blondefish.blogspot.com: January 2012

How do you eat yours?

First creme egg derivative of the season.

It's like riding a bike...

They say you never forget. From this day forth.....as Toots can ride a bike! Toots wants to win. Tiger's apparent motivation of choice is chocolate.

I'm Donna Pardy, Yike It's My Birday

Tiger has a gweat way of talking yike a yittle girwl. She is so cute. And now she is Free years old. She is a big girwl. She still needs some hewp wid eading her chocwate cheerios and also wid tying her shoews and understanding why de Chwrisdmas twee in de darden won't be cowd even do it's lying oudside waiting do be coyected. But she got yots and yots of wovewy pwesents for her birday and doday she yooks yike a pwincess.

Merrily we roll along

I made three attempts to read my book but each time never got past the first two paragraphs before a little person offered a far more exciting activity requiring my full involvement. You know where I got the time? When I was sat in the Immigration Office in Dallas with that sinking feeling after the passport 'wouldn't go through' at arrivals and the Immigration Officer asked me if I'd ever had a problem entering the US previously?

You could say that.

Turns out that swiping my passport automatically brings up a message to send me to the Immigration Office....and that having been sent there, I was far too nervous to read past the first two paragraphs anyway.

Well, I got in to America - and Immigration will try to take off the automatic message so I don't have to go through the 100-beats a minute heartrate every time I try to enter the United States - but they didn't make it easy. First there was the 4am departure for Edinburgh airport, the 30 minute check-in saga - which apparently still wasn't enough time for the BA lady to get us all sitting together on the three flights - then the buggy-saga (entirely their fault that the buggy appeared on the carousel and not at the plane doors at Heathrow as expected, so a friendly air steward and I went off in search of it while the little family met me once I'd come back through again to 'air side'), then the 'let's-sit-together' attempt for the long-haul flight which Mrs B managed so superbly that she got us all together AND upgraded, then the actual 10 hour flight (the kids were impressive but thank the Lord for in-flight entertainment), then arrivals (as above), and then we trooped down to the Connections Centre in Dallas to try and all get on the flight to Midland together. 'Nope', American Airlines said, 'All full'. At which point she-who-made-me-an-Auntie did a promising dramatic interpretation of 'we want to fly with Auntie Ingrid'. Big tears, me patiently explaining that she'd have to wait with the luggage and mummy for another 5 hours while I got on this flight, more tears, and then f-i-n-a-l-l-y the lady tap-tapped away and then handed over 5 boarding passes and we were off...together. Mad dash through the airport and security as we were the last ones to board the delayed flight. We made it! But without inflight trolley service as this was a teeny-tiny plane and there was a lottalotta wind out there. But Mr B was waiting for us when we arrived and got us and all our luggage home.

Tea, bathtime...and despite 1.5 hours sleep in the previous 24, the kiddies were jumping around while their mum and Auntie went to bed shortly after them. Home Sweet Home!

Flying with that number of kids and that amount of luggage really brought out some of the best in people - we had some very kind stewards, air hostesses and the general public help us out, and then some desperately unhelpful officials also. Not sure what they all thought of this unconventional family of two female adults and 3 kids, but it was fun!

Spousonomics: How to maximise returns on the biggest investment of your life

This one, quite simply, is a brilliant read. I've only just started it, but I am...intrigued.

Birth Order*

Today's read is all about Birth Order. I was about to write that it is today's PhD procrastination, but I'm finding that more and more I need to read something normal before going to bed, or my PhD cells spend the next few hours partying in my brain with the wedding cells. Not sure if reading on birth order is 'normal', especially because after researching a little bit more about it, scientific experiments have come up fairly neutral on the topic of whether it has much influence on personality.

And yet, it feels like it should; that whether you are the eldest, youngest or somewhere in between; the number and gender of your siblings; and spacing between siblings, somehow matters. I knew I was on to a winner when I nodded my way through the first few pages of 'First Borns' (yes I am keen to please, yes I am generally accepting of existing rules [or rather, it's taken me a long time to learn to think for myself], am not scared by responsibility or even leadership, I am generally organised, academically not un-successful, yet self-critical and over-sensitive at times) (and you non-First Borners are saying what????? but the rest of you will get me).

In fact, in a very Expensive, Comprehensive and Scientifically Accurate review of my nearest and dearest, by far the largest group of friends are first borns. The next biggest group are last borns. And way behind are the middlers and way behind them, the only child. In 3 out of 4 important romantic relationships, they were all last borns. In the one that worked: a first born. Interesting eh?!

* Sorry, don't know what's going on with the photo. Maybe blogspot.com is a middle child.

What's in a name?

Any reading not related to fish or supply chains can pretty much be considered as PhD-procrastination, but the one I'm in the midst of now is actually quite good fun. It's about the origins of words such as salary (originally salt money from Roman times), anniversary (the turn or a year from the Latin), vandal (from the Vandals, the sackers or Rome), or the names of animals given to inanimate objects (easel, crane). Nothing in it related to the sea unfortunately.

Arbroath Smokie

I've become quite pal-y with my local mobile fishmonger, Dean. He appears every Wednesday morning around 9am with a bright-eyed *parp-parp* from his fish van. I learned early on that his visits are somewhat flying, and unless you're fully suited and booted when he's due, you're otherwise likely to miss him. He only has two regular customers in my cul-de-sac: Ned, the elderly gentlemen with the gammy eye from over the road, and myself. Out of a possible 64 inhabitants in the houses that hear his cheery parp, the general lack of interest in the fish van is pretty much indicative of the way the industry is heading. And I'm sure he's not making more than 5 or 6 bob from the two of us. Sometimes I wonder if he even covers his fuel costs. It's actually a great pity actually, as he's got the finest fish around (NB supermarkets don't sell fresh fish) and he's never short of a compliment or two when he spies you: 'Hello beautiful' he'll call out to my panda eyes, bed-hair and uncoordinating cul-de-sac early morning cumbo. No wonder he's still in business.

Perú

Where to begin? With over 900 photos of the trip, I thought it best to not start at the beginning...and skip most of what comes in the middle and the end too. So here is just a small selection to sum up 10 days of our wonderful holiday:

El Lima by day: