happy birthday, Mycroft!

(Look, I even capitalised your name, even though I never capitalise my subject lines because...I have no reason. But I know it bothers you to be improperly lower-cased.)

Mycroft is fifteen today. 

Fifteen. 

15. 

That doesn't look like any smaller of a number no matter how I write it. It seems enormously older than 12, which isn't exactly an earth-shattering revelation, but I'm still astonished every time I think about it. 

Mycroft, you're growing up into a wonderful, kind, thoughtful young man, and it makes me proud to know you. Happy birthday, and I hope this is a good year for you. 

Actually, Mycroft probably won't see this at least until tomorrow - he's studying hard as I believe his exams begin next week. Astronomy? I think it's astronomy first. So there can't be any weekend birthday trips unfortunately, but we are stealing him away tonight for dinner and cake and whatever else he wants - hopefully some relaxation, since school must be pretty stressful right now. 'Something quiet' was his request via text a few hours ago. We'll do our best. Might have to go and pick him up before Sherlock gets out of school to accomplish that. 

Sherlock is planning to make him this massive cake that is essentially two enormous chocolate merengues with whipped cream and berries in the middle. He wants to make it 'all by myself but Lestrade can help', which is how he likes to do his cooking these days. 

-

Fridge art on the International Space Station: 

pic by Chris Hadfield, Canadian astronaut

artistic and other sorts of doom

I talked to Mrs N today about the possible painting class. She said they might start it as soon as March, and that Lestrade was so very kind to have volunteered to help out... I told her I wasn't sure how often he'd actually be able to do it since he's usually at work at that time...and she said she was sure I could fill in for him when he couldn't make it. She's tricky. You've got to watch her all the time or, apparently, you end up covered in small painty fingerprints.

I skipped krav maga yesterday to go with L to visit his mum (which was good, I think, in that she seems more or less resigned to my existence now?) so I went today. The instructor likes to demonstrate on me because, he says, it's important not to rely too much on body mass. Which I think is perilously close to a short joke, though I won't call him on it, because he's a bit terrifying. So I'm once again lightly bruised in various places, but it feels good to work my body that hard. It's a good class.

There are two upcoming FME courses, one in Birmingham and one in Manchester. One's quite soon, starts the 11th I believe, and the other's in early March. Lestrade, any preferences? 

snow and pinstripes

It snowed. I believe Sherlock may have mentioned it once or twice. It's very pretty, or at least the parts that haven't been turned into grey sludge by the traffic are very pretty. 

Sherlock has done his best to spend every waking moment outside and actually chose to walk to school today rather than have us take him on the bikes so he could be out in it longer. Amazing.

L and I dropped him off, had a run that ended with cold fingers, dripping noses, and a desperate desire for coffee. We went home rather than inflict our sweaty selves on some unsuspecting coffee shop. There were showers, coffee, toast, etc., and he talked to me about accent colours for the wedding, which seemed premature, since we don't know where we're having it, exactly when we're having it, or in fact any about it except that it will occur at some point in the future. But since we can't decide about any of those things, perhaps accent colours are a good place to start? He was talking about lithianthus purple (I had to look it up too), which is...extremely purple. But you can't get married in a beige jumper, and it is a nice colour.

Harry texted to say it should be a bee-themed wedding. I'm not even sure how that would work, but Sherlock would probably love it.

After lunch, we went to look at suits, which was like entering some sort of time warp composed of fabric, polished floors, and terrifying neckwear. We only went to two places, and then suddenly we were almost late to pick up Sherlock. I'll let L tell you about the shopping. The only thing I definitely decided was that I don't want to wear pink pinstripes, ever, for any reason, and I don't know how anyone could wear them without looking like a super-villain.

marriage of true brains

Interesting photos from a professor of neuroscience, Eran Gilat.
Found while googling ice brains with Sherlock.

We had lunch with Jo and Lisa today. They seem to have every detail of their wedding firmly under control. Lisa said she started thinking about it two years ago. Lestrade and I are planning to get married this spring or summer, and we haven't even started. The more I think about it, the more it starts turning into a mental game of 'who can I afford to offend by not inviting them?'

Well...that's overstating it. Obviously, I don't want to offend anyone, and it's possible my parents may not even want to come. It's a long trip for them, and they're getting older. But once you get outside immediate family, any hypothetical guest list seems to grow exponentially until you're inviting your cousin's dentist, and there's tulle draped over everything, and ice sculptures of zombies eating ice brains.

I told Harry I thought twenty people would be more than enough, and she laughed at me until I was forced to hang up on her. But Harry's wedding was enormous, and she probably would've invited our cousin's dentist, if we had cousins. She might be right to laugh though. When I count up the people I consider immediate family these days, there's already 11 of them, and that's not counting me and Lestrade.

Texts, after I hung up on her.

Harry: you should run away and get married in vegas
Harry: by elvis
Harry: wearing elvis costumes
Harry: WHILE SKYDIVING

hot air

Remember when Sherlock was so keen to tie himself to a bunch of balloons and become airborne? Mythbusters proved it would take more balloons than any reasonable person would want to inflate just to float a toddler, but I saw this today...

Half that desk is supported by balloons. Ones that, according to the article, "were genuinely air-tight and would never degrade, and Caltech were called upon to supply a Heluim/Hydrogen hybrid gas with an atomic weight 150 times lighter than Helium alone." 

Not that we could get any, but that is pretty amazing.

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. 

popcorn and paper chains

When we eventually get this Christmas tree, it will be so coated with paper chains and popcorn strings that there will be no room left on it for ornaments. Sherlock's been making the chains out of anything and everything he can find, from construction paper to magazines to pictures of different insects he's printed off the internet...and added glitter to. Glitter on everything.

There's unintentional glitter on the popcorn too. Maybe it'll keep the dogs away from it when they come home. It can't taste good. We had some trouble with the popcorn strings initially. I'd never made them before, and they're very easy to accidentally pull off the thread...or not accidentally, although Sherlock did mostly stick (in some cases literally) to the stuff in the bowl, since it had butter and salt added.

Also I almost set the kitchen on fire making it in the first place. But only almost.