Number 400!!

I couldn't not write a post today, as it is post number 400! Blimey... I've written 400 bits of often dubious writings and ramblings since starting this blog. I'll take a quiet pride in that.

So, what about today? What wit and wisdom can I impart on this most auspicious of occasions? Errr....ummm...well....errr....I've just spent the last 3 hours writing lesson plans for tomorrow and Tuesday. My tonsillitis has abated somewhat; I just need to expel the remains of several packs of paracetemol from my liver. (I can't take antibiotics. I am fatally allergic to antibiotics. Perhaps that's why I am so keen to avoid dangerous activities that could result in catching awful diseases and infections. Activities like travelling abroad, flying in planes, teaching teenagers in local comps...)

Oooh...exciting news vis a vis Mrs Pumphrey's bottom fluffage! Because I go to work in the dark and arrive home in the dark, my only view of the hens during the week is as fleeting shadows in the half-light of dawn, and when I put my hand in the pod at night to do a head count to make sure they are all in bed and they squawk at me for disturbing their bridge 'n' cocoa evenings. I only see them in their full daylight glory at the weekends. So I have missed most of Mrs Pumphrey's moult and the fact that she is now growing, at a mightily impressive speed I might add, a very robust and feisty looking set of bottom feathers. Her nethers now look like Santa's beard stubble in January after he's had his annual Boxing Day shave and let the regrowth start immediately in order to be full bushed up for next Christmas.

Thus I predict that in ten days' time, Mrs Pumphrey's pink pants look will be no more. And HURRAH for that. Three fully fledged hens with not a bald spot in sight. Result! (I like to think that my constant supply of white cabbage has kept their pecking habits under control. Have you ever seen a chicken try to disengage their beak from the solid depths of a white cabbage? Keeps 'em occupied for hours!)

What else? Tybalt sneezed in his sleep and fell off the back of the sofa this morning. I tried, and failed, to find a nice rug for my soon to be here grand-daughter's room. But I have since found one on the interwebbly, so yah boo to the town shops for being so inadequate. I don't know, you try to support the local economy blah, blah, blah...

I bought a new dustpan and brush after Andy snapped the handle off the old one during a particularly vigorous snow clearing exercise. I bought a red one. It is very shiny. I also bought a new cover for the ironing board. It is very spotty. And pouffy. And a new iron to replace the old one that has had a sticky bottom I've been unable to clean off properly for several months now. See how wild I've gone with spending now I'm earning again?? This week household utensils, next week a Nissan Figaro. Well, maybe not next week, but you get the gist.

Also, we have booked a holiday. A week in the West Country at Easter. In a little cottage with some friends of ours. And I'm planning on buying a camcorder. Only I am too confused about the various types and accoutrements available - flash, pocket, hard disk drive, DVD, high def, optical zoom, screen sizes, memory cards, SD, SDHC, CF, MSPD, XD, LCD - to make an informed purchasing decision based on my needs, so will probably end up choosing the one I like the look of best, which is the shiny, burgundy red one on page 529 of the Argos catalogue.

I ate too much apple crumble for pudding.

Phoebe escaped into the front garden this evening and sat in the grass and got a wet bottom. She has now got a glint in her feline eye that suggests she may be making another bid for freedom as soon as possible.

Heather caught a shop-lifter yesterday. Her re-counting of the event sounded like a cross between Keystone Kops and The Bill and that end-of-show running thing they used to perform in Benny Hill.

Why are pirates pirates? Because they arrrrrrrrrrrrrrre!

Time for bed, I think.