hols

hello, dear readers! it seems i am about to go and spend a little while with the lovely ladies at the kennels. i am one of their rescue dogs so i get a discount on my hotel bill for the rest of my life. the peeps are off to portugal with the prof and mrs prof. they are going to stay in a villa.

herself has decided she will write a book while she is away. mrs prof thinks this is mad and wasted no time in telling herself. the original plan was that all the peeps would write bits of it and then put it together but, as no-one else thought this was remotely sensible, herself is on her own in this venture. she is going to make the project easier by basing the characters on people she knows. this seems a bit like cheating to me. i hope there is a small part for a venerable lurcher...

this morning, as my boy and herself were waiting for the taxi that takes him to school, herself decided to try to untangle the universe. regular readers will know that the universe has not been the same since it received the attentions of the software engineer. my boy was persuaded to hold up the universe while herself fiddled with the little bits of see-through twine that hold it up.

as is his way, my boy's thoughts turned to weighty matters. or in fact matter. "what is dark matter, mummy?" he enquired. "i don't know sweetie, you will need to ask uncle pete." uncle pete, the beefburger uncle, is an astrophysicist and knows a lot about the universe. "i suppose we are all aliens really," said my boy, thoughtfully. "i mean, there were two bits of dust and then the big bang, then there were microbes, then amoebas, then little fish, then amphibians, then monkeys, then sort of monkey humans and then humans..." at this point the taxi arrived.

so herself is going to have to spend the whole day wondering why she is an alien...

more bbq-ing

last sunday herself and my boy were invited to a house-warming party. (himself was also invited but had important football-watching to do. this was because it was the semi-half-quarter-final of the premier-fa-carling-cup. himself seems to feel that if he does not watch every single football match being played anywhere in the world he is letting the side down. )

the house-warming was going to be a bbq. needless to say, when the day dawned the peeps had nothing in the house that could be barbecued. himself managed to locate some salmon. the other snag was that it was raining in what can only be described as a biblical manner. i looked on this as a good sign. people trying to keep dry are less likely to be watching their food, thereby allowing the odd nifty lunge by my goodself. however, it rapidly became clear that i was not invited to the barbecue. i had to hear about all the fun later, after an interminable afternoon of watching balls rolling around the telly screen. watching football is bad for my nerves. i want to grab the ball but i know from bitter experience that i will only bang my nose on the glass and, rather than sympathy, will be shouted at for obscuring the pitch just as a goal was scored.

it appears the party was good fun. on the way, my boy asked whose party it was. "its nic who used to work in my office, and her partner sharon. they have bought a house and this is a house-warming." she went on to explain that this did not mean the heating would be cranked up and everyone would be sweating but that 'house-warming' was just a saying. beefburger people need that sort of thing explained.

"so they are both women?" he asked. "yes" said herself. "they have been trying to buy a house for ages but previous ones kept falling through." she had to explain that this did not mean houses disappearing into the earth but that 'falling through' was another saying.

"so they are lesbians?" asked my boy. "yes, they are." said herself, and, remembering how forthright my boy can be, went on to remind him that it might be a little bit inappropriate to ask them questions about the finer points of 'what-lesbians-do-in-bed'. my boy has reached the age where his questions often relate to what happens in the bed department of various sorts of people. herself regularly finds herself explaining things like gender dysmorphia, erogenous zones and all sorts of other stuff, usually followed by "probably best to keep off this subject at school as some of the kids might not know this kind of stuff yet..."

in the animal kingdom we don't have categories like gay or straight. we take the view that you should get love where you can find it. it is not at all uncommon to see cows enjoying a lesbian frolic in a field and on more than one occasion i have found myself astride a dapper chap. but anyway, i digress.

when herself and my boy arrived at the party it was still raining. but soon it stopped. the hosts decided to chance lighting the barbecue. herself went outside to watch this momentous event. it became clear that it would be rather more momentous than planned as it was still in the box. regular readers will know that herself loves putting things together. her success rating in this is in inverse proportion to the number in the instructions at which she starts. she has a fondness for the number 8 and often embarks on assembly here, feeling that the earlier stages have no merit.

spanners were found and the guests got to work on assembling the barbecue. my boy came rushing out. "mummy," he said, in his usual stage whisper that can be heard across the road, "some lesbians are swearing and saying they are going to take off their clothes!" "since when did swearing bother you?" asked herself. (both my boy and himself have a fine repertoire of expletives) "and once you have seen me wandering around the house in the buff nothing could be half so scary. don't worry - i expect they are just hot."

conversation about the origins of the barbecue was going on. "i got it at argos" said the host. "ikea sell good ones," said one of the guests. "i hate ikea - its way too crowded!" said the host. "you're not a proper lesbian if you don't like ikea!" shrieked the guest. my boy rolled up in hysterical laughter. "that's blog-fodder!" said herself, "you will be famous!" (and sure enough - here it is in my blog.)

the next day my boy came home from school and as usual herself asked him about his day. "it was good," he said, "i told miss day about my weekend but she didn't believe me." "what do you mean?" asked herself. "well, when i told her i went to a party with swearing lesbians taking their clothes off she said, in a very patronising voice, 'now tell me, owen, is this what really happened or is this one of your stories?' "

the peeps have resigned themselves to more comments in the home/school book...

life, the universe and everything...

tonight herself hit her head on jupiter one time too many. regular readers will know that we have had the universe in our kitchen for some time. all was fine until the pond-digging day. as well as being a former graver-digger, the software engineer is also, well, an engineer. just because he engineers software it doesn't mean he has shrugged off that well-known engineer's habit of fiddling with things.

herself's dad is a former engineer. he has a computer. he cannot just leave it alone and be happy with it. he has to fiddle with all of it until it doesn't work. his peddle bin is instructive. when a little plastic bit broke he didn't give up the ghost. oh, no. the peddle bin of an engineer is expected to put in some mileage before it is put out to grass. so the old fella put in a nut and bolt and even a washer to mend it. now the hinge is so strong it will probably cause the rest of the pedal bin to crumble with plastic fatigue.

anyway, the software engineer did not like the wonky universe. "its just a matter of getting it balanced" he said. herself protested. "the universe is unbalanced!" she said, "our universe in the kitchen is simply reflecting that!"

the software engineer was not to be distracted. after half an hour of fiddling he had managed to balance the planets. this meant that pluto was rather nearer the sun than mother nature untended. but engineers are untroubled by such trifles. the only problem was that now the universe was balanced, pluto was right where the peeps hit their heads when they were getting a cup for a cuppa-tea.

himself is the tallest. "can you just help me get the universe down?" herself asked, rather plaintively. "no!" said himself. "i am going to seek solace in my monastry!" i should explain that this monastry is not in the real world but in a rather odd computer game that himself plays.

not to be beaten, herself got hold of the potato masher. she used this to unhook the universe in order to move it to a higher place where it would no longer bang heads. a loud crash was heard. one of the planets had bitten the dust. "what the hell was that?" said my boy, rushing in. "you've wrecked earth!" "no, its only pluto." said herself. well thats ok then. unless you happen to live on pluto of course...

coca

last night my boy announced at 9pm that he needed cookery ingredients for today. regular readers will know that this is not unusual. my boy has poor organisational skills. he blames these on his autism. i blame them on herself. he has her genes. she could not organise her way out of a paper bag.

"i need flour, and sugar and butter and an egg and cocoa!" said my boy. "where are we going to find cocoa at this time of night?" said himself, in something of a flap. "don't worry" said herself, they will have a bit of spare cocoa for the kids who forget. some of them are from homes where they can't get it together to get the ingredients together so they always have spare."

i am not sure why herself was so confident about this. i suspect it is because of when she was at school. from what i hear it sounds as though her family spent more time in the kitchen throwing things at each other than lovingly packing up the cookery ingredients.

however it would appear that things have changed. when herself got home, after a particularly tough day, she asked my boy "how did cookery go?" "i had to make savoury biscuits" he replied. "why?" asked herself. "because i didn't have any cocoa." "but you had sugar - what happened to the sugar?" "i think i gave it to someone" he said. "brilliant!" said herself, always looking on the bright side, "we can have them with cheese!"

the peeps went into the bedroom so my boy could not hear their conversation. "is it me?" said herself, "do they not have a single bit of cocoa in the school for someone with inadequate parents and poor organisational skills? don't they even have some in the staff room for the teachers?" "maybe they are trying to teach him to remember things," said himself.

it has to be said that incandescent didn't really describe it. herself feels slights on her parenting rather keenly. she also takes the view that if you want to teach an autistic person something like - remember the cocoa next time - you say to them "remember the cocoa next time" and for good measure write it on their forehead or their planner or somewhere. you do not say "if you don't have cocoa you will have to make savoury biscuits" as this does not really make the point.

she grabbed her bag and pulled out a document. "this is what i have been doing for the last two days!" she said, "this is why i failed to be perfect enough to have some cocoa hidden at the back of my wardrobe for just such an eventuality!" himself took the document. it was a court order closing down a crack house for 3 months. herself spent most of yesterday drafting papers and statements and sorting out getting this case into court. "these people are horrible violent thugs!" she said. "they ran over a toddler in a pram with their motorbike and broke her nose. they tried to cut off someone's head with a samurai sword. they have been shooting cats and cars. they have been having fights with knives in the street. they have the whole neighbourhood so terrified that no-one will report anything to the police. this is why i don't have any cocoa!"

himself looked at the document. "why does it refer to nottinghamshire police?" he ventured. we are nowhere near nottinghamshire. herself had a look. the court clerk had made a mistake and used a document from somewhere else. herself got on the phone. it seems that this can be sorted out easily and a new order will be prepared for placing on the shuttered up property.

herself rang the inspector to let him know. "oh blimey!" he said, "i hope it didn't come out in the photographs!" i should explain that the local paper had come along when herself and a policeman had fixed the order to the house and had taken pictures. after a call to the paper it appears that all is well. the photos will not be that detailed. so there will not be questions of the local police as to why they are policing nottinghamshire when they are so thinly spread round here.

"well at least some good came of the cocoa shortage!" said herself.

and why, i hear you ask, is this post called coca? has the venerable lurcher forgotten how to use a spell check? no, dear reader, coca is what they make cocaine from. and cocaine is what they make crack from. so it is a sort of pun. although not a particularly good one...

work

my boy is off school this friday. he has what is known as an insect day. this is where the teachers have to learn all about insects so the children stay at home and wreck the house. usually when he has an insect day one of the peeps stays off work. this week herself has too much going on so she has to work at home. working at home is good as i get some company and also she gets to catch up on the huge amount of washing that builds up.

this week it may be a problem. herself gets things called junctions which stop the naughty people from being naughty. this week one of the naughty people did not believe that the junction meant anything. he carried on being naughty. one of the police people said they would just have to get herself to "kick his sorry arse" which i think is police-speak for taking him to court. at least i hope so. since she snapped her achilles tendon it is not a good idea for her to be kicking anything, least of all something unhygenic. the taking to court thing may have to happen on friday.

anyway, if my boy is at home there may be difficulties in the sorry-arse-kicking. my boy is not the sort of character that can be left quietly outside the court with a colouring book. if my boy is left for even a few minutes he will have moved the court from yellow alert to red alert in the time it takes to dismantle a water-cooler. however, as always, sgt goose had the answer. "we can always take him down the pier!" he said. the idea of my boy playing on the slot machines with a police escort is truly wonderful....