short

Greg's birthday is this week. Wednesday, in fact. I'm reminding him of this because he might want to take some time off. In case he gets a surprise trip somewhere. I'm just saying, it's not out of the realm of possibility. I thought about making it more surprising than this, but I think the destination will be enough.

The boys are going to stay with their mum, or, at least Sherlock is. Mycroft is insisting that he's old enough to stay here on his own. Which I think is fair enough, but that's ultimately his mum's decision, so I'll let them fight it out. It'd certainly be easier for him to get to work from here than from her place.

That's about it from me, except to say that I still have blackberry stains under my fingernails from picking them with Sherlock the other day. They may be permanent.

And I'm adding this in because L just showed it to me... A memorial for the people who died in World War I. Article here.

quantum

So apparently last year, this biologist did a poetry offshoot of Nanowrimo wherein you write a poem every day for a month. Hers are science oriented and illustrated, and I like them a lot. Link to the article here, and if you look at the end of it, there's also a link to where she's selling the book if you want it. There's also a few more of the poems. Sherlock likes the one about the bees, unsurprisingly. 

In other news, something besides us is eating our lettuce. Rabbits, I assume. Squirrels? Do they eat lettuce? The chard isn't doing at all well either, but I do have five fairly massive cucumbers sitting in the fridge, and there are more growing. Quite quickly. L may run out of things to do with them before the summer's over. (Not like that, I know what you're all thinking.)

The summer holidays are officially here. Sherlock tells me it's BOILING and we need to go swimming immediately and repeatedly and preferably in the fjords of Norway. He also wants to go to Iceland and eat puffins and also bring one home as a pet... L and I have been talking about a trip, but I'm not sure it's going to include puffins.

We went to visit Jo and Lisa and Tadhg, who is amazingly tiny and looks even smaller when L is holding him. He was very quiet and sleepy while we were there, but Jo and Lisa assure us that he cries non-stop when they're trying to sleep, which I suppose is the way of all babies. Sherlock held him for about 20 seconds and then asked when he'd be old enough to eat biscuits or talk. I suppose whichever came first?

And finally here is a thing about Richard III's grave.

naked with a belt

Tollund Man, for instance, was found with a belt but no clothes. "It doesn't make sense to be naked and have a belt," Frei pointed out.

True... The rest of the article is here and talks about the possibility that they were tossing foreigners into the bog, not in some sort of religious ritual, but as an alternative to burying them with everyone else. But basically no one actually knows. 

And this is an overview of the allotment... 

We have lots of little green tomatoes. Something keeps taking one bite out of each one and then leaving the rest, but there are so many that surely some will ripen...eventually. We have beans and lettuce and a surprisingly small amount of chard, which got a late start. The enormous Thai purple beans show no sign of flowering yet, let alone doing anything else, but fingers crossed. Sherlock is very excited about them (so am I). 

A woman named Mary has a plot a little way down from ours. She has a silverbell tree (currently about four feet tall, but she says they're meant to grow up to thirty feet and that she'll keep it trimmed and good luck to her with that...), a border of cockle shells, and marigolds all in a row. This led to a discussion of nursery rhymes with Sherlock and the implication from L that Little Boy Blue blowing his horn was about...well, you can guess. And also, bizarrely, to Sherlock wanting to read The Secret Garden, once he was assured it didn't have any talking animals or other such nonsense. Not sure how that one's going to go, since it's also distinctly lacking in pirates, booty, and mysterious corpses. 

cucumbers and cats

Cucumber: the first of many. There are a million flowers and quite a few tiny cucumbers as well. This is the first moderately full sized one. Sherlock picked it and did not heed any warnings from me or Mycroft about the prickles all over it. He took them personally. I've seldom seen anyone that annoyed with a plant.

Also, L sent me this...

It's a book...of newspaper articles...about cats that hate cops. I think he's trying to say something about Maf. It's a weak case, considering how often she sleeps on his shoulder while he sits on the sofa. She's cleaning the top of his ear right now, and he's poking her every few seconds before it tickles, but she's determined.

She's doing all right with the dogs - holding her own. Using them as transport and things to jump off of in order to get onto the kitchen counter or the top of the table. I'm waiting for she and the dogs to start working in concert. With her brains and their brawn, I think they could get the fridge open. Then we'll really be in trouble. 

on a boat

Well...we're a on a ship. Sherlock and I and Mrs N and another teacher and roughly one million small children. The sound really bounces around in here when they shriek. As they do when Sherlock insists on telling gruesome pirate stories just before bedtime and acting them out by trying to jump on people like an animated skeleton would. After I put a stop to that for the third time, Mrs N came by to tell me she was so glad I'd decided to come along...ha.

In theory, they're sleeping now. In reality, they're talking in what they think are quiet whispers that adults can't hear, and they're mistaken. Which makes me wonder with some amount of paranoia just how much my parents and teachers chose to ignore when I was younger.

Glad I'm here though. It is fairly warm and slightly dank with a vaguely peculiar smell, but still - we're sleeping in a ship. 

the tennis

Well...Federer's in the final. I wasn't expecting that, to be honest, even though I put him down to win the whole thing in our tennis pool. I thought he'd go out to Rafa in the semis. Now that there's a chance he might actually win the whole thing, I'm bizarrely nervous. I've also done something to my back and may end up watching the final from a prone position on the sofa while avoiding any sudden movements.

I've been at the allotment a lot (that and the back may be related), and things are coming along surprisingly well. Sherlock wants us to plant watermelons, but I think it's too late (?) and also given the planting instructions, they might well take up the entire allotment. Space 6-8 feet apart! Still, maybe next year. Fruit seems to be our downfall (blueberry bush shows no sign that it might ever consider producing anything except leaves).

Mycroft is doing well in his new job, to no one's surprise. We went for a visit and Sherlock did not consume their entire supply of ice cream, although he is now convinced that, having got it once for free, he will get free ice cream there forever. Presumably even when he's grown. I tried to pay for it this time, but the woman who runs the shop thinks he's 'precious and a very polite young man' and since he actually is very polite with her, I didn't want to press the issue.

In other news, Murray's seeing someone, and she's apparently tennis mad. They went and camped in the queue for tickets. Murray said it was a lot like the Army but with less nudity and more swearing. Not sure if he was serious or not. He sent me pictures, one of court 18 and part of his finger and one of someone who had a Federthemed umbrella:

hawkeye

I feel like L posted this already in the comments somewhere, but in case he didn't, here is Rufus the pigeon chasing hawk of Wimbledon. And if anyone knows who's doing the voiceover, I would really like to know. He sounds so familiar.

One of the first times Sherlock watched tennis with me, one of the commentators talked about Federer's dislike of Hawkeye, and Sherlock was convinced for days that Hawkeye must be an actual person, because who would dislike a computer system, that just wouldn't make any sense, right? I have a picture he drew somewhere of Hawkeye scowling. He had an eyepatch I believe.

We have Mycroft home again with all his things, all over the living room, and all his dogs, also all over the living room (and Anthea, not all over the living room). He said there was no point taking it all up to his room as he'd have to bring it down to wash most of it tomorrow, which I think means he's turning into an actual teenager. Also his shoes have formed a nest with L's by the door to trip unwary newcomers.

And now I should probably get to bed. L and I have been up talking about the op he has coming up, which I mention only as an excuse for being up so late because I know you lot will worry otherwise. It's...not ideal, but nothing too bad. And of course if it goes well, the result will be a very good one, so fingers crossed. 

in the street

First, this:



I was hoping to get this up in time for L to see it at work and hurt himself trying not to laugh, but obviously I didn't make it.

Sports day was good. No serious injuries, no incidents of vomiting due to excess cake ingestion. At least not any that I had to clean up. The way some of the children were bouncing around, there might've been problems in the car on the way home.

As reported in the comments, L lost in the sack. Race. I did all right in mine. I'm fairly sure Sherlock won at consuming the most cake and also at thrusting slices upon people while informing them that he helped make it, which was only slightly true. He did help with the icing the night before. The lemon one with potatoes in did not taste at all like potatoes. It was delicious.

The Army instilled a certain wariness of obstacle courses in me, but one of you said that it would probably be designed for small children and not very fit parents, and you were quite right, which was a relief. The last time I did one, there was mud and icy rain and definitely no cake afterward. This was an improvement.

In tennis news, Wimbledon is coming up, and L suggested doing a thing for that like we're doing for the football, and Becca has kindly volunteered to set us up with something. Don't worry if you don't know anything about it. No one really knows what's going to happen. You can make assumptions, but all it takes is one bad day and the favorite is out in the second round. 

put up a plaque

A couple of pictures from yesterday. The Red Arrows, against a dramatically cloudy sky. They picked a good day for it, didn't they? Couldn't look better against pure blue. 

And then there's this... Floor plaque in a crypt we wandered into. That sounds...not quite right. It was open to the public. There was no breaking and entering involved.

Although Sherlock did say he wanted the plaque for his bedroom. I imagine by the time he's fourteen, he'll want the walls painted black with glow in the dark skulls and posters of Mozart and Nicola Tesla taped to his ceiling. Something like that.

Not pictured: a lot of naked (and occasionally clothed) people on bicycles. If you want to know why, you can check the comments in L's blog, but I prefer it without context. Just loads of people riding bikes in the nude.

It's been a lovely weekend. Back to usual tomorrow, and I have work as well. I'm glad I'm doing this job, and I wouldn't want to stop, but there are times that I dread getting called out, not knowing if it'll  be someone who's had enough vodka to kill a cow or a kid who's done nothing but exist in the same flat as his father when his father's had not quite enough vodka to kill a cow.

I fell asleep briefly last night watching L watch the football with Sherlock, both of them intent, in much the same posture, hunched forward, hands gripping knees. I woke up at their collective  shriek of...I'm not even sure whether it was victory or defeat, I didn't see the goal. Just flailed a bit and fell off the couch. I just feel incredibly lucky sometimes, and that was one of those times, despite being prostrate on the floor with a small cat helpfully licking my hair while Sherlock laughed and Greg asked me if I'd hurt myself...and then laughed. 

desert flowers

Keith Douglas was wounded by a mine in north Africa in World War II. You can read more about him here if you want to. This poem, says the article, was most likely written while he was recovering in El Ballah General Hospital, Palestine, in 1943.

Desert Flowers
Keith Douglas
 
Living in a wide landscape are the flowers –
Rosenberg I only repeat what you were saying –
the shell and the hawk every hour
are slaying men and jerboas, slaying

the mind: but the body can fill
the hungry flowers and the dogs who cry words
at nights, the most hostile things of all.
But that is not news. Each time the night discards

draperies on the eyes and leaves the mind awake
I look each side of the door of sleep
for the little coin it will take
to buy the secret I shall not keep.

I see men as trees suffering
or confound the detail and the horizon.
Lay the coin on my tongue and I will sing
of what the others never set eyes on.

I haven't been out to Red's grave yet this year. Things got complicated with half term and trips and chickenpox and sad little cone cats. I'd like to go soon though. I had meant to tell you a story about him, but it's late and I'm somehow still awake, but only in body. My brain isn't up to much right now. You know those nights when there is no logical reason you should still be awake, but you are? Yeah.

Instead, here is the picture of our blueberry bush that I couldn't find before. No flowers, as you see. It's probably too late to flower now, isn't it? Next year.

We've got kale planted as well and coming up with tiny, oddly shaped leaves. That's a first for us this year and for me specifically. My mum never grew it.

Maf keeps headbutting me with the edge of her cone. Trust her to come up with a way to weaponise it. I think she wants me back in bed with my head in the appropriate spot for her to curl up around it. I'll go and give it another try. Wish me luck.

cone of shame

Maf has been in for her operation. We now have a small cone cat.

She is not happy with me, but she still prefers to be bodily attached to me at all times. I assume so she can stick her claws in whenever she wants to. The worst was fishing her out from behind the refrigerator today. Claw marks nearly all the way from my wrist to my elbow. She doesn't seem to have done herself any harm in her short time without the cone though, so that's good.  

The allotment is doing well. Here is some chard that the squirrels haven't eaten yet. We're going to have to replant the rest.

Chives... Looking happy and delicious.

Those red beans that are meant to grow as long as someone's arm. Tiny right now, of course, but we have high hopes.

And cucumbers with a frame for them to climb up. We've got some lettuce planted under the frame so that the cucumbers can shade it if it gets too hot.

I thought I had a picture of the supposedly pink blueberry bush from last year, But I can't find it. It's not doing anything yet anyway, and I think it should have flowered by now if it were going to. Looks healthy though. We might have to wait another year for berries.

puzzlewood

We went to Puzzlewood. Here are some photos which are definitely not ours - they're much too good.

It's really...I feel like the word magical gets overused a lot, but it seems apt in this case. Even shared with a load of other people with children to entertain over half term, it was pretty amazing. Makes you wonder what it would be like to come upon it unexpectedly, alone, like walking into A Midsummer Night's Dream.

That's my opinion, anyway. Sherlock had his own ideas: i.e. it was a very large, green pirate ship, particularly the bridges. Well, obviously, right? There was a lot of stick fencing, primarily between Sherlock and the air, but at one point he called Mycroft's dogs (not present to defend themselves) blackguards, and there was a duel. Invisible flintlock pistols at (nowhere near) dawn, fairly tame piratey insults exchanged...

S: Your mum's...a hopeless landlubber!
M: She gets a bit seasick, that's all. I think that's uncalled for.

I sent the video to Mrs H. She firmly denies getting seasick at all, ever.

taken over by cats

Sherlock made these while he was resenting not being able to go to the park or to the polls or anywhere else. It's L and I as cats...

  I'm the grumpy one. You may have guessed. You can make your own here. I did one of Sherlock...

I imagine the little spiral is because he's dizzy from seeing how many times he could spin around without falling down, which is one of the ways he  has entertained himself. Fortunately, Mycroft is home now and more less willing to keep him from passing out from sheer ennui. They're planning a trip, belatedly, for Mycroft's birthday. Which may or may not end up happening, depending on time and the scope of the journey in question, but it's looking good right now. Details as the situation develops.    

Mycroft asked me not to make a cat out of him, but he didn't ask anyone else not to. Perhaps an oversight on his part. Just saying.

not too spotty

Sherlock continues tired, not too spotty and intermittently cranky, which is to be expected. He has consumed his entire body weight in homemade ice lollies several times over. I hope L keeps making them all summer. The lemon-basil ones were not a hit with Sherlock, but I love them.

Speaking of basil, it exists in the allotment. Our little non-producing blueberry bush looks happier this year, so perhaps we'll get some actual berries out of it (although Sherlock informs me that most things we call berries are technically droops drupes, but he doesn't know if that includes blueberries or not, and Johnnnnnn stop typing so I can look it upppppp why can't I use your phoneeeeeeee [answer: because of the 38 texts he sent L in a two hour period before I took it away from him]).

We will also have these enormously long Thai red beans:

They stay that color when you cook them, which Sherlock is very pleased about. Most of them that aren't green to start with turn green when you cook them. They also apparently get about as long as your arm, which should be something to see.

I'm going to let Sherlock look up droops now. Talk to you all later.

adventures at the supermarket

Sherlock and I went to the supermarket today after school. We got the usual: tea, bread, eggs, bacon. Probably more chocolate than any one household should contain. We usually do the produce section last because by that time Sherlock has calmed down enough that he won't want to take every single odd fruit home with him.

I was not counting on giant watermelons.   

(No one expects the giant watermelons.)

I suppose they weren't that big, in the scheme of things, but they were certainly big enough to attract Sherlock's attention, along with the attention of every other child in the supermarket. There were a lot. Of children. There always are when we go after school, for obvious reasons. Which is why I try to go during the day, but occasionally I forget what it's like, and today was one of those days. 

 I'm glad, because if I'd gone during the day I would've missed the sight of Sherlock and five other kids of varying ages standing around the stack of watermelons and gazing in awe as if at their new god.

One of the mothers, looking particularly harried (and her child particularly sticky with some kind of purple substance on his face), told me that he would get one slice and that she was going to fill the rest with vodka and throw a party. In Antarctica.

happy almost birthday mycroft

It'll be Mycroft's birthday on Saturday. He'll be 16, if you can believe it. I can't. I know I go through this every time one of the boys has a birthday, as if the passage of another year is some sort of once-in-a-lifetime miracle instead of something that happens, unarguably, on a regular (yearly) basis. I suppose, in some ways, time and our ability to perceive it and the changes it works on us and our lives is fairly amazing when you think about it.  

Pretty sure that doesn't give me an excuse to be astounded every single year though.

Anyhow, Greg and I looked into some birthday related things on his day off. I can't mention them here yet, of course, but I'm pretty sure Mycroft will approve. His mum has something in store for him as well-- something that makes me think she has at least partially reversed her position on security following him everywhere, which might be the best birthday present he'll get as far as he's concerned.

I'll try to limit most of the soppiness to your actual birthday, Mycroft, but you're an amazing young man, and I am terribly proud of you.

In other news, work has been mainly things I don't want to talk about here. There has been a decided lack of rats floating around in hatboxes and too many bad situations that could've been prevented. I'm starting to think that all FMEs should have psychological training and seriously thinking about getting some myself.

paper microscopes

So...that's pretty amazing, right? Sherlock wants one, obviously, despite already having a microscope. He wants one he can carry with him everywhere. I told him I thought other people probably needed them more.

Got an invitation today to a friend's wedding - Spence, I think I've mentioned him here before, thought it was some time ago. I also got a phone call from him.

S: Are you bringing that policeman of yours?

Me: Why?

S: Because I think Jenna's [the bride] mother has a record and she'd probably on the run and he should arrest her on sight. Maybe her father too. And my brother. He might need back up.

Turns out he wanted to elope. I'm not surprised. This is a man who doesn't just dislike his own family but more or less the entire concept of family. I'm a bit shocked he's getting married.   Police intervention may be necessary though. Murray will be there, and there's an open bar.

monday monday

Greg is not working tomorrow, and neither am I. Both the boys are back at school. Will we have enough energy to do anything besides nap on the sofa? That remains to be seen.

Maybe we can take a ride somewhere. Or a run. We're slightly behind in our training for the half marathon. Although we haven't decided which one we're going to do yet, so I suppose we can't technically be behind, and even if we were, were not as behind as I thought we might be by now.  

Mycroft and Sherlock did some training with me in the park once or twice. Mycroft keeps a steady pace and he's fit enough, but I think he finds running terribly boring (which, to be fair, it sort of is, in a way). Sherlock will run circles around me (literally) and then flop down, exhausted, in the grass. I think the dogs could outrun all of us.    

I was looking at that one in France again. I find myself unable to deny that it is very definitely in the mountains. Up some of them and down others. Also, on a trail and not on a road. Perhaps something different for our first race. Something shorter? Maybe something that the boys could do with us if they want to. Anyhow, it's good to have something to work toward.

Perhaps we could just go to France and not run at all...

2am wakings with a small cat

Went to sleep with a cat on my head as usual. Woke up with her gone, which was nice. Wearing a fur hat to bed gets a little warm. We're going to have a problem in the summer. I was up for a while, went to make tea in the kitchen.

As I was waiting for the kettle to boil, the cabinet door opened ever so slowly, and Maf stepped out onto the top of my head. She stood there for a second and then sat down and hung her tail in my face. Given she can barely make it up onto the bed, I have no idea how she got in the cabinets. And I hope we're not going to find little piles of cat hair in there now.

Anyhow, we watched some tennis I'd recorded (Federer v Djokovic in Monte Carlo, Federer won), and I thought about things. She probably did too, but did not share her thoughts.

Did you know that Gabriel García Márquez died a few days ago? There's a quote from One Hundred Years of Solitude that I think about fairly often. A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground. What if you think of it the other way around? If someone you cared for has died in a place, does that mean part of you belongs there? Does part of you stay behind and make a home there? We're supposed to carry the dead in our hearts, but what if they carry us?

I think Maf was probably considering how to bend the dogs to her will and use them as portable heating pads, which makes her far more sensible than I am.

three cats

My husband keeps silently meowing at me. He did it once in unison with Maf and has not stopped since. Says he caught it off her and she's clearly contagious. He appears to be right, since Sherlock has started doing it too.

And climbing trees and climbing Greg and getting his face in everyone else's food, but that's more or less normal behaviour...

We went to the park, well, various parks, looking for frogs, playing free-form rugby with the dogs, and now L and Mycroft are conferring about dinner. L is still trying to meow silently at me, but he makes himself laugh every time now. And me. And Sherlock. And Mycroft looks to Maf for sympathy. They are now the two most dignified people in the flat.

Also I caught her riding a dog earlier today.

foxes and peacocks

 A peacock from the park, photo by Mycroft. And L sent me one of his cockney fox, for anyone who was wondering what it looked like...

This post is going to have very little actual content, just to warn you. Apart from the pictures. Which I didn't even take.

Sherlock is completely manic about being off of school, bouncing off the walls, sometimes literally. Races with the dogs, playing with the kitten until she is worn out (which takes some doing), dissecting a stick of butter (don't ask), inserting cloves into the middles of all the grapes (you can ask, but I have no answers). Mycroft retreated to his room by two this afternoon, and I don't blame him. Of course, maybe it was tactical, since I did then get a short break while Sherlock sat outside his door and demanded to be let in.

S: Let me innnnnnn.

M: No.

S: Whyyyyyyy?

M: Because.

S: Whyyyyyy?

Repeat ad nauseum. If it was on purpose, Mycroft, thank you. I sat down for five minutes. It was lovely.

maftet

This is Maftet when I found her. She's much cleaner now. She was hiding under a bin. Near the scene of a murder, yes, but not actually in it. Sherlock was disappointed to learn she didn't eat any of the body. The rest of us were relieved. Although if she had, you could hardly blame her. She was clearly hungry. Poor skinny little thing.

I didn't really check her for fleas before I picked her up and tucked her in my jacket. Just got lucky. Maybe she hadn't been a stray for long. She seemed friendly enough. Still does, despite minor damage done to L's hand...

I am definitely not spoiling her, don't listen to him. She needs toys just as much as the dogs do. And maybe if she has a bed she'll be less likely to want to sleep wrapped around my head. I worry I might roll over on her. Greg claims to worry she'll take his eye out in the middle of the night.

She and the dogs are still wary of each other. Deimos tried to play with her earlier and knocked her over. With his tongue. She puffed up and hissed, and they both ran away, Deimos to hide behind the sofa and Maftet to hide on my shoulder. It's going to be interesting, by which I mean painful, the first time she tries to climb me when I'm not fully dressed.

Anyhow, she's in and out and down with Mrs Hudson or security half the day. Greg still refers to her as 'my' cat (or my pussy...), but she's not really. We do seem to be keeping her though.

stop and smell the garlic

A warning to the world: Sherlock is now old enough to be sneaky with Mycroft and Greg. He suggested a bike ride for today, and the four of us set out toward the coast. We kept going, further, and a little further, and then we were at the ferry…

Which we took, bikes and all, and my only starting to suspect something might be up. I did eventually realise it's my birthday on Monday (look, I've been distracted, all right?). And L clearly had a very specific destination in mind... One, as it turned out, with a hot tub.  And a trampoline.

Anthea and the dogs met us here, and it's just... It's really nice. Everyone all together and relaxed. I wish we could've brought the kitten, but she's probably had enough of motorbikes for a while, and she was curled up in Mrs Hudson's lap when we left anyway.

Oh, and when we got here, the wrong lock was locked, and L had to break in...with a coffee shop loyalty card. One of many, I suspect. Sherlock started practising five minutes later and didn't stop until he went to bed.

phobos

Watching L watch football is more entertaining (and occasionally heartbreaking) than actually watching almost any sport.

Sherlock's class are doing ancient Egypt related things again, although no one's getting mummified (that I know of) (possibly one of us if we stand still too long). I called Mycroft earlier and got about two minutes to talk to him before Sherlock stole the phone and told him about Egyptian temple architecture for two hours and also discussed what sort of animal head he would have if he were a god. His top options were jackal, crocodile, and cobra. (He said I ought to have a giraffe one, for which I blame my husband.)

I then got two more minutes of Mycroft before he had to go and do his homework. He says he's fine and, if transformed into a god, would like the head of something with no ears. We'll have him and Anthea and the dogs home again this Saturday, which will be very nice.

In his first two minutes, he told me a story about Phobos going after the rugby ball while some of the younger boys were practising and making off with it...all the way back to Anthea. Bounding across the campus with two teams of twelve year old tearing after him and whooping. He laid it at her feet and sat down, proud and panting and expecting a scratch behind the ears. Sometimes I wonder if Anthea regrets meeting us...

rotating buildings

They're making unbranded versions of various products...I think I have to get the Marmite for L, don't I? And here are these buildings in Dubai, which are apparently going to move and reshape themselves?

They're not built yet, but here is some information about them (second on the list). And somehow they generate wind power in the spaces between the floors? It seems like something out of Star Trek, to be honest, but the article talks about them like they're actually going to happen. Amazing.

So, yesterday... Yesterday was work, for just about 12 solid hours. Usually there are a few slow periods and I can get lunch and even pick Sherlock up from school, get the chores done... Not yesterday. Someone took pity on me around three and gave me half his sandwich, which I got two bites of before I had to leave.

And then when I got home, I found L had made dinner, despite being sick and looking after Sherlock all afternoon, either one of which is enough to make a person want a nap. He's amazing, and I'm very lucky.

spring

Well, I think it's safe to say that it's spring now. L took these today...

Things are blooming, the sky is blue, the sun was out... We got very dirty at the allotment... Well. Very dirty is relative. I have no doubt it will be much worse later on, but there was mud in abundance. And I strained the top of my foot somehow getting my boot off later. That's unrelated to the allotment. Probably.

Reg suggested to Sherlock that he make a scarecrow to keep the birds away from the new plants. He doesn't know what's he's wrought. I remember one of you being worried you'd started something here a few nights ago -- never worry about that. Honestly, it is impossible not to start something with Sherlock. His enthusiasms are enormous and often overwhelming, and always entertaining. We will have the most terrifying scarecrow of all time.

The running is...going. Well, the running itself is fine. Finding time for it is going to become increasingly difficult as the runs get longer, I think. And of course one has to schedule in all that time lying pathetically on the floor afterward...

training

I've been looking at half marathons since L foolishly agreed to do one with me. There's a few in France, in the mountains - which is good because it'll be cooler, but bad because...they're in the mountains. But we don't get Mycroft back until late June, so it's going to be either heat or elevation, and I think I'd prefer elevation. Greg? Preferences? Or we could just do one around here and then we could do it anytime, but I thought something different might be nice. 

There's also a Midnight Sun Run in Iceland, which sounds interesting. Apparently you get to lounge around in thermal pools afterward, which will probably be all we can manage.

And here's a training schedule that Sherlock sent me because "you and Lestrade are old and you should be careful you don't die when you run for miles and miles."

Noted, Sherlock. We will do our best not to die.

There's a link to the website where he found it, but I'm also pasting it here because the constantly moving text at the top of the screen on the site makes me want to hurl the computer across the room. 

moss power

HELLO this is Sherlock and that picture is of a lamp being powered by moss. This is a thing people have made up called biophotovoltaics and it is where the plants photosynthesise and release stuff into the soil that feeds bacteria and then the bacteria break that stuff down and release electrons and you can make power from that. Not very much yet, but I think this would be a good way to power space ships.

I think the different kinds of plants release different stuff, so moss works well and trees might not even though it seems like trees should release a lot more of it. They should find trees that release the right combination of things to feed loads of bacteria and then you could make a giant sphere in space with lots and lots of trees and plants and stuff and it would all run on BPV and could go forever because if the plants died you could just plant new ones.

The plants need their bacteria though so you would have to not do it from the same plants all the time, but it doesn't seem like you would need that much to power a space ship once it got off the ground and if you built it already in space that wouldn't be a problem and it would go forever and we could go to other planets. So I think they should work on that.

Also there is a man who wants to replace all the roads with solar panels you can drive on. That's not as fun but it's probably a good idea but I would rather have spaceships.

rat in a hat box

Work was...relentless. Not particularly terrible in any one case, but a sort of low grade, consistent terrible that makes one wonder if the human race is really worth it. It's not an unfamiliar feeling, but I suppose when I came across it in other countries, I had the luxury of thinking 'oh, well, but it's better at home' even when I knew that wasn't really true.

Getting home (properly home, our flat, as opposed to London in general) helped. Pizza and getting L back from his seminar helped more. So here's the one mildly bright spot of my day.

Reasonably nice house with a flooded basement and a break in. The man came in through the basement, sloshed up the stairs and had an altercation with the home owners. In the course of this, the woman's pet rat jumped off her shoulder and bit the intruder. Scampered off downstairs (the rat, not the intruder; he tried to go out the front).

By the time I got there to treat rat-inflicted facial wounds, etc., both husband and wife were absolutely frantic about their pet...who was eventually found floating in a hat box in the flooded basement. Like Wind in the Willows, I imagine, presumably with oars and a picnic lunch and a mole.

they grow up so fast

The sun came out today in order to taunt Greg for going back to work. What was he thinking? I took the boys and the dogs to the allotment, where Mycroft and I dug things and Sherlock and the dogs sniffed things. This has nothing to do with any of that, but L sent me this picture while we were there - jumping spider holding tiny jumping spider:

And thence, to the park. Where we pretended to play rugby. I tried to explain the rules to Sherlock, not for the first time, and then we all ran around with a rugby ball in more or less complete chaos. In theory, it was me against the boys, but the dogs wanted to play to, and then it was every man (or canine) for himself.

While we were distracted (Sherlock had climbed a tree with the ball and was taunting us), Phobos wandered off and tried to play with a little girl's balloon. The balloon went off with a bang, which gave me quite a start, Phobos tried to hide behind Mycroft, and the little girl hid behind her mum. Couldn't blame her. Phobos was easily bigger than she was.

Mycroft got her a new balloon and an ice cream and made Phobos apologise, in a scene I found eerily familiar. Just replace Mycroft with me and Phobos with Sherlock...

the road home

I'm writing this on the way back from Brighton. Mycroft's reading, Sherlock's asleep, and both dogs are looking over Mycroft's shoulder as if they can read too, or at least as if they're learning. 

I have some pictures for you, none of them taken by me. The food ones are by Greg (I was too busy eating). Deep fried battered buttermilk-soaked halloumi with chips, seaweed, peas, and the best tomatoes on Earth. They were pickled in vodka. More things should be pickled in vodka. I'm not sure what though. Maybe plums? Sherlock hated them, so we ate his.

Doughnut straws with brandy cream and chocolate to dip them in. Obviously we all loved these. It would be difficult not to.