Bonfire night. Great excuse to have 'bonfire party' supper (ie pizza eaten with fingers directly off kitchen roll - no cooking, no washing up, hurrah!). A couple of other wives came round later to help me take the littlies to the fireworks display. It was a cold, clear night - perfect conditions - and you can always trust soldiers to do a good job with pyrotechnics, so it all looked promising.
Headed straight to the refreshments tent for refuelling: toffee apples for the kids and mulled wine for me. When all you've had for supper is a slice of pizza, one Gluhwein can be pretty potent. I feared for the safety of Twin number 2, strapped into my backpack.
Son sat down to watch the display and said the fireworks were 'beautiful'. Twin 1 found various small friends to dance about like a maniac midget with. Twin 2 was happy just to wave half-sucked toffee apple into my hair throughout. I had a second Gluhwein and started to sway along to the music, grinning half-wittedly at random onlookers.
It was a great display for us dependents (wives and kids) but probably not such fun for the soldiers, given that most of them will have had some experience of altogether more real 'firework displays' recently. However, no-one shouted "Incoming!" and ran off to take cover - but some did look slightly twitchy, and with good reason.
I began to think about how Guy Fawkes was himself orchestrating a terrorist plot in a religious war. There was probably some important point to be made about irony, historical parallels, etc. but after several mulled wines and with a toddler spitting mangled toffee apple down my neck, I was not the one to make it.