Big kid has been eating porridge every morning for a few weeks, which means ten minutes of stirring the pan for me every morning. I don’t mind, I like doing it. So much so that I invested in a Scottish spoon this week to make it easier on my hand, wrist and arm.

Today, in a scene reminiscent of Andy and his carer in Little Britain, he jumped out of bed at 6:30 am ran into the kitchen and proceeded to slice a bagel in half, toast it and butter it all by himself.

Finished reading: The Son and Heir by Alexander Munninghoff 📚

Not a page turner by any means although it kept drawing me back in until the end. A true life story of very difficult family relationships centred on the author, his self-centred Nazi and all-round failure of a father, and his father’s father “the old boss”, who was a British spy, one of many strings to his bow.

🍿 A Complete Unknown (2024) - ★★★★☆

I really enjoyed this take on Bob Dylan’s electrifying personal highway to rock ’n’ roll superstardom hell amidst the increasingly furious shaking heads and would-be axe-wielding cable choppers of the folk establishment and elder guitar heroes.

Probably helps if you’re a Dylan fan. If you’re not, or you’re easily bothered by historical/factual inaccuracies in a “it’s the truth even if it didn’t happen” style movie then you should probably give it a miss.

Superb cast with highlights being Timothée Chalamet’s perfect portrayal of the obsessively creative introverted asshole Dylan and Monica Barbaro’s sensitive counterpoint as the already-a-superstar, slightly uptight but all-too-forgiving and exploited Joan Baez.

A Complete Unknown poster

Mum’s house has been on the market for just over a week, and photographs have been uploaded to the online estate agent listing for a full three days. She’s had three viewings, including one with a lady who really likes it and who’s friend lives on the same road - of course, she needs to sell hers first.

We’ve had an offer on the flat she wants near me provisionally accepted - just waiting on getting a firm offer on hers.

Now she’s panicking and looking at online house cash purchase merchants and auctions, because she reckons she hasn’t got time to waste, and she doesn’t want someone else to make a better offer.

Fundraising for my sons’ school got off to a slow start, mainly because the school was slow in sharing the online fundraiser with the school-to-parents messaging app, and then when they did share it they forgot to attach the link to make it clickable. As soon as they made it clickable and shared it again we got £190 in donations in one day. I’ve asked the school to keep sharing as “every day you share the school gets £200!”

My boy got his picture taken for the local council propaganda rag when they opened the school street this week.

Robin having a bath in the rainwater captured by the cover of the kids’ sandpit.

Big kid can breathe again.

Plan to ban smart phones in schools scrapped by MP: bbc.com

Big kid brought home a June 1983 copy of National Geographic from the school library today (I said it needs an update!).

Auto-generated description: A National Geographic cover from June 1983 features an image of space with the Horsehead Nebula and list of articles inside.

Some things never change.

A comment and a response discuss perceptions of bias in a National Geographic article on the Beirut destruction in February 1983, with differing views on anti-Semitism.

Big kid has got a place at our first choice high school for September. His best friends are all going to different schools - some by choice, others who didn’t get their first (or second) choice.

Hopefully I can get some grant funding for youth work at the local church, so they can all meet up there after school and maintain their friendships.