As Randy Quaid, playing Russell Casse in ‘Independence Day’, famously said, ‘Hello, boys. I’m back.’
He then went and crashed his aircraft into a spaceship and saved the world. I don’t intend to do anything quite so dramatic as I take up my typewriter and bash out my regular morning nonsense. On which note, lets get the AOB out of the way first: Happy New Year, Kali Xronia, and all that. As for the 1st of January, that was a ‘Kalo olla’ day as it was a first of the year (kali xronia), the first of the month (kalo mina), first of the week (kali evdomada), and so on, and that’s done with now, so lets start back at Christmas…
I don’t want to bore you with hundreds of shots of our Christmas and New Year, as they are mainly photos with us and the logical family in them, and there are only so many images of our godsons that mankind can take in one sitting, but over the next few days, I will pull out some choice pics, and throw them up here by way of a ‘things I did in my holidays’ essay from junior school. Since I last wrote, we have been away, flown to Athens and taken the boat back, and had a few adventures in between. You may have seen some on Facebook, but not everyone uses that millstone, hence, a few more pics and stories will appear here.
Christmas followed our tradition of helping out at the boys’ house on Christmas Eve, peeling veg, with now trained chef Sam creating things in the kitchen, making stuffing with Neil, and everyone lending a hand. The reward was a game of Cards Against Humanity in the late afternoon, now the youngest is old enough (it was his idea), before a quiet night ahead of the storm which was Christmas Day. Not a real storm, the weather was very pleasant, and has been since. Except, I have been away and then, apparently, it wasn’t.
Still… Christmas family time continued and was followed by Boxing Day fun, feasting, cabaret and films. H did his first piano recital, we played some duets too, and he did me proud, playing three pieces from grades three, four and five (he’s only just started at the beginning of grade four).
It’s so rewarding after 20 and 16 years of waiting, one can finally share certain films and humour with one’s godboys. We made them watch Monty Python’s Meaning of Life. (Inserts evil, sniggering emoji.) I mean, it’s a film that covers all important aspects of growing up from contraception and the Catholic Church, to sex education, middle age to death, and all with catchy songs and silly sketches, people having their insides pulled out, and fat men vomiting. What more could you want as a teen? When we later asked H (now 16) for his opinion of the film, his verdict was ‘Disturbing.’ But it was said in that tongue-in-cheek way he has, and we don’t think he will be scarred for long.
Anyway, that’s all done and dusted now, and not what this week’s set of blog posts was to be about. That’s just getting the Christmas stuffing out of the way so I can get on with the business of Athens, and our trip, and that adventure will start tomorrow. As for the rest of today, we are back to piano lessons (grade 4 proper starts today), the schools are back, everything is returning to winter normal, and we’ve almost finished the post-holiday washing and tidying. What’s still to do is model making, but more about that another time. Then there’s the book writing and publicity and, like everyone one else, somehow, making some money to keep us going through the winter. Stay tuned…
