Friday, August 03, 2007

Play Park Pranks

One of the first things we were desperate to do was allow the kids (myself included in that number!) to play outside! India is soooo dusty and dirty and HOT, HOT, HOT most of the year, and then in monsoon (ie now) it is very muddy (and still pretty hot.). It is great to allow the kids to play without worryng about them becoming filthy, ill or hyperthermic!


This photo is one of my current favourites, and is my desktop background just now. Alistair said "Oh look, there's Daddy and Alistair... ...sitting on their balls"! Well, I can't really disagree with that!


It was great to be able to see all of Alistair and Freya's Cousins this summer. This is Laura below, Penni's eldest of five children (oldest only seven years old, yes, my sister is some kind of modern icon of motherhood!). Alistair has come out with some great quotes actually. Another was that towards the end of our time in the UK Jo asked him when he was deep in thought "what are you thinking about Alistair?" He answered soberly "I'm thinking about all the cousins I've made"! He now has 11!

Being away from Friends and Family is one of the main things that Jo and I struggle with in India. We are both very fortunate to have quite large, and very close and supportive families.

I was remarking on how appalling the weather had been in the UK this summer to a friend, and we were suggesting that if it weren't for friends and family people should all leave the UK and move to the South of France or something! I guess the trick would be to be able to persuade your entire group of family and friends that they also really wanted to move to sunnier climes!?

seriously though, What a disaster is global warming! I thought it was ironic when I read today that the melting of the polar ice-cap has opened a fresh debate over the mineral and drilling rites under the arctic ice-cap, as these regions become more accessible as the ice melts! Russia have planted their flag somewhere under the north pole! About a quarter of the untapped oil resourses in the world are thought to be under the arctic Ice-cap, and The USA, Canada, Denmark, Russia and Norway are all in dispute.

I've got an idea, why don't we just create some sort of huge wick or pipe from the underground reserves to the surface of the ice-cap and create a huge bonfire to consume all the natural resourses we have left as quickly as possible, WITH THE ADDED BONUS OF MELTING THE ICE-CAP QUICK TIME!!!! There would end a debate. (Isn't money the root of all kinds of problems in the world today?)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6927395.stm

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2 comments:

Ward said...

Global warming. We must admit the weather has been a bit strange of late. I flew into Seattle last month into a summertime fog and all-day rain. Seattle normally has drought in the summer. Not this year! 18 inches of rain in the mountains last winter... in one day! One degree off the all-time record high last month, it was 37C. 90mph winds put out power for a week in areas. NY City was paralyzed this morning with flooded subways. Texas was under water this spring. Parts of England were underwater this summer, record monsoons in India. This list goes on and on and on and on and on.

Ward said...

I forgot to mention the 2005 hurricane season. Katrina, Rita, Wilma. The biggest, strongest and worst hurricanes ever, all in one season. It was 50 years worth of major storms in 2 months.