to want to use Bach's Goldberg Variations for pass the parcel music? dh has two objections...

[Lio]

1. We would have to make the parcel 32 layers thick, which obv has environmental implications.

1. He thinks the children would get bored, what with some of the variations being quite long. I say we just use the Glenn Gould 1955 recording, which is very zippy.

Any thoughts?

ds is going to be 5, btw. He is very advanced for his age.

How is darling Aspasia btw? How vividly I recall her interpretation (in dance) of Kepler's Conjecture! It was the highlight of your Summer Entertainments this year, Swedes.

Yes, it was indeed surprising that so few of Melpomene's friends were able to decipher the Morse thank yous, knitted from yarn from our own alpacas which Melpomene and Antigone had spun themselves, as part of their school's organic husbandry project. One feels mortified to discover that other people's children are, shall we say, just a teensy bit less advanced than one's own. It feels so tactless to draw attention to that fact.

Sorry, a little confused MadBad. Melpomene's friends are children?

Aspasia is currently reading Fritz Spiegl's Book of Musical Blunders and Other Musical Curiosities. I feel she's gaining a real understanding of musical irony. Whilst I am pleased I am also tres worried that she might alienate herself from her peer group at the Little Shitbags pre-school; I don't want her to leave behind all childish things. Not yet. Am I just being silly?

Onebat - that's so kind of you to say that about our Summer Entertainments. We are currently planning our Weinachten Entertainments. DP feels we should scale-down in light of the credit crunch and out of respect to our friends, many of whom are bankers. I was hoping for a Lenny Henry as Brummie Othello theme. We quarrelled.

Onebat - like Swedes, I am wary of my children distancing themselves so completely from their contemporaries. Melpomene and Antigone do seem somewhat isolated (perhaps even alienated) at school - jealousy can be such a destructive emotion, don't you agree? - which is why I am so glad that they have decided to continue with their Saturday morning classes in Thracian Dance and Car Mechanics, where they have been fortunate to find some kindred spirits. But equally, it was thrilling when they were top students at the OU summer school in Semiotics, Chaos Theory and the Works of e e cummings, even though they were the youngest students by a margin of 40 years.

Here I am, sharing the most intimate details of my twins' lives with my special MN friends, and someone comes along and dismisses it as pretentious, middle-class, aspirational crap? Whatever next? A suggestion that we are not in deadly earnest?

Darlings, you are wonderful. Thank you for making an old woman cackle.

lio, now howard goodall, I can do
dh made prog with him too!

not lionel though

carissima soror - sero ut semper advenio in rete matris, et, ut semper, rideo. disertissima nepotum Sloughi!

at in rete matris

Ahh but which version# goulds first version is nice and swift, ideal for the PTP moment. the second one is far too slow and the children will be distracted by his muttering

Bundle, I will give you both my children for Howard goodall's number

hmmmm
dear sisters, I always come onto mumsnet (very good!!!) late at night and always laugh? ummmm, something about slough

knew I should have done more than 2 years of latin

help me out clever people

Dearest sister - as always, I come late onto MumsNet and, as always, I am laughing. Very amused granddaughter of Slough!

You will be getting photo-card thanks for the frogs and co, we have had cuter fun with them than you can possibly imagine (they are a family, is v v lovely)

All: party was fab, but I have to confess that Glenn Gould got ditched in favour of Putumayo (sp?).

MadBad, thank you for translation, my sister thinks I'm clever than I really am

MB/Bundle, I also have two children but am willing to up it to three in order to secure HG's phone number. No wink, no smile, I need a deadly serious emoticon for this one.