Equity calling?????

It is no use. There are no amount of creams or gels or cow innards on the market that are going to help the bags under my eyes. The nightly goings on in the Beehive are starting to be nearly as active as the daytime ones.

Take last night for example: By midnight I am awoken by the chorus of coyotes who have decided to make our back yard the next venue for the Gilbert and Sullivan auditions ! Three times they were howling over that nice piece of venison (okay, this is where someone corrects me and tells me that they are like cats and howl when they are getting a piece of the action!). Of course, by now, my mind is well awake - BLING! Am I hot? Am I cold? Why is he snoring when I am awake? This way, that way, toss, turn........eventually I start to feel like I am falling.........falling........falling - PING! That was LMB! Although she is not talking, I am sure, in my subconscious I have heard her door open. I creep out to check and yes, lo' and behold, she is sat cross legged on the boundary between her door and the landing!!!!!

The story is that LMB has just moved into her own big bed!!!!! I know, scold away! She is nearly three, but we have been trying believe me. The interest has not been there. With this development however, has come a few hiccups, namely the visitation rights of LMB to our bed at any hour of the night. Only.........being LMB, she doesn't just crawl into our bed quietely and fall back asleep, she sits and stares from the periphary or sits, as per last night, just waiting , making no sound, rather like Damien in The Omen (not that I have actually seen this in full, but this is how I imagine him, to stand and just ..........watch!).

So, after a lot of coercing on my part and lots of resistance on hers, to get her back to her bed, she is, once again, in her favourite place............Daddy's warm spot and Daddy has been henceforth banished to the realms of pink sheets, butterflies, fairies and lots of stuffed bed partners.

But it doesn't stop there. LMB then has to get it all just........... "so"......This involves several rounds of forcing her feet with their sharp nails (note to self - cut the buggers!) under my body to keep them warm, intermittent slapping of my face to ensure I am still there! Scratching, pulling the covers off, sitting up and trying to climb on top of me. By all accounts by 3.30am I am exhausted, debating whether getting up to make a cup of tea will actually wake her (yup, NOW she falls asleep!) when finally the sandman comes.........and then it is 6.20 and I am awake again staring at two pairs of eyes very close up! aaaaaaaaaaagggggggggghhhhhhhhh!!!

Yesterday I went to a class night for Master Beehive the younger. Each year the school has an evening with a social and then information about the running and layout of each class. Of course with three of them, these all fall on different nights, different weeks etc and this year I managed to successfully get to 2 of the 3 (I totally forgot about Master Beehive the elder's classnight and found myself having to write a grovelly note to his teacher about my complete incompetence as a parent and begging her not to put a blot in my copybook just yet! Master Beehive, however, has still not let me forget!!).

Master Beehive the younger's classnight was always going to be the stickler of the three. For starters one of the dads in the class has a child with the same name as my own. Everytime he calls her name sharply in the corridor I find myself jumping, checking my shoes are tied and my coat is on the right way around, it doesn't help that his wife and Mr Beehive work for the same company so there is always that desire to talk shop and wine! (Oh life you treat me soooooo bad!) But this year..........we started with a song!!

For those of you who know me a little better than some, I am never one for sitting back in the karaoke or not taking the lead role in a few school or university musicals...........but put me in an ice breaker situation where I have to sing my way out..............The embarassment always takes a hold......I feel the need to crack a shitty joke or fart out loud and blame it on my neighbour! Somewhat like a 7 year old kid really.

So, my question is this - why do group events feel the need to do such ice breakers. Just stick to the name telling games - really - that is fine, we are all happy with that. If anyone feels the need for a rendition of Tit Willow from the Mikado - well, I hear that some Coyotes are looking for participants!!!!!!!

Yours warbly

The Beehive