Happy Christmas everybody!

We're in an icy cold barn in the depths of Cornwall.  Having arrived and nearly gone home the next day due to frostbite we decided to stick it out until at least after Christmas.  We've spent approximately £30 million on electrical heating and another £20 million on logs for the fire.  We had just got the barn up to a temperature that avoided us falling into a cyrogenic state of suspended animation when we had a power cut for 11 hours today which set us back to the ice age again.

Apart from that everything is fab.  Lights at Mousehole, Tintagel, Newquay, Truro, Perranporth beach - we've done the lot. 

Have a good Christmas whoever you are, and I hope Father Christmas brings you what you want.  Provided you've been good all year and not naughty.

Last Friday I bit down on a granary bread sandwich and a sizeable chunk of a molar broke off in my mouth which was much less fun than it sounds.  Today I went to the dentist who said I need a crown on the broken tooth before he stuck a temporary thing in that feels like a large lump of chewing gum.

So in January I have to go back and have a lengthy session of crown fitting.  And, here's the exiting bit, you get to vote on what I do!  Should I:

a) Go for the NHS option - a gold metal crown costing £181.50 to give me "a mouthful of bling" (as the dentist said), or

b) Go for the private option - a white/porcelain crown costing £275.00

I'm leaning towards the more expensive but more natural looking option.  Having never undergone this sort of dentistry before, any opinions would be welcome.  Will it hurt?

I've received a nice letter from the police saying that they are going to prosecute me and fine me £1,000 and give me 6 points on my driving license and maybe disqualify me from driving as well, for driving at 49mph in a 30mph speed limit area at 13:31 on the A4 Portway, nr Barrow Hill Road, Bristol.

But I've never ever actually driven there.  Luckily I have plenty of witnesses to prove I was in the office in Hampshire that day, and sitting in a rather dull meeting at exactly the same time that I was allegedly careering through the streets of Bristol according to the policemen.  It looks like I need to tick a box on the form to say that I think they've made a mistake, send an accompanying letter to prove my innocence, and pay the return postage so I'm still inconvenienced by the whole thing.  So much for innocent until proven guilty. 

I've been following Sweavo's bathroom project for quite some time with mixed fascination and horror.  Rebuilding a bathroom seems awfully complicated but he has inspired me to have a go at refurbishing our en-suite bathroom here in March House.  It's pretty grotty at the moment and could do with a bit of modernisation particularly as neither the bath nor the toilet work.  I think the key tasks are going to be:

• Replace all tiles on wall and floor
• Relocate shower, bath, toilet and basin and replace all units with something more modern
• Replace internal stud wall with fancy wall made out of glass blocks
• Add nice lighting

Hopefully I can complete all the work before, say, 2013. 

The "before" shot:

Photo of a tree stump taken in Sunningdale Park at 7:00am on 14 October 2009.  Reminds me of the Close Encounters mountain.

So three devastating items of news this week:

• Legendary actor and dancer Patrick Swayze is no more
• Legendary chef and bon viveur Keith Floyd is no more on the same day
• Legendary musical prodigy pair Chas and Dave are to split up

Life doesn't get any worse than this.

Surely this won't work?  Isn't swine flu a virus?

In follow up to my letter of 17th September, I write to inform you that we now have one pupil in the Prep section of the School who has been prescribed Tamiflu. Therefore, we will instigate the next level of precaution. This means that pupils, staff and parents will be asked to use bacterial gel before entering certain areas, such as the dining rooms.

It's dead hot here.

Driving back from Newport this afternoon two lanes of the M4 were closed, causing a huge tailback and delaying my journey by about an hour.  I was assuming it must have been a horrific accident that caused it but it turned out to be a demolished portable toilet block that was being towed by a Rangerover before somehow upending itself and splintering all over the carriageway.  There were toilets all over the place.

I was trying to think of an appropriate and mildly amusing pun or bon mot  but have given up.

Following hot on the heals of carrots, we now have courgettes!  Well, some of them are distinctly more marrow-like in proportions.  Loads more of these coming too.  To think I used to hate eating these things...

Update:  I've just realised it is a harvest of ten courgettes so, given my close relationship with the BBC, I've submitted the picture for the weekly Ten Things article.  I bet they don't choose it.

"I'm making a portable"

"A portable what?"

"I don't know - I've only made the handle."

It's my birthday today - 2 July, the central day of the year.  I didn't feel too old but then I read this article which I found quite amusing.  The invention of the Walkman wasn't that long ago, surely?

Best quote of the article is:

It took me three days to figure out that there was another side to the
tape. That was not the only naive mistake that I made; I mistook the
metal/normal switch on the Walkman for a genre-specific equaliser, but later I discovered that it was in fact used to switch between two
different types of cassette.

Haha - genre-specific metal/normal switch.

Lots of food stuff being grown.  We have sweetcorn, courgettes, artichokes, blueberries, rhubarb, carrots, peas, strawberries, celeriac, potatoes, apples, runner beans, cauliflower, peppers and chillis.  Here's the first crop - carrots!

I'm a big fan of the DVLA-buy-your-car-tax-disc-online site which is infinitely better than having to queue for 45 minutes in the local post office during your lunch break only to be told that "this is a minor post office and we don't actually do tax discs" by the grumpy cashier when you finally reach the front of the queue. 

My online-purchased disc turned up safe and sound a couple of weeks ago and then, weirdly, it did the same again today.  So I've now got two tax discs for the same car, both expiring on 30/4/10.  Although its nice to have a spare in case the original blows away during the warm summer of top-free driving I think I might try and recuperate some of the significant £170 pounds the small purple circle cost me.  

So, does anyone else out there own a Toyota MR2, registration **** *** and want to buy a cheap tax disc?  Say £169? Email me if so.

[Note to lawyers - I'm not really selling this and have already contacted the DVLA about their administrative error.  Please don't throw me in jail]

Me: Sam - you've finished your pasta so now please take your plate out to the kitchen.

Sam: I can't take my plate out.

Me: Stop being lazy and do what I've asked, please.

Sam: I can't take my plate out because actually it's a bowl, daddy.

Claire: Stop being facetious, Sam!

Sam: I'm not being facetious, I'm being pedantic.

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I think he's going to easily out-manoeuver us in English usage as he grows up more.

Addendum:  He's just let himself down by stating "I always fart when I laugh". Ha!  I win!