the adlards

I don’t usually write during working hours, but there have been a number of explosions on the Underground and at least one on a London Bus (at Tavistock Square near Euston). London Liverpool Street, London Kings Cross, London St Pancras, London Marylebone, London Euston and Stratford train stations are currently closed until further notice. The entire London Underground is also currently closed until further notice.

The Liverpool Street and Tavistock Square explosions were suspected bombs. The other Tube explosions are being blamed on power surges. No confirmed deaths, but eye-witness accounts of many fatalities. Plenty of “walking wounded”. Targeting tourist areas, not the financial district – anti-capitalist G8 related? Perhaps it’s the bloody French being sore losers …

We’re OK, Thameslink had overhead line failures overnight and I couldn’t get on a train this morning. I came home to take a conference call, planning to try again at about 10.30 by which time everything was closed.

I was crossing the Strand outside Pret having had a quiet sandwich with a friend when the Red Arrows rocketed overhead straight down Fleet Street towards Trafalgar Square trailing red, white and blue smoke letting us all know that in 2012 we’d better all be sports-mad or somewhere else.

So do you think olympiclets.co.uk will pay off the car or just enable us to rent our house out in 2012?

I read what is possibly the best post I’ve ever read on Dooce today (post of Tue, 5 July). I clearly betrayed the fact that I wasn’t working by the tear in my eye. Actually, I was reading it on my phone in Pret over a mid-afternoon coffee that was desperately required just to get my brain functioning in anything approaching a useful manner (see previous “treacle days” post).

Josie began potty training in earnest today. I burst in with my, “So where are my girls?” yell after work and was presented, immensely proudly, with the most enormous poop-in-potty-with-weewee-jus. Simply delightful. She’s doing very well – great joy derived from tipping it into the toilet and watching it flush, then tearing downstairs for Pingu and a treat. Quite a few treats today with much resultant bouncing off the walls.

She also had a group of friends around – an unusual experience for her, they usually all meet up at the park or at toddler group. It seems sharing is much easier when it’s someone else’s toys that are being shared. We never really change do we?

Some days walking to the station feels like wading through chest-deep treacle. Today is one of those days. Every step is an effort and every minute on the platform spent fighting the urge to call in sick. I usually only have these days when I’m really run down. Hadn’t realised that’s where I was, which is a bit worrying. Perhaps it’s just a bit of infant-induced sleep deprivation.

We now have a contact form for those of you who read this but prefer not to leave generally visible comments.

Tomorrow we find out where the 2012 Olympics will be held (and therefore whether we will be renting our house out for a few weeks in 2012 or not). This will be a highlight in my day.

As for today, I’ve had enough and am going to bed.

Gwyneth Paltrow provides clear guidance on managing noise sensitivity in the very young. Oddly enough tallies with the advice I was given …

Sophie is having a growth spurt, which for the uninitiated means she’s feeding every hour and a half for a couple of days. Doesn’t make for a good night’s sleep and Michelle and I are both pretty tired today – definitely wasn’t on top form at work. I’m led to believe puppies can be similarly trying (to the absolutely thoroughly uninitiated).

Yes, that’s right, Ben & Anna have started blogging … oh rapturous joy. Quite entertaining actually; well worth a read.

For noisies cf Monsters in the Bathroom

I’m back in my own corner of the sitting room, fitted in between the table and the wall behind the clothes drying rack. On the way home today we saw a car that must have been driven by very small people because the roof was so low they only had about an inch of window space to see through. This must have made driving tricky for them because they were in a field on the other side of a four-foot bank which they’d tried to drive over sideways. Seeing them there reminded me that my brother did something not dissimilar in a real BMW a few years ago. He doesn’t remember peeping out of the little windows, although he must have done because he’s here today. Which in turn reminded me that, in fact, he’s not. He and Ros moved back to South Africa today and arrived, I’m led to believe, safe and sound from that trip too.

Perhaps they weren’t very small people at all, those ones we saw today, perhaps they were just small-minded. Defensive driving must surely be a myth. No amount of paranoia is going to protect you from pusillanimity in control of half a ton of steel with a 200bhp engine.

When we passed the very small people Josie didn’t see them leaking out of their car because she was thoroughly engrossed in “Shark Tale”. If you have kids and were considering the merits of in-car dvd players buy one. Let go of the qualms about the sights they won’t see and the conversations you won’t have. You can tell them about the sights when you stop for a rest, or to clean the vomit off them because they get motion sick when concentrating on a small screen a foot in front of their faces.

Also remember that the smell of kiddie-vomit is worst when you return to the hot car following a rather nice lunch taken somewhere special along the way. Be sure to allow sufficient airing time and to send someone with a strong stomach or equipped with suitable breathing apparatus.

Contrary to the generally morbid tone of this post we had a very pleasant trip home. Josie was a little trooper, Sophie slept most of the way, Heather was a star entertaining Josie during her “more traditional entertainment” breaks, and Michelle and I shared the driving.

Back to work for me in the morning, as soon as I’ve reassembled Jo’s newly-washed car seat and re-installed it in the car …

This is my favourite place in all the world today. I’m sitting outside on the grass next to a roaring fire in what’s become a balmy summer evening, drinking (the same) merlot and eating (the same) stuffed chillies having cooked and eaten a fair amount of the organic lamb, found yesterday, along with quite a lot of other things.

There’s been a huge influx of kids today. You know, the ones driving small cars with enormous stereos and big lights on the front; the ones who’re only down for the weekend so are wandering around arguing about whether if they use sunscreen they will still get a tan before they leave; the ones who are actually just here to get pissed and only narrowly miss getting laid in the stories they’ll tell their mates. It’s nice to feel like a local. Grumpy I do naturally.

First thing this morning I tore down to Porthmadog and bought that in-car dvd player and a copy of “Fifi and the Flowertots” and “A Shark’s Tale”. I realised while blogging last night that we should have bought it and wanted to get there before they sold out today. I didn’t buy the tent, but entered a competition to win a tent, four rucksacks and four sleeping bags. Hold thumbs for me / wish me luck / whatever it is you do … we could be camping yet! It won’t be a Super-Size Tent, just two rooms, but it’s a start.

Quark (beloved Laser) had her bath day today on the lawn and is now stowed snug in the garage until August. We took Jo to ride “her” pony (first thing she asked for today – third day running) and were told – horror – that it was too cold for riding. Heart-rending quiet disappointment placated with home-made icecream (for Jo) and two scones with jam and cream (for Dad) at a beautiful cafe by a stream. Over the stream was a campsite … 😀

I suppose I should mention Orange, without whom I wouldn’t be blogging from this position at all. Their service is shite – their coverage map shows 3g here but I’m getting GPRS at anything up to, ooh, 35kbps – but hey, at least I’m online without having to use a hundred-yard phone extension.

Today’s our last day in Abersoch for the moment. We hope to be back later in the year. It’s absolutely lovely (mostly due to Nin & Phoe very kindly sharing their beautiful house with us).

Update 23:04 – have updated the gallery with pics from today. NOT in bed by 11.

A quick sail before the weather closed in today. Josie is the orange blob on the left.

Highlights in brief:

• All traipsing down to the beach and a quick sail with Jo before the weather closed in and it pissed with rain for the rest of the day.
• Driving to Porthmadog to visit Portmeiron by way of the seafood festival in Pwllhelli. Bought some excellent organic lamb at the festival (I know …) and Jo slept all the way.
• The weather systems around this bay are peculiar in that you can be absolutely sure that if the weather’s rubbish on this side of the bay it will be completely the same on the other side. Decided to skip Portmeiron and had an excellent jacket potato in Porthmadog instead.
• Visited Lidl, carefully avoiding Gelert store and prospect of spending lots of money on equipment we’re now sure we’ll use when Sophie’s a little older. Very nearly bought a portable dvd player for the car in Lidl instead. Decided to compare specs first. Almost certainly should have bought it.
• Mum-in-law sitting with Josie in the back of the car teaching her to sing “pat-a-cake” in a gruffalo voice. I would have her sitting in the front with me to avoid the future embarassment but I’m afraid she might try to teach me.
• Excellent rack of lamb with a decent merlot, very slightly marred by a very tired Josie but made up for by the rest of the company.
• The prospect of getting to bed before 11! Woohoo!

Pics from the first part of the day and Sophie’s bath in the basin in the gallery.

It transpires that last night’s pony fixation and lack of sleep may have had more to do with the caffeine in used tea bags than with manic over-tiredness. This inspires me to update my top five hot tips:

1. Never let your children play with tea bags. Even if you think they’re just squeezing the water out of them for fun. It’s not fun.

2. Always have the new nappy ready before you take the old one off. Never be tempted to “just let her/him air for a bit” unless you have a new nappy ready and are keeping a beady eye out for sphincter strains.

3. Swimming is to be encouraged, but only with a properly fitted swim nappy. See previous pontification.

4. If you use an over-and-under buggy like Phil & Ted’s Most Excellent one, do not let the toddler try to climb into the infant cradle. This is not optional and should never be confused with yet another display of climbing prowess. This rule should be emphasised to said toddler so that she/he doesn’t try it while you’re not around. These buggies cannot flip forwards, but they certainly can flip back, leaving toddler standing in the carry-cot cavity wearing the buggy like a mini submarine. Muffled cries for help with no child in evidence …

5. Never let your children taste green chillies stuffed with feta and myzithra cheese. Even if they beg incessantly. It might feel like it’d serve them right, right up until just after they try it. It is very difficult to stop chillies from burning. Pepper, mustard, red wine, radishes are all fine … never chillies (stuffed or not).

Now where’s that sunset?

And now all she wants to do is r-i-i-i-i-i-de horsies! Not sleep, not eat, not walk to the seaside. Just r-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-de horsies! This could become a problem; a 50p a ride problem here, but I suspect there’s potential for real spending back in Hertfordshire. By the time she finally yawned her last “r-i-i-i-i-i-de horsies” and fell asleep last night I couldn’t face blogging. This morning it was:
“DAAAAAAD! DAAAAAD! DAAAAAD!”
“Good morning Jo-Jo, did you sleep well?”
“Ride horsies now, Dad?”
“We’ll see what we can do Jo.”
“Ride horsies … Dad?”
“I don’t know if we can today, Jo, we’ll have to see.”
“See ask the man, ride horsies?”

Oh dear … how did she find out about The Man?
There is a good seafood market on the way, so perhaps I’ll cave.

It all began, of course, as an innocuous day trip to the Rabbit Farm (pics in the gallery).

No trip around that part of the coast is complete without an hour or so at the Gelert shop. We are, once again, considering the acquisition of a Super-Sized Tent with rooms for all the family. We’re certain we’d start camping if we had one …