Wednesday 20th June

While Pete has been away I have been very quietly…

lying on the couch reading

sitting on a recliner knitting

watching TV

snoozing

in between fairly hectic moments of working and being with much-loved small children.  I took two small girls to town last Saturday and we somehow – oh no – found ourselves sitting right in the middle of blocked-in- rows of seats (ie no possibility of escape) watching a magic show.  It went for 30 minutes and that was 27 minutes too long for me… The girls, 2 and 4, thought it was great and clapped most enthusiastically.  Ten year old Angus was also blocked in; he didn’t seem to mind at all.  But his mother, Nicky, and I rolled our eyes quite a bit… The magician was just so…weird!  He shouted HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY things at the children, smiling hugely, but the look in his eyes seemed to indicate… I HATE YOU ALL!!!  COME ANY CLOSER AND YOU WILL DIIIEEEE!!!!  Fortunately Angus, Eva and Zoe didn’t seem to notice the murderous gleam so all was well.  While the coast was clear, Jeff, father of the two small girls, slaved away with a chain saw for many hours, creating…a giant wombat for his beloved Katy’s birthday present!  It is indeed a most splendid creature, sawn from an old pine trunk.  I had told Jeff, when he embarked on his project, about the interview I read years ago, where a very famous sculptor, on being asked how he had created a beautiful rhinoceros from a large block of stone, had said, “It was easy.  I just cut away everything which wasn’t a rhinoceros.” 

I have also been…watching TV.  With full control of the remote!!  It has been quite a revelation.  Singing contests, cooking contests, building contests, talent and dancing contests, a few snippets of Reality (I don’t think so, Lara B…) TV – Hunger Games here we come!  The advertisements have also been more than surprising, after eighteen months of no ads at all.  Some of them are very clever, beautifully made, but I have no idea what they are advertising.  Cars?  Food?  Debt reduction?  Weight reduction?  Funerals?  Could be any of the above… My favourite ad, which Katy is also thrilled with, shows a large, plain man, crying sadly and eating deep-fried beige food with lashings of squirty sauce.  I think it is supposed to make us want to eat KFC.  Or something.  (It doesn’t work…)

Pete will be home tonight (calloo callay!) so my days of remote control are over.  No more ads…probably a good thing…