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Hooray - playtime! Though to be fair play time with a toddler is harder than work. But I managed to stagger through my bits of parental responsibility today. My favourite thing to deal with is the unexpected and inexplicable tantrum. We were having fun throwing a ball back and forth this afternoon, but then it went under a chair. Phoebe couldn’t see where it was so I went and got it for her. Meltdown.
What did she want? To find the ball herself? It was too far under the chair for her to get it. Perhaps she had enjoyed finding the ball a few minutes earlier when neither of us could work out where it had gone. And then I had spoiled another possible triumph. But who knows how the toddler brain works? Even if part of our own brain is prone to revert back occasionally.
But lots of laughs amongst the inexplicable tears.
My wife was interviewing some comedians in our kitchen for a film she’s directing and one of them brought his son along. The two kids played together downstairs. The boy, who was on good behaviour sat and watched TV for a bit and then said “I am using my manners”, which I liked a lot. Like they were something that he was rolling out for this occasion and usually he’d be running riot. Which I suppose is what manners are to be fair.
It looks like we’re going to be moving to the countryside in the new year, which means we’ll need another car. So I am looking to buy one that will also be big enough to cope with the demands of touring (for anything more than a one off date I have to hire a people carrier to fit in all the projection stuff and programmes etc) so I went to look at some cars in a car showroom. I am out of my depth in such circumstances and I walked around the floor, opened a couple of doors and boots and then walked out and went home again, too shy to ask for advice. Really I just wanted to check out the relative sizes of the various options before heading off to buy a second hand version elsewhere. But I am as out of place in a car showroom as I am in a motorcycle clothing shop, unable to cope with the “real man” demands that are made of me and aware that the smell of automotive inexperience wafts off of me. It always takes me ages to work up to having a conversation with these things. But I think I am fairly settled now on which size of car is fit for purpose at least.
Another lightning quick date night for me and my wife tonight, though I had to force myself through the tiredness to even step out of the house. Will we miss the ease of the Westfield when we’re gone? - I mean almost certainly- but hopefully the relative peace will make up for it. We had Tapas and a couple of drinks at the bar where I’d once seen Michael Gove and failed to kill him. Pre-warned is pre-armed and he didn’t show up again.
It felt like we were on holiday. Even if the holiday was only 90 minutes long. It's just incredible how precious stuff that we once took for granted can be. All the nights out that I enjoyed without even thinking twice about how fortunate I was to have the luxury of time and no responsibility. All the beers that never tasted this good because I never stopped to savour them.
