Weevilstepmother

Idly surfing the other day, I came across a website which made me grin happily then rub my hands with glee. Having reminded myself about Space Dust in a post a couple of days ago, I was searching for it to see if it still existed. It does. Oh yes. The site I discovered is called A Quarter Of and it's choc full (that one was worthy of PDG) of sweets I remember fondly from my childhood. I have to admit to going a bit crazy with my clicker, and before I knew it I had ordered a box full.

It arrived today, to my great delight, and the general bemusement of those around me. The Sun watched, open mouthed, as I opened the box to reveal an Aladdin's cave of sweeties, each lot packed in a little white paper bag twirled at the corners. Sweet Peanuts, Space Dust, Flying Saucers, Sherbet Dip Dabs, Cinder Toffee, his excitement levels rose with each new unveiling. We sampled here and there as we went, and got out some sandwich bags to make up assortments for each of the children. Methane Boy is sat eating his, watching over my shoulder as I type this. Unless Poppy is reading this, in which case he is already tucked up in bed and has most definitely cleaned his teeth thoroughly.

We broke open a packet of Space Dust and both the Sun and Tallboy guzzled with glee. I doubled up with hysterics at the sight of them both sat side by side on the sofa, their mouths open wide, a symphony of crackle and pop issuing forth, their eyes laughing and sparkling. The noise brought back memories of the poor dog's puzzled expression, and I laughed even more...

Undertaking a cross-town mercy dash tonight to pick Methane Boy up from Poppy's, I smuggled the Sweet Peanut bag into the car and Tallboy and I punctuated our conversation with the satisfied slurp and crunch of boiled sweet consumption. On our return, we handed one to Methane Boy. "What is it?" he queried, squinting at it in the light of a street lamp. A Sweet Peanut, we told him. "Do I have to take off the shell first?" he earnestly enquired. When we had finished hooting, we told him no, just put it in. "Mmmmm," came the noise from the back seat. A minute later he piped up, "It's got peanut in it!" Ummm yes, we said, hence the name. For a lad who has just done rather well in his GCSEs, sometimes I despair...

Nearing home, I mentioned that the package had contained Space Dust. Methane Boy tentatively checked with me what this was. Happy that he understood, he told me that he had been confused by the Space Dust/dog episode which I had related to him earlier in the week. The term Space Dust had dredged up memories of his drug education classes (just say no, kids!) and he had confused it with Angel Dust. Why on earth he thought his stepmother would have been feeding PCP to a hound, I have no idea. I think he and I need a little chat...

Anyway, rest assured that the next week or so at Weevil Mansions will be a sugar-fuelled frenzy of rapturous delight thanks to the lovely people at A Quarter Of, who are meticulous enough to note the lack of gelatine where relevant (thank you!). I have been showing the site to Tallboy tonight, particularly the enormous jar of Jelly Beans (my utter, utter favourite in the all the world in space) along with the subtle commentary "You see this? This is what I want for my birthday, OK?" We'll see...

Sometimes someone says something to you, and you respond without thinking. You then see the look on their face, and realise that if you had been half awake/ actually listening to what they said/ showing a modicum of interest, then you might have understood them and responded appropriately. When I was 10, I had an interview for a place at a secondary school. I had taken an entrance examination, and then had to appear before the Headmistress and assorted members of the Board. As a pre-teen, this was my first ever experience of an interview situation, and I was just ever so slightly nervous, as you might imagine.

At school the previous week, we had been making a scale map of the classroom, measuring everything in it and drawing its position in carefully. I had enjoyed this exercise, and whilst waiting to go into the dark panelled room I fought my nerves by thinking about what we had done. The time for the interview arrived, and my parents and I were ushered in to our places at one side of a huge highly polished boardroom table. The Head asked me a couple of easy questions to put me at my ease to begin with. Where did I live, and which school did I go to? And how big was my class there? "10 metres by 10 metres" was my confident response, I had measured it last week. As the interview panel dissolved in laughter, the realisation dawned that she had been enquiring as to the number of students, and the icy hand of gaucherie closed its fingers round my thundering heart. It can't have been all bad, though; they offered me a place with a generous bursary.

The Sun and I have had our share of this kind of misunderstanding, too. I remember once when he was a little boy of about three, we were playing in the front room, and I could feel a chilly current of air coming through the open door. The Sun was right next to the door, and I asked him to please shut it, to stop the draft coming through. He closed it with alacrity, and ran to my side with a worried look on his face. As he stared at the doorway, he asked me in hushed tones, "You mean a draft like at the zoo?" Puzzled, I considered this question for a little while before I was able to reassure him that a draft of air and a giraffe from the zoo were quite different things entirely.

As he learned language in those early years, he would often find himself with a lacuna in his vocabulary, and would express himself wonderfully with words he created to fill the gap. My favourite, which I persist in using to this day (to his great embarrassment), cropped up when we saw a waterfall. He didn't know what it was called, but supplied his own word. "Look at that water-go-down-splash, Mummy," he said.

The words he did know, he used with an astonishing nicety which told me he had inherited his mother's pedantry wholesale. Stood by the side of the road ready to cross, I held his hand and asked him to tell me when he thought it was safe to cross. "Are there any cars coming?" I prompted. "No," he said, and made to step off the kerb. I held on tight and pointed aghast to the large white heavy object that was passing us. "What's that then?" Clear eyes of reason looked at me, and he said, "'S a van, Mummy." The next time we crossed a road, I was careful to enquire as to the approach of any vehicles.

I am also regularly confounded with words which, on second reading, turn out to be saying something completely different to what my brain had registered on a first, casual, acquaintance. I, like many others, see a van proclaiming a Shopfitter's business, and read it as Shoplifters. I also have trouble with another reasonably common word, registering it as Whorehouse and having to do a double take every time I pass a Carphone Warehouse. I managed to outdo myself recently, when I was perusing a leaflet which came through the letterbox. Amongst the other bargains at Argos, my fleeting glance noticed what must surely be novelty aimed at Scotsmen who enjoy DIY in national dress. A second, incredulous, read, told me that I had managed to add a single letter to what was printed and come up with a Tool Kilt. I'm off to the Patent Office when it reopens tomorrow...

Methane Boy will soon be sixteen and a half. Or, to put it another way, he can start learning to drive in April next year. This fact fills me with equal measures of anticipation and apprehension.

A sensible boy, he is busy squirrelling away funds against driving lessons, driving tests, vehicle purchase and of course tax, MOT and insurance. You may wonder to which vehicle he aspires. A hot hatch, perchance? Something in two wheels for monsieur? (We think it would be OK if he gets proper training, but Poppy is less than convinced.) A ratty Ford Fiesta or a trim little Corsa?

No. His dream vehicle is a Bedford Rascal. Honestly. So convinced of its suitability is he that he has already concluded the purchase of the workshop manual on eBay.

Why does he want one? Well, for a start, he would enjoy building a bass sub-woofer and assorted speakers to fill the load space at the rear. His most recent effort was a bass sub-woofer designed and constructed by him from scratch. It's housed in a 50cm x 50cm x 50cm MDF cube which weighs a ton. Cracks have appeared downstairs (so far only in non load-bearing walls) as a consequence of its use. He has never yet dared to turn it all the way up. I think he fears my response to the smoking crater which would appear in the place of Weevil Mansions.

Secondly, it would be handy for filling with crap from skips. An acolyte of the Way of the Tallboy, he has followed faithfully in his father's footsteps of rescuing other people's rubbish. The tally between them so far includes an aquarium, A Vax wet'n'dry vacuum cleaner, various broken VCRs and TVs, and once (apparently) a toilet. A second-hand toilet. A broken second-hand toilet. No wonder I have so many grey hairs an air of distinguished maturity about my temples.

Finally, it will be "cheap to insure". On what, I enquired, did he base this assertion. Had he obtained some quotes, maybe. Oh no, he had "read it somewhere on the internet". Phew. For a moment I thought he may have been assuming wildly without basis in fact.

Every time we pass one on the road, he jiggles with excitement in his seat. He is watching about twenty Rascal auctions on eBay. Today, though, his star was in the ascendant, and he had the Rascal experience to end all Rascal experiences. He and Tallboy found themselves parked next to one in a car park. They appraised its rugged good looks and sleek lines. They viewed it from all sorts of angles. They peered through the windows. The owner arrived. Tallboy explained their interest and the worried owner put down his baseball bat and turned into a fount of Rascal information. Tallboy plucked up the courage to ask if Methane Boy might 'try on' the vehicle and the kind owner muted his young son's protests that he wished to return home and allowed MB to get behind the wheel.

Methane Boy was still grinning when they got home. I could tell that he could still feel the seductive pressure of seat on thigh. No matter that his left knee was pressed against the indicator stalk. Either the seat would go back a bit, or he would be able to announce to other road users his intention to turn or change lanes without removing his hand from the steering wheel. No matter either that his nose was pressed against the windscreen. Either the seat would go back a bit, or he would project a keen and hawkish mien to fellow motorists.

Let me know if you hear of one for sale. We'll come and take a look at it. And if Methane Boy buys it, I will arm wrestle Tallboy for the right to drive it home.

Pesky really got my goat the other day. I was sat at the computer, drinking a coffee and nibbling on a shortbread finger, when the phone went. Down went the comestibles, and off I went to answer it. Deep in discussion with a nice lady from Birmingham about when the gas man should come round and check that our central heating wasn't about to explode or CO us to death, I returned to the room in time to see Pesky (who had adopted her normal position of lounging by the keyboard) licking my shortbread. Curses! Struggling to contain my angst and fury, I concluded my conversation and turned towards my furtive feline, who rather sensibly retreated to the sofa. Overcoming my devastation, I picked up the shortbread and placed it next to her, since she might as well finish it off. There, that showed her.

That wasn't the first time I've had my food sabotaged by an animal. When I was six or seven, Mum made Angel Delight for pudding and left it in the dining room all served up in little glass dishes. When it was time for pudding, we discovered delicate little tongue marks in the top of our desserts. Meh.

One of Mum's dogs is an inveterate snaffler. Although she has had a poorly hip for years, she would think nothing of standing up on two legs to see what was on offer on the table or worktop. She ate half a pound of really expensive cheese once, much to Brummie Stepdad's disgruntlement. She also ran off with a joint once. And Mum thought she was going to die when she broke into the dry dog food container the night after they moved into the new house, stuffed herself, and then drank hugely. The poor creature swelled up massively around the midriff, and could do nothing but lie there bloated and whimpering. If I recall correctly, the Cartographer unsurprisingly found many little presents hidden cunningly around the ground floor when he got up the next morning.

Having seen a dog training programme on the TV, I suggested to Mum that she might be able to cure the dog's pilfering by setting up a memorable little trap for her. She left the remains of the roast on the worktop, having tied on various noisy objects (empty tins and the like). Soon enough there was an almighty crash from the kitchen, and Mum ran in to see a very surprised-looking and penitent hound. She's not done it again since.

Their official diet can seem somewhat strange at times. Brummie Grandad feeds them half a banana each at breakfast time. And Mum gives them carrots, breaking them into two inch lengths for the dogs to eat. The noise they make as the crunch the carrots with obvious enjoyment is enough to bring a smile to the most jaded face.

I must admit rather shamefully that in my teenage years I was guilty of feeding a dog something I shouldn't have. It was the 80s, and I was on a farm where we used to spend some time. There were two dogs, both black Labradors, very good natured luckily for me. One of my favourite treats was Space Dust, which was little crystals which you held on your tongue, and which crackled and popped when they came into contact with moisture, and released what I always assumed was Carbon Dioxide. I gave some to the dog. Its expression as the unique sensations unfolded on its tongue was hysterical, and my partner in crime and myself were unable to stand, talk and possibly even breathe for quite some time. It was more puzzled than anything, and it didn't hurt it (or it would have had my arm off, I'm sure) so you can stop dialling the RSPCA.

The worst animal/food incident happened some years ago, here at Weevil Mansions. This was when Pesky's sister was still alive. She was very affectionate and was my little shadow, always next to me. One night I sat down hungrily to eat my dinner. For a change I ate on the sofa with my dinner on my knees. The cat hopped up next to me and saw the plate so realised she couldn't come onto my lap. Instead she sat next to me, upright like a Pharoah's cat. Although her head was close to the plate I knew she was well trained enough not to pinch anything so wasn't unduly worried. Then she sneezed. All over my dinner. I was distraught, and had to have a sandwich instead. I don't need to tell you that the Ex thought it was very funny indeed. And you can put that phone down, this incident wasn't the cause of her subsequent death. Honest.

Ah, the sport of kings. I know you've been itching to see a betting/racing timewaster - and here it is!

Come with me to Royal Arsecot and use your knowledge of the racing world, current form, insider tips from trainers and a huge dollop of luck to build up your winnings. You start with a pot of £500, from which you can stake as much or as little as you wish over the series of five races. But you're only going to get into the high scores if you go for long odds and put it all on.

Before each race you are shown the runners, their previous form, their preferences for the going, and their trainer's opinion of their chances. You also see the odds for each runner, and are given the going for the race. Using your skill, deviousness, cunning, or just by shutting your eyes and clicking, you choose a runner. You might find it helpful to have the instructions open in another window so that you can refer to them as you choose. Your heart pounding with the excitement, you click the 'start race' button - and they're off!

Make sure your speakers are on for this, the commentary is a giggle as are the sound effects. You have a stock of five whips for encouraging your runner, and five tins of beans for re-energising them. Don't use them all up in the first race, they have to last you for all of them. If you win the first race, you collect your winnings and go back to select your runner for the next race.

For Phil and Donna the competitive amongst us, I have just had a go where I bet my entire pot each time and won each race, giving me a grand total of £648,000 and getting me into the top scores for the day list at no. 11. I'm sure you'll all do much better. But don't blame me if your mum/partner/child hears you shouting "Come on Red Bum!"

Fancy hats and binos at the ready, it's Arse Race.

Tallboy is quite the dab hand in the kitchen. And I don't just mean reaching down pans from the rack or getting the new jar of coffee down from on top of the larder. He can throw his hand to pretty much anything which doesn't involve actually following a recipe. "Yes, I know it says to use 50g of flour/fry it for 5 minutes first/avoid combining these two ingredients until the end but I just thought I'd do it this way instead..." It's the same with new things like lawnmowers and window blinds and anything else which comes in a box needing even a modicum of assemblage. He will dive in there while I sit nearby, reading the instructions. There will come a point where he grinds to a halt, scratching his head, while I wordlessly hold up the piece he is looking for and time how long it takes him to notice.

Anyway, back to matters culinary. When we first became romantically linked, I was pleasantly surprised by Tallboy's prowess in the kitchen. His cooking wasn't bad either. It was also wonderful to discover that he likes nearly everything. The Ex wasn't overly adventurous - "I don't like X." "Have you ever tried it?" "No." - and didn't like mushrooms, onions or curry. This I found rather limiting in veggie cuisine terms. Tallboy is a different proposition, and has even introduced to me to creations of his own. Sandwiches, mostly - he is the sandwich king after all. He eats like a horse and needs to keep himself going between meals, normally with a quick sandwich. Bread just evaporates in this house. Tallboy favourites include mashed potato sandwiches and egg sandwiches. Now, I bet you think you already know egg sandwiches. Not a la Tallboy, you don't.

How to make a Tallboy egg sandwich.

Hardboil an egg.
Butter two slices of bread.
Using asbestos fingers, reach into pan, remove egg and shell it.
Place whole egg on one piece of bread, top with other slice, consume in no more than three mouthfuls.

Again, I'm drifting off the point. This post was supposed to be about the blandest dish known to man. Last week, feeling hormonal and tired and jobless and penniless, I was in dire need of comfort food. What, enquired Tallboy, would I like for tea? Cheesy mash with stuff in it, please. Nice strong cheddar in the mash, and bits of other stuff like hardboiled eggs and sweetcorn and mushrooms and kidney beans embedded in the cheesy goodness. Can't beat it. He served it with a flourish and I sat down eagerly to eat. After a few mouthfuls, my brain tapped me on the shoulder. "Did you put any cheese in this?" Nope, there it still was in the kitchen, a little grated mountain ignored on one side. We worked it into the mash on our plates, so all was not lost, but it was a close shave.

That mash was not the blandest dish known to man, but it reminded me of the dish that carries that distinction. Going back a year or so, when Tallboy was newly resident at Weevil Mansions, he made dinner. We sat down to cauliflower cheese - the cauli beautifully cooked, the sauce lumpless and clinging. No cheese. He forgot it. Cheeseless cauliflower cheese. We struggled to eat the tasteless meal, pining for the forgotten cheddar. If you think you've had blander, I want to know about it!

The Sun clearly has a yen for World Domination. I had an inkling of this when he got that far away look in his eyes when his joke got fanmail. Confirmation, however, arrived on Sunday afternoon.

First let's rewind to Saturday evening, when the Sun and the Ex returned from their week in Scotland. I went to the station to pick them up, and failed to recognise my own son. There were two reasons for this - firstly, he had grown several feet taller and I was therefore looking out for him at too low a level, and secondly, he was wearing one of those silly pretend Scottish hats with the fake ginger hair peeking out all round the sides, totally obscuring his own hair and confusing the hell out of me. I took them back to the Ex's to dump their stuff, the Ex registering pleasant surprise at the lack of the sofa, which immediately turned to deep shame regarding the filthy mess that was now exposed in its place.

It's fair to say that both the chaps were experiencing withdrawal symptoms. The Ex's were easily cured when we dropped him off outside the Beaufort Hunt in Chipping Sodbury. The Son's howl of anguish on learning that the PS2 had not yet been hooked back up (following its week away at Mum's) was heartrending and distinctly worrying at the same time. I told him if he was nice to Methane Boy, he might set it up for him in the morning.

On Sunday morning as I ate my breakfast I could hear the Sun in the boys' room above me. Alternating between earnest pleading and bouncing on the supine Methane Boy, the Sun was making no progress at all - in fact, the only effect was to elicit a threat from MB not to set it up at all, ever. As you may possibly have spotted, MB takes his teenageness seriously and thinks mornings are for saddos. We have this quaint routine where he asks us at bedtime to wake him in the morning when we get up. This we do. And get abuse and grumpiness because we woke him up. *sigh*

Chastened, the Sun came downstairs and somehow managed to amuse himself without playing Jurassic Parp. MB made his way down somewhat later, in a much better mood. It's funny how you suddenly perk up when nearly-five-foot of nearly-ten-year-old stops bouncing on you. He set up the PS2 and ate his breakfast to the background noise of dinosaurs on the rampage.

A slightly hungover Ex came round to pick up the Sun to take him for lunch at grandma's. Methane Boy went out to play with Tallboy and the Cossack (who had stayed overnight) who were out messing about with the bike in the shed. It wasn't until several hours later that MB decided he would go up to his room to read. Within five minutes he was downstairs again, a puzzled look on his face. Where, he enquired, did I think the Sun would have hidden a paperback book? I had no idea, and, puzzled myself, asked him what was wrong.

He hadn't been able to find his book, you see. And the Sun had been asking him about it that morning in between asking him to fix the PS2 and bouncing on him. MB thought that the Sun had retaliated to the threat not to fix the console by hiding the book, which wasn't there anymore. I thought this was possibly a little far-fetched - maybe it had fallen down the side of the bed or something - but told him to give the Sun a ring at his father's. I didn't catch much of the call, simply hearing the words "Hello, it's Methane Boy, do you know where my book is?" and then his footsteps receding up the stairs.

Methane Boy was down within a minute, clutching the phone in one hand and the book in the other. He reported that the conversation had gone as follows:

MB: Hello, it's Methane Boy, do you know where my book is?
Sun: Ah, I've been expecting you to call.
Sun: Go up to the bedroom and I will give you further instructions.

I can almost imagine the little beggar madly stroking a white Persian cat during this call. In a fortress blasted from inside a cliff. With his hand hovering near the red button which will launch the ultimate weapon which will destroy the Earth. He is clearly in training to become a Weevil genius. But, and let's be clear about this, he is no match yet for his mother. Embryonic genius he may be, but he is still the lesser of two Weevils.

I'm somewhat surprised to find myself writing the hundredth post to this blog. According to my Blogger profile, I've written 99 of the hundred - over 40,000 words in total. Blimey days. It's been a lot of fun. I've been scratching my head for some time, to come up with a way to mark this milestone. Finally, I decided that for the hundredth post, I would tell you my favourite joke.

I normally tell it best face to face when I can use gesture and tone of voice, but as I first 'heard' it on the web, I'm sure it will be fine. It also seems to help if the audience has imbibed a couple of glasses of a nice red, so you could just nip off for a moment now and uncork something delicious to accompany the following. Don't worry, I'll wait for you...

Our story is set in Texas, where the protagonist works for a bus company, taking the passengers' money, giving them their tickets, and ringing on the bell to tell the driver it's time to move off. Sadly, he's not as careful as he could be, and one day he rings the bell for the driver to move off while a little old lady is still trying to get on. With one foot on the bus and one still on the pavement, she is hurled to the ground as the bus moves off, and unfortunately dies. Our man is arrested and charged with murder. At his trial, he is found guilty and sentenced to death. The day of the execution dawns, and our man is led to the chamber, seated in the chair and strapped in securely. The executioner approaches him and asks if he has any last requests. Scanning the room, the condemned man asks if that's the executioner's lunchbox he can see over there in the corner. Well, yes it is. Could he please see inside it? Certainly. Is that a green banana in there? Yes, it is. Well in that case, he'd like the banana. The executioner hands it over and our man eats it, skin and all.

The time for the execution arrives and the executioner steps forward and throws the switch that will send electricity coursing through our man's body to dispatch him for his crime. However, all that happens is that lights throughout the prison flicker then go out. Our man is untouched. Since the execution has failed, he is allowed to walk free.

As he is now a free man, he returns to his job with the bus company. He takes the money, gives out the tickets, and rings the bell. He has learned a lesson and is very careful at first, but over the months he lapses back to his former slackness, and a repeat of the first tragedy occurs. He is again arrested, again charged with murder, again convicted, and again sentenced to death. The day for his execution arrives and he is led into the chamber, where he is securely fastened into the electric chair. The executioner rubs his hands in anticipation, eager to finish our man off this time. He tells him that nothing will go wrong this second time, as he has wired all the power in the State to the chair. Finally he asks him if he has any last requests. Yes, says our man - is there a green banana in your lunchbox over there? Why yes, there is. That's what our man would like, and he eats it, skin and all.

At the appointed time the executioner throws the switch and lights all over the state flicker and die. Our man is unscathed. Since the execution has failed, he is allowed to walk free.

As he is once again a free man, he returns to his job with the bus company. He takes the money, gives out the tickets, and rings the bell. This time, he sees no reason to be careful, as he has twice beaten the system. The all-too-inevitable tragedy happens within a week. He is once again arrested, once again charged with murder, once again convicted, and once again sentenced to death. On the day scheduled for his execution he is led to the chamber, strapped into the chair securely, and awaits the executioner's words. The executioner has tested and tested the circuits, and tells our man that this time there is no escape. All the voltage in the entire United States will pour through the circuit, frying our man in a fraction of a second. But first, the last request. The executioner enquires if our man will be wanting a green banana? Yes, he will. Well fortunately the executioner happens to have one, and our man eats it up, skin and all.

The executioner grasps the switch and, taking a deep breath, throws it. Lights across the entire country flicker and die, but our man survives. Exasperated, the executioner turns on him and demands to know his secret. "It's those green bananas isn't it? What do they do for you?" "Not at all," says our man, "It's just that I'm a really bad conductor."

Given my recent track record with inclement weather, it was a pleasant surprise yesterday not to be rained on or zapped with millions of volts during our barbecue yesterday. An annual bike club event normally held in the Forest of Dean, I decided to relocate it to Weevil Mansions in the hope of attracting a larger crowd.

Visitors turned up throughout the afternoon and evening. The Alchemist came, to Tallboy's delight, and they instantly huddled in the shed to inspect the progress of the project bike. Methane Boy intercepted the Alchemist later as he emerged, blinking, into the sunlight, and received an enlightening lesson in brewing alcohol, leaving him with a dreamy, faraway look in his eyes. Could we have a third shed erected in the garden, he wondered, for him to use as a brewhouse?

Also in attendance was the Cossack, a huge hairy welshman with a penchant for Eastern European bikes, a taste for good wine and a considerable capacity for food. We had promised him a bed for the night so that he could drink to his heart's content. I even tucked up Ewnice on the spare bed so that he would feel at home.

He tells a good story and had us in stitches for much of the evening. He told us of his upset stomach earlier this week, occasioned by his drinking a panful of vegetable water. His normal habit on returning home from work would be to drain a goodly part of the liquid contents of the cabbage pan on the stove, and this he did. The consequence of this was not a happy warm feeling in the pit of his stomach but rather an unsettled presentiment of imminent gastric disaster. Examining the remaining cabbage water, a scent of lemon was detected and the mystery was solved. His mother, who suffers from dementia, had squirted washing up liquid into the pan. "Ah," said his father, "that would explain why it frothed so much as it boiled..." Surviving the internal rumblings of discontent, the Cossack reports that he feels particularly clean and sparkly inside.

He also divulged the source of his love for wine. Attending a Boy Scout meeting at the local church when he was a teenager, he and some friends found their way into the vestry. Discovering an unlocked cupboard, they opened it to reveal row upon row of Communion wine bottles. How they searched for a corkscrew, finally succeeding and opening several bottles, all of them becoming very drunk. It always pays to be prepared, I suggested. "Oh yes," said the Cossack, very serious. "I keep a corkscrew in the toolkit of my bike." That's certainly one way to ensure happy wine sampling during his tours of the South of France.

When it got too cold we retreated inside to watch a DVD and drink some more wine. The Cossack is considering getting a computer though he is still uncertain about whether it's worth it. Turning the screen round to face him, I told him to give me any subject that he wanted to find out about, and poised my cursor on the Google toolbar. "Linda Barker!" was his decisive answer. He had confided a strong attraction to her earlier that evening. Tap tap tap and there we had her website, complete with pictures. His smile widened. Anything else he would like to find out, I asked, poised again. "Oh yes!" he said, leaning forward in his enthusiasm. "Her address!" Sorry Linda. I'm almost certain he will turn out to be the harmless type of stalker...

We nipped round to the Ex's yesterday. We promised to push the mail through, you see, and check that all was well while he and the Sun sojourn in Scotland for the week. We also had designs on his sofa. Um. In the purloining sense, not the Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen sense.

We went prepared to grab and run. I put the seats down in the back of the car while Tallboy hunted for a tape measure. We have hundreds of them, ranging from crappy plastic jobs to a rather fancy one from RS. My favourite is my chunky 10m one - not that I have ever had call to measure anything 10 metres in length, but you never know when you might need to. Tallboy sheepishly drew a blank with the tape measures so I marched in to find one, rather gratifyingly laying my hands on the 10m tape. We were still in fallout mode, and it always helps to get one up on the other even if it is something as pathetic as "I can find tape measures better than you. Ner."

We piled into the car and squealed off on the Great Furniture Heist. I dropped Tallboy outside the Ex's and he let himself in quietly with the Sun's front door key while I turned the getaway vehicle around. Following him in, I found him struggling to push the door fully open against the snowdrift of junk mail which had piled up behind it. Between the two of us we managed to get it open in the end.

We had measured the car and knew how much space we had to play with, measuring the sofa we confirmed that we could just about get it in. After a few minutes and with mere background level bickering, we brought the sofa out to the car and shoved it in, along with the cotton throw which had been covering it. It seemed kinder not to leave it there, with nothing to cover. Chucking the tape measure in, we tried to shut the tailgate but it was an inch or two away from closing. Damn. I voted for just going, and hoping the tailgate didn't spring open, but Tallboy had a better idea and after diverting ourselves with a comprehensive bicker about the paintwork and what I felt was wrong with his attitude, the back of the car was strapped securely, and we were off.

Gaining in confidence as the sofa failed to jettison itself out of the car like an escape pod from an airlock in deep space, I built up speed, but had to stop at the only set of lights on the way home. Pulling away at green, we heard an ominous sound from the back of the car, followed by a short silence, terminated by a smack as something hit the ground behind us. Ah. I pulled in on the other side of the lights and Tallboy sauntered back to see what it was that had exited the car. I saw him dodging vehicles as I watched in the rear view mirror, surprised at his turn of speed as he darted out to grab the object. He normally doesn't move very fast.

He returned to the car bearing the remains of my poor tape measure. The cars behind us had seen it fall, and had avoided it. But as Tallboy had approached the lights, he could only watch as a car drove straight over my treasured measure and listen to the case crack under its wheels. It's a bit bent and broken, and doesn't zip back into the case like it used to, but it survived, hooray!

So let this be a lesson to you. When removing a sofa from your ex-husband's house while he is away on holiday, always keep a secure grip on your 10m measure. You know it makes sense.

As you know, Tallboy and I have covered several hundred miles up and down motorways in the past week. My abiding impression of these trips, if we ignore the moronic driving of many of those with whom we shared the road, was the caravans. Hundreds of the things, they emerge blinking for their annual trip to Devon, are lovingly hosed down by their doting owners, hitched up to the car and off!

It's fair to say that many of the caravans we spotted were being towed by recovery vehicles, as the cars that had been towing them had given up the unequal struggle on the hard shoulder. Nothing as spectacular as the time when we were passing a caravan one night and the axle broke, showering us with sparks. My favourite game with caravans is name-spotting. They are always called a name which implies derring-do and just a hint of naughtiness. Like Marauder, or Buccaneer. Most apposite, then.

This week's time-waster is also a caravan game. I thought it rather fitting in the holiday season. It's a simple idea, you have to reverse the caravan into the parking bay in the quickest possible time. See if you can beat my best score of never actually having been able to do it.

You need to scroll down the page a little to get to the game. Instructions (for non-Francophones) are simple: click Play to start, use the arrows on your keyboard to manoeuvre the car using up and down for forwards and back, and left and right to turn the steering wheel. If you liked this, there are many others to play including parallel parking and driving on ice.

So dust off the towbar and stick that silly extra mirror on the side of your car, it's time for Pepere a la Plage.

Mum's place (and Brummie Stepdad's of course) (and the doggies') is an ace little cottage in the Worcestershire countryside. 'Quaint' is one word which springs to mind when you see it. 'Picturesque' is another. But overwhelmingly, the number one word has to be 'tiny'. It's an inky minky dinky little place. The garage is nearly as big as the house.

Tallboy in particular has problems there. If he forgets to duck in the living room, he gets a large beam in the forehead. And if he forgets to duck in the corner of the living room, he gets a large hook through his eye. And a beam in the forehead. He has to limbo up the stairs. And bob through doorways. He is taller than the ceiling in the bathroom. This morning I was having my pre-interview bath, and hooted to see him shaving kneeling down. It was the only way he could see in the mirror...

Last night Mum and BS treated us to dinner at a very nice establishment. Over olives and warm bread, I pleaded with them to ask me test interview questions. Poor Mum had already been subjected to a test run of my presentation, but she's a game old bird and gave it a go. BS asked me the old chestnut "Where do you see yourself in 10 years' time?" My Uni chum Amanada was asked this question by a large accountancy firm once. Her answer? "Norwich."

Home and in bed, I was amazed how much taller Mum's spare bed is than the one at home. At least three times as tall, I'd say. I needed a ladder. With the low ceilings it felt almost claustrophobic. I lay on my back and stuck my leg up in the air, pointing my toes like crazy. I touched the beam but couldn't stretch to the ceiling. Tallboy lazily unfurled one of his long legs and planted it on the ceiling with ease. Sorry about the footprints, Mum. I had the last laugh as Tallboy's ankles got stuck in the end of the bed as if in the stocks. Fortunately he managed to avoid breaking his legs as he turned in his sleep...

Today, negotiating ourselves through Sheffield, we arrived with hours to spare at the interview venue. Killing time we wandered in a huge park which was teeming with absolutely no one. The interview itself went brilliantly. The presentation was fab, I dealt with the questions well (including one which Mum had asked the night before, yay Mum!) and got on well with all the interviewers. The bad news is that they are interviewing another batch on 2nd September so I'm going to be on tenterhooks till then...

On the way home, we battled through torrential rain, thunder and lightning, followed by bright sunshine which reflected beautifully from the wet road surface. Tallboy and I fell out somewhere in the West Midlands. To be honest, considering it was a 400 mile round trip, I'm amazed it didn't come sooner. The reason? Let's just say that if I have a Little Chef cherry pancake every day for the rest of my life, it will still be one less than I could have had...

Tallboy and I are off to Mum's to stay the night, thence to proceed to Sheffield for the interview tomorrow. So at 13.15 on Wednesday please all focus your good luck vibes on me and keep your fingers crossed (if it's convenient/safe, of course).

We had a little scare last night when Tallboy popped out in torrential rain to go and look at bike wiring at the Alchemist's. As he started the car on the way home, a warning light came on and failed to go off. Consulting the manual on his return, it predictably instructed us to take the car to the nearest dealer without delay. Faced with a 400 mile round trip, we were concerned that the fault might be serious, and fretted all night.

This morning, Tallboy called the nearest dealer who confirmed that it should be brought in for diagnostics, and said he could bring it in at ten. The guy was really helpful, ran the diagnostics and pinpointed the problem to an engine management sensor right up under the engine. It had probably been splashed by the puddles last night and shorted, but seemed OK now. Phew. He wouldn't even charge anything for the ten minutes he had spent on the car (I can think of other places which would have banged in an hour's charge straightaway).

They were very good when I took the car in for its first service a couple of months ago. I peeked my head round the end of the bay and said, "Can I have a look underneath while it's up on the ramp?" as I hadn't seen underneath it before. The mechanic waved me in and even gave me a little tour of the underside. Top man. What clinched it for me, though, was that he had removed the cable ties we put on (to keep the hubcaps attached) so that he could inspect the brakes. When he refitted the hubcaps, he stuck a new set of cable ties back on. Other garages I have had the misfortune to patronise in the past wouldn't have bothered.

The establishment? The Vauxhall garage in Yate.

The confession? Our car is a Zafira. No, not a silver one. (Poppy got one too, because she liked ours so much.) You may wonder where my Zafira paranoia comes from. Well, once we had bought it, suddenly Zafiras seemed to spring from every available side turning. Especially silver ones. Bleah.

The Brazil Nut popped round a while ago, resplendent in a rather fetching white dress which shows off her gorgeous tan beautifully. Not that I'm jealous, of course. She spoiled the effect a smidge when I complimented her on her outfit and she said "Oh, it was only £2.50 at the charity shop."

She was excited to hear that the fat sheep had been named by person or persons unknown out there on the internet, and giggled to see a picture of it on the blog. Had I mentioned the sliding down a mountain on her bum yet? Oh yes. At this point, Tallboy decided that it would be amusing to make a guilty swipe for the Sun's handcuffs, saying, "Oooh dear, don't take any notice of these." The Brazil Nut naturally homed right in and the innuendo levels in the room took off.

She came round to ask a favour, a subject which motivates around 85% of her visits to my front door. Cucumbers and other phallic vegetables are involved in a further 10%, with the last 5% of visits occurring as a consequence of her being locked out and needing a) a coffee and b) a sit down.

The favour involved the current French student (on a two week intensive English course) who was out for the afternoon at a barbecue. The BN and family were going out, and the French girl didn't have any keys. Could the BN drop her keys off with me, and would I write a note in French to alert the young lady to come here to pick them up? Mais oui.

With a sense of deja vu I sat down to write the note. I had to do exactly the same thing for the previous student, as the BN is obviously a top Portuguese speaker but doesn't know a word of French. Resisting a strong urge to capitalise on the situation, and write something like

'You are in great danger. The family you are staying with are aliens with designs on your spicy brains. Flee while you still can. A Friend'

I jotted the note saying 'the keys are chez Weevil' and handed it over. Mind you, there's been no ring on the bell as yet. I'm almost certain I wrote the key version not the spicy brains version...

As from Saturday, Weevil Mansions has been a child-free zone and will remain so for a week. The Sun is off in Scotland with his father, and the Steps are in Wales with their mother. So we had the choice of moping round the unnaturally quiet house all weekend or going off and enjoying ourselves somewhere. No contest, really...

We had decided to go to Barnstaple to visit Tallboy's Big Sis and her husband, Former Supermarket Manager. We weren't due there till five so we had the whole day in which to meander around the countryside. Our first stop was at the motorbike shop in Taunton that I visited after my job interview last week. Tallboy couldn't bear it that I had seen the brand new 1000S and he hadn't, you see. Bless him, he was so pleased to see it that he immediately dived into the window display to give it the once over, at one point squatting down to inspect the underside. "Gosh, that T-shirt has shrunk in the wash," I mused as I made apologetic-looking faces at the good citizens of Taunton who, passing the shop, were being inadvertently half-mooned by an excited biker.

Our next stop was a small lay-by on the Tiverton bypass. Having enjoyed our sandwiches as the car shook in the wake of each passing caravan, we executed a perfectly timed changeover when a gap finally appeared in the traffic, and Tallboy drove us the rest of the way to our next halt at the lovely town of Combe Martin on the North Devon coast. I'd never been there before, but Tallboy had been several times as a boy and remembered a fantastic beach full of rock pools and places to explore. The trouble is, our memories of wonderful childhood places seem to be cocooned in a veil of perfection - when we go back to visit maybe decades later, things appear smaller, dirtier, not as wonderful as we recalled. And this in turn seems to degrade our long-held happy memories.

As we turned the corner from the car park onto the beach, Tallboy visibly relaxed. It was, if anything, even better than he remembered. It was quite, quite perfect. The sun was shining warmly, the sky was a gorgeous blue with only a couple of child-drawn fluffy white clouds, and the sea was an amazing, inviting, deep blue. The cliffs that lined the bay were topped with green and made of highly stratified rock at all sorts of angles. It was enchanting. We held hands as we crossed the beach and made our way up the steps to the high concrete breakwater beneath the cliffs.

We had timed our visit perfectly, the tide was out and the top of the breakwater, underwater at high tide, formed a rockpool-bounded path along the bottom of the cliffs. Through the crystal clear water we could see the sand and rocks at the bottom of the rockpools, the forests of seaweed, the shrimps, whelks, limpets, winkles, fish and other assorted residents. They were also swarming with small children clasping shrimp nets, squealing excitedly at each new catch and running to place it with the others in their gaudy plastic buckets arranged haphazardly along the edges of the path. We bent to inspect each bucket as we passed, impressed with the catches, and heaped praise on the beaming proud upturned faces of each bucket's owner.

Tallboy reverted several decades and knelt down to turn over rocks to see if he could surprise any crabs. He managed only to surprise himself by dropping his shades in the water. Near the end of the breakwater the inviting entrance to a cave could be seen, and Tallboy leaped from rock to rock across the pool barring his way, and investigated. Brushing off my entreaties to be careful, he told me with great conviction: "I'm not going to fall in. I don't have anything to change into." I wasn't convinced, and kept myself at the ready in case of emergencies. I would have kicked myself if I missed a golden photo opportunity like that.

At the end of the breakwater we hopped down onto the rocks and sat watching and listening to the incoming tide. We inhaled the sea air, we licked our lips and tasted salt. After half an hour of tide-watching, Tallboy got itchy feet and started mountain-goating around on the ridges of rock, squatting to examine promising-looking pools. I found myself once again silently apologising to our immediate neighbours for the display of cleft flesh. He returned triumphant several times, clutching a small crab, which tickled my palm with its spiky feet, a shrimp which flailed in my grasp and jumped free with amazing vigour, and lastly a small fish, which I declined to hold by recoiling and squealing like a girlie.

Sensibly resolving not to imitate Canute, we wandered back down the breakwater while we could still do so without waves playing round our ankles. Making our way back to the car, we agreed that it had been a most perfect afternoon that nothing could mar. Reaching the tiny car park, however, we counted five Zafiras within a short radius of the car, and the niggle levels rose slightly, only to increase on the drive up the two mile main street when every other car descending seemed also to a vehicle whose name started with z and ended with a.

We arrived in Barnstaple with no further incident (apart from seeing lots and lots of you know what's) and spent a lovely evening with Big Sis and FSM. They had agonised over the catering as they're not used to dealing with vegetarians. Tallboy had tried to explain what I could eat, only for FSM to say, well, we'll get some fish in. No, said Tallboy, that's not vegetarian. Salmon then? Nor that. Ok, chicken. Definitely not that.

Reminds me of the wedding I went to in the late 80s when vegetarians were rather less common than they are now. It was to be a roast chicken dinner at the reception, and I was happy just to have a plate of the veg but the bride insisted that special arrangements be made. As a plate of roast chicken plus veg was slid under my nose, I turned to the waitress and said, "Umm, I'm the veggie." "Ooh yes," she smiled, "we know about you!" My neighbour got my plate and the waitress zoomed off into the kitchen, returning triumphantly with the special meal which she placed proudly in front of me. Cold chicken with salad. Seriously. Apparently it must be veggie if it's cold and accompanied by leaves.

Anyway, at Big Sis's We were treated to Marks and Sparks fabby veggie stuff and very nice it was too. Along with the wine and lemon tarte. We didn't have too brilliant a night's sleep as the spare bed there is a lot smaller than our super duper kingsize one at home, and we both balanced precariously most of the night. But all in all, we've had a lovely weekend, I've treated myself (without Tallboy noticing) to the packet of onion ring crisps we bought at Sainsbury's, I've indulged myself by writing about the nice time we've had, and now it's time to start writing my presentation for the interview on Wednesday. Wish me luck...

Yesterday would have been my Grandad's ninetieth birthday, so it seemed an appropriate day to mark his passing earlier this year. Emotions are still running high in the wider family and many issues have surfaced which are far from being dealt with, so we chose to go ahead by ourselves and remember him in our own way. Mum had a great idea about what we could do, and I was very keen to take part.

The Sun had been staying at Mum's since last weekend for his annual stay-at-Granny's week. His two cousins stay there too, giving the respective parents a break and Mum the need to sleep for a week after they all leave. They do fun things like walk the dogs through the 'bullockses' field, have days out, and have superb craft sessions with old cereal packets and eggboxes ("this one's a pterodactyl glove puppet, mum!").

I pootled up the M5 yesterday morning and arrived at Mum's five minutes after I had predicted. The house was empty, the gate was padlocked, there was no car in the drive and the dogs, who could hear that my car had pulled up, were going radio rental in the kitchen. I tried to calm them by letting them know it was me, but I had to shout so loud for my voice to carry from the gate and be heard over the barking that they totally failed to recognise me. No problem. I got out my mobile and called Mum, receiving the not unexpected message that the phone I had called was switched off. Ah. The thing is, the journey to Mum's house takes about an hour and twenty minutes. Or, to put it another way, just about long enough to really need a wee when you get there.

I was at the point of eyeing up a medium-sized shrub in the corner by the garage when to my everlasting relief I heard the crunch of tyres on gravel and went to greet the posse. I was ushered inside to see and hear what they had been up to, and to receive my present from one of their trips - a red glass frog. I also had to admire my boy's new treasured possession, the handcuffs he had bought in Worcester. The Sun had done his usual trick when away from me for a week and was at least three feet taller, or so it seemed. He had so much to tell me that he almost seemed to forget to breathe, so torrential were the words flooding from his mouth, and by the journey home that evening he was still talking so much that I regretted not having brought some of Thornton's best toffee with me so as to afford my ears a five minute break.

We packed up the car with the Sun's luggage and made our way to the Malvern hills, where Mum had planned our commemoration. Parking in a small car park half way up one of the hills, we piled out and waited for Brummie Stepdad who was to join us for our picnic. I scanned the skies nervously as we waited for him to arrive, as I had been checking the weather forecasts carefully and knew that thunder and lightning were likely. Thankfully the sky, though patchworked with some grey, didn't look too foreboding. With the arrival of Brummie Stepdad, we marched off up the hill to a lovely spot with a fantastic view, there to eat our sarnies.

I became slightly nervous when the first peal of thunder rolled around us, but we hadn't seen any lightning so tried to persuade myself that it must be some distance away. We did have a giggle at the alacrity with which those at the top of the hill were now descending. My concerns mounted as the next two claps rang out, although it was clear that the storm was on the move past and not towards us. I did mention that maybe we ought to think about getting back to the car, though Mum and BS were more sanguine than I, pointing out that we had seen no lightning yet. Well, what was there to worry about? We were only half way up a hill in a thunderstorm. Fair enough, as they pointed out, there were some trees around us which were obviously taller than us, but I had no wish to test the validity of the theory that we would be ok as any lightning would divert to them.

Wandering back down to the cars after seeing a flash of lightning (11 seconds between flash and clap), Mum opened her boot and got out the helium balloons she had bought that morning. We had each written a special message to Grandad on scraps of paper and we tied these to the strings of the balloons. Mum counted us down and we all released our balloons together, watching them fly up into the sky until they were tiny specks, then no more. It was a moving and exhilarating thing to do. As we craned to see them for the final few seconds, there was a huge flash swiftly followed by a deafening thunderclap, and the heavens opened. Timing, eh?

Arriving back in Bristol later, I enjoyed the feeling of the house being full and noisy, with all of us there for the first time in a week. StepD performed the finishing touches of decorating her new bedroom by standing in the middle of the room with a pot of pink paint and a brush, flinging the loaded brush wildly about her to streak and splatter the white walls and ceiling. She made a great job of it, it looks amazing. Methane Boy was enjoying his music, and the Sun was just dead chuffed to be home. As he unpacked, I saw his handcuffs and put them on, wandering with my hands out in front of me into the bedroom, where Tallboy was lying on the bed reading. "Oooh!" he said as he looked up from his book. I got onto the bed next to him for him to remove the cuffs and started to relax after my long day. "You haven't seen this," said Tallboy in a serious-sounding tone of voice as he removed the second cuff and puzzled, I raised my head. To see Methane Boy framed in the doorway watching with interest what his father was doing...

Here we are again, people. Time for something to spend a wasted moment or two on. The Sun and I enjoy playing this one together, as it can help to have a 'spotter' sat looking over your shoulder.

There is a definite chicken theme to this one, which is part of its charm. Basically a word game, you are given a set of seven jumbled letters and a fixed time to get as many words of three or more letters as you can. Each letter is emblazoned on the chest of one of a row of chickens in front of you. As you type that letter to make up a word, it disappears from the chest of the chicken and an egg squirts out of its derriere, to appear as the required letter in the word-making window. When you have made a word successfully, the letters appear back on the chickens and the word you made goes up into the eggbox above them. I always get really narked if I can't work out the seven letter word...

The sound effects are great fun, with the chickens squawking loudly as they lay their eggs. "Uh-oh" say the chickens if you type a letter that isn't there. They cluck you down from ten seconds, and when time is up, salute you with a formation raspberry the like of which I have never seen before. To shake up the letters if your brain is getting stale, you just press the space bar and they reform, making a bit of a fuss.

The very very best bit is when you make a mistake typing and press backspace, as the eggs get shot back up where they came from and the chickens look most discomfited.

So crack your knuckles and get your thinking caps on, it's time for Fowl Words.

This morning I picked up a letter from the doormat, opened it, and talked to it. "No I'm not!" I said, before throwing it down and dancing a little jig. Errrm...some background first, I think...

On Friday last week, I attended an interview for a job I didn't want. Having applied for it in May, I was surprised as anything to get a letter a couple of weeks ago inviting me to an interview. Confirming my attendance, I was amazed that the personnel droid at the other end of the phone was unable to tell me why the selection process had taken so long, how long the interview was scheduled to take, and other sundry and really rather relevant items of information. Funnily enough, this made me not want the job even more.

I resolved simply not to prepare for the interview, to attend, to respond to questions and to go. Then a thought hit me - I would be sat there cool and collected and not caring... What if they said to themselves, "She's cool as cucumber, let's have her!" Eek!

The interview was in Taunton, which involved a jolly little trek on the train, which sadly did not break down, crash, or have to stop because of cows on the line. On a whim, when I arrived at my destination, I phoned my cucumber-bearing internet chum, who works there. Stunned at hearing from me for the first time in 18 months, he offered to buy me lunch.

First, though, the interview. I noted with approval as I entered reception that the entire ground floor was done in different shades of purple. I myself was wearing a purple outfit and at one point the receptionist lost me against the purple wall, only to spot me again when I moved. I made my grateful way out into the open air after a completely uneventful interview during which I inadvertently used a phrase which could have been interpreted as an attempt to be pejorative about their client group, and tried obviously to read their notes, causing them to put their arms protectively around their notebooks like your mate next to you did at school so you couldn't copy.

I mused as I wandered round Taunton town centre that it does have an extremely high population of very vigorous elderly women. There must be something in the air. They were marching purposefully across roads, roaming in herds of half a dozen or more round the pedestrian precinct, and one or two of them were on pushbikes braving a very busy and narrow road. I also awarded top marks to the Big Issue seller who had set himself up behind a little barrier with a large sign on it "Big Issue - Please Form an Orderly Queue".

I had a bit of time to kill before meeting up with Mr Cucumber so I went to play with some motorbikes at my favourite bike shop. I got so immersed in discussions about flat torque curves and cassette racing gearboxes that I didn't notice the time, and had to zoom off when I realised that I had kept my lunch date waiting for twenty minutes. By the time I got there, there was time for a speedy cheese sandwich, a very quick catch up on life, work and divorce, and then I had to run for my train. Literally. I got on seconds before the doors closed.

Hearing nothing that evening even though I had been promised a phone call, I spent the weekend with a niggling doubt in the back of my brain but tried to look on the positive side. I was cheered up no end by a call I got yesterday afternoon from a woman at the NHS. Slightly disorientated at first, I asked if I had missed an appointment. No, she said, she was calling to let me know I'd been shortlisted for an interview next week. Ooh, I said, this is one of the ones I want, great. We ran through the interview time, the title for the presentation and so on. Then I checked whether it would be at the local offices in Bristol. No, she said, Sheffield. Bloody Hells Bells! I had to get the map out to check where it is. Still, it'll be an adventure...

Branching out my stalking activities, I contacted Donna by email to quiz her about her experience of the NHS. Foolishly she gave me her number and I had a very enlightening chat with her tonight about information management and so on. I even got to speak to Crash, who wanted to hear what I sound like. Nutters :) Thanks, Donna, it was very useful. Now to write that bloody presentation...

Back then, to this morning. I received a "sorry you haven't been successful on this occasion" letter from last week's interviewer. Stifling the tears, I read on. "I know you will be disappointed..." "No I'm not!" I said, and skipped down the hall to make some breakfast.

I recall, as a callow youth in my first year at work as a trainee Technician, finding a blackened but usable steel rule at the back of a lab cupboard. I quickly trousered this, as it would be better than the plastic rule I had been using till then.

From then on, curiouser and curiouser, my accuracy in marking out deteriorated. After much haranguing, over several months, my boss, "Airy" Boorne, decided enough was enough, and watched as I drew out some lines, then checked them. Unbelievably they were wrong! Snatching my rule, "Airy" scrutinised it closely. In minute letters at one end were engraved the words "Iron Foundry".

Part of the mystery was solved - the rule was directly scaled for making moulds for cast iron. On one side, the scale became progressively more generous the farther one got until at the twelve-inch mark it was actually twelve and a quarter. Conversely on the reverse, at twelve inches marked on the rule, it was actually eleven and three quarters. Depending on which way up I held the rule, I was either over or under measuring, proportional to the length involved.

The errant rule was quickly sawn in half, and binned. The mystery was why a specialised foundry rule was gathering dust in an Oxford chemistry lab cupboard.

The moral of this story is "don't assume things"- I still haven't learned that! (Just ask Weevil)

Thank you all, I knew I could rely on you - give yourselves a collective pat on the back :)

J's suggestion of JR Ewe-ing has been tickling me all day, but I'm afraid she was pipped at the post by hodmandod who suggested Ewnice. It just fits, really.

Honorable mention to Jenny for Shaun - I would have been sorely tempted to go with this one if we hadn't acquired a manic-looking sheep doorstop from The Big Sheep last year... and named it Shaun already. While I'm on the subject, can I just say that The Big Sheep was a fantastic family day out that we all really really enjoyed - if you are ever stuck for something to do for a day in North Devon, go there, you won't be disappointed.

I now have to go as I must cede the keyboard of power to Tallboy, who is going to contribute his first post. Give us a few minutes, I predict medium-level bickering for a little while as we get him logged in and posting...

Is it really two weeks since she left? The Brazil Nut is back, full of beans, from her holiday. They had a wonderful time, she said. They have a healthy glow and a glorious tan. Well, I saw Mr Nut this afternoon, and he tells a rather different story.

You know when there are nasty flying things around, like mosquitos and midges, what you really want is for a member of your party to be nectar for them. For the bloodsuckers to be attracted only to one person, so much that they form a cartoonesque V shape in the air as they all arrow towards him. You'll be wanting Mr Nut there with you then. Or me. The poor chap was covered in bites, not only from m and m's but from horseflies too. Ouch :( And ticks. Ick. At one point he had seven nestling behind his left knee. The bites on his legs were red and angry, and formed a complex dot-to-dot matrix. I had to keep stopping myself staring at them, trying to make out images and patterns.

I did feel hugely sympathetic, as this is what happens to me. I taste nice to bugs. It was particularly bad when I went to Greece while I was expecting the Sun. Whatever extra little chemicals were being pumped around in my blood were nothing short of addictive to the little blighters.

Fortunately, though, Mr Nut was the only one to suffer so badly. The children had an amazing time out in the wilds, and the dog went totally crazy. Islay developed a taste for swimming in the sea, was taught how to bark by a bigger dog (better late than never!), caught (and killed :( ) a rabbit, and became a magnet for every sheep tick that didn't manage to leap aboard Mr Nut. The BN said she pulled dozens of them off her - she has learned the twist technique which removes the nasty mouth parts which otherwise remain attached and get infected. Meh.

They even climbed a mountain (thus it was described to me at any rate) and stopped, exhausted, to picnic in a little hollow above the parapet of which they didn't dare to venture, so strong was the wind. As they were finishing, a group of mountaineers came by and asked them were they going up or down? Down, they said, it was too windy and there was no view because the cloud was so low. Who knew how far they would have to go to get to the top. Follow us, said the climbers, it's about five minutes to the top. And so it was and what a view, with the wind dropping and the clouds gone.

Coming back down again, the BN got fed up with mincing down sideways. She said coming down on the heather was scary, as you couldn't tell whether you had a firm foothold until you had committed yourself to the step. So she did what any crazy person would do - she sat down and slid down a mountain on her bottom. Sometimes the heather gave out and she would have to get up and trot across a rock formation, but for the most part it was the arse/heather combination. Yes, she admitted, her jeans had been a little worse for wear at the end. No, she hadn't managed to get them clean yet. And she would have to sew up that tear...

So anyway, you must be wondering how she rewarded her faithful neighbour for the care of her precious garden. Remember the cucumbers I have wrestled, the delicious courgettes I have been forced to eat, the lettuces, beans and peas which found their way to my plate rather than go to waste on the plant. The arduous journeys I have made in the searing heat from my house to hers, 15 metres down the road. The risk to my back as I picked up the mountains of junk mail from inside her door. Your curiosity is no doubt rampaging as you consider what this woman, who has holidayed for two weeks in the land of tablet and the single malt, can have bought me to recompense for my loving devotion to her greenery. Let me put you out of your misery, gentle reader. She bought me a fat sheep.



It's rather sweet actually. Although she did say she had bought it because it reminded her of me. Hmmm. Now, the problem is that I cannot abide to have a plush toy without a name. I don't have many of them, but those I do have, have a name. Like Bertie the Bear. And Babs the Baboon. But I'm stumped when I look at this sheep. Nothing comes to mind. So this is where you come in, all you people out there. In true Blue Peter style, let's have some suggestions of names for this creature. Let's name the fat sheep the Brazil Nut brought me from Scotland...

I was moaning recently in comments on others' blogs that I don't have people dropping in to Weevil Stepmother on the back of wacky and exciting searches. The vast majority of keywords used to find their way here are either "weevil" or "stepmother". I imagine that searchers for either of these terms are somewhat baffled to arrive here. Ooh, and hello if you're one of them *big wave*. Sometimes the keywords are "weevil stepmother", but I have a sneaking suspicion that could be Mum having forgotten the url...

There was of course the notorious "ladies weeing" search which has been duplicated a few times since (you can stop now Phil, thanks). But in the past week my logs have turned up two absolute gems.

The first was a Google search for "crazed weevil". I'm proud to say this site was top of the list :)

The second was a revelation - I'm a Googlewhack! One happy visitor got here by searching for swingball stoats. I sincerely hope this individual was actually looking for a Googlewhack. If this search was made in all seriousness, the mind boggles. I'm sure a stoat wouldn't hang on to the ball for long as it whizzed around, and if you were to play one at swingball I just can't imagine one could manage to keep a grip on the bat in its little paw. Although to be fair the wee inept beastie might make quite a tough opponent for swingball amateurs like Phil and Donna.

I have written this post as an entry in Jay Allen's Blogging for Books contest. The theme is the best or worst experience you've ever had working for someone else.

My best job ever was working at a University supporting deaf students. The main part of the job involved sorting out operators to cover their lectures, but once in a while there was no one available and I would have to do it myself. Sometimes this was great fun, at other times, horrendous (I'm thinking mainly of Economics here!).

I would trundle off to the lecture with a laptop slung over my shoulder. Meeting up with the student, we would choose a seat near an electrical socket and unpack the 'puters, hooking them up together. Mine ran the sending software, and theirs ran the receiving software, so when I typed in mine, the text came up on their screen. They could type me back little messages if they wanted clarification on something but mainly they sat there reading on their screen what was being said in the lecture.

You have to be a fast and accurate typist to do this, and also have the ability to process information very quickly in your head. Normal speech is around the 200 words per minute mark, and no one can type that quick on a QWERTY keyboard, so you have to listen to what's being said, while you're processing the last bit to condense it down, while you're typing the last bit you condensed. Rubbing tummy, patting head and tying a knot with your toes...

It wasn't all fun by any means. Some subjects were dire, some lecturers impenetrable. There was one wonderful lecturer in Social Policy who practically spoke in bullet points, you could almost see the structure of the lecture in the air around him, but he was definitely the exception. Sometimes your student didn't turn up, and you would pack all the kit up as quietly as you could, at times having to creep doubled over behind the bemused lecturer to unplug the cable from the mains before making your pink-faced escape up the stairs to the exit.

But this was really the point. The hearing students had to endure bad teaching. The hearing students had to go to boring lectures. The hearing students could oversleep or just not bother to go. It shouldn't be any different for the deaf ones. We were there to level the playing field. I remember one seminar in a room overlooking the road outside on a miserable rainy November day, when during the session I heard an agonised squeal of brakes followed quickly by a dull crump and a tinkling of glass. Without consciously thinking about it, I had typed *sound of car crash from the road outside*. I wasn't there to filter what I thought the student next to me should have access to. In any event, if I hadn't typed those words, they would have been extremely puzzled by the others craning to see what happened, and the altered dynamic in the room.

Some of the best lectures I went to were with sixth form school students who were deciding which University to apply to. It was particularly important for the deaf students to see what kind of support the University could offer, so we gave them a taster at special lectures put on during the University's open day. The feeling I got from seeing their expressions at the end of the lecture was unrivalled. They were so charged with excitement at realising that they really could do it, that the support was there to give them access to this world.

The lecture which sticks most in my mind, though, was one in which awareness dawned not for the deaf student, but for everyone around him. Unexpectedly, the lecturer finished ten minutes early. "Right then you lot," he said. "You all know that we're going on strike tomorrow, and since you all seem to be treating it as just a day off, I'm going to talk to you about the issues we're dealing with here. For a start..." He tailed off as he noticed me busily typing at the front. "You can stop that," he said to me, uncomfortable about the possibility of there being a record of what he was about to say.

I typed: Lecturer: [to operator] You can stop that.

"No." Operator: No.

"I've finished the lecture now." Lecturer: I've finished the lecture.

*firmly* "If I hear it, I'll type it." Operator: If I hear it, I'll type it.

There was absolute silence in that room. You could have heard a pin drop. And if one had, I would have typed *sound of pin dropping*. My heart was pounding as I didn't relish the prospect of a showdown with a lecturer in front of a hundred or so gawping students. Then realisation dawned on the lecturer and the other students that if I didn't keep typing, the student next to me would have had no access to what was going on there in front of him, and that this would be wrong.

The lecturer smiled and turned away. "Fair enough then," he said, and carried on talking about why he was going to strike the next day. I kept typing. For all I knew the student reading those words didn't give a stuff about why his tutor wouldn't be there tomorrow. But he had every right not to be excluded from the opportunity to know.

Were you ever the kind of child who enjoyed building exquisite detailed sandcastles with shells, flags and all sorts, stood back to admire your work then demolished it with glee? You too? Then you'll love this week's timewaster. (Demolition not compulsory, honest.)

Brainchild of the talented Denise Wilton, this site allows you to build little communities in snoland, in medieville (mediweeville?), or in blankton. Fun for a five minute mooch or a half-hour (or longer) extravaganza, you can save your city, send it as an ecard, come back to it later, work on one collaboratively with a friend, even set your city as your desktop wallpaper. (You have to register with the site to do most of these but can build without registering.)

I just knocked up a quick artist's impression of Weevil Mansions to show you all how easy it is:



I didn't have time to do the extensive grounds, country park, outhouses and stables but you get the general idea, I'm sure.

So here we go people, for this week's timewaster I give you *medieval trumpet fanfare* ... thank you, that will do ... I give you City Creator.

I have to admit that I'm not immune to the odd little accident, like dropping a large kitchen knife on my bare foot (two days ago, small nick, no blood), falling down the stairs (5 months ago, banged shoulder and head, should have been looking where I was going and not wondering what shade of blue to paint the bathroom) or nearly severing my thumb on a toilet. I may have these little happenings from time to time, but here's the important thing - I always know what I've done.

Tallboy sometimes seems to be a series of accidents loosely joined by the odd pain-free moment here and there. There was the time when he was bringing the duvet cover downstairs for washing and got his legs entangled in it with obvious consequences - he really twisted his ankle and it took ages to get better because his old bed wasn't as long as he was and his foot drooped, unsupported, off the end. And the time when his foot was run over while he was waiting at a roundabout on the bike - not his fault at all, some morons thought it would be funny to do it, and he still has a scar where his calf was squished into the footpeg. And his hernia - or 'hyena' as the Sun christened it. And the time he slipped over getting into the bath, jarring his arm and shoulder - hopefully the operation next month will fix that for him. And who can forget the nasty bang on the finger occasioned when he was helping me fit the barrel on the Purple Peril's engine (at least a four-hand job, that) and I let it drop after the last piston ring had been breached. These injuries are all ones which I have witnessed or had related to me very soon after the event. Or caused, come to think of it.

The others, which he acquires mostly at work or in the shed here, are complete mysteries. I will notice a new cut or burn or graze or bruise or chunk missing, and will ask, "How did you do that?" - the answer to which question, nine times out of ten, is "I don't know." I find this incredible. He has had some really nasty slices and bruises, and can honestly say he has no recollection of how they got there. It's become a family joke that one day Tallboy will come home after work with a gently pulsing stump where his right arm used to be, and when asked "How did you do that?" his gaze will follow the direction of the horrified pointing finger and his expression will register mild surprise and he will say "I don't know."

The Sun is in training to follow in his footsteps. His legs are continually covered in bruises varying from little dark smudges to full-on multicoloured extravaganzas. I believe that there has been one time in the past five years when there were no bruises at all on his legs. I shudder to think what the teaching staff at school think when he changes into his PE shorts. He had one on his shin last week, it was bigger than a credit card, and about the same kind of shape. "How did you do that?" was my immediate query. I don't learn, do I? "I don't know," came the response. Arrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhh!

"So, Weevil," you may be thinking, "you nearly severed your thumb on a toilet? Really? How did you do that?" If I said I didn't know, would you believe me?

Well of course I know, unlike all these other unconsciously-mutilated freaks round here. It was during the building work on the extension that a shame-faced Boss Builder came out of the garage to confess that some idiot had dropped something heavy on the toilet bowl, cracking it irretrievably. It was moved into the kitchen out of their way. When Tallboy got home that night, I could hardly wait to tell him the exciting news of the day, and dragged him into the kitchen to show him the stricken WC. The cracked part was hidden from view so I gestured round the back to demonstrate the extent of the damage. Sadly, I was incredibly accurate about its location and discovered the hard way that a broken ceramic surface is about as sharp as you can get. I had no idea that every day I was entrusting my botty to something that potentially could remove a buttock. It was a huge cut which bled and bled and took ages to heal. But at least I knew how I'd done it...

I woke up at 04.47 this morning to blinding flashes of light spiking through the bedroom blind, bowel-shaking rumbles of thunder, and the hammering of several swimming pools worth of rain. Brontotastic!

The break in the weather has been most welcome as the nights have been sticky and muggy and the days glaringly hot. I've even got a new cat, due to the weather. Pesky used to be a very nice witch's cat kind of black. Now she's brown, presumably bleached by the sun. And finding amazing new reserves of lying around snoozing when I thought she had that pretty much completely covered...

This afternoon, as I sat at my desk, I became aware of more rumbles in the distance. It wasn't over yet. I wasn't sure how far away the thunder was, or whether it was even heading this way, so, in order to assess the need for crazy unplugging (I'm paranoid about the computers), decided to brave the rain and stick my head out of the window.

Hopping up onto the step stool I keep underneath the back velux specially, my head emerged through the window and I scanned the horizon hawkishly for evidence of the storm. The rain was refreshing, though, and I stopped for a moment just enjoying the coolness. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I became aware of a presence, a shape that shouldn't be there. Slowly, I turned my head to the left and there, perched on the highest part of the TV aerial was that damn woodpigeon. You know, the one that taunts me by cooing down the flue. It, in turn, swiveled its head round to look at me. There we were, practically nose to beak. It tried to outstare me, then tilted its head to one side engagingly. Shrugging its wings and ruffling them back into place, it turned away again to contemplate the garden.

I paused for a while, envisaging a cartoon-like scene where a bolt of lightning would descend and strike the pigeon, leaving its smouldering skeleton still clinging to the aerial. I daydreamed happily for some time until the thought occurred to me that, during a thunderstorm, I was stood there sticking my head out of the highest point of my house right next to a large piece of metal (with fetching pigeon accessory). I ducked back in pretty sharpish, I can tell you. The pigeon, braver by far than me, lived to coo another day.

The unnatural forces at Weevil Mansions are multiplying. Their target this time - underwear.

The girls' knickers end up randomly distributed between the two of us. The plain ones, that is. The fancy ones know exactly where they belong. And as far as I can see, the boys' appear to migrate arbitrarily between all three of their underwear drawers.

Tallboy rose with an anguished wail this morning. "I have no pants!" It was true, there were none in his drawer and none in the clean laundry waiting to be put away. Nor were there any of his in Methane Boy's underwear drawer. Nor in the Sun's. Nor (and this is where the Twilight Zone music should start playing gently in the background) were there any in the laundry basket awaiting washing. Where have they gone? I've bought him three packs in the last six months. We should be smothered in the damn things. Every morning, Tallboy should be surfing down the stairs on a multicoloured wave of cotton undies. Not standing forlorn, looking hopefully into the cobwebbed corners of his underwear drawer.

Socks, too, are affected by the underwear goblin. Somehow there only ever seemed to be one of a pair of the Sun's in the washing basket at any one time. Their partners must have made bids for freedom under the bed or in the cupboard. When the time came for distribution of fresh laundry, he would be lucky to have one complete pair out of all his socks from the wash. "Aha!" I thought, "I will put the singletons on top of his drawers, and then when the next wash is done, I will match them with their errant partners." This failed to work rather spectacularly. The pile grew and grew until, concerned that it might tip and engulf the poor child pinning him helpless to the floor, I got a bag and put them in.

With some minor successes in Sock Blind Dating I foolishly let myself hope that we had turned a corner. As the bag grew fatter and fatter though, I realised that something somewhere was terribly wrong. The child was wearing odd socks to school every day - it turned into quite a trademark for him. Aghast, I rounded up all the socks in the house and engaged in a frenzied matching session, at the end of which I had to accept the awful truth that the majority of his socks had no fellows.

I ditched the lot and went out and bought him a full complement of new ones, each pair exactly the same as the others. Ha!

Methane Boy is himself no stranger to sock woes. He favours black socks sporting characters from the Simpsons or South Park. And huge holes in the toes and soles. I have never known anyone with such caustic feet, and in that I include the Cartographer, who had feet of mass destruction as a teenager. MB's socks do not get worn out, they get eaten by the noxious atmosphere surrounding his feet. It really is quite frightening. I once bought him some M&S socks which boasted an added ingredient to keep down the smell. He wore them once. I never saw them again...

So now you know. We are infested with invisible underwear fiends. If you ever pop by for a cuppa, I suggest you keep one hand in close proximity to your waistband, just in case. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go and accompany Tallboy on an underwear hunt.

Blimey days! If you think I'm going to let you catch me Crash, you're wrong :)

I think I have a few loose ends to tie up, so here goes:

The Wedding - all went very well, no hostilities between parents. Top marks to my Wicked Stepmother who leaned over and shook hands with Mum and Brummie Stepdad, who was in wedding mode (smile, shake hands, smile, and so on) and didn't have a clue who she was until Mum told him. The Planner looked amazing and she and the Cartographer made a wonderful couple. Yay for happy couples!

The Reading - Five minutes before the ceremony I could hardly remember any of my words but the reading went off very well and I didn't have to look at my notes once. Tallboy did his best to sabotage the reading on several occasions whilst I was learning it. The first line goes "Now you will feel no rain, for each of you will be shelter for the other." The first attempt at sabotage was to suggest that it should read "Now you will feel no rain, for the wedding list will include a large golf umbrella". This, while unhelpful, was easily beaten aside. Not so easy to deal with was the offering he made me the day before the wedding - "Now you will feel no pain..." This lodged in my brain, and how it didn't appear during the reading I will never know.

The Journey to Shrewsbury - given Tallboy's track record for navigation, we agreed before we set off that we would probably have a row at Bridgnorth. Though Tallboy thought that Kidderminster might come up late on the rails as he recalled one particular roundabout that had caused him problems several times before. We had been through the route together, I had written it out in big clear writing, and we were confident that we knew where we were going. What could possibly go wrong? Well as it happens, nothing. We arrived in Shrewsbury in good time without having driven a single centimetre out of our way. The reason? I felt really tired on the motorway and could hardly keep my eyes open so we swapped over at Strensham and I navigated, falling asleep during straight stretches of road where there was no danger of roundabouts.

Somerfield Hubcaps - whilst in Shrewsbury I had the bonus of spotting a Somerfield delivery van. It did indeed have very jazzy looking hubcaps, but as it was stationary, I couldn't tell if they stayed still when the van was moving. Curses! Anyone else seen one in motion?

The Wedding Reception - this took place at the Planner's parents' house, or rather in their garden. Not a huge venue, but well laid out with a bar in the garage and a large Berlin Wall type trellis down the middle. Which turned out to be pretty fortunate, as the paternal posse sat one side of it and the maternal posse sat the other, while Weevil alternated between the two sides. And the bar.

The Journey Home from Shrewsbury - when we had managed to prise the Sun and StepD away from the dessert table, we piled into the car and made our way back. Tallboy had foolishly kindly offered to drive back, so I had been able to have a glass of wine. Or two. Unfortunately I do tend to babble inconsequentially when tiddly (it's a gift Phil, go for it) and Tallboy was rather hoping this wouldn't be the case this time. Last time he drove back from Mum's with a tiddly passenger in the front seat, he told me grey-faced the next morning that those one and a half hours had been the longest in his life. I just remember the caravan's axle snapping as we overtook it. Apparently I said, "Oooh sparks!" The rest of the journey was a happy blur. Coming back from Shrewsbury, I apparently burbled about Nuclear Power Stations for a bit, navigated us through Kidderminster with panache, felt woozy, opened the window a bit and went to sleep for the rest of the trip.

Computer woes - a message from Methane Boy over the wires last week urged me to tell him how to hibernate his computer (this is a way of shutting down which lets you restart in exactly the same position you were when you shut down, without going through restarting the operating system, etc). He had worked out most of it, just needed to know which button to press to make it happen. I told him. Back came the message "I'm going to test it, brb". After ten minutes, it was clear that he wasn't going to be right back at all. I considered phoning to check all was OK but decided he had probably been distracted by a cake or something, so left it. I learned the horrible truth the next day - the PC was very deeply hibernating and wouldn't wake up. Worse news today - Network Guy has been coaxing and twiddling - but all is lost. Not only will it not come back alive, but it has lost every single scrap of information on it. Every one. Every single not-backed-up-at-all-no-not-a-bit-of-it piece of information. Meh. So, have you backed up recently? Yes you there, have you? If not, go and do it immediately. Well, finish this post first, then off you go and do it, in memory of Methane Boy's poor lost data.

Oooh look, a bench - Tallboy and I have toiled for hours this afternoon, using up leftover wood the builders left behind. We made a bench :)



Yep, we think it looks rugged and rustic too.