Darciesmum we're having pasta with leeks, bacon, peas and dolcelatte, and a salad of little gem, walnuts, chives and a little pumpkin seed oil because I am addicted.
Nice laid back day after my nearly completely sleepless night - we took a long walk this afternoon as the sun was setting and watched a few of the boys' home rugby games (against St Bede's today I think), then back home to tea, mini mince pies, Miles Davis, the new Private Eye for me and stacks of end of term exam marking for DH. I think Film4 is having an anime season tonight as well so that may be on the cards for later...
Have (almost) managed to forget that I am massive and a week overdue...
I was sent this study about the factors that help marriages stay strong when kids come along - a good summary of the study here. It's mostly no brainer kind of stuff but it's always interesting when academic research confirms it after controlling for factors like socio-economic background, age, education, ethnicity etc.
The most interesting finding in my opinion is on p.38 about generosity. It says that the 1960s and 70s saw a rejection of what was at the time an expectation that all the generosity in a marriage should be proffered by women alone, and that second wave feminism advocated a more individual attitude within marriage as a reaction to this. This study finds that in fact marriages are happier and more likely to stay together not if women throw off 1950s expectations of wifedom, but if men adopt the same expectations - so both spouses make a regular, overt effort to "serve" the other in small ways (the study gives the examples of "a spirit of service, frequent displays of affection, and a willingness to forgive the faults and failings of one?s spouse").
In other news DH and I had a taste test between the PG Tips we had been drinking and a box of Clipper organic fancy stuff. I couldn't believe we could actually tell the difference - the Clipper tea is so much better, we could both tell immediately in blind tests.