Somewhere there is Morningtown, many miles away

Isn't it odd that, when you've got to get up especially early for a busy day, it takes ages to get to sleep the night before? You finally pass out, exhausted, about half an hour before the alarm wakes you, and you go through the day in a trance, looking and feeling like death.

Stand by your man

I think I might have stood a bit too close to him. Man-flu seems to have crossed the species barrier from male to female (and yes, you blokes are another species sometimes!). However I now realise that it only lasts 24 hours, so there'll be no excuses in the future.

Roman in the gloamin'

We have two small ponds in the garden; the orginal plan was that water would be pumped from the bottom one to the top then trickle aesthetically down a little pebbly rill back to the bottom one. Thus the water would be constantly aerated for the happy survival of ornamental fishies in the top and froggies and newts and suchlike in the bottom one. Unfortunately it never really worked out like that because we never got around to permanently wiring in the pump which meant that it only worked when the back door was open to be plugged in, so it could only be on when we were in, and when it was off there was too much water in one pond and not enough in the other, and it was all a bit pants really. Then half the fish died, and a heron ate the other half, and the ponds started smelling manky, so I decided that this summer, before any wildlife settled in the sludge at the bottom to hibernate I'd empty them both and fill them in.

I'd get the bottom pond nearly empty (baling it out bucketful by bucketful, and taking any efts I found across the field to a real wild pond) then have to go to stop for a break because my back ached and it was usually getting late and supper needed cooking. Of course it was at this point, every time (oh yes, I've done this several times) it rained, and filled the pond again.

Ned reckons it's a Sisyphean task that will never be complete, but I reckon it's merely Herculean and will be done eventually. I wonder if the Greeks or Romans are right.

Working together they get the job done

Barack Obama
Can we fix it?
Barack Obama
Yes we can!

Let's hope so anyway!

(With apologies to Bob The Builder)

Rockabye, sweet baby James?

Ned was emailed a picture which has caused great consternation at Genie Towers. Ned studied it carefully and couldn't be certain; I studied it carefully and couldn't be certain. So we called the Boy to have a look and see what he thought. He too studied it carefully, and finally decided that no, it couldn't be him because his trousers don't have a white lining to the pocket.

I'm not sure if that was meant to reassure me or not.