Washed up & wrangling

We're back folks! Thanks for being patient while our technical difficulties were being sorted out.

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It has been a fairly pleasant summer this year and this means that everyone and his dog - usually literally - has decided at one point or another to hit the coast for a few days. Nevertheless, Julie and myself have had the inclination to have a wander along the promenade and enjoy the sights - ie, people watching.

That said, since the weather has been kind this year, we have had the chance to enjoy some lovely plants and flowers along the pathways. In particular, Eastbourne is famed for its 'carpet gardens' (so called, because the precise layout of the plants and flowers are reminiscent of the geometrically-patterned rugs of Persian fame).

However, for the purposes of this Gem, we are more concerned with the border & rockery plants. Lots of exotic-looking blooms, scrubby, tenacious plants - and various species of shrubbery.*

In places, these shrubs can be fairly dense, which is perfect for the flocks of smaller birds. They  get somewhere to roost and hide from the aggressive gulls - and it usually means they can dash out, grab a morsel to eat and dash back in again.

Unfortunately, space is something of a premium, so there tends to be a large amount of bickering coming from the shrubbery.*

Interesting - those shrubs must be more spacious than I first thought...

*NI!

Feeling the family love

We've just got back from a long weekend visiting my mum up in the West Midlands. I say 'my' mum, but she insists that Julie also calls her that, because she doesn't believe in the tag of 'in-law'. We had a nice time, despite our various ailments, and even managed to get out for the day as a family, with my sister and Toby (the Jack Russell) completing the group.

Another thing we managed was a game of Scrabble. As usual, there were mock-cries of 'cheat!' - along with very real aspersions cast upon the character of various people who dared to make their play in someone else's ideal place. In the meantime, there was plenty of chit-chat; after all, there was no rush, so we took our time taking our turns.

Mum had recently bought the new album by Rod Stewart, "Time". It's actually really rather good, especially as it's his first album of original material for a couple of decades...

The opening track, 'She makes me happy' is one
of the most joyous songs I've heard in ages.

The thing is though, there is the matter of earworms. The human mind is usually open to subtle suggestions, with the result that some item or event (normally an almost insignificantly minor one) will trigger some memory. In the case of earworms, what will happen is that you then have a tune stuck in your head, playing on loop for hours.

Having listened to the latest Rod Stewart album a few times, Mum was most definitely liable to have a Rod-themed earworm start up. During a quiet moment, as we all contemplated the letters on our racks, Mum suddenly began to quietly sing a Rod Stewart classic. One which elicited a particularly apposite response from Julie...

Cue much hilarity.

Mind you, considering how Rod Stewart looked at the time of this famous song, d'ya think he's sexy?

Baby, it's HOT outside.

For people who have been living on another planet for the last week or so, Britain is in the middle of a heatwave.

Similarly, those people may not have heard that Prince William (second in line to the throne of Britain) and his wife, Kate Middleton, are expecting a baby. In fact, said baby is a little overdue, as the original due date was for early last week. In fact, I was mildly thrilled to think that I might have shared a birthday with the third in line to the throne... Oh well.

Kate Middleton, pregnant and pretty.

As it stands, though, the baby, whose sex the royal couple are as of yet unaware, is overdue. Enough so that it is theorised (ie, gossipped) that Kate was induced. In any event, it was reported today that the royal mum-to-be is in labour in hospital (link to BBC article).

Meanwhile, in our own household this morning, I was enjoying a cup of tea, and Julie was scrolling through news stories and relating some of the headlines to me. Obviously, Kate Middleton's situation was going to be high up on the list...

...thanks for the image, love...

Ballooney tunes

Caution - slightly NSFW due to language.

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Julie's been singing again.
There we were, having a nice little drive through the countryside. We'd turned the radio off and didn't fancy music at all, so we didn't bother with a CD. Instead, we looked through the window and enjoyed the views (or, in my case, as much as a driver can and should).
At one point, a random thought was started in Julie's mind and she tittered and sang a couple of lines...

Funny... I don't recall that being in the English version or the German original. I'm pretty sure Nena might have something to say about it...

Sadly, due to restrictions, I can't post a clip of the song here. Never mind, you can just sing those two lines over and over until they've become a level 9000 mindworm.

***EDIT***
Apologies to everyone. Because I had been so fixated on posting the video for the song Julie misquoted/paraphrased, when it became clear that no video was available to me, I forgot to adjust the blog to reflect this.
Of course, the song in question was Nena's '99 Red Balloons'.

The Great Platypus Debate rambles on...

Oh deary me. First, Scott decides that being different equates to being a platypus. Then, Julie joins in and gets herself, me and pretty much the rest of the world confused about how a platypus may be different from, say, a tortoise. And now my father joins in. You may recall that, when the mood strikes him, he can be as whimsical and off-beat as my lovely wife. And that, when the two of them get together, all you can do is sit back and try to stay afloat. Because once they're off, you have no chance of keeping up with the glorious oddities the pair construct from thin air.
It's quite charming, actually, that my father gets on so well with Julie - almost better than he does with me, I sometimes wonder, but that's fine with me. In my opinion, Julie is one of the personable people I know. It's almost impossible to not like her, she's that scattily charming. And considering that I'd always said (before they met) that Dad would be the one Julie would have to be the one to win over; Mum being so staunchly liberal it's beautiful.

Recently, we visited my folks and we were playing Scrabble (yes, there WILL be a Scrabble-themed Gem along soon...), and talking about what had been featured on Julie's Gems. Naturally, The Great Platypus Debate reared its unique head. I didn't have a computer handy, so I referred to the original notes I had jotted down in my omnipresent pad.

"Are platypuses like giant tortoises?"
"...no."
"Well, they're similar shapes, aren't they?"
"...no.""They're both flat aren't they?"
"...no."

At this point, amidst the general laughter around the table, Dad decided to side with Julie in his own little way

Although I wouldn't put it past someone to try. Before various animal welfare societies heard about it, obviously...

This has all the signs of a pun

And that's just the title. Yeah... sorry about that one.

You may have noticed that times are getting a little hard. Belts are being tightened everywhere. Unless you happen to be a politician, of course, in which case not only are belts being loosened after each and every meal, but larger pockets are being installed.
>sigh<
If you look along the road at the bottom of our street, you'll see many of the shops have closed down and there are plenty of these signs to be seen.

Seriously, there are a LOT. This picture was taken in Birmingham, which is apparently one of the worst-hit places in Britain. Our town isn't so bad off, but it's not good. The only businesses that seem to be opening and thriving are cafes, hair salons and beauty treatment places. Oh well, when it hits the final fan, we'll have nothing to do but look good and be refreshed.
In the meantime, business after business it closing down and there are more 'To Let' signs appearing almost weekly, it seems. In fact, as Julie so rightly put it...

Ba-boom tish!

Playing games with votes and letters

As a family, we're a little different to many. Yes, there is a television, we have a computer and even an Xbox (an original one, second-hand. We're not made of money, you know). However, when we get together, our favourite pastime centres around a couple of board games. Followers of this site will already know that these games are Scrabble and Trivial Pursuit. There are a couple of others, but we always return to these tried and trusted friends.
In the case of me and Julie specifically, Trivial Pursuit is always a good choice on several levels. First and foremost is the fact it's not Scrabble. I'm not doing down Scrabble in the slightest, but it does have to be said that it's not exactly fully interactive; one person has a think, plays a word and a score is jotted down before the next player takes their turn. Only one person is involved at any one point in the game. Sure, it stretches our vocabularies nicely, but for getting everyone involved and interested, there's nothing like a good old question-and-answers session for stimulating discussion - all the more so when you have questions that sound vaguely risqué. Here's an example;

"What sport are you playing if your balls are black and blue?"

The answer, of course(!), is Croquet. (OK, gents, you can uncross your legs now.)
Naturally, when alcohol is introduced, the daft questions magically become utterly hilarious, as do the answers given. Especially when people get so caught up in the game they forget just whose turn it is. Don't they, Julie?

That was a good night; I only managed to get the one Gem out of the two games. Partly because I couldn't keep up with the free-associating banter between my wife and my father. Mind you, the three large glasses of red wine may have had something to do with it to. Oh gods... never again (please bear in mind my alcohol intake is generally limited to a pint a month. If that).

Well, I say 'never again', but it was totally worth it. Especially since Dad won the second game - it made up for him not winning a single game of Scrabble in the days he stayed with us. He's no slouch when it comes to words, not by any stretch of the imagination. However, when the opposition is my mother, he's fairly used to 'winning silver' as he puts it. It's now a family in-joke that he begins each game with "Bagsy coming last!"
Mind you, it doesn't help that he has a rather desperate approach to making words up. At least the rest of us tend to apply a certain logic when we consider alternatives. Another regular feature of family games is Dad playing a word which is met with the chorus of, "What? What the hell's that?" Another problem is that a certain leaning toward jazz-inspired music and comedy may be all well and good when it comes to listening to Stan Getz or The Goons, or meeting Julie on her own ground, but it's not hugely useful when it comes to using the alphabet. That said, it is useful when it comes to describing his inability to make a word out of the (admittedly awful set of) letters on his rack.

See? Witty, knowing and superbly pithy. Shame he came last again though...