30 June Teachers Strikes- a diatribe

buy your teacher Citizen Smith
it will teach them how to strike

So tomorrow the aptly named NUT are taking strike action. The teachers' unions are campaigning against changes to their pensions which they say will mean working longer, paying more and getting less when they retire.

If you want to cut to the chase and here me rant full on, just click on the RANT link, otherwise you can read the background to my peevish state of mind. Perhaps I woke up on the wrong side of bed this morning.

As a private sector worker, who has survived the recession with my job intact I find the main reason stated above for the strike baffling: I don't have an employer provided pension. If I want anything in excess of the state pension (if there is still one in 30 years time!), I have to fund that myself. I already lost out when Equitable Life went under, so that set me back a years worth of contributions before I'd even really started.

I'm a qualified chartered accountant working in practice with 10 years post qualification experience. My colleague's wife is head of year at a primary school. That's head of year, not head, not deputy head. She gets paid roughly what I do. In the summer she spends a month at the seaside with her kids and parents. I work in a non unionised profession that doesn't strike. A profession that has a history of long working hours. 50 hour weeks aren't unusual and there have been occasions where I've been at my desk at 2am, or for the majority of the weekend. I don't complain, it was my choice.

But it's not really the issue of the pensions that's got my goat up. Pensions are part of the overall package that teachers get:

• good (better than average) job security- how many headlines about mass redundancies in the teaching profession have you seen during the recession?
• reasonable working days- our local primary is dark and locked up when I leave for work and dark and locked up when I get home in the evening.
• an employer contributed pension- wow, in all the jobs I've had there's never been a sniff of one of these.
• long holidays- whilst teachers do obviously do lesson prep and admin during some of the school holidays, they still get massively more than most. Currently a quarter of my holiday is allocated to school things like daytime parent evenings (an oxymoron if ever there was one)!
• a fair salary. I'm not going to say it's a great or even good salary, teaching obviously has it's skills and it's challenges but in context it's not unreasonable in my opinion.

So what really gets my goat in a climate where we're all having to watch our backs with the spectre of unemployment continuing to hang over us, and our schools increasingly switching year inductions, parent evenings and everything else that has traditionally been held outside office hours, into the working day, the teachers are costing us another day of annual leave and apparently most of them can't even be bothered to attend marches or picket the school from what I've personally heard.

you apparently wont see many picket lines,
particularly in St Albans

In my book if you're going to strike, you should be on a protest march or standing by a burning brazier waving a placard and chanting slogans, a proper 1970's Citizen Smith style protest. You shouldn't be proudly telling people that you intend to spend the day at the cinema. Apparently when the Irish teachers went on strike a couple of years ago, there was a perceptible rise in shoppers crossing the border for a day trip (this is anecdotal, someone told me over twitter).  That is not the way to get sympathy for your cause in my opinion!

I'm unconvinced that the need for strike action is so necessary but even taking that a moot point for now and ignoring my opinion on it, the way to gain sympathy for your cause is to do it properly. Not gad about like you've got an extra day of holiday. Yes, I know NUT aren't paying it's members a basic salary during the strike, so there is a real cost to the time off but the honourable intentions of the ideological few are being drowned out by the cavalier actions of the many.

As a full time working dad I understand that things can be difficult but the way forward isn't to punish the kids at school and their parents by heading off to the cinema to watch Transformers 3.

Things to do in St Albans

There are plenty of things to do in St Albans. I've lived here for 10 years now, with and without children and come rain or shine we've always found plenty to keep us busy in St Albans.

Here is a brief guide to show you a few of the things that will keep you entertained on a day out in St Albans:

• Parks
• Museums
• Pubs
• Restaurants
• Other

Parks

can you see a heron?

The most notable park in St Albans is Verulamium Park. This is set in acres of land and as well as having a great view of the Abbey, home to the remains of St Alban, England's first Christian Martyr, it also has a rather nice set of Roman ruins and a covered Roman Hypocaust that is generally open when the Museum that nestles in the corner is open. The lake is home to coots, moor-hens and herons as well as the usual ducks and is well worth a walk around. If you're looking for things to do in St Albans, it's always worth checking out the councils what's on page, as it details events in the park. 

Clarence Park is situated closer to the train station and whilst not being as large as Verulamium Park, is often the scene for outdoor performances and is surprisingly tranquil for a park in such an urban location. It's also home to St Albans City FC, who are on the up and up since they got new owners last year.

Museums

St Albans Museum Service runs two museums in St Albans, Verulamium Museum in the corner of Verulamium park, and the Museum of St Albans on Hatfield road, at the top end of the town centre.

Since St Albans was one of the largest Roman settlements in the country, Verulamium Museum caters to the Roman side of things. It's impressive enough that during term times, coach loads of school kids come from all over the country to tour the museum, meaning it can be somewhat crowded. There is an entry fee but it's well worth paying as you'll see excellent objects and interpretation.

The Museum of St Albans hosts a variety of temporary exhibitions and the social history collection. Entry is free and it is well worth a trip if you want to know more about the social history of a very old town.

There are other museums in St Albans that are not run by the city and district council, like the Organ Museum. Opening times are limited though, so it is well worth checking their rather colourful website before embarking on a trip.

Unaffiliated with the museum service but right next to the park is the Roman Theatre of Verulamium. This is on the estate of Lord Verulam, so a separate charge is in order to see the ruins but unless they're closed for shooting or something else, you can walk up the drive and around a lot of the grounds of the Gorhamberry Estate.

Pubs

If you're out and about and fancy a pint or some pub grub, you're very well catered for in St Albans. It has all the usual chains if you're not feeling adventurous but since the city is the home to CAMRA, the campaign for real ale, if you fancy something a bit more interesting, you will be in luck.

A good place to start is in St Michaels village which has a string of pubs from the Rose and Crown right up to the Lower Red Lion. The Lower Red Lion usually has a beer festival running over bank holiday weekends but if you twist the landlords arm he will sell you a Peroni.

Up into the town, you will still find a lot of hidden gems on side streets, like the Farriers Arms, the Garabaldi, the Goat and the White Hart Tap. Finally, there is also the Horn , which really comes alive in the evening as a music venue. It's even won the music pub of the year award a few times to boot.

Those are just a few of the pubs you'll find in St Albans, a flavour really. There are plenty more and you can't really go wrong with most of them.

Restaurants

Most of the chains are present in St Albans, from Pizza Express to Zizis but you wont find a McDonalds or Burger King in the city centre. Of more interest are the local restaurants, offering great food at a variety of prices from the affordable to the eye watering. 

If you like Italian food, then Cosa Nostra on the Lower Lattimore Road should be your destination of choice. It's a small family run restaurant that has been going for about 20 years. The pizza and pasta are great, the venue intimate and the service is very friendly.

If you like great traditional English food, you're also spoilt for choice in St Albans. Two restaurants that you should definitely check out are Darcy's and Lussmann's. Lussmann's describes itself as a fish and grill restaurant but that really doesn't do it justice. Check out the locally sourced ingredients and the chef's passion for proper food, and it will give you an idea about the quality of the meals on offer. Darcy's offer a modern take on traditional fayre and are also keen on sourcing fresh ingredients.

If you prefer Thai food, Thai Square actually won an award from the Thai Tourist Board a couple of years ago for its Thai food. Having said that, Thai Rack, which is just around the corner, also does excellent Thai food, so you are really spoilt for choice.

Curry lovers are well catered for too, with Devdas being the cream of the crop, although extensive personal research has shown you genuinely can't go wrong in St Albans if you want a curry.

Finally, and a bit of a left field eatery, is the Waffle House. This is situated in an old water mill adjacent to Verulamium Park. They serve a selection of mouth watering sweet and savoury waffles. Bookings are not taken and be warned, they are extremely busy in the summer.

Other

Days out in St Albans with the kids are amply catered for too. If the weather is nice, a trip to Willows Farm is a great way to spend the day. There is plenty to do for kids of all ages and since it's situated right next to the motorway junction, if you don't fancy popping into the town, you can avoid all the traffic.

The Abbey Cathedral of St Albans is also well worth a visit. it's apparently the site of longest continuous Christian worship in the country. It's a real hodgepodge of architectural styles, so you'll not really see another cathedral like it. The tea shop is also worth a visit as their cake, whilst not officially being divine, is really nice.

So there you have it, something for everyone and hopefully something to inspire you if you're still wondering on things to do in St Albans!

Shell V-Power, Ferrari, NASA and our Vauxhall Zafira

When you start to think about it, a lot of everyday technology derives from what was once really high tech and out of the reach of all of us. There are a surprisingly large number of everyday things that started off with NASA and the space race that are now everyday; from scratch resistant glasses lenses, to ceramic braces so your teenager doesn't feel too insecure with orthodontistry. Shells working relationship with Ferrari is very much the NASA of fuel technology.

the British contingent on the Shell V Power
network of champions. Tall people at the back 

It's for this every reason that I sacrificed a couple of days of precious holiday and escaped to Maranello in Italy. More specifically, to Ferrari. It was a tough job but someone had to do it. If it's any consolation, the taxi picked me up at 4.05am and the six course meals didn't help my diet any. Ferrari's boardroom, whilst being incredible and enormously difficult to even see a picture off, let alone sit in and drink cola in, did also happen to be that bright shade of Ferrari yellow that backgrounds the prancing horse. Thank goodness it wasn't bright sunshine!

Shell and Ferrari have a working relationship that goes back decades. In fact it originated before Ferrari was actually Ferrari, and a certain Mr Enzo Ferrari ran the Alpha Romeo racing team. Ferrari used to race in numerous different classes of motorsport, and their success was so legendary that Ford put everything at it's considerable disposal to design and build the original GT40 to stop the success of Ferrari at Le Mans. Now days Ferrari only race in the F1, the most high tech race series on the planet. They're also the only team to have competed in every single season since the start too. They competed in more races than any other team, had more pole positions than any other team, won more races, drivers and constructors titles than any other team and, well, you get the idea.

Shells relationship with Ferrari is so strong that there are 3 Shell filing stations at the Ferrari Factory and every new Ferrari leaves the factory with a tank full of Shell V-Power. Unfortunately my cunning plan to leave my Shell Drivers Club card behind the counter at the most frequented filling station was thwarted. That would have earned me a few points as their state of the art factory crafts a few thousand cars a year.

Shell work exclusively with Ferrari on F1 fuels, fuels which are 99% similar to their road fuels. The technology, like kevlar, that started off in body armour and is now used as reinforcement in bike tyres, filters down into the technology we use every day. Shell phrase it like this:

‘99% of the chemistry in Shell V-Power race fuel is identical to the chemistry used in the Shell V-Power road fuel that can be bought at Shell forecourts. It is this remaining one per cent that allows enough experimentation to help give Ferrari the edge on the track’ .

Cara Tredget, as you can see from the above clip, says it very well. But it's not just Ferrari's that benefit from a tank of Shell V Power, and if you come back in a couple of days I'll tell you exactly why the work with Ferrari means our Vauxhall Zafira is going to last longer as a result...

Cyber(Mummy)

Say hello to me if you see me at Cybermummy today, there can't be that many blokes around so if you call all the beardless ones Alex, you'll be right at least some of the time!

A big thank you to Appliances Online for paying for my ticket. Without which I certainly wouldn't have gone. Do I look like I'm made of money? No, I look like I can't afford a haircut and have slept in a hedge. Imagine how much worse I'd look if I wasn't married to a wife who really looks after me!

The School Stealth Tax

I'm generally a fan of education. I liked most of it, apart from foreign languages, which I was rubbish at. I never liked the way Mr Astin sat on the corner of peoples desks in 3rd form French and scratched himself with your ruler either come to that.

In retrospect I'm also liking the way our family weren't stung for money at every single possible opportunity either. The boy is at nursery now, and will be moving up to reception in September. The odd outing or sponsored this or that is understandable but there seems to be something every single sodding week at the moment. And of course none of it is compulsory. Unless you want to upset your child and leave them marginalised when everyone else has paid their 50p to soak a teacher. The Water Aid soak a teacher thing has happened in the same week that every child has been given £20 of raffle tickets to sell and the school photo form to choose from. The raffle has a £400 first prize for goodness sake.

We've had two paid events, sponsored spells, sponsored dress ups, sponsored reads, sponsored this, sponsored that. I like to choose which charities I support but I also like to see the boy included in what's going on, and by the look of it so do most parents, since the vast majority seem to take part in everything.

The school photo thing is genius too, first time I've actually seen a premium being charged for ordering and paying over the internet!

Obviously I am aware that their is a cost to attending school and not just in uniforms with a school logo transfer on them that seems to add £5 to the price, but a bit of common sense needs to be exercised in my humble opinion.

"Very" Fashionable footwear- guest post

Being 6ft 4 inches, my feet are fairly distant from the rest of me. That sentence makes sense until you think it through- my feet are actually attached to me, so they can't be further away from me or closer to me than they actually are. But you get my drift.

With size twelve feet footwear has always tended to be functional (to actually fit me) rather than stylish. When I started dating the lady who is now my long suffering wife, she embarked on the boyfriend project in an attempt to smarten me up a bit. This meant I wasn't allowed to wear trainers that were held together with grey electrical tape any more. But it did me I had to educate myself in the murky world of footwear.

The thing I like about buying trainers online with Very is I don't have to be stupid and ask the staff whether the trainers I am looking for are fit for the purpose I want to use them for. The sidebar clearly differentiates between running shoes, gym shoes, plimsolls and fashion/casual trainers. Given the plethora of choice nowadays, it's nice to be able to know what you're asking for is actually what you want. Of course I always find they never have my size in stock instore and that a size range up to 12 is almost always theoretical but at least with free returns and a large warehouse, you can be almost certain of getting what you want online with Very.

How to get your kids running from the room screaming

BED HEAD

Fathers Day: A nice slow afternoon

With wifey ill yet (wo)manly dragging herself out of bed to go bowling in the morning, the afternoon was left to me to entertain the kiddos while she went back to bed to recuperate from illness and an embarrassing score at the old ten pin.

Started off the afternoon with a bit of gardening. We've been away a bit in the last couple of weeks and that combined with the long needed rain meant the veggie patch was lush and verdant. Unfortunately the verdant-ness of it all was partially weeds, so some hefty weeding needed doing. I didn't trust the kids to be able to spot a weed from my raspberry bush, so I left them making mud pies out of the remains of a grow bag while I weeded.

Rogue Raspberry, how I love you!

Bit of a result, I spotted a small raspberry bush growing about a foot into the lawn. It had obviously been seeded from the actual bush proper which was next to it. A bit of work with the fork and it was soon in it's own pot.

Once that had been done, it was on to harvesting some broad beans and all the black currants before they over-ripened. There's a frightening statistic about how much of the UK black currant harvest is dedicated to Ribena production. It's something like 5,000 acres of farm land produce black currants for nothing other than Ribena. Well, they haven't offered to buy my harvest, so tonight I'll probably be stewing them.

We did some more housekeeping- thinned out the radishes, fiddled with the peas, picked some gooseberries and so on but the majority of the rest of our outside time was spent tidying up the mud pie mess. I subsequently found out the boy had been in trouble at school for doing the very same thing. Kids eh?

his attempts to curry favour worked

I thought I'd have a stab at making something properly for tea too. I had a go at Tesco's Thai red curry. The ingredients were pretty simple: chicken, fish sauce, red curry paste, coconut milk, onion and pepper but the results belied the ease of cooking. The boy actually ate about half his body weight in curry and the child minder is going to have a rather nasty surprise when he does his afternoon toilet visit...

So that was my Fathers Day afternoon, pretty nice and relaxed all told. We had a smashing morning at the bowling, even if I did come third behind my brother and the boy. I was a little too honest in helping him aim his ramp thing and he got rather too many strikes as a result. I'm a strong believer that Dads get the easier deal of it in most circumstances, so Fathers Day shouldn't be about getting stuff, it should be about doing stuff with the kids and that's what we did.

The Boys first sleep over

anything you like, just don't wake Fifi up

I had a taste of things to come last night when wifey had a girls night out with, amongst others, Izzy's mum. Since her daddy was away at a conference, she had a sleep over with us (at least until about 11.30ish at any rate).

So, the boys first sleep over and in the words of Jason Derulo, I was ridin' solo. The brief was simple, wifey and co left at 6.15pm and all I had to do was get them to bed and make sure nobody died in the interim. Even I could manage that.With wifey's help I make sure nobody dies at night time almost every single day. That's not to say we fail occasionally, but to say I am out on the odd evening myself.

I thought I'd eschew the disciplinarian dad routine and tell the Boy and Izzy they could stay up in the boys room as long as they were quiet and didn't wake Fifi up.With that promise I got everyone off to bed at the usual time with only the reading of Winnies Flying Carpet as an aid to sleep. Go me, I am indeed a parenting genius.

So, by the time of the incident, I'd only been upstairs a few times:

1. The world's most enormous poo for the boy (I even tweeted my amazement about it);
2. Closing the blind;
3. A less enormous but still impressive poo for his sleep over buddy;
4. Turning the light off and giving them a torch;
5. Taking the torch away and turning the light on;
6. Putting some music on (Cat Stevens if you must know);
7. Opening the window;
8. Shutting the window;
9. Explaining the concept of superheroes and why it was alright to have a Spider-Man walltastic mural.

In a way it was really sweet since they kept to the pact. They didn't shout and all I could hear was a soft "Daddy" from the top of the stairs.

Then the incident happened.

"Daddy, come quickly please.", still in a quiet voice, "I think I've got a nose bleed."

Quite why he thought he had a nosebleed and wasn't completely sure will forever remain a mystery. As I rounded the bend on the stairs I saw what could have easily been a scene out of the Shining. There was blood on the bannisters, a bloody handprint on the wall, blood smeared all over the bathroom door and, well, you probably get the picture.

In the middle of the carnage was a slightly worried looking 4 year old who quietly told me he'd done his best to keep it off the carpet. Bless. And to be fair there was only one drop on the carpet. The rest of it that wasn't still inside him was variously on the vertical structures of the house and him.

I'll never get to the bottom of what happened, I suspect the two of them agreed a story before calling me but it was funny, especially the really useful help Izzy gave while I was clearing up.

So, sleep overs then, they'll be better in the future wont they?

Book review: Art of Roughhousing: Good Old Fashioned Horseplay and Why Every Kid Needs it

Whilst the title might be a mouthful, the Art of Roughhousing: Good Old Fashioned Horseplay and Why Every Kid Needs it, is a great book and a book you must buy if you're a parent to boys. 

At times our 4 year old seems almost feral but such is the way of boys. They've got a lot of energy and hormones to work out of their system, at times it descends into random acts of violence. The most memorable instance of this was a trip to the Chiltern Open Air Museum. It was early and not many people were about, so when I was hailed by someone calling themselves the head of the friends of the museum, I walked over for a chat. As we were about to shake hands, the boy stepped out from behind me, punched me in the goolies hard and ran off. I doubled up on the floor wheezing, leaving the chap standing there looking a little confused.

So anything that gives me ideas on releasing the energy and aggression in a more controlled way is fine by me and thats where the Art of Roughhousing comes in. The book starts with a disclaimer about there being mild peril in some of the activities (and references the sledging down stairs on a mattress!) but does rightly go on to say that if you do anything slightly dangerous for long enough someone will eventually get hurt.

We are very risk adverse today, even though a lot of it is media lead hysteria. In light of that it's nice to read a book that lets you rough and tumble with your kids but also tells you when to stop. The book has a few wordy chapters but is mostly made up of one page rough and tumble things to do, with an illustration, age range and description. It also tells you how long to do something for- for example all the upside down games should be limited with smaller kids due to the change in blood pressure inversion causes.

It was nice to see some of the things we've "invented" for ourselves in there too, and doubly nice to see we weren't doing anything too dangerous. Art of Roughhousing is an essential read for anyone with boys, it retails for £9.99 but is available for a discount at stores like Amazon. Highly recommended.

Fathers Day is approaching! guest post

If you thought Interflora only did flowers, you'd be sorely mistaken, as you can see from their great range of fathers day gifts.I've been a good boy this year but have told the wife that the boy and the wee lass aren't to splash out on me (too much). This probably means I'll have that tricky moment where I try to identify the great piece of art work they've each lovingly crafted for me without offending either of them mightily by getting it wrong.

If wifey takes the pictorial hint to the right, this will be the second time in a week we've actually used Interflora. Wifey's parents celebrated their ruby wedding anniversary last week and we sent them something from the anniversary gifts range. We even managed to do it via the ropey wifi when we were in Italy via my netbook too, which was very handy.

That only leaves my dad to sort out and he's been particularly useful recently. He's just turned 70 but is still really active. In fact the day we went on holiday, our pipes burst. I just turned the water off at the mains and the feed from the tank off and dropped him an email. When we came back from Italy there had been 7 hours of plumber supervision and tidying up done. I imagine there was also a fair bit of swearing but we missed that fortunately.

So whilst it makes sense to give Interflora a ring if you want fresh flowers delivered, don't forget they do more than that, which is handy if you have a phobia of shops at lunch time or don't actually want to visit your parents this weekend...

Holiday excitement

A Daddacool holiday is never a dull affair and this one to Altominicio in Italy courtesy of Thompsons Alfresco certainly lives up to the billing. Our last proper holiday abroad had abandonment by the tour rep in a hotel just shy of the Atlas Mountains as I developed a nasty case of dysentery. We were left in Morocco (a nice country, with really friendly people) on our own, with no phone or access to a doctor (none of the staff had more than rudimentary English).

Before that I third degree burned my knee at a Korean BBQ restaurant in Sydney, since then I've dropped the Boy's favourite soft toy, Bun-Bun, off the Walshingham Light Railway (recovered on the return trip), and last summers holiday ended after two days with the pox (of the chicken variety) descending on both kids, with their grandparents having not had it.

Cursed.

So it's no surprise really that we've had two episodes of excitement so far this holiday. Bizarrely, both of them happened near the same town but on different days. On the first day we actually failed to find the city centre of Simione,thanks mostly to a mixture of roadworks and interesting signage. But that wasn't the actual disaster. Oh no, nothing that easy. We were approaching a roundabout and the car behind began tooting. I thought it was because I was driving a little slowly, so decided to loop the roundabout and let them overtake me. It turns out it was actually due to the wee lass opening her car door, which proceeded to swing fully open on the roundabout. There are many things I love about the Skoda Yeti (apparently a Mercedes Class A substitute as far as the car hire people were concerned) but its central locking isn't one of them. I eventually sorted the lock out by engaging the child safety catch but I still can't get the central locking to actually lock us in.

The second Simione related incident happened today and had the potential to be a little more traumatic than the mere opportunity to lose a car door. We had just done a great boat tour of the island of Simione (is it an actual island or just a peninsular that's been artificially cut off? whatever) and been around the castle. A quick trip down to the lake side ended with a gentle stroll back to the car half an hour before the parking ran out. As I strapped the boy in, the words that will forever send a chill down my spine occurred  "But where Bun-Bun? I can't see him anywhere." Oh lawks, we had lost Bun Bun somewhere in a fortified town that had the largest Roman ruins in Northern Italy, as well as a castle.

A deep breath (for fear of passing out) and I told everyone to stay put in the car and I would find Bun-Bun. I pelted it back in the humidity and everything, all the way to the furthest point that we'd walked to without stopping once, the blood thumping in my ears. Right down to the lake front. Right up to Bun Bun who was still sitting on the bench where a small boy had left him.

I ambled back with a stitch and a severely sweaty t-shirt to find everyone on a bench having a fruit juice. The boy look unconcerned, the initial panic in his eyes gone because his daddy had told him Bun Bun would be found. It was then that it really hit me, the complete trust in my competence that only a small child could have. Parents are indestructible and omnipotent and the day you find out their just real people, the world gets a little greyer. Of course, if he wasn't 4 and had any level of discernment, the Boy would have realised I was a jammy bugger and it wasn't down to my god like status....

Mini Disco, a new life experience

At nine o'clock in the evening I never thought I would be sitting in a marquee with two hyper active (and probably over tired) kids. After a day out (without the buggy since we didn't take it on holiday with us) that involved a boat ride, a trip to a castle and a bit of drama as bunny got lost (and then found), we thought they'd both be exhausted.

Wishful thinking.

They're both doing some sort of wrestling/dancing hybrid at the moment which will likely end in tears soon.

Mini Disco basically comprises a hilarious set of links between kid friendly songs in Italian and sort of English. I now wander around saying "Hi Five!" and "Mini Disco!" in a sort of mock Italian accent. It's great fun.

We're at the Altominicio resort just off Lake Garda in Italy courtesy of Thompsons Alfresco at the moment. Aside from the hail stones, electrical storms and being ripped off by the local car hire company (hint: pretending to be sympathetic after ripping someone off and saying you'll only charge for one toddler seat doesn't work when you charge for two AND your victims have a price list), it's been a great holiday, and none of the problems we've had have been Thompson Alfresco's fault anyway.

The kids have loved the pools, they've loved YF (Your Friends, the kids entertainers), and they've loved the food too.

We've missed a bit of peace and quiet in the evenings, as we've been to Mini Disco nearly every evening. Might even have to buy the CD....

Happy 70th pops

It's my dads 70th today but I'm off to Italy at silly o'clock. He's quite a character and so far as I know is the only man to ever present us with a fridge magnet of himself. It shows him winning gold at the national indoor rowing championships a couple of years back. Him and his mate Bernie were the only people there who weren't members of a rowing club- all their rowing was done on concept 2000 rowing machines down the gym.

Turning 70 has excited him because he moves up and age category and he's already started training for this years competition.

So happy birthday pops, you mad old bugger!