Better than a kick in the knickers with a winklepicker

sharelle, I need to reply to you re London but i don't know now how possible it'll be to get up there due to other peoples' commitments (can't take the kids up on my own!) I'll see what I can do though.

Been down to Hastings today for Hubs' birthday. Pub lunch, larks at the deserted seafront funfair... oh, and. Cake. Mmm. Cake.

I was quoted by Graham Linehan today, which frankly makes a change from all the times I quote him.

Hubs is taking me out for a semi-surprise (as in, I only found out about it 24hrs ago, once it had all been planned) early anniversary dinner tonight at Cafe Des Amis tonight while Mum babysits.

DOUBLE WIN.

Oh, and I bought the latest of several post-pregnancy impulse buys today - hair dye. Bright hair dye. Permanent hair dye. Shall keep you posted as to how that works out. And I was giving the tattoo parlour some funny looks as I passed it, too. 30 is rapidly drawing near, & I always said I'd get one done by then. Hmm.

We have been recasting Mary Poppins with modern actors this afternoon. So far, we have:

Mary Poppins - Kate Winslet
Bert - Ewan McGregor, or John Simm
Mr Banks - Up for serious debate - see below
Mrs Banks - Jess Hynes
The Laughing Uncle on the Ceiling - Would probably be Jim Broadbent, but ideally we'd cast Alan Rickman for the lulz
The Admiral on the roof - Jim Broadbent unless he was the Uncle, in which case, David Jason.
The Admiral's Mate - Tim Spall
Two Policemen - Simon Pegg & Nick Frost
All the Penguins - Andy Serkis

Now - a debate rages on regarding Mr Banks, because I reckon David Mitchell should play him, but Hubs says no. Hubs is willing to give both Mitchell and the less brilliant Webb roles as Bankers, but really doesn't want to give the part of Mr Banks to the eerie-eyed voice of middle-class sarcasm. He says he'll 'play it as too much of a charicature'! Pah! Give a successful comic actor a chance in this, our entirely hypothetical recasting of a film that should never actually be remade, Hubby!

I think secretly Hubs just doesn't want to relinquish the role to anybody but the brilliant David Tomlinson. At one point he did suggest that Tomlinson would just have to be CG'd in to every scene of our remake. Very telling.

EDIT - bethamphetam1ne had the brilliant idea of Colin Firth as Mr Banks, which I'm happy to do, although Hubs believes that this is Sacrelige. In case you;re wondering what La Reynolds' role would be in the Poppins Reboot, BTW, he will play the Pearly King who says 'I said it to me girl, and now me girl's me wife'.

THE CRUNCH!



Hubs doesn't actually have that rakish facial hair, BTW, but I like to think that if he were to become a Superhuman Jedi Knight, he would do.

Have to share this exchange from last night when we should both have been sleeping:

Hubs:I need to think of something to get my Mum for Mother's Day.
Me: Yeah, me too.
Hubs: I was thinking of getting her a load of cheese.
Me: It *is* her only vice... apart from all the chocolate and alcohol.
Hubs: I think she'd like that. Not as her main present, just as an extra, you know, in the same way that I'd be really chuffed if anybody gave me a Battenburg.
Me: *gets the giggles*
-pause-
Hubs: They'd giftwrap cheese, wouldn't they? They'd giftwrap anything.
Me: Maybe you can just get her a Stilton wheel and put it in a hatbox.
-pause-
Hubs: I'm not sure whether to get her a big block of cheddar or a selection of little cheeses... you know, a Babybell, a tube of Primula... couple of cheese slices... so she can pick and choose.
Me: *dies*

It's not even half past ten. Hubs and I haven't touched a drop of alcohol tonight. So why are we doing impressions of Worf putting Picard's flute up his bum and then anally playing the theme tune to Animal Hospital with it?

That man.

Yesterday was a very, very Thursdayish sort of a Thursday. Allow me to share my pain with you in list format:

1, Began the day imitating a mid-90s pop song by being rudely awakened by the dustmen, at about 7am. There should really be a law against noisily collecting rubbish before the hours of daylight.

2, Awoke with a vague, annoying headache that stayed with me all day.

3, Remained exhausted all day, for no real reason.

4, Got a phone call at 5.30 (when hubs is usually home) saying he was caught in traffic and would probably be another 45 minutes.

5, 45 minutes later, at 6.15, hubs was very much not home.

6, Was starting to worry by quarter to 7. When hubs finally got in at ten to, I was utterly knackered and randomly furious without actually having anything to vent it on.

7, attempted to make cakes for the party tomorrow once Vi had gone to bed. My hand mixer decided to break half way through doing the cake mix. Planned on buying a new mixer today and doing the icing tonight but hubs declared the mixer fixed, so I attempted the icing. Mixer gave up after approximately half a second of mixing, but since I already had all the ingredients in the bowl I had to carry on. Ended up making the icing by hand - a lot of stirring. The icing may be slightly lumpy tomorrow :(

8, That done, Hubs and I spent 5 minutes turning over the living room to find the TV remote only to find it in the place it always was, only covered with a book. Perfect.

Today is being much more Fridayish, however. Violet has come out with several new sayings today ('Hello', as well as 'very very hot' and 'very very cold') and my Ma and Sis are down tonight.

Plus - don't faint - I've been working on Zombie Dad and it's very nearly finished!

Oh, plus a big weight has been lifted from all of our minds yesterday. I haven't felt comfortable blogging about it (and still don't) since it involved legal shenanigans, but one of my extended family has been going through a really horrible time of it recently but yesterday found out that (legally, it least) it wasn't going any further. I had been very worried about her, and she'd obviously been finding it very upsetting. But it's done with now.

First off, from mrs_picard
If you see this, post a quote from Star Trek in your journal.

"To know him was to love him... and to love him was to know him. Those who knew him, loved him, and those who did not know him... loved him from afar."

...Or words to that extent. I'm terrible at remembering quotes ad verbatim. Perhaps I should have gone with "Oh Shit" instead. We watched "Family" last night, which was a brilliant episode with Picard getting all wibbly and 'falling down in mud', but unfortunately we couldn't take it particularly seriously because Picard's brother was played by this bloke...



Not the one who was Amy Hardwick's Dad in Blackadder, the other one. We might have spent a while quoting Top Secret at one another.

Hubs and I wrote a French version of 'I'm Henry the eighth I am" today called "I'm Louis the sixteenth, I am". We're geniuses.

Vi has learned to tickle. She thinks it's brilliant, and shouts "iggleiggleiggleiggle!" whenever she does so. She also likes pretending to sneeze at the moment.

The students are all back this week. It's making me quite misty-eyed and nostalgic, although not when trying to get groceries in Sainsbury's when it's rammed full of teenagers with their parents stocking up on food supplies for them. Bastards.

YAYZ! It took forever, but Hubs has finally slain the last Colossus. He is thinking of adding it to his CV.

Wicked ending, if The Longest Cut Scene Evar.

The Bobbo came back! Yes!

Happy Birthday PIC!

We have come back from a Hubs' Birthday/Father's day weekend away, and Hubs is off today as well. Good fun was had, an aquarium was visited, a funfair was frequented, 'Witness' was watched (Me: Tits! Amish Tits!), a BBQ was noshed.

Was going to start that Photo Diary meme today, but the camera's knackered... think the batteries have run down again, and I can't be arsed to recharge them.

Violet has developed an unsettling habit of always making a beeline for the grimmer inhabitants of our book, DVD and video shelves. The Exorcist DVD has always fascinated her, as have Hubs' copy of 1984 and both of our copies of A Clockwork Orange, despite them having completely different covers. Lately she's been intregued by Taxi Driver - she climbs up onto the little foam chair next to the video shelf to get a better look, pulls it out and points excitedly at the picture of Travis Bickle moodily treading the New York streets and cries 'DADA!'

I'll accept that Hubs is a bit of a Macca lookalike - a youthful La Reynolds, even... but Bobby De Nero?







If you say so, Vivi!