the adlards

It’s end-of-summer hayfever time and Sophie is rotten with it. Jo has occasional sneezes and a light fever. Emily’s snotty and Michelle and I are sleep-deprived. It’s been two years since Sophie’s Big Seizure – hayfever and tonsilitis conspiring to trigger a fit to remember. So now we do our utmost to help her avoid ear infections, throat infections, … any infections; something the blooming hayfever season makes difficult.

Which brings me to the television thing. We don’t get out much when the chidlers are rotten. We stay in. So that they get better, dammit. That means a constant, repetitive shuttle from the toy room with lego-and-puzzles-and-tracks-and-towns-and-scooters-and-books to the lounge with a massive. obscenely massive. collection of kids DVDs. The timing of the shuttle is governed at one end by the pitch of screaming and at the other by, well, the producer’s whim. Or the studio’s budget.

It would have been nice to get into the pool today. It’s 31 degrees just now (88 for those of you celsius-challenged trans-Atlantic-people). Inside. It’s 17.10 and was hotter earlier and we couldn’t get in the pool because we know that’ll delay everyones’ recovery. Luverly.

It’ll be winter soon. I like winter.

Those days when life was better, the sun shone brighter and we had more fun.

Josie watches this morning’s partial eclipse of the sun projected through a pinhole.

We celebrated the arrival of 2009 with a breakfast picnic at Kirstenbosch. The streets were empty, the park was almost empty and we were back home and in the pool before the temperature got much over 25.

In a private ceremony I welcomed in the New Year with a venti affogato – more ice cream and espresso than you could shake a stick at.

Sets the tone for the rest of the year quite nicely I think.

Yes, indeed, 2008 – the Year of the Owl.
Here are some I stuffed earlier …

Getting the contacts off by disolving the glue with nailpolish remover is JUST SILLY.

It’s unfortunate that they have to sedate to glue the contacts on. Something about solvents and hairdryer and forty minutes of effort.

We’re all looking forward to getting away for a while next week. Before then, though, Sophie has her first overnight EEG; I have my first overnight in a hospital Lazyboy. It’ll be a bit like business class before lie-flat beds, I definitely have the better deal.