Sea-ing Red

Another birthday over, another year older. I do believe that birthdays are becoming less exciting with age. Although D took me for a lovely meal last night - well the thought and being together were lovely - the meal was distinctly average. The restaurant itself was gorgeous and set in a cute little town not too far from us. I did not take my mothers advice though. She always professes 'when eating Italian always go for the pizza or pasta as the other dishes will not be up to scratch.' I chose the salmon in orange, lemon and white wine sauce. My rationale for this was that I am intolerant to wheat and it results in abdominal pain, so I was trying to be sensible and choose wisely, as I was also on a promise for later that evening! The salmon itself was cooked very well and I enjoyed it once I had scraped the jar of herbs from the top. The chips/fries/whatever were cooked in old fat and had a strange burnt taste to them. D had a king prawn kebab thing in a spicy sauce, but it literally was one skewer with 6 prawns on it and a tiny salad. After trying to eat incredibly slowly in order to prevent us appearing like gannets, and trying to ignore the abrupt waitress; we were left FOREVER. No one came to ask us if we wanted a desserts menu or any coffee etc. No one asked us if we wanted the bill. No one asked us if we had enjoyed the meal or if we wanted any more drinks. Well they lost out there because we left, paid without leaving a tip, and headed home to our new fridge freezer to eat masses of properly frozen ice-cream. Prioritising the ice-cream and a rather funny episode of 'Live at the Apollo' with Lenny Henry, Ed Burn, and Andy Parson, put us a whole half hour behind my menstrual cycle - bugger - I mean, what's that about!??? Someone is punishing me. If only we were back in the early onset of our relationship where we were ripping each others clothes off before we were hardly through the door after a night out. Bloody typical. According to Ed Burn - we would only disappoint each other anyway. Oh, and mental note: I must stop asking D what he is thinking, because apparently men are not thinking about anything or it is something so trivial, pathetic or weird, we might reconsider our decision to be with them.

As we were discussing 'us' during dinner, (well I was talking, D was pretty silent as usual); I did mention to D that I felt it was important we maintained a healthy relationship to avoid 'better offers' from appearing 'better' in this first instance. Following a look of confusion and a brief - 'I don't want a better offer' - which was sweet; I tried another metaphor to explain and suggested that if the grass is cut regularly, watered and fertilised well, the grass will never seem greener on the other side. For those of you thinking I am a sex crazed maniac - I was merely trying to point out that the passion was dead and that we needed an injection of romance back into our relationship, but I was trying not to be so blunt and/or hurt his feelings. He did seem to understand, but has not acted upon my observation thus far. It has only been a day, perhaps I will give it time!

We have our visitors from NZ staying with us now. They arrived safely this evening following what sounded like a traumatic journey - mostly being lost from what I can gather. They hired a car to travel around the country, and as they were travelling down from Edinburgh to us in Northumberland, they may well have found the 'scenic' route. All very well until it became dark. A little embarrassed that I can only put them on airbeds and that the sheets are not ironed, I have made my apologies. I have never tried to be a good housewife or ever professed to being one, in fact quite the opposite - and everyone knows it. But I do not have the power to create more house space and or bedrooms unfortunately. The weather seems to be raining on our parade for tomorrows plans too, but we will stay positive.

Another one of life's little parenting challenges presented itself this week. Worms. Or in Ali's words 'the sea-horses in my bum mummy.' She has been complaining about these sea-horses intermittently for sometime now but I never gave it a second thought because she does say some bizarre things. It was only this week that it dawned on me when she also commented her bum was itchy and she had been scratching it a lot, causing red marks. The health visitor informed us that usually you would see the worms in the bum or faeces - but I had not clapped eyes on any, thank god. So we went for prevention just in case and have all had to take a tablet (like the cats!). Ali has a new hand wash all of her own and a lovely pink nail brush to encourage effective hand-washing; which we were trying to do anyway but she cannot reach the sink on her own in this house, therefore we have also had to resort to washing them using the bath taps. Regular boil washing of towels and bathing to wash away any eggs laid were also advised. Very contagious apparently - great! Please seahorses - stay away from the visitors.