Barely a ripple

Dad sneaks a birthday through with barely a ripple - a couple of cards and a text from Neice Madeleine, plus (of course) some prezzies from Mum. He had left a few unsubtle hints on the "Birthday Present Ideas" board just in case she was feeling uninspired; these were mainly barge-book flavoured; he needn't have worried.

Mum is constantly appalled by the big gaps in Dad's "education" born out of growing up in a house which didn't have a TV (it still hasn't), he has whole chunks of "culture" missing. The original old St Trinians films, for example. Dad was watching the new one, bought recently by Mum (Russell Brand, Rupert Everett etc) and professing ignorance of any previous incarnations. This ends up as a rich vein of Birthday Present ideas for Mum to mine, as you can imagine!

The evening is also a dead loss as Dad has to be at a Hort Soc speaker's night (subject greenhouses - think the earlier scenes in "Calendar Girls" where they are yawning to talks on broccoli) to take money off all the little old ladies who are going on a coach outing. So there's no chance of a special meal, and that gets postponed to Friday Night when there is a chance of the obligatory Calvados.

And today he's busy, too, bound for the Hilton Hotel (no less) in Bristol, for a meeting. He reports enjoying the sight of buzzards and red kites soaring above the M4 in the clear sunny blue skies, while the volcanic ash from Iceland sneaks in at even higher level and closes down all the airspace. The kites and buzzards are not listening. On one Radio 4 programme the presenter is taken out into the back garden of a lady who lives under Heathrow's flight path to record and transmit the silence (!). M4 and M25 Matrix boards all proclaim Heathrow Closed, or Gatwick Closed.

Deefski

No getting out of it.

As you can see from these pics, we did get a bit more snow over night, it coming down seriously off and on, but realistically it was the East end of Kent that bore the brunt (Dover etc) and we only woke up to an inch. Dad decided he couldn't really cry off a planned trip down to Bristol, getting a few worried texts from Mum before he got there about the state of more snow falling and maybe him not being able to get back.

He is now safely home and we are all safely gathered back into home and hearth. A nice warm pic of Haggis in a recent favourite position, stretched out really close to the fire. That always used to be Meggie's role "official fire-worshipper", but lately Haggis has adopted the position. He does look nice and warm.

Deefski

Romantic texts and Pancake Day

We were all deserted by Dad Monday night, as he was off on business to Bristol, so it fell to us to protect Mum from ghosties and ghoulies and things that go bump in the night. So when Dad texted Mum with a romantic "Good morning - I am missing you" on Tuesday morning, he got back something along the lines of "Yeah, and I missed you too at Oh-Christ Hundred Hours in the morning when the foxes were kicking off in the back garden". Dad guessed someone had turned off the "Middle-of-the-night-dog-releasing-button" (Guess who usually has to get up to let us out!)

Dad got back in time for the pancake party. Mum had got the batter ready but neither Dad, nor John, Denis or Diamond had turned up yet, so instead of just lemons and sugar, Mum had got bored and started getting out ever more possible fillings - choc spread, jams, segments of satsuma, sliced banana, Greek honey..... you name it. She'd made gallons of batter, so everyone was full to bursting.

Poor old-Dad, we are told, didn't get any, as first-Mum (daren't call her "old"!) thinks they are just for kids. When he found out we'd had them, he sent first-Mum a "written warning" e-mail with photo's attached so she'd know what lemons looked like. He copped such a telling off! Poor old-Dad. Hope he didn't get too killed when he got home!

Now Mum and Dad are into something awful called "Lent" when they jokingly challenge each other to go without alchohol for 40 days and 40 nights. Bet they don't make it. They want me to give up poo-ing indoors. Might. Might not.... Mind you, apparently, when you are an Irish Catholic (Mum says) you are allowed an exemption on Paddy's Night. Even Bono says so, so it must be true.

Deefs