The Monkeys Share a Moment

Nico the Beluga Whale

One of my favourite books is " Turtle Diary " by Russell Hoban .

Whatever you feel about these massive creatures being contained in tanks it was impossible for me to resist being completely captivated by Nico as he swam right in front of me .

Back from Atlanta !

( Subtitle Alice has a new monkey from Pottery Barn Kids )

Those of you who follow this blog will know that Alice the skinny greyhound has many loveable traits , not least the one where when she needs to go out ( and means business ) she gets very silly and throws her toy monkey up in the air . As the monkey gets a bit jaded and is indeed looking a bit dishevelled I spotted the most amazing long skinny monkey in Pottery Barn Kids in the Lenox mall in Atlanta ( yes I did manage to fit in a bit of retail therapy at the close of business on one or two of the conference nights and very satisfying it was too , even if the dollar pound ratio was ghastly and my feet were hurting due to a nasty case of Dhobi itch ( the alternative name for athlete's foot as found on the medication box ) and yes I did get Nat's Uggs in chocolate brown , the tall ones thank you for asking and they probably saved me quite a few squids , besides my bacon .

Alice is loving this new monkey , in particular the odd grimace on its face and the present has gone down very well , almost as well as the Uggs in fact .

Atlanta was quite an experience . Amazing how I can travel to the other side of the world and back and spend day after day watching speaker after speaker ( 17 in one day ) , working from 8 30 till 5 30 , then shopping , sightseeing ( CNN HQ , Atlanta Aquarium with its three beluga wales , church service in Sweet Auburn , Martin Luther King Centre , socialising , drinking the occasional cocktail in a revolving bar overlooking the city then riding up and down in glass lifts for the sheer " we dont get to do this in England " fun of it , and not suffer a single headache . When not a month ago I take a tiny flight to cardiff in Wales and then spend the next two or three days incarcerated in a fairly ghastly student room unable to leave the sanctuary of bed and bathroom and finally end up in Accident and Emergency at the local hospital . Moral of the tale ..... if I'm going to a conference , go to an American one , they suit me better !

And one of the best things about going away ?

Coming back Monday morning and finding a surprise waiting for me ... David had stayed up till 4 am two nights running ( or was it three ... or five and he isnt saying ? ) to paint the kitchen the most amazing lime green . The preparation alone would have taken me ten years .

Pictures will follow ....

Monkey Dog

We can't decide what it is with Alice .

For weeks she will be perfectly housetrained and sleep soundly till mid morning so long as she is wrapped like a mummy in a series of fleece blankets and has the sofa to herself and is tucked up with her monkey .

Then Ping , it all goes pear shaped and she starts tippy tappy to the top of the stairs as far as the stair gate and whine whine till I wake ( D's tinnitus mitigates against any overnight hearing of Dogs or Car Alarms or indeed anything needing attention , though he does respond very rapidly to a prod and is very happy to go and deal ... ) and go down and see what she wants . back on the sofa , Alice is by this time usually making it clear that she has been disturbed and wants tucking back in with monkey and the blanket . Pearl the Senior Birman is often sitting primly on the chair , back turned , and one wonders if she has tweaked the blanket away as Alice sleeps . Who knows ? Pearl gives nothing away .

But occasionally there is a double pear and sometimes even a Mr Whippy and Alice has not come either to have her blanket replaced or to ask to go out but to inform the Responsible Adult that the carpet is wet or worse , she can't abide the smell from the chocolate log in front of the tv . Horrors... the heart sinks and the clean up operation begins . ....

Then the inevitable trudge back up to bed and the stupid pointless internal dialogue .... why is she doing this ? Why does she mostly ask to be out but not this time ? Why does she need three poos in one day ? Why come and get us after she has been but not before ? Blah Blah ....

Energy Champions

Humorous e mail from friend about the university she works in having lost money via investment in Icebank . As a result they are appointing Energy Champions to save money .... tunring off lights etc .
My dad was the self appointed energy champion in our home when I was growing up . You might have had one too, if you're as old as me . It involved the lights being turned off as you were coming down the stairs and usually invoked a flurry of yells from my mother threatening to kill him if we or she tripped in the dark and broke our necks . It never made a blind (oops) bit of difference , he still felt the pennies saved were more crucial than the health and safety issues . As our lavvy light was outside the actual bog as well if you were sitting brooding in there he would often turn the lights off whilst you were on the pot , thus necessitating finishing the job in pitch dark . So it never phases me when there's a power cut , it just reminds me of the olden days ... fumbling for the bog roll and so on . Thanks Dad for that .

I had to go to an interminable school meeting last night . There were power point presentations last night where the handouts on the chairs bore no resemblance to the presentations on the screen , throwing me into a right state of turmoil , thinking mine had been stapled together wrongly . Nat had refused to accompany me , having bigger fish to fry , in a bottle of cider , possibly . The meeting involved much jargon such as learning portals ( what ? ) , targets , key stage this and tier that and by the end I was stuffed . When they announced your student should be revising two and a half hours ( per day ? per week ? ) I know it was all over . The teachers were all very jolly and made some important points about citizenship and attendance and things I can relate to so all was not lost ....

Delicious Carbs ?

I'm off to Atlanta next week , leaving at the crack of dawn on Tuesday and not returning for several days . Travelling for a conference and I'm already starting to think about my last such experience ( no not Cardiff , when I wasn't so much fretting about carbs as carbolic and how to clean the lavatory in my little uni room which became horribly blocked when I was overcome by migraine and all its attendant effluents but that's a whole other story ). No not Cardiff but Albuquerque in New Mexico , October about three years ago .

Sarah Vine has this morning written a wonderful piece about carbs and those of us on low carb diets , describing us as miserable ( if skinny ) gits and wondering what is the point of being able to fit into those lovely skinny jeans of yesteryear and sit entirely comfortably in our easy chairs without our muffintops threatening our internal organs ( and dear Readers , I'm almost there ) if we are all the while so miserable we grump our way from one end of the day to the other . And here's the thing ! She says its the lack of carbs .... that people who don't eat enough carbs are grumpy ! Now I've been grumpy for years and there are people who would testify that I could grouch and moan even whilst troffing my bar of Dairy Milk , and latterly I've put everything , but Everything down to the Topamax ..... my persistent cough ..... my broken ribs ...and now latterly my grumpiness and thoughts of how relaxing it must be to simply fall asleep for a very long time .
But now here is Sarah suggesting its the Low Carbness ??? What am I to make of this ?

And how does this connect with my trip to the States ? I'll tell you how ? Its the thought of all those delicious conference breakfasts which have been starting to niggle away at me . The enormous baskets of croissants and assorted Danish pastries that arrive at around 8 am , scenting the air with the aroma of almonds , chocolate , coffee. The coffee which arrives which little pots of milk all flavoured with hazelnut or rum or brandy ... the machines selling chocolate right outside every room . Or so it would seem . The restaurants serving mega portions of everything .... I don't need to go on do I ?

It would be silly not to check out whether in fact Sarah has a point ? At least at breakfast time .
I can't be expected to fiddle about with yoghurt whilst standing up and making small talk with people from different countries can I ? ( And there won't be any yoghurt , I know this for a fact , just pastries ) . All eyes will be upon me as one of the few Brits attending ... I don't want to come across as pernicketty about food , that would be unmannerly and well , like I said , just silly in the face of those delicious pastries .
As Sarah said
Delicious Carbs . Here I come . Just for a week .