Tea Room the Thirteenth

[amberlight]

Welcome to the newest instalment of the One Parent Families tea room. As it's heading for spring, we're now in a nice warm orangery surrounded by woodland filled with spring flowers. All are very welcome to join in with us parents of one (or indeed more!), the tea room gardener/handyman Mellors, various virtual Bishops (don't ask) and a variety of other characters from previous tea rooms. Grab a cuppa, relax!...

oh StillCrazy I love your blue top!

Yup, I probably wacked all of you playing lacrosse at some time or other. It is such a small world that one of my best friends at Uni I first "met" when her U14 team sobbed and sobbed when my U14 team walloped them beat them soundly on some muddy field. I find it weird that DaisyBoy will never think of me as a sporty mum whereas in my heart there is still a bit of me on that muddy field iykwim

Yes, I am tres chic, am I not?

Ah, Daisy, if only I had been just a bit less of a couch potato more sporty, we might have given each other black eyes on the playing fields of sarf London. School motto: Mens Sana In Corpore Sano (Even With A Few Teeth Missing). Although I suspect I would have been playing for the Old Girls while you were in the U14s.

Has anyone opened the Bolly yet?

So, if not my school, where were you StillCrazy? Clues please.

FWIW I was north of 30 when I started the Long Legal Trek....I don't in retrospect think it was old. At the time I hadn't realised how long the training would take

oh and, because I think our lives are weirdly parallel Still Crazy, did you manage to get the £3 each way early book train to Brighton like I did last week??

Oh the shame. All those years at Marcia Blaine School and still I can't spell.

Gawd, I never knew there was a spell checker....

OK, StillC you can remain ANON until we meet
I am old enough to forget there is a new tate so when I Tate I mean TateBritain

haven't done black box no. Just making random stuff with sellotape and bits of plastic.

I only noticed last week. 'Tis one of the many (mostly undecipherable) icons on the Internet Explorer toolbar - a little tick symbol saying "ABC check". But it obviously skips anything inside the >s. Gah.

Have just been looking at the school league tables.

Making random stuff with sellotape and bits of plastic? That was Tate Modern, surely?

More Bolly?

Tee hee, Daisy, slur against the legal profession not intended (it was the pupillage that put me off)! Some of my best friends are lawyers, mutter, mumble Actually, true story, one of my best friends IS a solicitor.

CMOTD Avoncroft, what a good idea! I have been there, many millions of years ago (my maternal grandparents lived in Bromsgrove). We are planning on doing some stuff in that rough direction in the summer, as we aren't having a proper summer holiday but are going to use my parents' boat (moored in Worcester) as a base for some day trips. We have lots of things to do locally, but slightly further afield will make a nice change, plus I NEED to get away from the house. Although that does make it all more expensive, as we will need to put the cats in a cattery.

Speaking of which, one of them is here right now, he has stolen DD's chewy vitamins, got one of them out of the packet, and pierced the bubbles for every single one of the remaining vits - and I KNOW where his claws/teeth have been, so they're going to have to go in the bin. Annoying cat!

Phew. Someone else who doesn't mind that the thread is turning into the Lower Remove of St Trinian's.

Bolly, DCMB?

I am a bad bad person - got really angry with Wriggle because she was too happy and excited to go to sleep until after 9 and just wanted to kiss me and shout 'I like you all time, Mummy' when I just have so much work to do. She then cried herself to sleep.

In the long run, which will I miss more - overexcited Wriggle or working on the laptop?

On the other hand, one piece of work is correcting a friend's dissertation for Sunday and two are presentation to groups of teachers, not to mention lessons for classes ...

Tea, why has life been treating you badly?

JM, I take it that you have found out by now that Catita's visit is not happy.

And all cats have as their life's mission to be annoying.

One of Wriggle's baby gps died. We had funeral. We are uncertain about the cause of death; she suspects dragons. She is now unclear whether Noir (we are not imaginative in our animal naming) will be cared for by the mice in the garden or will dissolve.

oh yes, Racng< I know that desperation to work - and concentration is so aided by a screaming sobbing child, I find

Poor you, come and snuggle on the sofa with Merlot and a big rug

The cats sound excvellent DCMB. I once saw a film aobut pupillage and one girl was sent out to buy bait for her pupil master's fishing trip at hte weekend. That always struck me as a feel good mopment after 5 years of training ..

I also thought is odd that anyone could have considered this good film....

right, ty0ping gone to cock, I;m cold. night night

Sorry - I still haven't found why Catita is going to the U.K. but I take it it's not for a good reason so would someone clue me in?

News from the Olympics - it's been fantastic. Canada has FOUR gold medals so far which is incredibly thrilling as no Canadian had previously won gold in Canada (the Olympics have been here twice before, in Montreal and in Calgary.) The weather has been utterly glorious - bright sunshine and up to 14C during the day (although seriously chilly at night). There isn't enough snow, sadly, and that has apparently sparked some complaints (because there's so much we can do about the weather, after all ), but the city of Vancouver is just sparkling with events and enormous crowds, all of whom seem ridiculously happy to be here. We went downtown yesterday and walked around Robson St, which is the main shopping and event street in Vancouver, and had so much fun just looking at all the pavilions and exhibits and shops... and the spirit of friendliness here is just amazing. DH and I have tickets for bobsled next Friday (he'll probably go with a friend who lives halfway to Whistler, where the bobsled course is) and the Closing Ceremonies, where we will hand the torch and the Olympic flag off to the U.K. (I presume).

Good morning - or good night JM. Catita is in the UK for her grandmother's funeral. It was very hard to decide whether to come or not, leaving Kittenito at home waiting for his op.

Sunny morning - who knows how long it will last. DH staying in bed; I am entertaining Wriggle and trying to get a bit of work done on my presentation.

Sounds fun JM. And we have a British Gold too ... and while I would still be delighted if it were, ooh, ice dance or something, I am especially pleased that it's a woman in a completely batshit insane event requiring metaphorical balls of steel. Yay!

RS, poor you and Wriggle - I am on my own with DD this week and I KNOW there will be fireworks at bedtime (she insists on me 'checking' on her every five minutes, and takes over an hour to go to sleep, 'tis wearing) and I also KNOW I will regret it the moment she's asleep and all angelic.

DH is heading for the airport right now - no tears from DD this time, as she knows there will be PRESENTS at the end of it all. I do hope he doesn't get her too much, as it's less than four weeks until her birthday.

Sounds fantastic Jacksmama, brings back memories of our honeymoon (some of which was spent in Vancouver). We were in a cable car coming down Grouse Mountain when it got struck by lightning, more than a little frightening, but quite exhilarating "after the evenet" IYSWIM. After that they shut it down for 2 hours, so we were lucky not to be stranded "up top"!

Trying to summon the enthusiasm to do some gardening. It'll amuse Mr B, and probably the neighbours too.

Generally people already know who I am, alas. Alarming amount of info out on t'internet, which I try not to read

Never played lacrosse, though: We were more of a tennis and swimming sort of school, on account of being in a town centre with a pocket handkerchief sized sports facility.

Morning all. Just loitering here a while before I too go out to tackle the garden.

Racing - as we know, there are people here far better qualified to discuss theology than moi. But we were in a similar situation when we had to hold a funeral for a goldfish, when CrazyGirl was, I guess, about the age that Wriggle is now. After a couple of days, it became apparent that I had not buried the goldfish deep enough and he had been exhumed and eaten, presumably by a fox. With some trepidation, I imparted this knowledge to CrazyGirl. She pondered briefly, then announced that the goldfish would be happy, now that he had been eaten by the fox (of whom she is very fond).

I have a fresh batch of cinnamon buns here, for anyone needing sugar and spice to start the day.

whoo! So - daisy, you went to "my" school? wow - and you know the BA captain - double wow - and now I think I need to at least check you were in the same year as me, you don't have to tell me who you were if you don't want to but it would be nice for verification purposes to check we are who we think we are, as it were. IF you want to, email me on thumbwitch at live dot co dot uk.

(by the by, did you know that Justine went there for a short while too?)

JM - WOW. You are so lucky to be in Vancouver - guess I'd either forgotten that's where you were or it hadn't clicked. . And I LOVE DCMB's description of the Women's Skeleton - perfect! I was really thrilled that Aussie TV actually showed it - they're not very inclusive, you know. They're all fully buoyed up here about Torah Bright winning Gold on the snowboard half tube thingy.

RS - sorry to hear that a minipig has departed already - love the idea that the mice in the garden are looking after it though! Whenever we buried pets in the garden, usually in a shoebox, DAd would always plant a brick on top of them to stop the foxes and to stop him accidentally digging them up later.

Catita - by the time you read this you'll probably already be in the UK so I hope your journey was not too bad and you got your bassinet. We could never pre-book one either, but we always managed to get one so I hope it worked out for you.

Cinnamon buns sound fab, lurgy is thankfully receding but a hefty dose of cinnamon will help it on its way nicely!

Hugs to Catita - sorry I've been so clueless, I'm so sorry to hear of your grandmother's passing!

at "batshit insane event requiring balls of steel" - that's pretty much how I feel about luge, skeleton and bobsled, oh and let's not forget ski jumping!!

DCMB, I will be alone with Jackbaby for 6 days in just over two weeks. Am dreading it a bit, because - although he is the loveliest little boy in the history of the free world - he has a lot of energy and I tend to fade a bit in the late afternoon/ early evening. Nor am I a morning person. . Thank goodness one grandma lives here, and that she loves to help with him.

I have just spent 20 minutes in the garden (after a longer tidying-up session this morning) and I am f.r.o.z.e.n.

I've made a vast steaming jug of hot chocolate. Would anyone like to share? I think I'll sit here with my icy feet up for a moment, before I go to sort out supper and tonight's dvd of choice for the CrazyFamily weekly film night. Carousel tonight, I think.

Oo the hot choc will go nicely with the 2 family sized banoffee pies I have just made! Would anyone like some?

I certainly would! Thank you!

Mmmm, banoffee pie would be just the thing, since I have received tonight's ration of 54vpages of dissertation - at least 200 000 words apparently plucked at random; a do it yourself sentence kit with many words left over. I am slightly relectant to get started.

To everyone who suffered from their ex-pets being dug up - I bypass that process by not burying them, merely arranging them with grave goods in the hedge; a sort of sky burial.

Hot choc and banoffee pie sound fab.

DS spent a useful amount of time this evening reenacting the womens downhill skiing event. DH and I liked this as we only had to make the starting beeps, and then cowbell noises as DS ran round the 'course'. Who knows why this had to happen, but it certainly wore him out nicely, and as he'd had a two hour nap today (lots of excitement over the historical reenactors round the cathedral, plus a visit to all his favoured tombs in there had worn him out then), meant he still went to bed at a reasonable hour