The One and Only Tea Room - Now Hanging in Babylon

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

Well folks, here we are, transported through time and space to the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

Golden couches and the distressed chintz sofa are arranged on a terrace overlooking the Euphrates and, as we recline on the exquisitely-soft cushions eating peeled grapes, we can enjoy the warm fragrance of the gardens' many exotic blooms. The garden is tended by the indefatigable Mellors, with occasional help from the bishops, rabbis and any passing world leaders. Somewhere behind the terrace there is an aga and a priest's hole, with optional massage table.

Please come and join us for a celebratory drink and conversation ranging from the profound to the profoundly silly.

I have to tie mine between trees. This result sin it barely being above teh grass, but that makes it easy for boy to climb in on his own. and it still swings nicely.

There, you see, modern sculpture you can lie in!! What's not to love. Did you go to many gardens today, Maud? We paddled to a couple and thought of you!

So, where is our pack then? Is an Ox recruitment feasible? Have always fancied doing a brownie but just wondering, I guess Oxboy is wrong age as well as wrong sex, but how is sex handled in these modern times?

old gimmer emotion obviously - the other sort doesn't bear thinking about...

Morning all.

Taking LCT to GP again as he's coughing his head off which usually means chest infection with him. sigh MrTee is off on his own to look at a house we are interested in and is to report back in minute detail!

I would love a hammock. I wonder if it would fit on my balcony?

Oxeye, don't the boys have beavers or something? Which LCT will never belong because I cannot say 'my son is a beaver' with a straight face, really I can't. ::Tee is actually a 12 year old boy::

Rainy Belfast day. Hot brekky?

Though I'm on totally the wrong side of the country, I'd love you to come to a bbq at ours Mary.

We had lots of rain here over the weekend, which was not good for the school campout. But ds had a lovely time there, and New Tent was good and waterproof. The alpha mums obv don't go, so it was a bit more relaxed with lots of dads sitting around chatting while the kids ran feral

Unbelieeeeeeeeevable amount of rain at M.Snake's Open Day yesterday. Number of staff in polytunnel where he was stewarding: 7; number of visitors all day: 2. When Wriggle and I turned up in full waterproofs, they were busy modelling chainsaws and snapdragons in plasticine. Then home through the floods - in June!!!!

I think boys can be brownies now, can't they? It would take a boy of character, though.

Thanks CMOT :)

Tee, if you haven't got room for a hammock, how about one of these?

Oh Mary We don't do barbecue either. And I will miss the community barbecue that we organise on the 25th June, or I would invite you to that.

OOh I like that Mary! House Mr Tee is looking at today has a garden so I might have that chair and a hammock!

I'm gearing up to suggest a barbeque to DH - need to do something.

Took the dog for a walk in the rain yesterday afternoon - she was very glad to get out but sat looking very wet in the car on the way home - and then was extatic to be dried off - makes her quite puppyish.

Boys can't be Brownies (or Guides or Senior Section), just as men can be helpers but can't be warranted leaders. The reason/justification is that the organisation aims to provide role models for girls and young women and would undermine its own aims otherwise. This is apparently controversial - se MN threads passim - but it seems fine to me, and wholly defensible under the Sex Discrimination Act/Equality Act which allow women-only initiatives where (eg) they are to redress historic under-representation etc.

The Scouts have long had women as leaders (my brother's Akela was a woman, in the censored mists of time) and they admitted girls as members quite a number of years ago.

Shall we have a virtual barbie tonight? At least it will be weatherproof.

::Hands Mellors the comedy apron::

Err, whole point of that digression was to say that, such is my desperation to recruit more help, I would willingly put OxBoy on the register as OxGirl if it meant Oxeye would come and be Tawny Owl/Snowy Owl/Mad Old Bat.

Can't think of a better location for a bbq than a garden Maud - so, yes, why not!

I will stock a completely separate non-meat BBQ on the otherside of the garden which will also do 'sides' for the more omnivorous amongst us.

UniS is hanging in the garden whilst hanging on the phone for tax credit people. it seems DH and I may have earned slightly over the limit this last year- the joy of variable income and self employment.

So hanging about am I that I have just spell checked and Corrected all the randomly spelled words in this post.

BBQ- excellent idea. I'll make some kebabs. We had home made burgers yesterday- but not BBQed.They were served with Home made rolls & home grown salad too. How sad MN middle class is that.

11minutes on hold so far.....

Excellent! We have a plan. Babylonian Barbie here tonight. Everyone bring a dish or something to drink. Mellors in the comic novelty apron - everyone else dress up (or down) however you prefer.

after 30 mins of phone time I have renewed our tax credit claim.... HOW do people do this if they work full time?

By using up all their lunch hours, I think.
Just been for pre-chemo blood test. Need chocolate.
Thank you for kind word yesterday good people. Kind words for each of you available here.

Is that what they told you Amber or is that just your own feeling? What kind of chocolate would you wish for?

::Proffers chocolate::

Here. Scoff this while reclining on the golden couch as Mellors wafts over you with a peacock feather fan.

It's my own feeling that chocolate would be the Right Thing, especially since there's two big meetings to get through today before tomorrow's fun.
Oh splendid - thanks Maud! We've upgraded the Distressed Chintz Sofa then?
That's a very unusual place for that fan, I have to say...

Amber - if it makes you feel any better, I once ended up very at a similar blood-letting experience. Always busy there - so busy that you had to take a ticket and they had a system a bit like a supermarket deli.... So, very experience phlobotomists - doing this day in, day out - used to veins that had not had a great time recently. First arm - no luck. Second arm - no luck. Third arm () - hit a nerve - change of personel - Fourth arm - prodded until sucess. By this stage I decided that I had better not get up from the chair immediately as I would probably faint. Immediate panic - glass of water... here, I'll get a wheelchair for you.... . Despite my protestations, the Sister decided that she was going to personally escort me back up to the 4th floor - thereby continuing to mean that they were down to only one test at a time rather than the normal two.

You have four arms??!

(They don't use my arms any more - veins no longer in working order. It's the amazing under the skin portacath. But it's a very complicated and long medical procedure to do so, because it's so close to the heart. And it ruddy hurts at the key point too. Oh well. Saves hurty arms getting more hurty.)
Thanks for the extra choc hot chocto go with the choc...delicious!

I think 4 arms is a Ben 10 character. Babylonian BBQ sounds a great idea , although I'm not sure I could eat a whole Babylonian! :o

Am tired, so tired, and I've got a bible study class I'm running in 10 mins...

Mary, Mellors might be able to fit both of us on couches and fan us both at the same time? Have some of this choc...