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12.02 – 12.08

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Life

Went for a run with Σσ for the first time in more than five years. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I don’t think she disliked it either, when historically I always had the sense (rightly or wrongly) that some aspect of us running together was irritating her. Perhaps she did dislike it and I’ve just lost my sense of when I’m being irritating. We’ll see if another run happens again sometime. I hope it does.

We had a parent-teacher meeting on Tuesday that was a mixed bag. I think their main point was they’d like Ηη to stop shitting himself (wouldn’t we all pal), although I wasn’t in the room at that point in the discussion because (you guessed it) Ηη was shitting himself. Σσ felt like there was too much focus on getting him to fit into their regime when by their own admission he’s a free spirit and likes to be doing his own thing. I don’t suppose there’s a realistic way for them to change how they teach on a per-child basis. We could send him to a Steiner school. I mean we couldn’t, but I’m confident that would be an unmitigated disaster anyhow. One of his teachers chose to use the phrase, “I don’t think he’ll be hard to break”, which while we understood what they meant in the context still felt like a strange thing to say to a parent even if it’s how you approach it as a teacher. I think he’ll be grand in any case. I think Σσ might have another word with them though.

Ηη now tells us he likes dinosaurs (never has before) and dislikes mermaids and pink things (always did before). When pushed on this he said it’s because he doesn’t like girls things and mermaids and pink are for girls. The insidiousness of all this needlessly gendered nonsense is heartbreaking, but I don’t think there’s anything we can realistically do at this point to convince him otherwise. I don’t think I’ll be able to bear it if he wants to get his hair cut short. Conversely Αα gets pretty fucked off if we try to put her in a dress or dungarees instead of joggers and t-shirt.

Αα got quite ill early in the week. She seemed to be getting better towards the end but got quite puffy on Friday and we had a late visit to the GP who consulted with someone at Homerton Hospital to check they didn’t think it was Kawasaki disease. They didn’t, but they could hear she’s got a crackly chest. We’re hoping that’ll clear up because at this point I’m starting to feel like we’ll never sleep again.

Another 5th birthday party on Saturday afternoon, followed by Ηη’s first ever trip to the cinema to see Moana 2. He held it together remarkably well at the party (I think there was slightly less sugar on offer than usual, which likely helped). And it sounds like he was pretty good at the cinema too (even while his pal was being not especially good). I drew the sitting-at-home-with-Αα straw, which ordinarily I’d have been very happy with, but her illness and subsequent foul mood meant she chose to spend the time beating me up (which continued until she passed out). She seems to be getting increasingly physical with us when she’s fucked off about something. I’m hoping we won’t start getting lectures from nursery about her having beaten up the other kids.

I ordered loads of bathroom tile samples.

Aila’s still on the up.

Work

Content API. I mentioned that maybe we needed to ‘create a new pipeline’ because a colleague had suggested it. After careful consideration I don’t think I actually know what it means.

Might have to revisit Rx.js because it’s in use for the Content API. I dabbled with it a few years ago and from memory I found it to be a bit of a headfuck. No real reason to believe I’ll find it any different this time around.

Listening

• RHLSTP 539 – James Acaster

Running

• Tuesday hills
• Thursday hills
• Sunday 5 x Swain’s – Highgate looked pretty beaten up in the wake of Storm Darragh