Paul Davidson
Weeknotes 071: I didn’t like the loud light
These are especially late because I was away on a stag and it would have been more nonsensical than usual.
Travel during storms without trains is a bugger. We did the huddle-on-the-floor-beside-the-toilet thing. The stag has no plans to be a parent, but the abandoned pram beside him gave a lot of people the opposite impression, to his obvious discomfort.
London town remains a fun place to visit and not live. Full of stories that stayed well enough away from banter to be funny. The Irish lads enjoyed the British museum. And it was only when I got home that I found out the Dublin Castle is infamous. Old enough that I was drinking pints of water by that point. After we taught them a few Empress “cocktails” that is. Baileys and Aftershock. Yummy.
The Best Man found us a hotel for £24 a night. And it had walls, beds and a sign that said “Hotel”, so who are we to argue? It provided a grotty grimness to videocalls with Piglet reminiscent of cheap European horrors.
We spent so long prepping Piglet for sharing her toys during the party, we forgot to say I was going away. A last minute deal that I would meet up with Santa for a present if she was good worked. I returned to stories of how one of the bigger boys read stories with her.
While on the 10-hour leg of the 3-hour journey back via Carlisle, I could catch up on videos of Piglet riding her scooter to the pub in the dark smotherings of chocolate ice cream. She even got a rare visit from her Auntie, up from Dorset.
The upshot of the delays is that the train is free. But the refund website won’t accept pdf tickets. Not to be too cynical, but if something was this broken for getting money, rather than giving money, it would be fixed by now.
The local park is steadily being fixed. The swings are back from their Covid hiatus and the one-person see-saws are all back. Including a motorbike which has been out of action since before we moved. Piglet is smitten.
Just as Piglet finishes, The Chef has started teething. She’s been distracting herself with her airpods and I might need to upgrade us to a family streaming account. The only eeny-weeny teeny-tiny consolation is that she got the job! We celebrated with customary fried chicken and midweek Cremant.
As we’ve got a metro mayor round here, we get a sop of arts and culture funding. There’s a lights and stories festival coming up and the taster session was down the road, beside a lovely cafe. Be rude not to.
With The Chef working this weekend and my parents in Glasgow for their 40th wedding anniversary, Piglet was farmed to Lǎolao and Lǎoyé while I dug a trampoline hole. Had a lovely chat with the neighbours in between tunes and hacking out tree roots. One of the roots turned out to be a mystery wire. Both me and it were fortunate to avoid the secateurs. Flushed with optimism I tried to move 350 kg turf in one deadlift. Might invite the Mountain round next time. An evening bath with half a bag of magnesium salt spared my back the worst effects.
Instead of building the trampoline over the hole on Sunday I called Daddy-Daughter day. We rocked on the motorbike. Got underwhelmed by the Mouse House. Debated whether festival lights or hand-driers are scarier. Said Hi! to the Archaeopteryx. Made lamb pie together. And cuddled when The Chef got home.
27 February 2022