from my phone

This is a very brief post to say that L is as amazing as you all suspected. I don't think I've ever been so surprised, despite knowing there was some sort of trip coming, and so touched that he'd go to this much trouble.

Have just herded Sherlock and Mycroft down off the roof again, with some regret. Mycroft was lying down looking at the stars, and Sherlock was playing 'star songs' on his violin. A lovely image, but a bit screechy to the ears with other people trying to sleep.

We're all back in bed now. Goodnight, everyone. 

a day out

Lovely day out on Saturday. Perfect weather, L relaxed, Sherlock at his most curious, turning over every rock and bringing us bugs and odd plant life and throwing rocks and sticks in the water. We are, as L mentioned in his post, getting bikes of the non-motor variety, and I'm hoping I can still ride one. I'm sure the phrase 'like riding a bike' exists for a reason, but it's been about twenty years.

I suspect no matter how old I get, it'll still be odd to think I could've done anything as an adult twenty years ago. Well. Semi-adult. I'm not sure being in medical school actually counts.

In other news, L is enjoying my slow death due to curiosity about this weekend and isn't helping by claiming one of my presents has certain characteristics in common with bagpipes. I'm not sure I want to know.

We're getting Mycroft back on Thursday. I know he was just home for a visit not that long ago, but it seems like ages. I'll try to keep Sherlock from spontaneously combusting with excitement before he gets here, but I'm afraid the cards are stacked against me. 

jumping

The day Lestrade got this new case and had to be out past Sherlock's bedtime was the same day I had my physio. Could've gone badly. Sherlock's become very attached, as you probably couldn't help noticing, to his murder stories, but the stories aren't the real issue. He just likes having L there to tuck him in and say goodnight, not that I think he'll admit it. So it could've gone badly, but instead there was jumping.

Sherlock's not much for pretending, generally. Not for him the 'floor is made of lava' type games. Usually.  Turns out it works better with phrasing like, 'What if the flat was suddenly flooded with superstrong acid?' Although he did point out that it would eventually dissolve the furniture and the floor as well if it were that strong, and then we'd be in trouble, and anyway was there really an acid strong enough to 'melt people'?

There was a lot of jumping from one piece of furniture to another, followed by acid research online and wondering how hydrochloric acid could exist in our stomachs if it's that strong, which then led to him telling me all about carnivorous plants that trap their prey in various ways and digest them with acid. Although not all the way, because we also looked at some pictures of dissected pitcher plants online and they're all full of insect corpses. Fascinating really.

And then he asked about chlorine gas and chemical weapons, which was a less cheerful conversation, but did lead to him claiming he could do more jumping jacks than anyone in the Army. He demonstrated. I think he may possibly be right. By then, it was meant to be his quiet time before bed, so we read his mummy book on the couch for a while.

Never a dull moment. Even on the bad days, I sometimes wonder how I got this lucky. 

this is sherlock

We were going on a school trip to the museum which was already good and fun and we had a little bus and then it broke down and when the man came to pull it away he let me pull the lever that makes the rope get tighter and keeps the bus from falling off!! And then we couldn't get all the way to the museum or really anywhere because Mrs T said she wasn't taking all of us on the tube so then we all had ice cream and waited in a little park while she tried to get someone else to come and get us and then there wasn't enough time for the museum but that's okay because I've seen it before and we can go at the weekend anyway and THEN there still wasn't anyone to come and get us so she called some of the parents to see if they could pick up their kids early and John came and got me from the park so I got to go home early from school and really there was no school ALL DAY and now I'm home and it was the BEST DAY EVER!

previously on the moor

Mycroft and I had tea and an interesting conversation about people willingly giving up their privacy in exchange for the opportunity to vent to strangers all over the internet. At the time, I didn't think that applied to me at all...

Right, let's see...Baskerville Hall, excellent tea, bruised shins, what happened next? Oh yes. Sherlock came back just before dinner, I sent him upstairs to clean himself up, and he never came back. I had dinner with Mycroft, and then spent the entire bloody night looking for him, with no success. 

That house is massive, and I never did manage to search the whole place. If I'd had any sense I would've just waited in the kitchen with Mrs Hudson. As it turned out, he'd been in to get a sandwich from her and then took off out to the moor again. She gave me breakfast and also the paper, in which I read that something was killing people out there. 

I followed Sherlock, obviously. Slowly. Found him near one of the big tors. I think he may have kicked me again, can't quite remember. It started pouring, we shared his sandwich, and then we fell asleep in an alcove in the rock. 

It was dark when we woke up. Went outside. Sherlock said he saw something and took off. I saw it too. Didn't know what it was, just that it was glowing and growling and looked like something that had been on its way straight to Hell and took a slight detour to terrorise Dartmoor. I think I caught up to Sherlock and grabbed him just about the same time Anthea showed up out of nowhere and took a shot at the thing. It ran off. 

After that, it was a long and thankfully unexciting walk back to the house. Sherlock fell asleep. I didn't know it at the time, but I'd left my cane at the tor, which I would come to regret in the morning. That night I was just grateful to be in a bed and was certain the next day would go far more smoothly. [insert the hollow laughter of hindsight here]

badgers

Because I thought it should be collected somewhere... 

Badger Tales

by Desert Wanderer, A from NW, and ReReader
(Lightly edited to make the bits go together more smoothly.)

*

Once upon a time, in a garden far, far away (like, in Ipswich or something) lived two badgers, named George and Jack. They met each other over the scene of a honey pot theft that left another badger badly bitten. Of course, being our heroes, the badgers recovered the honey pot and gave the thief a good what-for.

During the scuffle, George had broken a claw and was very put upon. "Alas and woe betide me," he cried. "How ever am I to get yummy grubs and mealworms to eat without my claw?!"

Jack smirked at his funny language, but still felt bad for him. "Alas and woebetide?! Have no fear! I can fix a claw, for, before I became a crime-fighting badger, I was the greatest pawicurist in the whole county."

not just make up, 80s make up

Thank you, Nicky!

The banal details of our shopping trip clearly can't compare to this, so I'll just mention that Mycroft got a shirt with a pattern on (still very tasteful, but I think every single one he owns is solid colour but this), and Lestrade talked me into jeans that are probably too young for me and failed to talk me into ones with some sparkly thing on the bum. 

road worthy

Just going for the test now. Wish me luck.

the play's the thing

Sherlock's class has written and is currently acting/reading a play. I don't know if they mean to do it as a performance or not (I hope so). Apparently Mrs T said they had to base it on an existing play to give it some structure and gave them the general plot of Hamlet.

To give you some idea of how closely they've stuck to the original, Sherlock is playing Ophelia, but instead of drowning himself, he dives into the river and swims up to attack the pirate ship to avenge the death of his father. I think he also rides a moose at some point. I'm afraid the moose may have to go if they actually attempt to perform it.

Also, it's no longer set in Denmark, but in London, leading to the immortal line: Something is rotten in the Thames, you can tell because it stinks really badly right here, I think it's dead fish. The Thames is also the river Sherlophelia dives into. He thinks he should be able to do it for real. His secondary suggestion was that they put it on near the Serpentine and he could dive into that instead.

(L - Sally says you're feeling poorly. Anything I can do to help? Sorry I fell asleep all over you last night; you were very comfortable.)

Oh, and re: the spider discussion going on in the comments, my policy is that if they're in the house, they've got to go, usually via a shoe bottom or rolled up newspaper, so you're all much nicer people than I am. 

stick insects

Sherlock's going to love this.


Lord Howe Island Stick Insect hatching from Zoos Victoria on Vimeo.

There's an amazing article about them too.

On Lord Howe, there used to be an insect, famous for being big. It's a stick insect, a critter that masquerades as a piece of wood, and the Lord Howe Island version was so large — as big as a human hand — that the Europeans labeled it a "tree lobster" because of its size and hard, lobsterlike exoskeleton.

I wouldn't want to find one in my slipper, but I hope they get a second chance. 

Went for a nice ride with L this afternoon while Sherlock was squeezing all possible information of a visiting biologist about the pond. L even rode on the back for a while, with no apparent heart attacks. I imagine he'll still be glad when I get my own though.