Tag: slice of life

PRIDE Christmas potluck weekend

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We had our very first PRIDE xmas potluck brunch last Saturday. I made a ham, JuanAn made a spanish tortilla (potato omelette) and Antonio and David (and Antonio’s mom and Eli’s grandmother) made paella*. Attilla brought some salad and Rui was in charge of puddings. It was a very fun afternoon, with waaaaaaaaay too much food.

On Sunday, Katy and I did our first xmas shop at Tesco. We bought the booze and the non-perishables. We’ll get the rest of the stuff that we need for New Year’s closer to the time.

Bean’s being a pest at the moment. The good news is that he’s walking on his cast like nothing was wrong and he’s still sleeping very well. The bad news is that when he’s awake, we just want to kill him. Otherwise, he’s a happy, normal 2 year old. I’m looking forward to dumping him with the oldies and then running away for a bit of quiet time with Katy in London.

*There was some debate to see if this could actually be called paella, because it was made with onions instead of garlic, but the end results was very nommy nonetheless.

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A milestone, of sorts.

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Last Friday saw us going to the A&E department for the first time with Bean. He was having is pre-bedtime snack on a kitchen chair when he decided it would be a grand adventure to climb up on the back of the chair. The chair, being mean and vindictive, didn’t like that at all and decided to show its displeasure by toppling them both over. Unfortunately, his legs got muddled up in the chair back when it hit the ground and, though he stopped crying fairly quickly after a few cuddles, he wouldn’t put any weight on it so when we phoned up the emergency doctors, they told us to go to Addenbrookes.

All in all, it could have been a lot worse. It only took two hours from leaving the house to leaving Addenbrookes. In that time, Bean was a really good boy. He was sitting at a table in the waiting room and playing with toys, looking at the other kids and generally chillin’ with a box of juice. The x-rays didn’t show anything broken, but they’re treating it as a toddler fracture so for the next few weeks he’s sporting a nice purple leg cast below the knee (Katy wanted hot pink but I vetoed the idea).

I’ve always known that kids are resilient and as long as all of the pieces are in the same room they’ll eventually all fit back together. Still, even though it’s a small thing in the grand scheme of things, it’s not a nice feeling. Katy’s feeling bad because she things she should/could have done something sooner to prevent this, but I keep saying that the only way to make sure kids don’t get hurt ever is to wrap them in cotton wool and keep them sitting still all the time. That way madness lies. I will repeat that it’s still not a nice feeling though.

I’m heartened by the fact that Bean isn’t really fazed by any of this. He’s a bit grumpier than usual – mostly at the fact that he can’t run around at the moment – but he’s hobbling as best he can. Where he couldn’t put pressure on his leg on Friday night, he’s now walking – slowly – from the couch to his chair. He’s climbing on the back of the sofa and he’s standing up when I go get him from his cotbed in the morning. We had a nice weekend going to Cambridge, Tesco and Scottsdales and he was acting like he normally does. So yeah, it’ll slow him down for a bit then he’ll just get on with things, as you do.

We also found the time this weekend to get the last bits of xmas shopping done, decorate the house and put up the tree. Bean clapped when he saw it lit for the first time, which is always good for morale. He kept yelling “LIGHTS!!!”, pointing and clapping. All good :)

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Canada Trip Redux

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I had home leave this year and we went to Canada for 2 weeks in early October. My sister and some cousins had organised a big party to celebrate some milestones in our extended family, so we just had to go. I was a bit apprehensive about the whole thing, seeing as it was the Bean’s first long-haul flight and all, but the whole trip went surprisingly better than expected.

We boarded the cats, left the house keys to a plumber who would be redoing our bathroom while we were away and went to Leicester for a few days prior to our departure. That way, Mel could be our chauffeur to/from Heathrow. We went to feed the ducks and geese at Groby Pond and saw deer in Bradgate Park.

The flight to Canada was long, but fairly uneventful. Bean was very good in the plane. He slept during take-off and giggled while there was heavy turbulence during the landing. It took a bit of fiddling to get the CARES harness properly setup, but once we figured it out, it wasn’t too bad. It was a good thing that we got him his own seat in the plane though, because he wouldn’t have stood to be sat on us for the whole flight. He kept getting up in his seat and waving to everybody, especially the poor woman behind him. Changing a nappy at 37,000 feed is interesting and lets just say that conditions are a bit cramped. Even though he didn’t sleep a lot, there wasn’t too much fussing. We managed to keep him fairly well entertained, even if we had to watch Shrek the 3rd about 5 times. In the end, when passengers were departing, Bean got complimented on hid good behaviour. It must be said, ironically, that this was the first time ever that I flew long haul with only one child present in the flight – and it had to be mine.

Bean was good at the folks’. He got used to little dog quite quickly, even if he was a bit reticent about her the first night there. Once he got over that, he kept chasing after her and kept feeding her food. We had to put the dog out at every meal because half his food went to her. Even then, he ate like bottomless pit. He was always outdoors, playing on the swings or in the sand pit, eating apples, and running through the leaves or grass piles.

The party was more fun than I expected it to be. I ended up doing a fair bit of the catering, but that wasn’t too bad as it meant that I was certain that I’d be able to eat the food :) My boar roast marinade gravy got lots of good reviews as well, which is always nice for the ego. Bean got lots of fuss and compliments, and tried his first taste of beer. He also kept trying to get into ladies bathroom. That’s my boy.

Both Katy and I noticed that Bean seemed more grown up during this trip. He got more and more chatty, started eating with a fork and could drink out of a glass without giving himself a milk facial. He also discovered a very important word for him: “MORE!”, shortly followed by “JUICE!”.

Having 3 kids in the same house is chaos and Katy and I were taking bets on how soon it would take for all of us to get horribly sick. We were hoping we could hold out until after we did all that we wanted to do. We had a full calendar planned. We went to see horses at a neighbour’s farm. We tried feeding Ben to them but they weren’t interested.

We went to the Canadian Museum of Civilisation and for a jaunt to Ottawa. It was really funny to see Bean constantly run up to my mom’s car and try to get in for a road trip. The museum was fun. Bean rode saddles in horse display. We bought way too much stuff at the gift shop, including a beautiful ‘Children of the Raven’ rug. We went to the Byward market for a wander round and stopped for tea and a biscuit at a nice but very chaotic tea shop in the market. Bean has really taken to being carried on my shoulders, but we had a bit of an incident with a rogue tree branch :( That’s what gave him a scar on his cheek in the other pictures. On the way back to get picked up by my mom at the museum, Bean was waving to everybody, including dogs and pan handlers who – surprisingly – waved back :)

On Tuesday, we headed to Montreal. We had lots of things planned in very little time. We had a photo shoot with Isabelle at the Botanical Gardens. Bean got tired and grumpy part way through it but we managed to get some really nice pics in the end. I was impressed at how easy he was to put down for nap at my sister’s place while I tried to fix her wifi setup. In the end, I gave up and we went to our hotel. Very spanky! We got a suite upgrade with a jacuzzi for Katy. I had a boys night out with the old gang. Katy wasn’t in the mood to come so she stayed in, had a very nice meal (got a bit tipsy) and pampered herself (and accidentally ordered a PPV movie). We had a “Fuck it!” moment regarding the money situation when we realized that the holiday would cost a bit more than we expected, but sod it. We have one nice trip every two years. We’re going to enjoy Montreal. Boys night was fun, but we got old. We spent the evening in the kitchen, standing around a kitchen island and talking about work, kids and motorcycles while one of the guys was itching for a rant and really let rip at the poor St-Hubert restaurant that delivered his food one hour late and cold. That was impressive, especially considering that the restaurant is only 5 minutes away (this prompted the quote of the evening – “Would it be quicker if I just went there and cooked the damn thing myself?”)

The following day, Katy had her appointment with Norm for her tattoo and I had some time to do a few errands. I even managed to sneak in some tea at Ming Tao Xuan, even though all the shops open stupidly late in the old port. We had plans to meet Michel and Isabelle at Bishoku for dinner but those well through when Isabelle caught the man-flu that Michel had just gotten over. I’ve been going to Bishoku for over 10 years, when it was still called Tokiwa. When I was still living in Montreal, Michel and I used to go at least once a week. I’ve been living in the UK coming on to 6 years now, but I still go every time I have home leave. Amazingly, when I phoned up to make reservations, they remembered my voice and were thrilled that I was going. I was told that we needed to come!!! Going to a restaurant that remembers what you like after a two year absence and makes you stuff that is no longer on the menu speaks volumes for the service. I love those people, and they never disappoint :) We had sooooo much food, but damn, it was good. It was better than good. I wish them well – they need to be there when we go back in two years. We got a bit tipsy at Bishoku and Katy was dorphed-out from her 6-hour tattoo session, so we hailed a cab (yay! cabs everywhere! took 5 seconds flat) and we headed back to the old port. Katy was asleep before her head hit the pillow. I watched the glow from our fake fireplace for a while then did the same.

We came back to Ottawa on Thursday, when we had booked ourself a night at the Hilton Casino. It took a bit of stress and faffing to get us there, but we got a suite upgrade when we got there and that more than made up for it. We had late dinner reservations, so we went to the cigar lounge to chill a bit and have a drink. The bar only had roasted almonds as a snack. When I informed the nice lady bartender that I was allergic to nuts and we were getting rather tipsy on the good red wine we were enjoying, she got the kitchen to smuggle some sandwiches into the lounge for us. Unfortunately they had loads of garlic in them but its the thought that counts. That’s the sort of service that you don’t get hereabouts. I didn’t have the heart to let her know I couldn’t eat them. I went to the little corner shop and bought a bag of crisps. Not as posh, but very effective.

We went back to the suite to get presentable before dinner and had an amusing encounter with the bed turn-down maid service. Poor lady, we must’ve made a bit of an impression. Having said that, I’m sure it’s not the first time something like that happened…

The evening ended on a bit of a sour note. Katy’s meal didn’t completely agree with her. The restaurant declined my credit card because the computer at the front desk had mis-scanned it and I had to call Natwest to clear everything up. The room aircon was being a pain. There wasn’t a kettle to make tea so I had to use their weird percolator, but the water coming through reeked of coffee and to top it off, the the teabags were already waterstained. When I called up for tea to be sent up to room service, it took 30 minutes before it came but once it did and I showed them the state of things, the attendant was less than impressed, apologized and said that his manager would be informed. We were comped the tea. Tea made it all better.

The following day, we went to Kinki in the market for a sushi lunch. I have to say, for as much as I hold Bishoku near and dear to my heart, Kinki is a cooler place to eat. The ambiance is a lot more hip and the food is a bit more avant-garde. We had really good panko chicken and wasabi calamari as starters, followed excellent rolls. I especially recommend the beef-fillet wrapped shrimp surf n’ turf roll.

On Saturday, we went to the Science and Technology museum in Ottawa, to show Bean the train gallery. Bean was a bit grumpy and a bit of a handful, but I think he enjoyed it. My mom has bad laryngitis and completely lost her voice and my dad’s back was playing up.

On Sunday, I met up with Michel in the market before Roger Waters show. Had “small” pint of Hoegaarden at D’Arcy McGees on Sparks St. then went for dinner at Kinki. I found out that previous meal there had garlic and sesame in it, but I was pre-loaded with antihistamines so no harm done. I ended up doing the same thing again and it was still good.

The Roger Waters show was kick ass. I had a little something to enhance the show but there was a ton of stadium security and they were acting as kill joys. We went outside during the intermission, along with a significant number of people. They were scanning people in and out. It was a mess. Let’s just say, however, that the second part of the show was more intense than the first.

The show was excellent and I can’t wait until May to see it again in London. It sounded just like the CD. Now, normally, if you go to a live show, you expect that things will be different, but in this case, different would have been disappointing because the album is so iconic. It didn’t disappoint. It was spot on and almost perfect. I cried, again. Sue me.

Monday was our last day in Canada and it was a bit hectic. Bean had broken my mom’s chain so I gave her mine. I knew it would make her feel good to have something of mine with her all the time. Thing is that I feel naked without it now, but xmas should fix that. After a bit of a packing, weighing and repacking frenzy, we headed to the airport. Even with all our best efforts, we still had one suitcase that was 3.4kg over its allowed weight limit. The lady at the desk told us that we could shift stuff around to our other two suitcases, who were a few kilos light each. Unfortunately, both other suitcases were packed solid and nothing would have fit (trust me, we tried). In the end, those 3.4kg cost us a flat penalty fee of $100. Fuck you, Air Canada.

The trip back didn’t bode well, when Bean had an emotional outburst at being restrained in his seat. It was probably just fatigue, and he chilled out when other people starting boarding the plane. I changed him into PJs after take-off and he fell asleep around 8 while we were watching Avatar. Things seemed to go smoothly, until he woke up round 10:30pm roasting hot. He must’ve finally caught what the boys had. Perfect timing… We gave him water and meds and, although he was a bit listless, he spent the flight chilling in Katy’s arms watching Sherlock Holmes and another movie after that.

The only bad thing is that he slept the whole of 2 hours that night, when he normally sleeps 12. We went through customs and baggage with little hassle, and then we met up with Mel for the trip back to Leicester. Bean and I slept in the car and then we managed to make it through that day. The end of the story is here and here :)

All in all, a very good, very positive, very tiring, very expensive trip. But worth every penny, even if we’re broke now :)

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Quick update

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After many trials and tribulations, we’re back in Saffron Walden. Holiday’s over. Katy went to work last night and is working tonight and I’m back at work bright and early tomorrow morning. Bean is fairly back in his UK schedule and is going to be in nursery full-time for the next two weeks. That should really cement his routine. Now only if his attitude could get back into gear :) He’s a proper little monster at times these days. Yay, terrible twos.

On the bathroom front, we have a toilet, sink, shower and bath. We’re still missing a tiled floor and the final finishes, but that should come on monday. Pictures to come soon. We winterized the garden by dead-heading the flowering plants, bushwacking the out-of-control herbs and planted some violas and pansies. More pictures to come soon.

I need to write a massive post-holiday post and process a few hundred pictures. That should come within the week.

So yeah. Holiday over. Back to the grind.

Having said that, I’m rather looking forward to a bit of boring routine for the next little while.

Now if only Katy could stop watching the bajillion episodes of Neighbours and Home and Away that have been series-linked on the sky box, life would be good. As a side note, we only had about 20% free space on the box with all the junk that had been recorded). We’re going to have hours and hours of catch-up TV for the next little while ;)

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Great way to start the day.

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We were woken up at 6am this morning with a rather large and unexpected crash. When I went downstairs to investigate, Reenie was looking all guilty and pitiful and the glass tank in which we keep the hamster had crash landed from the top of the TV unit onto the coffee table. The glass-topped coffee table.

Sigh. It could have been a lot worse. Only the tank was broken and the hamster, while stressed and a bit shook up, seemed ok. He’s chilling out in a tupperware box in a dark corner for now until we go get a new tank later today. The bean didn’t even wake up from all the commotion. Once we got everything cleaned up, we went back to bed. Katy’s snoring away right now but I haven’t been able to go back to bed.

Nice way to start a lazy Sunday…

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Mixed emotions about the whole driving thing.

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So far, I’ve had 3 driving lessons. The first one was only on a closed course to try get to grips with the basics of clutch control and low-speed manoeuvring. The other 2 were mostly throw-you-in-the-deep-end on the road. I have been both thrilled and terrified and I’m a bit wrung out.

I’m at a quandary here. It seems like I have a triple-whammy going against me. I’ve never driven before, so I’m a total newb for roadcraft. This would explain why I cut across oncoming traffic while doing a right-hand turn and almost got run over twice on roundabouts (having said that, Joe told me that every new driver does stupid shit like that). My eyesight – being its normal self – makes it difficult for me to read the instrument gauges easily (the speedo mostly is a git – it’s in KPH and has a small inner dial in MPH, but it’s painted brown on black and I can’t make it out unless I lean in, which is not a good thing to do when you’re doing 50 MPH). So that means that I have difficulty maintaining the correct speed for the road I’m on, and that’s dangerous. Both of those combined as well make it difficult for me to anticipate things well enough in advance for me to react appropriately, like judging the correct speed to take a bend or timing gaps to enter the flow of traffic. The final whammy is confidence. I’ve told myself all my life that I can’t drive, and now I’m trying to prove myself wrong. All of that taken together at once is proving… difficult, dangerous, scary.

I had a good long chat with the instructors at CamRider. I can’t commend them enough. They’re being really professional and genuine about the whole process. What it boils down to is that they don’t want to just write me off, they don’t want me to just write me off and they don’t want to just keep taking my money if this is something that won’t be safe in the long run. The head instructor, who I was with on the 3rd lesson, tells me that if he thought I was untrainable or unsafe, he’d stop things then and there. He says that no single problem in itself is a no-go. He’s trained people with worse eyesight than me. He’s trained complete newbies before. We just need to address things a little bit at a time and find a solution that works for me.

The thing is that on a closed circuit or a cul-de-sac, I can handle the bike correctly. My clutch control has already gotten a lot better in those 3 sessions and I can do the Module 1 manoeuvres. The real problem is that when I go out in the real world, all of that control and confidence goes out the window. I get flustered and I start doing stupid – and potentially dangerous – things.

Again though, the instructors tell me that this isn’t anything they haven’t seen before. I’m probably just over-thinking things and making my demons bigger than they are.

There have been fun moments though. The rat race in the Villages and the straight road to Sawston were really cool. On the other hand, having my first real road ride while it’s pissing it down with rain and having both the inside and outside of my helmet visor (as well as my glasses) sopping wet while on a national speed limit road was… not a fun moment. I was a bit wired that night.

So. Where we’re at now is that I have a one-on-one lesson tomorrow morning where it’s just going to be me and an instructor and we’ll assess the situation after that. If they think I can’t, then so be it. I’ll have at least tried. If they think I can, we can work on a plan so that I can think I can.

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I’m tired, Katy’s tired. The beastie is tiring.

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It’s been a loooooong weekend. Katy’s been working 12-14 hour night-sit shifts since Friday night so she’s knackered, and she seems to be coming down with a bug, which isn’t helping her energy levels. It’s still a transitional process, but I’m finding it a bit rough to not see her these days. It seems that we’ve only had three night in the past month when she hasn’t been working, and two of those were in Leicester. She leaves shortly after I get in from work, so we have maybe 15-20 minutes to chat a bit before she has to get ready. I generally put beastie to bed and then spend the evening cooking and watching TV. When she’s not working night-sits, she comes home between 10:30 and 11:30, so we might have another 15-20 minutes to chat, but by then we’re both tired so we just go to bed. I’m sure we’ll both get into the routine of things.

The beastie is just being a beastie and is into everything, biting everything, throwing everything, climbing everything and scratching everything that shouldn’t be scratched. I discovered that he can climb into his high-chair by himself during one of those “it’s too quiet” moments. He was sitting happily next to the fridge eating my fridge magnets. Oy, vey.

I had my first motorcycle lesson this weekend, the Compulsory Bike Training (CBT) course. It gives very high-level pointers on maintenance, controls, maneuvers, road safety and the like. I’m doing the course with Joe and he said it best when he said that it feels like it’s too much to take in at once and the best way to get everything to become automatic (like it is for him to drive a car) is to get out on the road and do it. That’s actually a bit intimidating, but I’m looking forward for more.

The day started out with a bit of stress because I had to pass a field eye exam. Now I know that this sounds dodgy, but I knew where they kept the fixed-distance license plate they use and I already knew what was written on it, but all of that went out the window when the guy said “just read the plate on either of the cars at the end of the parking”. I took a deep breath and said what I saw. The dude squinted a bit and said “yeah, that’ll do”. HAPPY DANCE!!!

Joe and I didn’t go on the road on Saturday, even though a road ride is normally part of the CBT. That’s because we’re doing the direct access course that will allow us to ride bikes bigger than 125cc. We’re going to be doing the rest of our lessons on 500cc bikes that require a things be done a bit differently than with the smaller, lighter bikes. The other guy who was on the course with us, a loudmouth Ozzie who will someday wrap himself and the 1100cc crotch rocket he wants to get around a tree, was only doing the CBT and went on a ride. I find it a bit mind-boggling that, in most cases, people are let loose on the road for unaccompanied riding after only 6 hours of training on a bike that can do 70 mph with very little difficulty – without even needing a theory test. Still, that’s how things work here apparently and who am I to question a system that will actually let me drive :D

It is a lot to process, the things you need to unconsciously think about to be able to drive safely. The good news is that they seem very competent teachers and they’re very safety oriented. Still, I’m a bit humbled to say that I expected it to be easier. Anyway, I have a feeling that if all goes well, I’m going to be very proud of myself for accomplishing a goal that I’ve always thought impossible to achieve. Go me.

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