Tea Room The 24th - San Francisco Painted Lady!

[Tee2072]

Welcome to the 24th incarnation of the One-Child Tea Room. Not that you only have to have one! Just so long as you enjoy chat, tea, coffee, cake!!

The usual rules apply - no bunfighting. If you like that sort of thing, go elsewhere.
Other rules: bring . Or .

Our ongoing voyage take us to one of San Francisco's Painted Ladies!

We've brought the Aga over, it's in the back in the cosy kitchen overlooking the back garden. The chintz sofa is in the front room, under the bow window! All of the pillows and duvets have come along as well!

What's that? The Priest Hole? It's just over there --> behind the bookcase!

Mellors is upstairs, preparing the bedrooms for naps and such.

The aspidistras are thriving as they overlook Nob Hill! The horses have found themselves stabled in the Garden, which is much larger than these places usually are in this city!

So come in and have a seat!

::tea hurries off to Powell Street to catch the Cable Car to Ghirardelli Square::

Not surprised...is there a sort of victim support counselling service that can help them, or a community officer who can help put practical things into place? Hope so...what a situation for them (and you....)

Mmm. Will find out tonight when they are having a visit from a uniformed officer - I assume s/he will be able to put them in touch with Victim Support, but what they need most (I hate to say it) is to be less trusting when people spin them a yarn.

So difficult though...people can be terribly convincing. And most people are nice and want to help in some way.

Oh dear! tales of woe abound - Maud, and :( to hear of your parents' tribulations and re. tv situation for you. Flippin' sales people. Hope the police find something but yes, it will make your poor parents very nervous. My grandparents had plausible types invade their home once - one kept my nan talking while the other went through the house but my grandad found him and scared him off - they didn't get away with much, thank goodness! but it's the feeling of vulnerability that you're left with (also been there).
When I was burgled in Oxford, we ended up getting an alarm system put in, with 2 panic buttons, one in the bedroom and one in the bathroom, because I was there on my own 70% of the time. That helped my nerves, anyway.

Amber - scaffolding poles and rest are mutually exclusive. Good lewd rolls, though!

Boo to the boat race result (light blue through and through, despite having lived and worked in Oxford for years!)

Serpent - I don't really know what to say - but I do wonder if it's something about French blokes married to English ladies that causes them to be so fecking rude - T42's Beer isn't a lot better given his last effort! Anyway. How very unpleasant of him and I tend to agree that those who rail most strongly against something are usually hiding similar traits themselves (witness the homophobes who are homosexual but don't want to be). Is TMYMM fearful of MH ishoos? Perhaps someone in his family had them and he is scared of them?
TBH, I'd be tempted to tell him to feck off with his French holiday - you'll take Wriggle to your friend's house and he can do what he likes, so long as it doesn't involve you having to drive him anywhere. But then I'm confrontational like that.

We;re looking to come back to teh UK soon - hopefully second week in May - just got to get MrT to sort out his Irish passport and I have to ring the immigration office to check if I can leave while I'm under consideration for upgrading my visa to permanent - but seeing that they told me it would take 6-8 months from May, I can't see me leaving the country in May being much of an issue.

Sorry to hear of general illness and trials and tribulations all round.... Amber put that scaffolding pole down now! I know it would make a good trotting pole or jump for Earl Grey, but Mellors is quite capable of moving them on his own, and you never know, might make him work up a sweat

Tee - when mistlechick was little we had no end of problems with congestion - has ended up with him having a permanently perforated eardrum which is not good (thanks to the Dr's ignoring the low-level discharge for too long), although we'll get it mended at some stage. However, we found moving him off cows milk and onto goats milk products definitely helped with the congestion - if its proving difficult to shake, might be worth trying.

Maud - I am looking forward to 'family' holiday with MiL, BiL and his wife and 2 nieces with trepidation. MiL tends to be a bit manipulative, nieces have very limited diet - we shall wait and see how it goes! Being by the sea should be nice though.

Also sympathies with your parents - I found out that my elderly neighbour had been burgled a few weeks ago - I heard nothing - two men (it is thought) intruded and went through her house when she was there - including writing a note (she's rather deaf) demanding her pin number or they'd kill her. Not good.

I will put mistlechick back on baking duties and get the rolls in order - they are looking rather a sorry lot. He has decided which birthday cake I'm making him this year. I've not told him that he's got it wrong and I shall be doing the spaceship with aliens not the spider....

Oh, why not the spider?? Black icing is the best. especially if it turns your tongue black.

commiserations to those who are struggling with family politics. All I can offer is virtual chocolate. so here it is.

Hi all.

Very long day client wrangling. But I got to say 'I told you so' about a million times.

mistle that's an interesting idea. Only I have no idea where I'd get such a thing in Belfast, especially in liquid form!

Maud sorry to hear your parents had a frightening incident.

::lines up for a massage from Mellors. And some cake. And some ice cream. And some ::

How are your parents this evening, Maud?

Amber, I waved today but don't think you saw me.

Have entered a new phase with TS -- he has mastered how to get down (beds, sofas, chairs) AND how to get down the steps. All in one weekend. I'm doomed.

Made carmelized onion chutney tonight. All that crying and it didn't seem to make very much.

Amber must have been under the scaffolding when you waved

Maud, so sorry to hear about your parents. Can only hope that with time the feeling of vulnerability eases.

Feel sorry that I overreacted to MrS by repeating it. He comes from a home where his father behaved in exactly this way, both to his wife and children. It is sad that under stress he repeats the pattern. It is also sad that I come from a family where no amount of disharmony could be tolerated, so never learnt any coping strategies. Still we must be together for a reason, and he does not repeat the family negative pattern with Wriggle; I think that he is so afraid of this that he is quite ridiculously overindulgent. Feel that the French thing could have some slight bearing, as misunderstandings do occur, in spite of his excellent English and my OKish French.

Amber, I can think of no definition of resting which involves scaffold poles.

Sorry to hear about your parents Maud - how very frightening for them.

Amber scoffolding poles! I can see we will have to tie you down to the Sofa again.....

I read today that Diana Wynne Jones died at the weekend. I quite liked some of her books...

Hello all. Just back from visit to my AgedPs.

When I am in the tea room I feel I must be the only person on the planet who has never heard of Robert (?) Asprin or Diana Wynne Jones (except here) and has only read one Terry Pratchett book.

Serpent - It didn't sound to me as if you were over-reacting. What MSnake said was spiteful and untrue. I really don't want to keep harping on about this, but hasn't MSnake now had enough time and life experience to unlearn the unhealthy model for a marriage which he witnessed between his parents? You seem such a kind and emotionally-generous person and it saddens me that you often seem to blame yourself for the excesses of MSnake's behaviour. Was Wriggle there when he said those unkind things to you?

Scout - You're not doomed, but you need to up your calorie intake as you'll now be doing even more chasing around after ToddlerScout!

Hot chocolate with brandy chaser, anyone?

Don't worry, Maud, I haven't heard of them either.

MrScout has a Governors' meeting tomorrow so will be working from "home." It does mean lunch after swimming, though. And TS can stay home from Guides. YAY!

Today TS also realized that noise comes out of the phone and it's not unpleasant. After listening to the dial tone for ages I called MrScout and had him talk to TS -- oh the look of pure joy at hearing his Daddy's voice come out of that white thing Mommy was holding to his ear.

Oh that's lovely. Girl liked to listen to familiar voices on the phone even before she could say anything back to them.

Last time he heard one of us on the phone I was at Seniors and TS was home with MrScout. TS wailed and wailed. Don't know if he was frightened by the voice with no body or upset because he couldn't find me.

Nooooooooooooooooooo! Not Dianna Wynne Jones! This has not so far been a good day. [Ironic understatement emoticon.] Could this be the third awful thing which means it's over and things are going to turn back upwards? [Pathetically hopeful emoticon.]

And yes it makes Wriggle very defensive of me.

Morning.

I have no idea who Dianna Wynne Jones is.

Serpent, I have to agree that it seems you are making excuses for his bad behaviour. At some point all grown ups have to get over their childhood issues and accept that they are acting badly all on their own.

I don't think LCT understands phones in terms of hearing people he knows, but at the moment everything gets held like a phone. TV remotes, blocks, literally everything!

Morning all.

Today, no scaffolding. OK, there's been ironing, washing, bed-changing...but no scaffolding. This has to be good.

::helps herself to a large plate of cooked breakfast and tries to catch up with the conversation::

Hands Amber a refilled mug of tea. and ties her to the sofa, with a good book. The Erectors Special Handbook I think its called.

Windows open, beds made, ginger beer put away... too early to phone box office re tickets.... what shall I do now. Amazon and birthday present catch up I think.

Birthday Amazon vouchers?? Splendid things, if so. Did I miss the birthday? Happy Birthday if so

I've spent an hour getting assertive with Virgin Media, whose engineer has done unspeakable things to our cabling and installation. The chap at the 'I've had enough and want to leave and never return as a customer ever again' centre was very nice and gave me a refund. But now I have two half days this week for them to turn up and put right the mess they left, and it's a lot of stress.

::starts reading Erectors Special Handbook from her sofa-bound position::

Not my Birthday, tho I did order my self a trio of Diana Wynne Jones stories, I was sorting out a present for my Brothers birthday ( last week I forgot it) and various nieces and nephews and SiL who have birthdays coming up. I have combines all the American relatives summer birthdays into one bog order that also has some Easter present books, SiL will have to go through teh box and work out what is for who.

I am growing to love Amazon, even though some of their delivery arrangements are perverse (eg using couriers for express deliveries but couriers only deliver at times when you are out).

Sun is over the yardarm, so who'd like some ?

Oh, definatly !

Fortunatly our couriers will come back later with our parcels if we are out

This week, ds is learning about Easter. This has led to some interesting conversations to say the least

Which books, UniS? And have you seen the film of the moving castle book? Not much like the book but we love the Japanese director whose name I have forgotten.

Raises to Maud.

Tea, wonderful necklace!! How did you drill the holes?

These couriers will come back the next day (also timed to maximise the probability that you'll be out) but, after that, you have to go to their depot in the middle of far-flung nowhere.

The Easter thing will be fine, Cmot, I'm sure. He'll reach his own conclusions.

and some Twiglet Surprise to go with it, perchance?