A Family Sunday

So today the MiL & GiL came to visit. Of course, they intended to stay for lunch. The only problem with that was that we didn't have any food in to prepare. TW had overnighted in Portslade, seeing a friend, and she had consumed prosecco. I had stayed up late, drinking red wine and watching "Fargo".
So TW went to Lidl and did her weekly shop with the MiL & GiL, and then started preparing a roast. In the end we ate at about five pm, which wasn't the intention at the start of the day. We did consider going to a carvery at one point, but quickly dismissed that, causing great disappointment for the children. The Eldest had a real sulk about it, huffing and slamming doors... Eventually she went with TW to Lidl, and thank god for that, because if she had stayed at home she would have been unbearable.
The kids are in bed now, so it's the usual catch up on shit tv for the masses, a.k.a. SCD  and X Factor results. You gotta keep the masses occupied and distracted. I'm quite tired, it was hard doing nothing all day, so I shall be going to bed shortly, to forget this filth.

Welcome to Sunny Worthing

Days like Sunday are lovely. It's warm in the sun, but with a cold undercurrent. TW and I decided to drag the children out for some fresh air, and so we promenaded along the seafront. The girls were all on skates, and the Middle Child was particularly good, pushing and gliding effortlessly ahead. We had sweets in our pockets, to keep the energy levels up, and we were out for about an hour and fifteen minutes. The girls enjoyed it after whingeing that they didn't want to go... The great thing about going out and getting some good quality fresh air though, was that we got to mong out at home for the rest of the day... :)

When I'm 64...

Esther McVey is obviously deluded when she says that because the Rolling Stones are still gigging, people can work into their seventies.
How she can compare the Stones, who gig "every now and then" and are adored by millions, to carrying on pushing paper into pension age is beyond me.
One simply cannot use "pop stars" as examples for everyday behaviour, since they are outliers in every sense - they don't work 9 to 5, they don't work every day, they don't have thousands cheering their every deed. The Rolling Stones are very lucky and envied by millions, but they should not be used as a yardstick by which others should be judged.

East of West

I started collecting East of West some time ago. It's a comic written by Jonathan Hickman. I read the first issue and then I stopped reading comics for some reason.
I didn't stop collecting, oh no, that would've been too logical. So I've got about 15 issues to catch up on.
I've just re-read Issue #1 and I am so looking forward to binge-reading this story. Death is abroad, and it's not a pretty sight...

London Extended

The first weekend of the half-term, we spent mostly been in London.

TW had been frantically searching for a reasonably-priced hotel for one night, so that she could take the girls up to London. She had some harebrained idea that she "needed" to take the girls to London. I thought the idea was that we could crash in London and avoid the children whingeing on the way home, but as it turned out, I was wrong (more on that below). Any way, she wasn't having much luck. All the places she found which were affordable looked a bit dingy and a bit sub-par. I dare say that after a day trudging around London, any room could look inviting, but I was of the opinion that we should wait to get the right accommodation before arranging to go to the Big Smoke. But sitting in the comfort of our living room, the hotels she was looking at didn't seem to be that appealing. 

Then, on the Friday night, as we were discussing what alternatives there were, a friend of hers phoned and told her that he'd seen her trials and tribulations on Facebook, and why hadn't she phoned him? We could all stay at his, he said. TW replied that he lived in Essex, so why would she call him? Au contraire, he responded, we're on the Central Line and quite easy to get to on the Tube... So we had a quick chat and decided to take him up on his offer. On Saturday morning we came down to see the girls lounging in front of the TV as normal, and told them of our plans. They were pleased and excited, to say the least. Since TW's friend is godfather to The Youngest, and has visited recently and played with the kids, it may have been that seeing him was the bit they were looking forward to the most. 

We had breakfast, got dressed and ready, TW made some sandwiches and boxed up the left over chilli, and we headed to the train station. We bought the tickets, and had a few minutes to wait, so I popped to the Co-Op and picked up some pastries and a newspaper. We caught the 10am train up to London, and we were on the way. 

Once we arrived in Victoria, we headed east towards the Houses of Parliament, and then TW remembered her nephew was in Halls near Victoria Station. So she called him and miraculously he was in. In reality, I should say miraculously he answered, as he'd obviously had a big night out on Friday, but if you're in your early twenties and living in SW1 why wouldn't you take advantage of that? The girls were surprised and pleased to see him. We talked for a few minutes and then headed on, across the river and left (north) on to the South Bank. The route was crowded, as you would expect on a Saturday lunchtime. Not only with tourists, but locals getting about their business. In addition, there were "street entertainers" on the bridge, blocking up the pavement. There was one bagpiper, which was fine, but the rest were con-artists "playing" Find The Ball", with wads of £20 notes in their hands. It was a bit depressing. In addition the other annoying people taking up street space for no apparent reason were Christians. There were Born Agains, Jehovahs, and probably some others I didn't recognise. They were hawking their irrelevant wares, so many of them that you probably couldn't spit without hitting one of them (not that I tried it, natch). 

The hordes didn't start to thin out until after we got past the London Eye, which is an attraction we need to visit at some point in the future. We sat and had a sandwich, and watched a couple of street acts. There was a woman juggling knives while balancing precariously on some wobbly stuff which the girls watched, and then we saw some Jamaican acrobats. The Middle One actually got picked to be in the show, but she became embarrassed and didn't participate, which was a shame because her finale would have been being picked up and whirled around by the acrobats. Then we walked on.

Part of the reason for visiting London was to go to Shakespeare's Globe, because The Eldest is studying the Tudors in school and Shakespeare is a big part of that. It was more expensive than we would normally spend, the tour of the Globe was £36 - there are much cheaper ways to be entertained in London (as well as much more expensive ways!) - but the tour was led by a jobbing actor who made the whole thing very entertaining and enjoyable. It was well worth the money. And the Eldest learnt a lot; she came back from school and told us that she'd shared a lot of the facts with her class. In fact, she had remembered quite a lot of things which I'd forgotten.
After the Globe, we went to the Tate Modern for a short time. I'm always amazed at the works of art one can see there for free; there are works by Picasso among others which are just there within touching distance. Walking around the rooms with three small children is not the best way to appreciate the art on display, but I was very impressed with some of the pieces.
We weren't there for very long, as we were all getting a little tired, and then we headed to the Tube and aimed to meet up with TW's mate in Gants Hill.
Onthe Sunday we headed back into London and saw Covent Garden, then made it to Hamleys. By that point though the girls were tired and so we caught the 38 bus to Victoria. We headed homewards and made it back to Worthing at about 4pm (as I recall). What a weekend.

Tantrums

Our middle child is particularly susceptible to tantrums, but only when she's tired. So on nights like to last ht, when she stayed up late to watch fireworks, tantrums are pretty much guaranteed. And thus it was; lots of loose accusations about it "not being fair", and we're "horrible parents " and we "never let me have sleepovers".
To be honest, I was pleased that I managed to remain calm throughout this particular episode.
I guess it's a mix of the emotional high of being with friends and watching fireworks, and the low of going home alone to bed. When you combine that with being tired, it's quite a potent mix, and the whole thing becomes a bit of an emotional rollercoaster.
I'm not sure how to smooth out those steep dips and awesome climbs once the ride starts. I think it's just a case of staying calm in the face of the heartfelt outpourings and not react. After all, it wasn't like she was refusing to go to bed, or clean her teeth, she was just crying and accusing us of being hideous while she was doing the normal things she would do while getting ready for bed. So I think I need to expect it and plan for it in future.
Indeed, I think I've entered a period of calm all round with the children. I do shout at them when they annoy me, and the causes of annoyance are many and varied. It can be not putting something away, or arguing with me when I tell them it's tidying up time. I need to implement a trigger where I take a breath and don't react at their level of ferocity / emotion. And I think I've got one that will work for a bit, at least. The answer is to say "I don't want to shout at you, ...", and in that time I have averted my normal unthinking switch into shouty mode, and it ends up being a bit of a calmer discussion, at least from my side of the dialogue. We'll see how it works out - it's early days yet.

A Fat Man in an Ill-Fitting Shirt

I looked at myself in the mirror today and all I saw was a fat man in an ill-fitting shirt. Strange how liking at the same thing at different times produces different results.