Thursday 21 March 2013

Just So

So, we got to talking a few days back - and I learned something interesting. Whilst Himself had Gameboys, Nintendos and more as a child - he never had the Just So Stories.

So I'm reading them on an evening, out loud, proper bedtime stories, to make up for not having Just So in the past.  (Just as it should be, Best Beloved, do you see?)

We just did my favourite "Stickly-Prickly, Slow-and-Solid and the Painted Jaguars" and I'm looking forward to telling him the tale of "How The Alphabet Was Made", but not before "The First Words", of course. Ooh, and "How the Leopard Got His Spots"...

If you want to join in and share the wonderful timeless tales, Project Gutenberg has them on file for free!


Monday 4 March 2013

Cat fight

Well, that was exciting.

Woke up at 4:20 to the sound of screaming (thought it was Rich snoring at first!) and went out to discover two girls lying in the middle of my road, hair extensions everywhere.

The nice couple from down the road came out and helped separate them, and the blonde stormed off screaming and shouting - fortunately in the wrong direction; they were quite lost.

(They'd have to be, to end up here from town!)

My goodness, she was only 16. Smashed out of her head, having spent the night at a gay bar..

I called the cops, took the other to find her bag and the other half of her broken glasses (seems I got lucky and picked the rational one, a little older, just trying to care for her off-the-rails friend) before bringing her back here for a cup of sweet tea and a chat with the local bobbies.

She reckons her friends drink was probably spiked.

Well, normally this is a very quiet street - it is just far enough from town and obscure-direction enough not to get hassle.

These girls had been visiting friends at the flats, about two minutes walk away, when the blonde one got into trouble.

Turned out there was a pretty mighty fist fight, and she ended up on our street, where her friend was trying to stop her running off further, and call the blonde ones mother.

Blonde was making SO much noise, I thought someone was in serious trouble - and, idiot I am, I got up and headed right for it.

The less-than-classy lady just down the road stuck her head out and just hollered at them: not particularly conducive to resolving the issue. More, adding to the problem of waking others up. 

I'm probably going to get a really weird reputation, having police round at 4:30 am.

Sunday 3 March 2013

Jumping Jacques

If Jacques previous owner was even interested, well, heck, he wouldn't recognise his dragon any more. He's doubled his weight in six months, nice and slowly, to 321g. He has headfats, his spine is no longer visible, his tail has bulked out and his muscles are in much better shape. He'll always be on the short side due to malnutrition in his formative months, but oh, he is so much a different lizard.

The last few weeks has brought about an amazing change in his attitude too; after months of aggression, snapping and tail whipping, he has mellowed out. He has got happy colours, and only flinches if someone does something he's not expecting. He still gets grumpy if you tickle his earspikes, but he's starting to chill out about everything else - including people touching his tail.

Jac's even getting the hang of this "being hugged" thing, and is starting to understand the proper way to be picked up - under the chest rather than over his back. It's dawning on him that it feels much more secure and less like someone's going to eat him.