We're quite excited that Keisha Castle-Hughes got nominated for an Oscar and Jed picked up on the nice example of structural ambiguity in the Snowmail report on it:

Thank you Billy - that's fascinating reading. And being the language hot dog that you are you must have loved the quote for Whale Rider: '...Castle-Hughes was discovered by a casting director who visited her school and had no previous acting experience...'

It's the only time of the year I wish I had Sky to watch the whole terrible but unmissable award show live. We used to have Oscar parties to watch it all through the night!

Apoa went to her very last secondary transfer assessment yesterday, which was a music audition. We came out of the school around 5pm to find heavy snow, thunder and lightning waiting for us. We enjoyed the traditional winter pursuit of standing at the bus stop while no bus comes, followed by the bus that crawls slowly past without stopping. Two and a half hours and a combination of bussing and walking and stopping off at nando's later, we were home, where we were greeted by a snowman (or what was left of one after the cheeky boys next door had been round). It's all melting around me as I write so I hope the kids are making the most of it while they can.

B-)

Yesterday I had a chat with a neighbour as she cleaned up after someone broke her car window and tried to steal her prescription glasses(!). If this was a movie, we'd have known that was going to be significant at some point. This morning, Kiloh fell on her way to school and got a bit of the glass in her knee. It was easily removeable, luckily (and lucky Kiloh spotted it as I didn't notice at first) and she was very grateful after it was cleaned up.

We were woken up last night by a bizarre sound which turned out to be a fox hanging out outside the house opposite and wailing in distress. It was like a cross between a dog's bark and a cat meowing in distress, maybe the kind of noise you'd use in an animated movie for a baby dinosaur. Very strange. It left when I looked outside but came back as soon as I went back upstairs. Of course, I've been listening to this today

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Had a great Burns night at the weekend, the first one we've done with kids involved. Everyone joined in and some with great gusto. The kids all memorised small four-liner ones (2 graces and 1 little witticism about the joys of a highland welcome). We consumed decent but not outrageous amounts of usquabae, including some of Bonnie Prince Charlie's liqueur (in Edinburgh Fog as well as on its own - no rusty nails, though). If you fancy reading a bit of the bard, this is one of many well-stocked sites.

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'...if Hutton brings down Blair'

Interesting article on spiked today

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We're off to Scotland on Thursday night.

The kids are excited, and also excited by the prospect of snow. They're saying we might get some in London tomorrow but if not, we're hoping to see some in Scotland. Hope we don't manage to avoid it. On the other hand, Ohna is very busy at work and can't afford any weather delays. And the kind relatives who will be ferrying us around when we get up there would probably rather do it on roads with a bit of traction, visibility, etc. I remember borrowing Tracey's boyfriend's VW beetle up there once and driving back to Bessie's from Aberdeen with the most ineffective windscreen wiper in the world.

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Elma asked me who had given Aidan the book. I had to confess it was the naughty neighbours (us). It got worse at the weekend. Kiloh, Anna and Makeda spent Saturday making cigarettes by rolling up paper and colouring the ends in red. Then they dressed up and went nightclubbing while 'smoking' all afternoon, pausing every now and then to drink some 'brandy' and 'champagne' (apple juice really). Hope they don't export this game to school as well.

Kiloh justifies her new smoking habit by saying 'it's better than sucking my thumb'

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Aidan's teacher phoned his dad and asked him whether he was sure it was appropriate for his son to bring a book like this to school. Then Aidan showed him the dedications inside the cover revealing the guilty parties who had given it to him for his christmas.

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I just phoned Apoa who had her last selective exam today - she's still got a music audition and an assessment (which isn't selective) to do. As usual, I turned my lamp on her and asked detailed questions. Now I've got to resist the urge to tell Ohna all about it before she gets the chance to debrief.

Kiloh, meanwhile, seems to have pressed on both the intellectual and physical accelerators at once, with three books on the go at the moment (Lemony Snicket volume 10, Coraline by Neil Gaiman and The Subtle Knife on CD) and also having just restarted football club, gymnastics and swimming and also signed up for tag rugby. This was a first-come first-served deal and she was very impressive at making sure she was the very first to apply, getting straight on the phone to Ohna and filling in the form ready to hand it in first thing in the morning (she's also in the habit of leaving for school 20 minutes before the bell nowadays - the journey takes around 3 minutes door to door).

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Hi Dug,

Glad you're enjoying once more with feeling I haven't listened to it much because I haven't got round to watching the episode we taped a million years ago yet (not to mention the broken vcr I haven't had fixed yet even though it's only one phone call and it's rented so the repair is free and everything...) Your mum has a copy of the CD, btw

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Apoa made it to the second exam stage for the last school she's trying for. At least one of her friends didn't, which is a right bloody bore.

Last night the kids pretended they'd heard that she'd got through, which is the kind of fate-tempting thing a grown-up would never do, so I'm glad she did make it. When she phoned to tell me, I got to pretend that I didn't believe her and thought she was just pulling my leg again. So now she's got one more exam, one music audition and one 'assessment', which is an exam for a school that's not selective but tries to take kids from all the ability ranges. Can't wait till she's done it all. But then I guess Kiloh's turn will come round before we know it.

B-)

I've been busy as you can tell by the gap between this and the previous posting. Lots of postable stuff has happened but you know, life. I still don't have time to write this, but there does seem to be a general feeling that the later on a Friday it gets the more justifiable time-wasting is, which seems like a bit of a paradox but whatever.

Anyway, I won't tell you about all the stuff that happened over the last few weeks. Instead, I'll start by venting my frustration after spending an hour and a half this morning standing in the cold waiting to buy a day ticket at the Royal Opera House (while reading 'Crime and Punishment' - in for a penny...) only to be told when I got to the sales point that it was one ticket per person - something they didn't mention when I phoned to ask about it last week. I didn't want to go without Ohna and I have an overdeveloped 'let's-just-deal-with-it' module and didn't think about kicking up a fuss until too late, when I phoned up too late for them to do anything about it. So I left with nothing but memories...

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