J'accuse!

I may have mentioned before I am the happy[1] father of twins, their birthday despite my wife's best efforts falls on Halloween. For the best part of six years the two tcho tcho's [2] have believed 31st of October is when a large portion of the UK and almost the entire United States celebrates their birthday [3].

Needless to say Saturday before last was birthday party time and in keeping with the typical six year old party theme[4] lots of cake and chocolate were on show. I hasten to add neither cake or chocolate passed my lips, mainly because the tchos have decided to be the defenders of Dad's honour by making sure he can't succumb to temptation.

They take this task very seriously, by which I mean with the same level of seriousness as practiced by the East German Stasi or the KGB, though with slightly less reliance on torture and more on sleep deprivation techniques. While I make their lunch in the mornings there is always one pulling security duty to make sure I don't sneak an extra penguin out of the treat drawer. The sound of a drawer being opened in the kitchen will inevitably draw some kind of response, normally a simple warning "Dadeeee are you eating chocolate?" from some corner of the house. Alternatively, the sound of an opening drawer is swiftly matched to the sound of of a small herd of elephants[5] charging down stairs, and the “J'accuse” moment as they silently observe me from the bottom of the stairs as I put the cutlery away.

If I'm honest their efforts to keep me on the straight and narrow are pretty unnecessary. I'm past the cravings stage, these days if I think about any of the "forbidden fruits" its nearly always in the context of "it would be nice to have one right now" rather than any sense of desperate need.

So life goes on, we inch closer to our target of £1000 and are only a little way off. This means you could be the person who helps us finally get there, or more likely you could be the person, who persuades one of your mates to be the person who helps us finally get there! Think how warm and rosey inside you'll feel if that happens.

Oh and I'd just like to add a little comment about a conversation David and I had last week about the things we gave up. For three weeks I've been under the mistaken belief we agreed to give up chocolate, pastries (by unspoken agreement pastries to include sweet biscuits) and fizzy pop, why mistakenly? Well, someone asked David what WE'd[6] given up, "chocolate, cakes and pop" he answers, "does that include booze as well?" they respond, "Umm, yes" says David without I might add consulting me in any shape or form. So now apparently, I've been and still am giving up drink as well. Now, if I sound a bit embittered when I say I am giving up booze, it because well I am. David you see doesn't actually drink alcohol in any shape or form so he's not actually giving up anything!

David Parry j'accuse!

[1] For a given value of happy, which is whenever they are asleep, definitely out of trouble or not a risk to life or limb either to themselves or any passers by - which is surprisingly often.
[2] I'm not explaining this again, go back a few posts and read my footnotes...OK, look, its a nerdish literary reference to an early 20th century horror writer.
[3] The number of presents my wife buys them, would seem to support their thesis so its not really their fault.
[4] Actually, the tcho's 'traditional' party theme, involves skulls, bats, witches and other assorted horror tropes along with chocolate, cake etc.
[5] very loud pygmy elephants, but still elephants.
[6] Emphasis mine. You'll understand, why I need to emphasis it if you finish the sentence and understand the injustice.