Saturday 18th May 2013: London, Part 1. A Girlie Affair

After a pretty turbulent week (turbulent in terms of western standards), Rob gave me a day pass and not just of the Oyster variety, so that I could spend time with my nearest and dearest in London.

Think Sex and the City meets Manchester in London and you are close(ish) to setting the scene for the day.

Just back-tracking to the turbulent week.  I think the level of turbulence can be easily summarised by the fact I nearly ran myself over with my car.

As I was getting the shopping out of the boot, I could hear Rob the Wise's wizened words, "Will you please remember to put the hand break on when you park the car". Yes, even writing this I can feel the fear unfolding again in slow motion...

Open the boot of the car; Sainsbury's bags in my hands, clinking; car moving towards me and increasing in speed; drop the bags - find the time to put the clinking one somewhere safe; open the passenger seat door as car is still in transit; spread-eagle myself across the passenger seat as I heroically dive for the hand-break; cheering in the background (err, that never happened:Ed); neighbour walks past to see Sainsbury's bags strewn across the car park floor and me, legs akimbo, facing down over the passenger seat.

Yes, a shopping trip with m'mam and lovely sister-in-law in Covent Garden (or 'Coventry' Garden as I later found that I had been telling everyone via the wonders of predictive text) was just the tonic needed. 

As I arrived at early o'clock in Covent Garden, it was so peaceful and calm. Whilst waiting for the others to arrive, I spied the Disney Store in the corner of my eye and thought to myself, "I will pick up an over-priced Minnie Mouse toothbrush which glitters and sparkles whilst you brush your teeth". I hasten to add that the toothbrush was a gift for Bethan as they don't do an adult one...unfortunately...

Anyway, I saw a very long queue of people outside of the Store and considered if it was really worth queuing for a bloody toothbrush? I decided it was and joined the queue. 

As I stood there, patiently, I was people-watching along the queue for quite some time (people watching - a favourite past-time of mine; especially as I make up stories for the people I watch much to Rob's annoyance) and was disconcerted to see that most of the people looked liked they were of high intelligence and had copies of Tolstoy's War and Peace on their person; I started to consider that the Disney Store would be the last place on earth that they were visiting, never mind queuing for. "Hmmm", I wondered and decided to ask the academic-looking man in front of me (who vaguely resembled Bamber Gascoigne) why they was such a long queue for the Disney Story to which he replied in a very posh voice,

"There isn't daaarrling...Ha! Ha!...we're queuing for tickets at The Royal Opera House so we can be assured of seats to watch Verdi's Don Carlo which has been directed by Nicholas Hytner".

"Doh!" came my reply.

Later that afternoon, we went to 'arrods to get m'mam a bag and looked in 'obbs at some fancy dresses - yes, it was not the time and place for me to forget about dropping my /h/s; however, I was so excited to be with the girls shopping and dining in London with my free day pass that I didn't give an 'oot.

This is my 'Arrods bag from the Mancunian Branch of
the famous London Store. M'mam doesn't know what she's missing :-)

Monday 1st April 2013

So happy! Not only is Bethan now fully potty trained, she can also wipe the seat down of her Fisher Price 'toilet' with the Dettol wipes and put some toilet duck under its rim :-)

Only joking - April Fools!!! There's 6 minutes left until midday and I couldn't resist. Besides I'm bored. Stuck in the car on the M6 Southbound on the chevrons that are supposed to keep 2 cars apart (yes, like that's going to happen) and thought I would have a go at writing my blog.

Had a top Easter weekend with family and friends. Highlights include: a trip on Tommy the tram; shopping in the city; Bethan's first wide-eyed visit to the Disney Store; eating tapas and drinking good wine; James getting more confident in his intrepid crawling adventures; laughing and spending time with the Kirwins and the Sheldons; celebrating Easter services in the church I grew up in.

Lowlights include: 1. A near death experience; this happened when my mum convinced us all that a road which we were crossing to get to Deansgate was 'No Entry'. That was until a taxi came hurtling around the corner and nearly took us all out. Thank God Rob is nippy with the pram and buggy board. 2. James the Ripper's Pooey Bum: James' perchance for ripping up the weekend supplements and envelopes and then eating them meant that the two Easter Sunday poos were challenging to say the least. Sat in the snug in the Club changing his bum was a rite of passage for our son as all Kirwin descendants have been privy to that experience (Rob said it was more like a rite of a back passage). Anyway, the various bits of coloured paper that we found in the nappy told their own story. Rob said that all James needed to do was swallow some sticky back plastic and it would have come out gift wrapped. 3. Saying TTFN to our loved ones.

Had to laugh before we left my mum's this morning though. As my dad saw us packing our car with way more stuff than we actually needed he said, "Good Lord! No wonder you got a bigger car!".

This made me think about a beautiful Indian Summer during October half-term 1984 when my parents, three older siblings, myself and a week's worth of food climbed into our white Austin Allegro (equipped with a roof rack) and travelled from Manchester for a holiday on the Norfolk Broads. One of my earliest memories is when we all had to get out of the car so my dad could drive over the bridge at Wroxham because the car couldn't take the weight. No one batted an eye-lid as it seemed like the most normal thing to do.

Like I said, I couldn't help but look in our car this morning and giggle when I saw all of the crap stuffed into the back. If I took out Bethan's portable DVD player and asked her to play with a pack of cards she would look at me as if I was daft. On the other hand, James would probably be in his element because he could rip them up and eat them.