We’ve noticed that the beastie has learned to head bop along to music he likes.
Current Mood: Amused
The beaver is a proud and noble animal
Notes from a bemused canuck
We’ve noticed that the beastie has learned to head bop along to music he likes.
Current Mood: Amused
Edit: In case the video goes away, which it surely will after a while, here are some screencaps:
Current Mood: Amused
We had a BBQ this weekend – one last shindig before Lennart and Leen leave for Belgium. Joe and Matthieu weren’t able to make it, but Juan Antonio, Florian & Anna and Phil and the kiddies were able to come (jeez, his kids have grown!). As usual in these matters, I made waaaay too much food. I had three packs of sausages, burgers and I’d marinated some homemade tandoori chicken. That was accompanied by corn on the cob, a cheese plate and crudites. Katy went mad in her own inimitable way with the puddings.
It all went down smashingly. I’m really happy with how the chicken turned out, and I do have to say that a small-ish BBQ (by North American standards) filled with 18 sausages, 8 burgers and 10 chicken breasts was an impressive sight to behold. Smelled bloody good too :) I think I’m finally hitting the bottom of my gas cylinder. Not bad considering that I’ve had it for 4 years now… The weather gods were clement and we had nice breaks of sunshine and the wind kept it to just a nice temperature. It got a bit chilly near the end but people were stuffed with enough calories so that it didn’t matter. Juanan kept mentioning how unfair it was that he’s the one with the reputation as a big eater when compared to the bottomless pit that is Flo’s gullet :) Lennart says that it’s because Florian has a better PR machine :D
Pictures are online here: http://www.flubu.com/various_pics/BBQ_sept_2009/
I’ve come to the conclusion that BenBen finds us boring. He’s been uber-grumpy in the last week or so. I took him into Saffron Walden on Saturday while Katy was having a jaunt with Donna and I didn’t hear a peep from him while I was at Waitrose, or the butchers or the market. And, of course, he was flirting with all the preeeety laaadiiiies he could charm (he’s going to be a heart-breaker, that one). As soon as I got him home though, where it was just me, he was less than thrilled. Same thing for the BBQ. He loves being passed around and was all giggles and charm. When people left, grumpy baby. QED, we’re boring. Katy says that it’s impressive just how much he doesn’t mind being passed around, even when we’re not in sight. I was in the kitchen getting food ready and Katy was in the dining room setting things up and the beastie was quite happy with Leen or Anna. It’s what he’s been used to, I guess. He’s been going to nursery since he was 3 months, so for him, it’s just another preeeeety laaaady to charm :)
Once the beastie was asleep for the night, Beckie came over to keep an eye on him and we went to see Moon. It’s a good movie, if slightly creepy in the beginning. I don’t think I’d buy it, but I was happy to see it and I’d recommend it for a good sci-fi movie with an old-school feel to it.
Current Mood: Happy
Videos of the BenBen
The Bobble Dance
Bananacat
Current Mood: Amused
Not a lot to report for this past week. Work’s been up and down. I’ve been working on cleaning up code written up during a recent student project. The code does some very nice things in truly god-awful ways. I shouldn’t be too harsh about it, as it was from a student who’d never programmed in Java before. Still, it gives me nightmares and for the first time in a very long time, I feel stupid because I’m having a hell of a time trying to wrap my brain around what it does and how it does it. It really doesn’t help my morale when a coworker just looked at the spaghetti mess and said “oh yes, it does this here and that there. it’s quite simple, actually”. Bastard :)
On the home front, the BenBen has mastered the art of sitting up unsupported and his first tooth has broken through. More are hot on its heels. The clever beast managed to barf on me this morning and, as I put him down to clean him and myself up, he kicked my tea cup off the coffee table. Triple-score points!!! Otherwise, he’s generally in a good mood these days and he’s discovering new foods at a good pace. The ladies at the nursery are impressed in his ecclectic tastes. It’s not every baby that likes asparagus and olives, apparently.
Some lads from work came and helped me move the old sofa into the office. It took two tries and a bit of swearing, but we managed to get it to its final resting place with a minimum of pain or injury to either myself or the house. It smelled of cat wee so we nuked it with the odor remover and washed all the covers. The office is starting to look nice and usable now. I borrowed some homeplugs from a guy at work and I can now connect the SunRay console to the house network. I haven’t tested it out yet but it’ll hopefully mean that I can work from home on the days that I need to stay at home. I have to say that I’m impressed with the technology. I’d never heard of it before but they allow you to create a home network using the electrical wiring in your house. Very clever. I’ve ordered my own set and they should be in next week.
Katy and I have been on a Sopranos marathon. We’re starting season 3 now. Brings back memories of watching it Michel and tearing large chunks of the floor in that apartment in Montreal (hee hee hee, screw you Mister Silver!!!) We went to the Saffron Screen to watch Star Trek. I really, really liked that movie and it’s one of the few Star Trek movies I’d consider buying on DVD. Beckie, our babysitter, had an easy night last night but I think that she’s going to be a life saver in the months and years to come.
On the cooking front, we managed to have only one BBQ this week but that’s because the weather was mostly crappy. I made beef koftas. They were nice. I took the beastie for a walk to town to pick up stuff from the market. The fruit and veg stall is going to be beneficial to our budget, but the butcher and the bread stall might hurt our wallet so it might be a mixed blessing. I made spahetti with a creamy bacon and seafood sauce. Very, very nice. We’re going to have to buy more of that seafood mix from Aldi.
I poached some chicken breasts in some apple juice and some herbs for the beastie. I whizzed some up with some mixed root veg (swede, parsnip, sweet potato, carrots) and some leek. It’ll complement his lunches of pasta with meet sauce and chicken with veg and cous cous. It seems that I’m cooking more for the beastie than I am for us :)
Current Mood: Amused
Q: Why am I speaking like a lolcat?
A: Cause I’m tired.
I’ve been sitting in a saunaauditorium for the past two days attending a conference in Leicester. I’m sure the talks are excellent but I’m having the damnedest time concentrating on them because of the heat. The talk I gave this morning seemed well received, so thats good.
BenBen’s sleeping pattern have gone to pot. He’s woken up at 5am for the last two days and he’s not napping all that well. We think it’s the heat. We;re in Leics until Sunday. Hopefully the weather is going to chill out – literally – and he’ll settle down a bit.
Katy and I went to see Transformers 2. I can see why it’s being nominated for worst movie of the decade. Michael Bay managed to create *two* characters even more obnoxious and stereotypically un-PC than Jar Jar Binks. That deserves recognition. And a kick in the face. The movie was so bad it went all the way to almost good. Everything blows up. It’s one giant fight scene, and nobody but the bad guys get hurt. The robots have testicles. They hump your leg. I kid you not. I’ll go see Transformers 3 when it comes out, but I don’t think I’ll buy the dvd…
Current Mood: Sleepy & Tired
One week later and I’m walking – well, limping, really – but at least I’m back at work. My ankle is strapped in and I’m wearing my hiking boots (which do nothing for my foot odour) so it’s not too bad. I don’t need to take painkillers any more and the swelling is mostly gone. There is still a kick-ass bruise on both sides of my ankle but it’s now multiple pretty colours and that’s also going away.
We spent the weekend in Leicester. Good news, we have curtains! They cost a damn sight more than we expected them to, but at least we have something that Katy and I can agree on. It should be the last big thing we need to spend on. It needs to be the last big thing we spend on, because we’re broke at the moment and since Katy’s maternity pay is ending next month, our budget will be tight for the next few months. Joy, joy, stress, stress, stress. Really, it’s doable but we’ll need to be frugal – something we’re really, really bad at doing.
We went to see two movies: Coraline and Terminator:Salvation. Coraline is really funky and I’ll be buying it when it comes out on DVD (see? not frugal!) T:S was very meh. Ok, but nothing spectacular. They did manage to tie in nicely into the first and second movie, but… dunno. I wasn’t hanging on the edge of my seat. BTW, when did the movies become so expensive??? Tickets for two adults for a matinee, two medium soft drinks, the smallest popcorn available (which was still bigger than a whole portion of microwave popcorn that I usually share with Katy) and a small ice cream: £30!!! How the hell do teenagers afford that? I mean, shite!
We got our new sofa on Friday. The thing is f’n HUGE! I knew it was big and it knew it would fit, but seeing it in a giant showroom doesn’t do it justice when you imagine how it’s going to look in your living room. I had to ask the delivery men to put the old couch in the back shed because they said that it wouldn’t fit in the office. I think it’s partially that they didn’t want to be arsed to make it fit through the door, but they have planted the seeds of doubt about getting it in its proposed resting place and that doesn’t make me a happy bunny. More to come later when we attempt to pry it in :)
The BenBen was a bit of a handful this weekend. We think his teeth are giving him grief. It’s coming up to the right time and he’s showing some classic signs of it. He’s drooling on everything! And I mean droooooooooling. My clothing gets soggy just looking at him. We’re going to go see a dermatology nurse about his eczema. Hopefully it’s something he’ll grow out of and it’s just being aggravated because of the heat at the moment. We’ll see what she has to say.
Current Mood: Sick
I’m happy Diversity won, but at the same time, I think that it’s a shame and a farce that Stavros Flatley didn’t even place!
Quote of the moment: You’ve got to have some Greek in you somewhere. No one is that cool who isn’t a big Greek.
The dance act is quite cool though, so they’re going to wow the Queen :)
Current Mood: Amused
I guess I must be overly sentimental, but watching this made me choke up a bit this morning. I don’t know why.
Current Mood: Sad
The classic:
The soon-to-be classic:
Current Mood: Amused