The Darling Crepes of May

[CointreauVersial]

My turn......

I've got two girls - 13 and 10.

I bet you look glam, Pirate. QQ rocks the grey hair red lipstick look but then I might just look bonkers. Have found glasses but am clearly losing marbles as they were on top of the piano in their case. What sort of person leaves prescription sunnies on top of the piano on a Sunday evening? Not one whose picnic basket has the entire contingent of sandwiches, I fear.

Am going to crash early with pile of trashy library books. Have nearly finished 'squabble free summer' feature. Yesterday I wrote about the use of apps in health care, especially ophthalmology. Tomorrow must crack feature on sight loss and learning disability. Why can't I have a nice feature on cake?

'Lemon drizzle or chocolate fudge? We report on the latest findings.'

'Has coffee walnut had its day? We investigate.'

'Brownies - cake or not? We go inside the nation's kitchens to find out.'

DD1 has just told me that one of her classmates has had a ganglion removed from her neck on which cancerous cells were found. This means she has to start chemotherapy, she cannot do her bac and she cannot take up her place at medical school in the UK. This is the most awful thing I've heard in a while, completely out of the blue - it makes me so angry at the unfairness of life.

Oh Hatty, that is so sad

BTM - it puts every single thing into perspective - I think DD1 has understood this was well.

She can't take up her place this year. Hopefully she will take it up next year. Poor girl. A year is a lifetime when you are a teenager.

DD1 has understood this "as" well.

On a lighter note MI - my prescription sunnies are often on top of the piano. It's a very handy surface for glasses, TV remotes and even music.

I think the British Uni will hold her place - I just hope to God she's OK.

I hope so too. ....and post and the ginger cat . I have no idea where my sunglasses are - I know I took them out of my handbag the other because there was just no point .

That's what I need - a comforting ginger cat. Am curling up watching Mr Drew now - can't believe how they're speaking to him.

Hatty, that is so unfair, poor kid. Would make me rage too.

Bindi, I also am in London, dc are 15 and 17.
We have had some lovely summer holidays in North Wales (Snowdonia).

I am getting worried about that knitted thing. What it it for (as my grandmother said about the tortoise we took to stay with her)?

dd's exams started here (she is redoing a couple of AS papers), she is alarmingly cheerful and relaxed...[waves at Hatty and Crem]

Hmm there is a faint smell of dead small animal in the house - it could be behind the piano but I can't bend down or pull it out to find it. DH will be home in about an hour and there might be a treat in store for him. It won't be the fault of the ginger one though - he couldn't be bothered. Stares hard at the black git (cat!!!)

Oh hattymattie - how bloody awful.

All three DCs are hunched over the dining room table at the moment, doing a Y6 SATS Mental Maths practice paper. I think the older two think they will wipe the floor with DD2 (being Y9 and Y8) but my money is on the youngest.

It was improperly disposed of gunk in the waste disposal unit. Glares at dd but cannot comment or be cross due to GCSEs.

Hatty :(

I've been going grey since I was 14 so only realise how grey I am when I see old photos. Unfortunately I don't do red lipstick and have lost my clothes mojo.... (If I ever had it!) agree QQ is the role model in this department.

Bastard cancer how utterly, utterly awful.

Yes, QQ is the role model - classic winter?

Do you know MI - I know of so many people with cancer at the moment - and at least three of the DC's classmates have lost parents. I don't remember anything like this as a child.

The results are in.....

After three Mental Maths tests, the DDs were neck and neck. DS (who's Year Bloody NINE) was miles behind.

Oh dear CV - the girls trounced the boy then - that sounds like the same dynamic here.

I don't think I'll be any kind of stunning endorsement of going grey - it's more that I don't think my current washed-out blonde does me any favours. Especially as running, much as I love it, has definitely made me look haggard. I look like iggy Pop most days.

Also, whilst previously I have loathed the grey when it's started to come through, this time there is just so damn much of it that it kind of blends into the blonde ok - so I really haven't hated it.

Anyway, I can always start colouring it again if I really hate it, I guess.

Hatty, that is so sad: sending good vibes to her and to your DD.

I am another one with mousy hair which I have highlighted - my hair is also going grey from the front, too. I also have the odd white eyebrow which is quite disconcerting. My DSis, who is five years' younger than me, dyes her hair and she is very, very grey, mine is still quite dark at the back, if you see what I mean.

We've just had the most tremendous thunderstorm with torrential rain (so bad that the satellite reception disappeared). I am hoping that this means that the air has cleared and we might, just might, get to visit Alnwick Gardens tomorrow.

Fortunately our aged black and white cat (of course!), is now quite elderly and doesn't really chase anything at all. We have had all sorts of dead and partly living bodies in the house over the years, though. The most interesting thing was a mouse which had crawled into a glass flower pot thingy in the conservatory, died because it couldn't get out, and then had sort of dried - most odd as it appeared to by mummified.

Hattie, that's so tough. Bindi, I have three (17,13 and 8) and live on the South Coast. We are mid AS levels, but seem to be coming through so far. Like CV, our youngest would win in Mental Maths and spelling

Tomorrow two very exciting things are happening here - high speed broadband man arrives to set it up and the roof is coming off the kitchen (taking advantage of the three day summer window, which is apparently occurring!). I'm not entirely sure the two are compatible!

Cancer is a bastard - your poor DD's friend, Hatty.

I sent my cousin a large box of chocolate brownies last weekend (he has cancer of the oesophagus and is undergoing chemo and radiotherapy). He will be fed through a tube as of next week, so it was his last chance to pig out, and he has always been a chocolate fiend. I am going to send his lovely wife a bottle of vodka next week, as I think she will need it. He seems to be responding well to treatment. He is, bizarrely, being treated on the same ward as his father (lung cancer) and uncle (leukaemia). We've already had two deaths in the family this year.