Apropos Bercow

Ten years ago when John Bercow was made Speaker I insisted on watching his inauguration live on television.

Thunderthighs (then aged 13) came into the room and asked “Why are you watching this?”

“Because it’s historic.”

“Why?”

“Well.  The previous speaker was forced out, which has seldom happened before.  John Bercow was elected by secret ballot of all the MPs, which has never happened before.  And he’s the first Jewish person to be elected Speaker.”

Thunderthighs thought for a few moments then …

“Jewish … Is he beige?”

I was and am completely nonplussed by that one. 

So much so I didn’t feel able to ask what it was all about.

Every year since the millennium I’ve helped organised a Summer Fair and Xmas Pudding Fun Run fundraising for the school my boys went to.  The local MP The Right Hon Alan Campbell supports the school and turns out every Boxing Day to start the Run.  So over the years of cold, frost and sometimes horizontal rain we’ve become friendly acquaintances.  The next time I saw him I told him about Thunderthighs’ beige remark.

“Beige” said the Rt Hon MP “Well I’ve heard Bercow called a lot of things but I’ve never heard him called beige.”

Guilt is good

The loft is Thunderthighs' domain. 

  

He keeps his laptop on a table beneath the velux windows where there is plenty of light.  The other day after a thunderstorm and the room became muggy and he opened a window.  Rinwater cascaded off the velux right into his laptop.  Shortly thereafter the keyboard started “playing up”.  Pressing a key once led to multiple letters, numbers and symbols appearing on the screen.

We took it off to our friendly local computer hospital and were advised to dry it out slowly.  The loft being the warmest room in the house it was left on a high chest of drawers, well away from windows.  48 hours later it was no better so we went back again.

Our friendly local computer hospital replaced the keyboard and gave us the old one (for spare keys) saying “This has got a heck of a dint in it, are you sure no one’s punched it?”

(They know our family well and we have form.)

Thunderthighs looked sheepish but said nothing.

The laptop kept misbehaving and the blue screen of death appeared more than once.

“Are you sure you didn’t punch it?”

“Well … I might have”

So back we went.

He’d broken the hard disc.

They’ve solved that problem by replacing it with a solid state unit.  Which might even be punchproof.

Then yesterday

“It keeps turning itself off and the fan’s making a funny noise.”

“Was the fan making a funny noise before you punched it?”

“No.”

“For crying out loud!  Why didn’t you tell us that at the beginning?  We’re not bloody psychic.  If you don’t tell us things we can’t sort it out.  Tell us everything.  Even if it’s bad stuff.  Especially if it’s bad stuff.”

I emailed the computer hospital
“NOW he tells us the fan is playing up since he hit it.  I despair!  I really do.  You may see one of us again soon ... if there isn’t a murder”

We were greeted with smiles when we went in and we discussed the possibility that the fan problem might also involve dust and cat hairs, as.the cats do like to sit right next to the warm air vents.

“Cat hair’s a more common problem than you might think” said the computer doctor “but we do need to check that none of the fan blades got bent when he punched it.”

Since we got home Thunderthighs has: changed the cat litter; hoovered his room, the stairs and landings; and mown the lawn.

I mentioned this to his father who commented “I wonder what he wants, or maybe it’s guilt.”

“I hope so.”

“So do I.”

And Fester wasn’t even brought up Catholic!

Birthday Tea

Today is Ferretfingers's birthday and we had our traditional birthday tea of pizzas, sandwiches, crisps, chocolate birthday cake, at least three different varieties of small cakes and, for the first time, a kit-form trifle.

Ferretfingers will not eat trifle.

But if I serve the jelly, blancmange and cake in separate dishes he will quite happily put them all together in his pudding bowl.

I have almost mastered making chocolate blancmange from scratch, rather than out of a packet, using sugar, cornflour, drinking chocolate and milk. My first effort was a bit heavy on the powders and you could have bounced pennies off it. Today's moved a little better.

The other day, as we had some milk going off, I experimented using a jar of unset blackberry jam for flavouring . I don't think I used enough cornflour and/or didn't boil it long enough (too small a pan to risk it) so it remains the consistency of ketchup. Fester is using it as a pouring sauce on bananas and, today, the aforementioned kit form trifle.

Thunderthighs looked at it in disgust and asked "What's that?"

Before I could speak Fester, licking a dribble off the spout of the serving vessel, replied "Rat's poo."

Thunderthighs "Thanks Compo."

Runs in the family like a wooden leg, as Mum used to say.

Bug

Facebook threw up this memory of 21 June 2015 when answering the question “What's on your mind?”  I wrote

We all have a bug.

Ferretfingers went to bed at 9, woke me up at 4, when I put the cat out:  

he's complaining of a headache, his pyjamas are in the wash, and there's a cushion cover in the wash too.

Thunderthighs says he is feeling tired, has a muggy head and admits to having had "an explosive dump."

Fester is still in bed (having taken delivery of Father's Day cards and gifts) having tossed and turned all night.  I usually have to put up with snoring but last night we got talking too - through the cpap mask.  Unusually for him he was having bad dreams.  But since they were all about putting pits on maps, which is all he seems to think and talk about when awake,

a) no wonder

b) I have little sympathy.

And me?

Well the washing was dry when I had my first tour of the estate on getting up.  Then it got windy and started raining so I dashed out and got it all in before it got too wet (unaided and in dressing gown and slippers) and now the sun's out again.  I have at least two loads of washing in the offing and a pile of damp stuff to iron.

As well as playing Florence Nightingale to the men of course.

It's a great life if you don't weaken.