Herod rides again!

Cribs recalled for Christmas

Bad news bears no gifts

I'm at my parents house. We're off to France tomorrow on a family holiday. It's my sister's idea. She got it into her head some time ago that we should squeeze as many family holidays in as we can while... well, while we're still a nuclear family, I suppose. We did the same thing two years ago, for the first time in fourteen years. It went pretty well. Though I'm hoping this time we can avoid exchanging gunfire.

Anyway, my dad just bounded into the kitchen as I was layering Mexican hot sauce over my tuna salad. "Have you heard the weather forecast for when we're away?" he asked, an enormous grin stretched across his eighty-year-old face. He was out of breath. He'd actually run down from upstairs to deliver this news. "You mean here, in England? No, what?" I responded, clearly not wanting to hear his answer, gearing up to stab the messenger with my fork. Dad just stood there by the fridge, licking his lips, his grin still making him look like The Joker might look after reading The Code of the Woosters. Then, with undisguised glee in his voice to compliment the idiotic facial expression, dad said, "Sunny all week!"

After cursing the gods, I wondered: what is it with people enjoying bad news so much? Really, what are they getting out of it? In this specific case, was dad just happy to have it confirmed by the TV weather girl that sod's law is infallible? Or was he getting a kick out his son's (inevitable) grief at hearing that he's away for the one week of sun Britain will see this summer? Or is he actually happy that all of next week, stuck in the middle of the Loire valley, we'll be sitting around the pool cursing the bloody English weather?

Note

To Amazon, Moss Bros, my first primary-school teacher and anyone else perplexed by issues of basic spelling, my name is not SMITH.

Thank you for listening.

Jesus (in context)

"My father's house has many rooms... All of them full of junk."

Advice to parents

"If you bring a child up to think for himself, don't be surprised when he does."

- John Higham, father of

Literarily: the tragically predictable sequel

My father calls me into the study. I find him staring at his computer.

Me: Yes?
Him: Thanks for sending me this 'Books' thing.
Me: Er, sure.
Him: I've clicked on the link.
Me: Yup...
Him: How do I look at the rest of the blog?
Me: Oh, right. You click on Amnesiac Review at the top there.

He clicks. Large picture of small man on panto horse being touched inappropriately by medium-sized, bearded man.

Me: [Hurriedly] Um, but you don't need to click through to that because I specifically sent you the relevant post.
Him: OK.

Beat

Him: So what d'you want me to do with it?
Me: Eh?
Him: What am I supposed to do with the link?
Me: Nothing. Well, laugh. It's funny, right? Things Fall Apart on a books conservation site?
Him: So why's there a link to the British Library?
Me: Nggghhh... [Long slow breath] Just in case anyone was in any doubt that there actually is a book by that name - it wouldn't be funny if I'd made it up... You HAVE heard of it?
Him: Yes, it's by Chinua Achebe.
Me: Correct.
Him: But -
Me: Never mind... [leaving]
Him: So you don't want me to adopt a book?
Me: NO!

TV

Until I was about 10 the family TV lived in the coat cupboard.

The first movie I ever saw was at the cinema - it was Michael Jackson's Moonwalker.

I have had an odd relationship with film ever since.

Father's Day

Seen in TESCOs: one book on Josef Fritzl, in the Father's Day display.

[Thanks to KJW]

Raul Ibanez, on bloggers

(For those of you who don't know, Raul Ibanez is the Left Fielder for the Philadelphia Phillies. He's good. Check his stats.)

"You can have my urine, my hair, my blood, my stool -- anything you can test. I'll give you back every dime I've ever made [if a drugs test is positive].

"I'll put that up against the jobs of anyone who writes this stuff. Make them accountable. There should be more credibility than some 42-year-old blogger typing in his mother's basement. It demeans everything you've done with one stroke of the pen."

Damn, why does everything think all bloggers live with their mums? Also, why does everyone think we want samples of their stool? My co-blogger and I are forever receiving anonymous stool samples in the mail. We understand people's frustrations at the things we write about them but our mums insist the poos in the post really must stop.

With the sympathies of this blog

"Music was the driving force of my life, but I was scared. When I was young, the line in my house was that you do something sensible - it doesn't matter whether you like it or not. You only do music as a hobby."

- From an interview with Bryce Morrison in this month's Marylebone Journal.

Parenting: the basics

Mickey Mantle was so hyped that it about broke him: He made the New York Yankees club when he was 19 years old. Then, after a rough spell, he was sent back to Kansas City, where he was so depressed he talked about quitting the game. That's when his father famously drove up to Kansas City and started packing his clothes and (in Mickey's memory) said, "I thought I raised a man. I see I raised a coward instead. You can come back to Oklahoma and work the mines with me."

Mantle, you might remember, decided to stick it out with baseball.

Reminds me of a heated 'discussion' I had with my parents in Pizza Express in Barnet last night.

You know it's the worst day ever when

thanks to your evil sister, you've got the Blossom theme tune stuck in your head.

Last night

my sister hit on McLovin in Waterats.

That is all.

UPDATE: No it isn't. I can't help noticing that McLovin's Wiki entry includes a reference to teabagging. Clearly I'm not doing my job as an older brother.

Thought for the day

The white south of England middle-class Englishman and woman is the most rootless creature on earth; we would rather belong to any other community in the world.

- Nick Hornby, Fever Pitch

The worst excuse for environmental destruction I've ever heard

Courtesy of my parents' batty new neighbour.

My parents: "Why have you torn out all the hedges and rose bushes from your once delightful garden [you utter fruitcake]?"

Batty new neighbour: "It's to stop people hiding behind them and jumping out at you."

The reliable son returns

My younger brother, Jacob*, is returning from Egypt this evening.

I know this, not because I am being despatched to collect him from the airport, but because my mother has left a Times educational supplement on MBAs lying on the kitchen table.

I have suggested she make something involving broad beans by way of a home-coming meal: he'll like that.

---
* yes, really.

My dad

thinks he's doing his bit for the environment by eating burnt toast.

My dad

is cleaning his car before he takes it to the garage to be cleaned.