to be is a lack of focus. It's unsure where it wants to be a full blown dark adult film or a slightly creepy kids film and on occasion Depp, Hathaway and Bonham Carter cross the line into giving the younger ones nightmares. Which would be fine if it wasn't for the Mad Hatters slightly odd dance at the end which seems a bit tacked on.

Nevertheless, its a cracking film and well worth owning on blu ray if you ask me.