Quick daily posts

[Podolyanka]

As a teacher, I always look for the objectives of any new theme. What is the point of cake smash? Teaching the kid what? Turning him/her into a monkey for one day and then again trying to teach him to behave properly?

[Serinde]

When my nieces and nephews were little (last century) and my children had their first birthday, they had a slice of their cake, of course. Inevitably, they ate it with their fingers and made a bit of a mess, which is cute in a toddler and necessitated a bath, which they would have had in any case). But it's not something you'd want to continue into later life. What I find remarkable is that, of course, someone has monetarised it. Oh, and that parents have fallen for it.

[fccs]

Ugh! Cake smash? Seriously?? When my son turned one, he had his own little cake and, being one, he ate it with his hands (maybe two bites). No smash, no professional photographers, just a little boy with his cake. I had to wash his little hands and face, but that was it.

I’m old school - a first birthday captured in pictures, as it happens, randomly, spur of th moment, candid...these are the pictures that are priceless. The staged photos may be considered artsy, but give me the real ones any day. Those are the ones that capture the personality, and isn’t that why we take photos?

When my son got married, obviously there was a professional photog and his pictures are gorgeous. But one of my favorites is one of my son and his wife walking down a paved ramp, side by side, with him holding the train of her dress. It was taken from the back, so no faces...I absolutely love it!

[Mabel Figworthy]

I still think it's a lunatic idea (apologies to anyone who's had one for their baby and enjoyed it). To my mind, if you your baby has a birthday cake at the party with all the relatives, and happens to put his face in the icing, and you happen to have a camera with you, and it happens to result in an adorable photo - fine, lovely, keep it to embarrass them with when they get married.
But to set up an appointment with a professional photographer in a studio with a specially baked cake (there was another one for the actual birthday party in Teddy's case), encouraging the baby to smash the cake and smear himself in order to get"adorable" pictures - no, that simply doesn't do it for me.
Rant over

[richardandtracy]

I think we are all of an mindset where we consider profligate waste to be a bad thing.

There is a metropolitan mindset developing that sees profligacy and conspicuous waste in every sphere as the only way to show personal success and achievement. A baby cake smash party is all part of that mindset. A mindset that, in all honesty, repels me. A one year old baby won't remember anything of it. It's all part of shallow, selfish (usually self-entitled middle class) parents turning their child into a fashion accessory to justify the £30k wedding they felt they deserved along with all the other trappings of a successful life. As it grows up, the brat (for that is what it'll turn into) will have its every obnoxious whim catered to because the 'doting' parents will have more cash than love to shower on the apple of their selectively blind eyes.

Sorry, seen something like this all too often with those who went to boarding school with me. I now only have contact with one school friend and his wife, and they are childless through necessity (it's unlikely my friend's wife would survive a pregnancy due to heart & diabetes problems). Many of the rest followed lifestyles befitting millionaires on incomes similar to a bus driver, all to impress their inconsequential friends. I was deeply unimpressed. I have several cousins following the same path too - I know their names, but I am delighted to report that I have not the faintest idea where they live or how to contact them any more.

Hmm. As I grow older I am sounding more and more like a grumpy old man.
I love it when a plan comes together.

Regards

Richard

[Podolyanka]

When I googled "cake smash", the first thing google suggested was "We will arrange an unforgettable baby's first birthday cake smash party for just 800 pounds!"

I also think that hiring so-called professional entertainers to birthday parties is due to the parents' laziness of souls and lack of true love for the kid.

[Mabel Figworthy]

Richard, I agree with a lot of what you say, although being married to an ex-boarding school boy who is nevertheless extremely frugal (and wouldn't have a cake smash party even if everyone else on the planet had one) I have to say that generalisations are almost always dangerous.

I was slightly appeased by hearing that originally the cake smash had been planned as part of the family party, but Covid intervened hence the studio. Still think it's a silly idea, but that made it ever so slightly better.

Baby will not grow up to be a brat because he has sensible grandparents who will be an antidote (An antidote to doting parents - quite a good pun there!) I think son and DIL are generally fairly sensible, it's just that DIL is definitely of the Instagram generation and wouldn't dream of having anything in Teddy's life go unphotographed. They are nice people, though, in spite of having a cake smash . (Apparently Son had a much better time at the cake smash than grandson!)

[SteveM]

Yesterday we drove through the small town of Boring, Oregon. Normally it is uneventful, but this time we noticed a sign that said "Paired with Dull, Scotland". A little research showed that Bland, NSW was also part of the group. I've never had such an interesting trip through Boring.

[Mabel Figworthy]

[richardandtracy]

I have been on leave for a week, and today was the first day I didn't do gardening with a chainsaw or brush cutter. Delightful to lie down in the paddling pool for over an hour and slowly get to a comfortable temperature for once. In Kent the temperature has been horrific for most of the last week, most days above 30C (86F) and up to 35C (95F) on one day. The humidity has been so high we've actually had clear air rain, with a small amount of light rain happening from blue skies. That's unusual and not nice.

Regards,

Richard.

[Podolyanka]

Your climate is really not the "mild, moderate, sea climate with average winter temperatures above zero C" as we were taught at school. What about our above +30 C for weeks in summer and below -30C for a few days every winter, but the last one?

[richardandtracy]

Lyudmila,

It isn't like that any more. It used to be. Over the weekend of 1/2 August we saw a local weather forecast that was more than a little unusual. The forecaster started by saying that from 1960 to 2010 there were 3 nights in those 50 years where the temperature never dropped below 20C at night, and this is defined as a 'Tropical Night'. Her forecast had 5 nights where she was forecasting that it was possible. In actual practice this happened on only 3 of those nights. So in one week we had as many 'Tropical Nights' as had occurred in 50 years. So, our climate is changing, and it's changing fast.

As for having +30C in summer and -30C in winter almost every year, I really don't know how you cope. The weather must be utterly brutal to cope with.

Regards,

Richard.

[Podolyanka]

It is OK but needs a habit and a proper heating system
One winter my Australian friend asked me to describe what I was putting on to go for a walk if the weather was below minus 30C. In her next letter (those were the times of real paper letters which were travelling for 11 days one way) she said, "Wow! You must be spending lots of money on all those clothes!" I had to explain that winter clothes are useless for other seasons, so she was impressed even more.

If it were not for their snakes and crocodiles, let alone spiders and other crawling -flying- jumping-swimming critters, I would envy them for their one (summer) season for the whole year. As it is, I prefer my minus30 to plus 30C and no need to check if I am not sitting down on somebody. It is really not worth all the saving on fur coats and high boots if there is a red back's hole with a web door under one tree and a tiny wasp's nest on the doorway to the garage, and from time to time a goanna visits the back yard and you wait till she stops sun bathing and leaves. What never failed to impress me, were the boards on the beach saying, "Stonefish". Or when the radio says that the lady who sank last Monday was killed by a sea wasp. And you had been swimming there all day last Sunday.

[richardandtracy]

There is that. I was struck when going to a swimming hole near Cairns in Queensland at the bottom of a waterfall. There was a sign that had a printed background and a removable/replaceable plate. The sign said 'A Saltwater Crocodile was seen in this pool' and the removable plate said 'Yesterday'. And there were people swimming in the hole. Must admit neither Tracy nor I could join them.

The wildlife in Australia is fearsome. But I suppose if you know what to look for, the risk seems to become manageable - even if it's just an illusion.

Regards,

Richard.

[Serinde]

Where I grew up in the US, our climate was a continental one, so I'm familiar with the seasonal swing from fridgedly cold to the stupidly hot, too. As you say, Lyudmila, you need to have a plan. Winter clothes were all cleaned and put away in May, there was winter and summer bedding, we even changed the arrangement of furniture in the living room (no need to focus on the fireplace when it's 90F!) in one house. It wasn't uncommon to change the curtains from heavy winter ones to stop draughts to lighter ones that only blocked the sun. Blinds were pulled on the sunny side of the house. And frankly, when it got to be 100F (rarely, and in late August, usually), you didn't go out much. In fact (and here's your useless piece of information for the day), I'm so old I remember businessmen being allowed to go home in the afternoon because, without air conditioning, it was too hot to work in an office.

Up here where I live in Scotland, we've had some brilliant sunny weather, but I will guess that when the numbers are crunched in January, that we have been just about 1C over average. But I'll bet it has been wetter -- if that's even humanly possible -- and noticeably windier: neither thing is good, but is what was predicted by climatologists.

[SteveM]

I woke up at 3:30am to the sound of wings fluttering. I switched on the lamp to confirm what I already knew. Not one, but two bats were circling the bedroom looking for the way out. Thankfully after a few minutes they both found their way back out the door left open for fresh air. For some reason my wife insisted that the door be closed for the rest of the night.

[richardandtracy]

That's not something that happens every day...
Good that you've got them.

Regards,

Richard

[fccs]

Bats? In the house! Oh my gosh, I don’t know what I’d do. (I do know I would not touch them because they carry rabies and other cooties.)

[Podolyanka]

I know that Steve would possibly have had a dead body on his hands if I had been there.

[Serinde]

Rabies in bats is pretty rare in the UK -- we made it our business years ago to get rid of rabies in the canine population, too, so that's one less thing to be concerned about.

The weather, even up here in the usually-Frozen North, is so balmy and humid (21C and 80% humidity) that I feel like it's a warm May day from my childhood. Just waiting for the thunder, although no rain is expected. I know a Scottish summer day when it (rarely) see one, though. So no gardening today, but I may take my stitching or even weaving outside in the shade. Alas DH has convinced himself that today is the day to mow the lawn -- tomorrow will be marginally cooler and still dry, so I might attempt to divert him.