Payday!

The Sixteenth of September Two Thousand and Eleven. Friday.

Survived another (lunar) month without completely running out of money - hooray! Due to some technical problem or other this week's wage slips haven't arrived yet. Nevertheless, the actual wages have turned up!

Hmm, what is it all going to get spent on this month? First up was a maintenance payment. Apparently you still have to pay for your kids to be fed even after you've skedaddled with all the family silver. The laws in this country are ker-razy!

The usual bills: rent, getting the prepaid electric meter key to work at Sainsbury's, council tax, TV licence, phone, internet, satanic cult dues, laser hire and £3 a month to the psychic goat sanctuary.

Two birthdays! Due to poor scheduling son numbers one and two are both getting numerically older before the next payday. And with it being my birthday the month after if I don't get them anything they're bound to get the huff and not bother getting me anything in return. I hate having nothing to open on the day. Gift vouchers - or those 'credit card' type things that seem to be all the rage these days - just won't cut it. What sort of exchange rate is two cakes in order to get one in return? What a swizz!

Normally I have a bit of a splurge at the beginning of the month - maybe buy a DVD or two, or a CD or something. The truth is I have a shedload of stuff that I haven't read/seen/listened to yet so there's no great demand for new things. Although the Region 1 DVD of Adventure Time is out on the 27th, that'd be cool. Hmm, I suppose I should wait until next payday for that, really. It wouldn't be long after the release date.

There's a charity donation I'm overdue at making. Get on to that tomorrow.

Got to set up the payments for the new HD Humax too. That's going to take a chunk out of the proceedings for the next six months, but I knew that when I got it.

I've got most of the comics I want for now so that won't make too much of an impact of funds. There are the UK Marvel Collectors editions - I'll be picking up some of these tomorrow including Fantastic Four Adventures and Avengers Unconquered. I like the fact that you can still pick up US comics from WH Smith, even if they are reprints.

By all means suggest other things I can spend my wages on in the comments section, or on my Facebook page. I'm off to sleep now - my favourite free thing.

More soonliest

Nature, Red in Tooth and Claw

The Twenty-Second of August Two Thousand and Eleven. Monday.

Seemed like it was going to be a lazy day today. No2 son jumped onto my bed and then proceeded to jump up on down on me. I retaliated with some black belt tickling techniques I had picked up during my 3 year sabbatical with the monks of the Tzeng-Chu monastery in Tyne and Wear back in the nineties. When - as is the way with this sort of conflict - we eventually decided to team up and combine our attacks against No1 son it looked like the idea of getting dressed wasn't even being considered.

We got as far as lunch time. Watched a bit of rubbish on telly, although I did quite like a programme I hadn't seen on cBeebies before called Raa Raa the Noisy Lion which I quite enjoyed cos the main character's catchphrase was 'roarsome'. Oh and there was a Zebra called Zebbie, which seems kind of obvious but it still managed to make me smile. Still there wasn't a lot of movement or desire to move.

But I am a caring and responsible parent so I thought we'd better get out of the flat and get some fresh air somehow. So I made a flask of coffee, put some milk in a sports bottle and an old Irn Bru mini bottle and we went to the bakers and got cakes! We ate them in the square outside my flat and checked out the insect life at the same time. There was a really cool shield bug on our bench and No2 son has taken to collecting ladybirds. He got his first of the day here.

It was a very pleasant afternoon, sunny with just the odd cloud keeping things from getting too hot. In a flash, we decided that we'd go down to the beach for a paddle.

I live just round the corner from Scarborough's South Cliff. It only took a couple of minutes (after an unscheduled loo stop) to get to the cliff lift and get to the sea. I had gone for my shorts even though I knew the sun would make my legs itchy (they're itching now!). But I kept my hoodie handy cos I can't find a sun hat big enough for my giant potato of a head.

I had a dignified paddle while my two offspring set about splashing the heck out of each other. There was much screaming and laughter so I can only assume they were enjoying themselves. I was merely content to let the soothing waters of the North Sea work their magic on my aching feet.

It could have been the Mediterranean. The sun was on its slow, slow way to bed and there were long shadows and bleached out silhouettes all around. Check out this shark -

Of course that wasn't the real thing so the three of us made our way to the rock pools to hopefully find something more lively. And did we ever!

It's not very clear from this photograph but somewhere behind the seaweed there's a crab that was tucking into a tiny squid. It was amazing! Proper David Attenborough stuff. Who knew this sort of thing went on. And it was a tiny squid. A tiny squid. I don't think I've ever seen anything like it in my life. That white bit in the photo above is part of the body of another squid that was in there. The crab got scooped up and put in someone's bucket, but so did both bits of squid so I think he was happy enough.

Imagine if there'd been a nearby atomic test at that moment. If the squid and the crab had mutated to giant size who knows the extent of the damage that could be caused? Would have been pretty cool, though, but that's not the point.

After a mini aquatic safari we continued splashing a while before we wended our way towards the chippy. We took in the gardens on Prince of Wales Terrace en route where there was running, chasing and hiding but no deadly battle between giants of the deep. It was enought just to let the day run down from there.

There was a small conflict, however. When No2 son saw me getting my own squeezy sachet of mayonnaise to go with my chips he insisted that he should have one of the ret sauce one. I tried to explain that we had plenty of sauce back at the flat but I could see that the squeezy aspect of it was the real appeal. So much so that No1 son decided he wanted one as well. I relented - it doesn't do to spoil your children but I thought a 20p sachet of sauce wasn't really over doing it.

It hasn't been bad for a Monday.

More soonliest.