X-rated beauty

Beauty means different things to different people. I was walking around Bermondsey this week...it really is a fantastic, unknown part of London, and took the opportunity of snapping a few things that caught my eye:











Of course, beauty is more than skin deep as the people who created these pictures were trying to convey ...they're for a calendar, and rather different to the Pirelli calendar I used to get sent when I worked in the car industry:















*Pin-up Calendar 2010 was done by BUTTER, the advertising agency for for Eizo in Germany - their copyright acknowledged. Who says the Germans don't have a sense of humour?

Taking her up the aisle....

We're not really Royalists The Boy and I. In fact I'm of the 'chop their heads off' persuasion....I'm not quite sure of The Boy's real views on the matter, but he is at least irreverent.

The Girls on the other hand are loyal subjects...and certainly love a good wedding.

So you can imagine, the amount of time and space being given over to the Royal wedding is driving me to distraction. On the day of the announcement, the BBC, as it always does, went off the deep end with its coverage. All day there was 'live coverage' filling the airwaves. Live coverage of what? They got engaged in October, they're not getting married until the spring at the earliest. They've been dating for eight years. There was nothing to talk about. Really absolutely nothing And more importantly, the days when we are all were passionate royalists are long gone. William's mother and father are probably to blame for that. Yet the BBC still insists on devoting ridiculous amounts of resources to this.

I'm not happy.

The morning after, The Times was giving away a souvenir poster, which The Boy put up...and then felt the need to decorate...



The Girls are not happy.

I am mercenary enough though to look forward to the inevitable public holiday, this will bring...

Whilst I'm on the subject of the media, I rather think they've got it all wrong with
Aung San Suu Kyi too. I'm delighted that she's been released...no one should be confined to home for a decade or more. There is, after all only so much tidyng up you can do. But in celebrating her release I suspect the world's media and our glorious leaders are being remarkably naive in suggesting that this is a step forward for Burma. She's been released by the military on their terms and their timing - days after an election which they engineered. They were the first elections for twenty years and it'll probably be another two decades before we see more elections there again. Her party remains banned. She is politically impotent, and if she says too much will doubtless be locked up for sedition. This is a real PR victory for the military.

And as these things always come in threes...I can't help but think that the Irish situation is yet another victory for the bankers...a state forced to take loans from the EU because the market says it should and not necessarily because they actually need to. In another age, it would be time for revolution...and I know who I'd be putting up against the wall first!

I may have got out of bed the wrong side this morning....

Before and after

...oh there is such a range of things that I thought of for this week's challenge...but I chose this image as the before



It was a beautifully designed contemporary clock which sat in the window in Brighton, casting a wonderful blue glow when the sun shone through the 12" glass disc. The Boy and I loved it.

We came home one Friday night having been away for a week to discover that some days previous a seagull..presumably a young one...had fallen down the chimney and into the flat. Heaven only knows what terrors went through its tiny little bird brain in the days and nights that it spent there. But this was the 'after':






I managed to catch it, by throwing a towel over it and carrying it down stairs. When I put it down on the grass outside, it hesitated for a moment before lifting off. I wish I'd got its address to send the 'bill' to...or perhaps I should have put it in front of a beak...

The clock never recovered.

It's just not fair...

One of The Boy's friends has been grounded for 2 weeks and banned from alcohol for 4. He's fifteen. It doesn't seem a very harsh punishment for getting so drunk at Saturday's party that he spent the evening with his head down the great white phone to God, and then proceeded to heave ho in his Dad's Jaguar.

I gather he thinks "IT'S SOOOOOO UNFAIR!"

The Cat has homework every night, and it takes her from arrival home time until head on the pillow time to do it all. In between stopping for supper, chatting to a few friends on Facebook, listening to a few songs on iTunes, etc, etc, etc.

"IT'S SOOOOOOO UNFAIR!"

The Boy, on the other hand never has any homework to do at home, so spends the evening stealing The Cat's computer, watching TV, playing on X-Box, listening to iTunes, chatting with friends on Facebook, reading, watching YouTube, making a mess in every possible room. It's a mystery how and when he manages to get his homework done, but done it is. So I whooped with delight when he announced yesterday that he had an English essay to do last night.

That was the wrong thing to do.

How unreasonable of the teacher to set it. How ridiculous. Doesn't she realise he has a German test this week. That's a GCSE thing. That is more important. He needs to focus.

"IT'S SOOOOOOO UNFAIR!"

I offered no sympathy...the teacher says they need to understand the pressures of juggling deadlines. I understand her logic.

Later he suggested that he explains to the teacher he does the outline, and a bit more, and will complete it after the test...what do I think? I'm sympathetic, not really knowing what the teacher might say, what are the rules and suggest he discusses it with her. But then I discover the essay was set last week...he had all weekend to do it. A weekend that was spent doing sweet FA. Apart from partying.

Sympathy goes out the window.

I'm in trouble again. "IT'S SOOOOOOO UNFAIR!"

J(o)e le taxi

The Cat's Mother skived off parental duties for the weekend by absconding for a couple of days away with the girls...

It's been a busy weekend:

Friday:

I picked up The Cat from school, with her friend and brought them home to get changed for a party
I picked The Cat and The Boy up from the party at Midnight

Saturday:

I drove The Cat and The Boy to a friend's party at 7.00
I picked The Cat and The Boy up from the party at 11.00

Sunday

I drove The Boy to the Remembrance Day parade at 8.45
I picked The Boy up from the parade at 11.20
I drove The Cat to school for a play rehearsal at 12.45
I picked the Cat up from school at 2.30
I drove The Cat to babysit for friends at 5.00

I know it's every parent's chore and I'm so glad I'm fully into the swing of things...