holidays...

Hello. Sorry, I know it's been a while. It was the breathless excitement of finishing that essay and the whole whirlwind end-of-term thing. I've now finished the taught bit of my masters. There's still loads to do, but I don't have any more academic stuff to work on, it's just writing short stories and chapters towards the novel now - the nice bits. Quite wierd to have time to watch telly in the evening and not have to get on with set novel/essay/critiquing - tonight I sampled the delights of the hairy bikers (it was bakery porn, really - whilst they were hoofing down Hungarian scones, I was eating the last two gherkins in the jar and thinking wistfully about cream teas).
Tonight I'm sharing a bed with Twin 2, who has a hideous cough. I'm stocked up with her inhaler, bottle of water and box of tissues and am psychologically prepared for a very interrupted nights sleep. Bless her. Luckily I have diddly-squat to do tomorrow, so lack of sleep is not a problem, hurrah. Oh, well, I do actually have to take a huge load of washing to the launderette because the washing machine has just broken (and so has the sat nav in the car, wonder if the end-of-term thrill has affected my electric aura and caused me to fuse any appliance I touch? And will I be able to find my way to the launderette now?). And I also have to take my son to the garden centre to spend his birthday money (is it normal for a ten-year-old to want to spend his birthday money on plants? no, thought not).
Anyway, so what has been happening for the last week? Hmmm....(pause whilst I cast my mind back)...
The twins had a go at being body guards in a shopping mall on Saturday. We'd been to see Pirates with some friends as Son's birthday treat in a mall in Derby. When we took the girls to the loo afterwards there was some worried looking teen and her mate hanging around. They asked if they could walk out of the toilets with us as some other girls were threatening to beat one of them up. I sympathised; I have vague memories of girls threatening to beat me up and having to hide in loos or library (although I also seem to remember that as soon as I started wearing blue eyeliner and scrunch-drying my hair these threats seemed to stop - a top tip I perhaps should have passed on to the troubled Derby girl). So I told one twin to hold on to each of her hands and pretend she was an auntie and out we strolled. My girls may be only six, but nobody is going to mess with them, so the Derby girl was saved a punch-up (or more likely, a bit of squawking and hair pulling).
Other than that, we're just pootling along in holiday mode (which means that I wake up at six thirty when Twin 2 comes in and asks if they can watch 'Milkshake' or play on the Wii, I mumble something that she translates as a yes, and then I wake up again two hours later to goggle-eyed children and cereal all over the living room floor, then I make breakfast, set Bertha to work on the living room floor, and think hopefully about the possibility of going for a whole day without having to yell at anyone - I almost managed it today...).
Right, Twin 2 has stopped coughing, so now might be a good time to go to bed and try to get some shut-eye before she starts again.
Night then x