A quiet birthday?

Am pleasantly surprised that besides myself the site does actually have visitors! Ok .. so it's no way competing with Disneyworld or Dollywood (I think that's what Dolly Partons theme park is called) but nonetheless there are those out there who are reading my tiny little thoughts and perhaps smiling.

I was definitely smiling tonight ... Mujnu, my nephew, is the grand old age of two tomorrow and he had his birthday party at the grandparents home today .. Vertigo and I had been discussing what we were buying the kid and mention had been made of various loud and annoying gifts such as musical instruments but we thought better of it.

Suffice to say that Mujnu and his parents were happy with all the quiet gifts Mujnu received. Goliath explained that the Phonics Alphabet toy that I had bought for Mujnu's Eid present was doing his head in. Apparently Mujnu loves playing with it during the day but it also has a tendency to turn itself on in the middle of the night if a moth fluttered by within a mile radius! We explained the concept of batteries to Goliath and how to remove them and Visa told him to be thankful that we hadn't bought the kid a drumkit.

Anyhow everyone was having a great time, eating plenty of food and watching the kids fight it out over all the toys when we got a late visitor bearing gifts. All the kids run to tear off the wrapping paper (kids don't care whose birthday it is, they're not missing out!) and a huge roar of laughter and cheers erupt from all the adults, except Mujnu's parents who are holding their heads in their hands. The latecomer looked around bemused ... "Did someone else buy a drumkit too??!!"

Is anyone out there?

Have decided to install a visitor counter to see if anyone out there is actually reading this. This could prove embarrassing ...

Moon landing

Well it's one small step for Zoo, one giant leap for his parents. Zoo has taken his first stumbling steps from one set of arms to another. He has been tottering for a week but except for myself and Cream, no independant unbiased person was able to verify this as he refused to "do the trick" whilst anyone else was around.

However today his aunt managed to witness his feat. Perhaps he was expressing a sense of solidarity ... she has been known to fall after three or four steps herself, she's not called Vertigo for nothing!!

Answer to a philosophical question

There has always been some questions that needed answering .. the one that popped to mind today was "whether a tree makes a noise if it falls in the woods and there is no-one around to hear". I have discovered the answer ... yes.

Zoo was tottering around the house, everything possibly dangerous has been nailed down, firmly secured or moved out of reach, whilst we were doing our own things and we heard an almighty scream. He had fallen on his bottom, not hurt himself at all, but because there was no-one around to check him over, he decided to make a noise!

Next question I will be working on is Shrodinger's cat in a box ... Watch out cats, here I come!

Please don't feed the animals

Not sure what's up with mum these days ... to put things politely ... she's a large woman and normally nibbles when we go round to eat. I've never worried too much about it as I have witnessed her "checking" her cooking for seasoning and it normally involves eating a small portion of each dish of which there are many. Add this to her regular cups of tea and the lack of any weight loss and you can tell she's fine.

However it's Ramadan and we are all fasting from about 5.30am until 6.30pm and my mother has it would seem stopped eating altogether! She came round to mine twice to open her fast and ate all the starters and then moved her main course around on the plate but never ate it. I just assumed she didn't like my cooking. But having gone round to the parents for iftari, I noticed her doing the same to her own cooking.

As we all tucked into our large portions of food, I questioned her on how little she was eating and she commented "I'm only human!". We all looked at each other and then in a chorus cried "And what are we then ... animals?"

Four months of blog

Well that didn't work well at all ... after securing everything down and leaving him to his own devices he just got frustrated that there was no-one to play with. I suppose I should be glad that he's a sociable little thing .. but I never realised how exhausting entertaining a kid is! He is now having his morning nap in his cot so bugger the ironing ... time to blog.

Dr John Reid amazed me by asking all muslim parents to be on the look out for possible terrorist tendencies in their children. The signs are hanging around with pious religious types, learning more about their religion and culture, taking an interest in international issues, possibly even attending protest marches. Now most parents of any religion would be ecstatic if their children took more of an interest! But it would seem they are wrong to. If your child is out of the house until 3am, comes home reeking of alcohol and obviously drugged up, spends their time locked in their bedroom listening to loud music and ignoring everything you say whilst still living under your roof ...then you're ok. See it's always the quiet ones you need to keep an eye out for.

Mrs Campbell would have done well to heed Reid's advice. Her daughter, Misbah, who she chose to rename "Molly" was showing classic signs of being radicalised! Taking an interest in her religion, refusing to drink alcohol, wanting to spend more time with a menacingly large bearded muslim. She should have sat her down and had words! Instead she let her be and Misbah managed to get kidnapped by her father to be forced into an arranged marriage with an old man in Pakistan.

The media soaked up every last drop of this ... evil Pakistani father, kidnapped child, forced marriage, tearful news conferences ... until they realised that they had the completely wrong end of the stick ... they had the candy floss on the other end and once they placed it into their mouth it melted away and just left them with sticky fingers! In the words of Misbah's brother it turned out to be "total bullshit". Some showed signs of remorse but to this day they still infuriatingly refer to her as "Molly".

Zoo does his own thing ..

Blimey .. haven't been able to spend a sufficient amount of time at the computer for me to be able to blog ... but am being brave today and letting Zoo "do his own thing." This invariably means he crawls and cruises around the house and I go running when he starts screaming (which normally means he is getting frustrated that he can't get hold of/into something) or alternatively when he is uncharacteristically quiet (which means he's managed to get hold of/into something that he's not meant to!) Oh dear .. I hear screaming ..