Moolies

Meanwhile, in other news

Nora stood up today on her own. Without thinking about it, for about 3 seconds. She only really fell over because she was standing on the bed.

Also, we have of course got ye olde traditional a-b-c blocks in a trolley with wheels and a handle. When we first got it a couple of weeks ago she was a bit too scared to hold the handle because it doesn't have any breaks. Today for the first time not only did she hold the handle, but walked, confidently along for the entire length of the flat, and loved it.

Now you'll have to excuse me whilst I go and throw up.

That familiar feeling

There is a discernable pattern going on here.

Nora goes to nursery Wed/thurs. She starts getting symptoms on Sat/Sun.

more or less every week at present.

And I don't know what the hell she's got this week (conjunctivitis, phlegmy coughing and snots) but I'm feeling queasy and green in the face. Seasick, basically.

Yeeeeuch.

"New" humans

I was reading about the amazing and fantastically interesting news regarding Homo floresiensis this morning and it struck me that this was a particularly "Deep Thought" moment.

By bringing light to this diminutive human species, living quietly on an isolated island, being chased by giant rats and basically (think of the scale here) Dinosaur sized lizards, philosophers and chin scratchers on the human condition and indeed animal / human rights have been given a goldmine. If, and it's a massive "if" (which personally I don't believe will happen so...) *if" wee metre high Flory is found to still be alive in the depths of the Indonesian island jungle, how will s/he be treated? As an ape? Will we build breeding centres for them and treat them as a rare species to be regenerated, as we do Pandas? Will we accord them full human rights? Since they have been given the scientific title of "Homo" after all?

Perhaps they would be found to be an excellent genetic match and we could use them for experimentation instead of chimpanzees? Go see them in zoos and have them as sophisticated pets? They'd be very trainable wouldn't they - they could be trained to work in the service industry as surreptitious cleaners.

Anyway. It is all very amazing and fantastic, somehow. Like discovering that we're not alone. Or we weren't, anyway. 18,000 years ago. My God, that's chickenfeed. I'll bet there are many small isolated islands which will now be being looked at under microscope like conditions trying to see just how many other human species there really were, and how long ago it all started to homo-genise (a ho ho).

Memories of John Peel

Standing in the DJ booth at Manchester Poly having absolutely nothing to say to him because he's in intense conversation about football.

Ringing up the "Mayo phone" during his show to tell the show about a local gig we're putting on (16 years old here). "Hello, can I leave a message for John?" "This is John"...!

Sending him a memo whilst working at the BBC asking him if he still has a copy of (and could he play so I could record it) "Hip Hop Bommie Bop" by the German punk band "Die Toten Hosen" - and he phones me up at work and has a chat about it. Had I heard X? Had I heard Y? (No, of course I hadn't).

Listening to, and recording so many hours of his shows. In common with many, many people, all my Peel sessions have endings which cut off the beginning of some hopeful sounding and informative explanation of who that was, or some other completely irrelevant piece of information about his house. A worn out tape of the Pixies sessions, at last replaced by a CD, but it's just not the same without those mumblings.

Listening to tales of his kids growing up (I always remember him taking one of them to see Michael Jackson and being singularly unimpressed).

Difficult not to love him, really, wasn't it. Rest in peace.

Strange teeth

What are they doing?

Nora now has:

1 tooth on the top row
3 teeth along the bottom.

This makes no sense. At least she's more used to teething irritation these days. She'll actually get to sleep. We have a slight issue with biting my arm when slightly bored and being held. My mother says "bite her back, she'll soon learn". I'm a bit - eh??? (So far. Hoping I can hold back from that particular action).

So If she does it *so far* I've been pulling her away very fast and saying "No. No biting. Ow" firmly, and looking stern. Difficult when munchcake looks at me quizzically then grins her huge cheesecakey, ridiculous grin and goes "Heeeeeeeeeeee".

What a minx.

Misery

I am being emotionally crippled by blog spammers.

Listening...

To Nora being fed by McK whilst I'm sitting upstairs suffering the most from the stinking cold Nora and I both have.

The loveliest thing is listening to the plethora of different sounds. You don't notice them so much close up.

Hey, so I woke up this morning and got myself together to feed her Noo-ship & have my breakfast and realised that there wasn't a chance in hell of my going to work. So, oh, what luxury. Even though you have to be sick to get it - a morning in bed, dozing.

The first one in just over ten months.

Amazing.

You eeediot

Rules when Nora is getting a cold and so are you:

1) Go to bed early because she will wake up and be miserable at about 10.30 and every so often after that
2) Remember that you thought about rule 1 at about 8pm then carried on working.

Tombstone tooth

Oh dear.

Nora appears to have inherited the Todd (my Mother's side of the family) tombstone tooth. I have it, Tod has it, and I think her brother has it too. Her newc tooth on the top left has broken through earlier than the others - and get this, also slightly *above* the bottom of the gum. The reason for this is that it is pushing outward and forward. It is also slightly bigger than the other teeth around it. By way of explanation, I have done an artist's impression of the tooth if it were in the mouth of grinning film star, Tom Cruise:

The reason I do not look quite like this donkey faced man - apart from the whole "man" area is that when I was a child I was smashed full on in the face against a cement block thus attaining both a state known as "balloon head" and also an instant dentistry job. It still sticks out a bit, but not much. I flushed my horrible rubber-band-drive brace down the loo "by accident".

My mother lied to me. She said it doesn't show up in milk teeth. Maybe nora has an extra huge version! Argh! It'll be bad enough as it is!

Erk.

Liver

Is by universal consent (that is, of anyone who ever attended a british state school in the 1970's) disgusting. can someone please explain to me then, why my daughter thinks it's delicious?

Nora is back on the food train, and with a vengence. She's eating herself out of all the meals we had cooked for her (and sneakily bought because we didn't have time to cook any, but organic bought ones are really cool - well, some of them, anyway) so more steak stew & now liver n' onions have been done, melon pulverised and tonight, a nice rice pudding. Vegetable stock having been made and frozen, a lentil vegetable stew comes next as well as a cheesy pasta sauce (but no pasta. She doesn't like the non-wheat stuff. Brown rice, maybe).

I think it's the teeth - when she's teething she actually seems to eat more, I think it has something to do with chewing. She devours her rice cakes now, and, such is my diet I guess, she also loves a variety made by Organix which have an all-natural real-spices coating. Ginger, tomato.. it says "suitable for 12 months and up" on the packet but I thought she'd go for them - good god, she hoovers them up.

Next week, I confidently predict starvation stakes.