Categories: uncategorized
Date: 20 August 2006 12:52:03
OK, so it seemed a bit of a long holiday Deeleea.. but I'm here and planning a load of blogginess to make up for lost time. It's your own fault. You asked for it! And I shall expect you to read every last boring minute of it ;o)
Actually, it will probably be only a short entry and extremely interrupted as my supervisory role is greatly in demand right now. This is due to the impending arrival of two new members of the family. No, you can breathe again, Tiddles hasn't made anyone pregnant (as far as I know). No, Smudgelet has been saving his pennies and is planning to exercise his new-found sense of responsibility by branching out into pet-keeping - so not the patter of tiny feet but the splosh and bloop of tiny fins in the form of two goldfish. So the gravel is currently being distributed over the bottom of the tank .. and the lounge floor.... and in a moment it will be joined with water. Woo hoo!
Tiddles is suffering from goldfish envy. He's frustrated that he has no money to spend as he's longing for goldfish too. His choice - his choice. In fact this holiday is proving a real financial learning experience... or would be if he could but learn from it. His holiday spending money was confiscated after he was a little bit too free with a quantity of money of mine (silly boy!). Smudgelet's always had a real problem with generosity and sharing, but seems to be overcoming that and was unable to stand seeing his brother in pecuniary difficulty during the holidays and kept bailing him out, which wasn't quite the point. So I instigated the Holiday Diary Earning Scheme. Each evening they were given twenty minutes to do a diary then the quality of the diary was judged and given marks out of ten, each mark being rewarded with 5p. Needless to say, Smudgelet seized the challenge and earned himself another £4 spending money over the week. Tiddles? Well, he continued to bemoan the fact that he couldn't afford to spend any money at all all week and has continued to do so since returning home. Silly boy.
People keep asking how Dad is. It's hard to say. Mentally he's far far more with it and he's drawing and painting, going for little walks, and yesterday even came with us for a ride in the car to the local garden centre (even though he sufffered for it afterwards). But painwise he's really suffering and has been shaken by the oncologist's latest comment that his arm is in severe risk of breaking. He's going for more radiotherapy to see if it will ease the pain at all. His nights are more broken now (guess who's doing nights!). It was quite tempting to take it personally when he deteriorated again the day I returned from holiday after being really quite well for my sisters! I think it's more a case that he feels less that he has to make an effort for me than for them.
Right, off to supervise the washing of my lounge floor! Will return shortly with holiday tales.