Tag Archives: McMini

2 Dec 2013 · 7:23 pm

Aw bollocks it’s the Chaos Fairies! Never mind here’s another gem from McMini.

Multo pissed offo con ultimo gizmo, con action grumpo. I dropped my iPad today and smashed it to bits. Arse, that’ll teach me to eyebomb our garage door with McMini for a laugh and then try to take pictures of it.

Wankpots! Wankpots! Wankpots! Bloody Chaos Fairies.

Needless to say I dropped it from about 3 feet and am almost certain that it was my spanner fingered attempts to catch it that were responsible since they simply involved me batting it up into the air so it went higher up and came down on one corner as opposed to its back. Then again, if these things are the all purpose take everywhere items the makers and adverts would have us believe then maybe they should try making them a bit more sodding robust. Probably.

IMG_0891

On the upside, the screen works so I won’t have to spend £110 (urrrgh MT’s knees go a bit wobbly) on a new screen straight away. There’s a shop who’ll fix it quite near and they will do it while you wait (2hrs) and I might even be able to get McOther to pick it up – said shop is about a mile from where he works.

Oh and our garage door looked like Nigel Mansel for a few moments – until I removed the eyes in disgust.

And another positive, I managed to do 35,000 words, or thereabouts for NaNoWriMo, which, considering I wrote nothing at weekends or the week before last and very little last week either is making me feel… smug.

So to cheer us up, another couple of conversations from McMini.

His godfather is recovering from a shoulder up and suggested we draw him a card.

“My shoulder hurted a lot once but once I had got home it went away. He will feel a lot better when he gets home.”

And on the subject of marriage, overheard by his Dad.

“I’m going to marry my Mum when I grow up.”
“You can’t do that,” said McCousin, “your Mum is already married to your Dad.”
“Yeh but he’s old. He’ll die before long and then I’ll marry her.”

I’m not quite sure how to take that.

And this evening as we’re going to bed.

“Eugh! I’ve just smelled my trousers and they smell absolutely stinky.”
“Oh dear, what wee and poo stinky?” 
“No. They smell like fried socks.”

So… a mixed bag.

Oh and if you’re wondering where I’ve been for the last two weeks, well, for the first one I was baking a cake – more on that story, later.

In the second week I was catching up with all the things I was supposed to be doing when I was making the cake instead. Then I was hanging with the in laws and McMini. There’s not much going to happen this week either, phnark but I do hope to get the K’Barthan Trilogy done by Christmas.

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8 Nov 2013 · 11:46 pm

Things you don’t know about parenting until you try it Number 63: Night Terrors.

2012-11-06-153One of the surrealist things about having kids is night terrors.

McMini is getting over a sick bug and has a slight temperature so it was pretty much a given that he’d have one. They are also more likely to happen to very active children and McMini is extremely active. He started crying in that certain way and I went upstairs and found him sitting in bed shaking with fear, sobbing his eyes out and staring at something only he could see. Normally I talk to him, sometimes he responds, sometimes I just sit with him to make sure he’s OK and reassure him when he wakes up.

“Mummy…” crying.
“It’s alright mate,” doing the special calm voice, “I’m here. What’s up?”
“Where am I?”
“You’re in bed. Are you scared?”
“Yes,” sobbing, “but Mummy, can’t you see them?”
“What?”
“The Power Rangers lined up in front of the curtains.”
“I’m afraid I can’t.”
“Why not?” still sobbing.
“Because you’re asleep mate and I’m not in the dream with you.”
“Oh.”
“Yeh. It’s OK you’ll wake up in a minute.”
“Will I?”
“Yes. Are you scared.”
“Yes.”
“I’m not surprised, I would be too but don’t worry, you’re just having a night terror. Would it help to sit on my lap until you wake up?”
“Yes please.”
McSmall climbs on lap.
“What’s a night terror?”
“A very vivid type of dream. I still get them sometimes. Mine are when I can see the room I’m in but I hear a noise which I know is not real (but is still very scary). To be honest you probably won’t remember this when you wake up. Do you want a drink of water?”
“No thanks.”
“Sure? It’d be nice and cold on your throat, might wake you sooner.”
A beat. McMini stops sobbing abruptly.
“Mummy?”
“Yep.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Ah, have you just woken up?”
“Yes. Why am I on your lap?”
“You got on here.”
“I don’t remember.”
“That’s OK, you wouldn’t you were asleep. You’ve just had a night terror that’s all. D’you remember what you were dreaming about?”
“No.”
“Well, it sounded very exciting because while you were asleep you told me it had power rangers in it.”
“Oh.”
“D’you want to hop back into bed now?”
“Yes please.”
“Right o.”
I hug him and give him a kiss.
“Night kiddo.”
“Night.”

Night terrors. So surreal. If you’re little one is having them fear not. I found a few things on the NHS website which helped me feel more relaxed about it so I thought I’d share them:

  1. It’s scary for sure but try not to freak out. This is easier if you can remember having them yourself. Just sit with the child, hold them if it seems to help. Speak calmly to them if it helps you – sometimes they talk back quite lucidly and calmly, even if they’re crying their eyes out.
  2. Their eyes may well be open.
  3. It’s NORMAL, don’t worry, your small one is fine. It’s basically, a normal nightmare but at a different stage of the sleep cycle.
  4. It’s tempting to wake them but most pundits agree you should let the terror run its course. It will take anything from 5 to 30 minutes if our own experience with McMini is anything to go on.
  5. They are more likely to happen when your small person is extra tired, has a fever, and is going to sleep more deeply. They can also be caused by things that are likely to wake them up, excitement or sudden noise, for example the huge firework some complete bastard let off outside our house just before tonight’s terror started.
  6. Once the attack is over, if they start sleeping peacefully again, it’s often useful to wake them as this can break the cycle and stop them having another one.

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25 Oct 2013 · 4:36 pm

Am I what I eat? I hope not.

It’s Friday, not much is going on, McMini is upstairs ‘playing’ with a cross trainer, which is somewhat worrying but hey, he’s enjoying himself, taking some exercise and it’s keeping him quiet. Actually, it’s not, he’s shouting cheery numbers down to me as I sit here in the kitchen.

“One hundred a million!” clunk clunk, “seventy zero” clunk whirr clunk, “fifty a hundred three!”

Which reminds me, I don’t think I’ve posted anything about the conversation we had in the supermarket the other day.

After our splendid trip to Alsace, McMini has developed a liking for frankfurters or “les knack” as they are known in Alsace.

Dinosaurs meet.

Dinosaurs meet.

So I tend to buy them in packs of four, one sell by quite soon, one with a date a bit further away so I can keep it in reserve for later in the week. So there we are at the cold meats section and I’m rootling about at the back looking for one with a longer date. McMini is idly looking at the packets of stuff asking random questions and I am marvelling at the way his mind works.

For example, his question about precut salami: “How big is one of these sausages, Mummy, if it’s not cut up?” you get the picture, I’m sure. anyway, there we are.

“Mummy…?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know what this meat is?”

“No,” I say, because Mummy is not really looking.

“It’s pterodactyl meat.”

I grab the latest sell by date knacks I can find and pop up to see what he’s looking at. Pancetta, cubati de.

“Is it really?”

“Yes. They catch the pterodactyl and then they kill it, and cut it into tiny pieces and then WE eat it.”

“I see. That’s… very interesting. Did your father tell you that?”

“No, I made- I found out all by my own. I know all sorts of interesting things.”

“I’ll say.”

At this point I notice an elderly man who gives me a lovely smile and walks away chuckling.

Later, on the way home, he says. “Mummy, I love you and Daddy and God more than anyone else in the whole WORLD even more than my best friends!”

This is how a five year old thinks and talks, I suppose and it’s really rather wonderful.

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16 Sep 2013 · 9:05 pm

“Come in to my parlour,” said the spider to the fly.

On our last day in Alsace the weather was blinding so we left later and spent a morning at the hotel pool. McMini was playing with model planes, micro mini planes, one of which was an X Wing fighter out of the StarWars films. The conversation, as reported to me, went like this.

McMini, “Get in! Get in! Get in.” rinse and repeat.
McOther intrigued as to what is going on asks, “What are you doing there?”
McMini shows him the X wing with it’s cockpit opened. “I am trying to get this ant to climb into my X Wing.”
McOther, “Why?”
McMini, “So he can go for a ride.”
McOther, “But he’s an ant, he won’t be able to drive it.”
McMini, “That’s alright, I will drive it for him so he can have a lovely time.”
McOther, “I’m not sure he’d like it, why don’t you leave him where he is?”
McMini, “But Daddy he will have such a fun time.”
McOther, “I’m not sure. Ants enjoy different things to humans, he might not like it.”
McMini, a little crestfallen. “Oh… are you absolutely certain, Daddy?”
McOther, “Yes.”
McMini, “OK, I will leave him where he is then.”

We’ve been giggling about this ever since.

This evening, McOther rang to say that he was on his way home and that there was a lovely moon. I suggested McMini could look at it through his junior National Geographic telescope (what was I thinking)?

McMini, “Will I see any aliens?”
MTM, “Maybe.” (What was I thinking?)

So we got the telescope out and set it up and he has a look.

MTM, “What do you see?”McMini: “Nothing, just whiteness.”
MTM, “Hang on, shall I just check it’s in focus?”
McMini, “Yes please Mummy. ”

So I check it and focus it.

MTM, “There you go.”
McMini, “I still can’t see anything.”
MTM,”Hang on, let me check that again,” MTM checks the focus again, “is that any better?”
McMini, “No I still can’t see.”
MTM, “Maybe it’s the angle, shall I check again?”
McMini, “Yes please.”

So I check the angle and yes, it’s all fine, the moon is bang in the middle and he should be able to see it. I wonder whether he’s closing the wrong eye. He has another look.

McMini, “I still can’t see any aliens, just white moon.”
MTM, “Well, you probably need a bigger magnification to see aliens.McMini, very crestfallen, “Oh…. I wanted to see some aliens.”

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30 Aug 2013 · 9:38 am

McMini

Another gem.

On the beach, on a blustery day.

“Mummy this wind sounds like a giant growl that never stops.”

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18 Aug 2013 · 9:21 am

More McMini…

It has occurred to me that outside the input from others this blog is officially, not funny any more. So I decided the best way to fix that was to abandon my postings about McMini on facebook and put them here, where everyone can see them. So, here they are.

First up, McMini on… hmm, yes, well, I suppose this is a kind of recycling.

He sits in bed examining the soles of his feet and carefully peeling off a bit of loose skin (have you got the boke yet? I have). He holds it up.
“Look Mummy, I am eating this meat. It is delicious,” he says, puts it into his mouth, chews and swallows.
This morning, things have changed.
“Mummy, I picked a bit of skin off my feet just now but I didn’t eat it because it stinked, so I threw it away somewhere. I don’t know where it is.”
“Great, I’ll look forward to finding that later,” says Mummy.

McMini on hunger; recently, he has been developing hollow legs.

“I’m so hungry I could bravely eat a dinosaur’s tongue! And the horns of a dinosaur.”

Polite rebuttal.

“If you will excuse me Mummy, I am feeling a little tired now so I think I will have a sleep.”
“Night night.”
“Night.”
Mummy gets three quarters of the way down stairs.
“Hey Mummy! Come and look what I’ve found!”

Scientific enquiry…

“You know the little hole on a whale’s head? Well you know the water that comes out of that? Well, it’s old air. I am going to try and blow the old air out of my nose. When the water goes into my mouth it is cold but when it comes out it is warm.”
Science fact number 63. Old breath has water in it.

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31 May 2013 · 2:40 pm

More from McMini

Some recent gems…

“Mummy I have an idea in my leg.”
“Do you?”
“Yes. I am full of ideas, I have them in my legs and my hands and my body and my fingers and my neck and my ears and my mouth and even in my eyes.”
“I see.”
“Yes. And this idea is in my leg.”
“Gosh. What sort of idea is it?”
“I think I’m going to go outside and ride my bike.”

A few weeks ago we went to visit a friend who has a son exactly McMini’s age. They live in Surrey, near Pirbright. In the afternoon we went for a walk in Brookwood Cemetary which is near there. McMini and friend stopped in front of this memorial to Polish soldiers in the second world war.

Polish Memorial at Brookwood Military Cemetery.

McMini and his friend stood in front of it lost in silent contemplation.

“What is that Mummy?” asked McMini.
“It’s a memorial.”
“What’s a memorial?”
“Well, some men from Poland came here to fight in the Second World War. They were killed and this statue has been put up to commemorate them, and how brave they were.”
Long pause.
“Oh.”
Another long pause and McMini’s friend sidled up to him.
“What did she say it is?” he whispered.
“It’s a special statue to remember a man who died in the war.”
“Oh.”
“Yes. He was a pterodactyl.”

Oh well, at least some of it went in. Just… the wrong bits.

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24 Jan 2013 · 5:20 pm

I knew I shouldn’t have shown him that book on Florence Nightingale

McOther came home from work feeling terrible. He went upstairs for a rest. McMini and I arrived from school and went up to see if he’d like a cup of tea. He said yes please.
“When I’m ill I like to go to bed and have a little sleep and read my books, then I feel better,” McMini volunteered.
“Thank you,” said McOther.
“Come on, let’s go make Daddy’s tea,” I said and we went down to boil the kettle. While I was fishing a tea bag out of the tin and generally phaffing, McMini disappeared. When I went upstairs with McOther’s tea, there was our son sitting beside his Dad with a book on aeroplanes and a StarWars annual.
“I am just reading to Daddy, so he will feel better.”
“Good boy, do you feel better Daddy?”
“Yes I do,” said McOther’s mouth but his eyes said, “Help me…!”
“I think we should leave Daddy to sleep now though, eh?” I said.
“But I haven’t finished reading him StarWars.”
“I’m sure he would love to have a sleep first, it’ll be much more exciting if he has to wait for the next installment. Right Daddy?”
“Yes, that’s a great idea,” said McOther, with a certain amount of feeling.
“What d’you reckon?” I asked McMini.
“Hmm… Yes Mummy I think you’re right. OK Daddy. It is time for you to have a little sleep. I will come back to see you later and find out if you are better,” said McMini. “Let me turn the light off.”
He turned our three position bedside light onto medium, then bright then straight through off and back onto low several times, so I decided to save McOther’s retinas from a third searing by doing it myself.
“See you later Daddy,” he said.
I’ve managed to distract him with supper, TV and a game of football but he is very keen to take a star wars annual up to Daddy and read to him, even though it’s actually his Dad who’s doing the reading…

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29 Oct 2012 · 5:38 pm

Mini Man Says….

This afternoon, McMini approached me with his doctor’s kit and explained that he was going to ‘make me better’. He sat me down on the sofa with his medical case and protective knight’s helmet beside him and got to work. He selected the special looky-in-the-eary-thing. No idea what its technical name is.

“First I will look in your ear,” he says and proceeded to do so.
“Anything in there?” I asked him.
“No.”
“Do you need to look in the other one?”
“No, I saw right through to the other ear from this side.”

I admit I’m a bit of an airhead but not that much, surely. Then he gets out the reflex testing hammer.

“Now I must put on my hat to protect me if bits fly off your elbows. Please roll up your sleeves, Mummy.” He put on the knight helmet and proceeded to tap my elbows very gently with the hammer.

Then he listened to my tummy with the stethascope.

“Mmm. Your tummy is full of bugs. I will have to kill them.”
“Oh dear,” I said.
“Scissors,” he said holding them up. “Open wide.”

Other gems he has come out with include.

“Rain is like wee falling from the sky.”

“If you’re not careful you will get dirty and have purple skin and the purple won’t go away.”

“Turn the lights off please. Thank you. Look! I can see in the dark. It is because I have been eating lots of carrots. I have eaten so many carrots that soon my eyes will pop out and turn red like a dinosaur.”

He is very into dinosaurs at the moment. Last night, he squatted down, looking, to all intents and purposes, as if he was about to have a pooh and started to bounce slightly, humming as he did so. It looked as if he was doing the Mr-Whippy-having-a-crap-joke.

“What are you doing?” I asked, slightly bemused. He smiled up at me and said,
“I am laying my eggs.”
Later I found him squatting down humming but without moving.
“Hello Mummy. Now I am sitting on my eggs,” he told me.

Today we went to a Dr Who exhibition at my local museum. It was great. I’d like to go again, but I doubt I’ll make it. It’s only on for a week but there was a worksheet and a prize draw and I didn’t get to totally fill it in. Mwah ha hargh, no! Not for ME; for McMini.

At the end we spent a lot of time looking at a life size Dalek, one of the really early ones, pre my era (mine are the 73/74 ones). I came under heavy bombardment to buy one of the souvenir Dr Who action figures – the Daleks were well cool but £15 a pop – so I demurred and promised him one when we got home as I have a few spares in my collection of shame.

When we came home, McMini proudly told McOther about the ‘garlic’ he’d seen while I chortled into my hand. McOther didn’t seem to get it. I went and got a Dalek for McMini which he proudly rushed downstairs to show McOther. It was only then that the dear man realised what a ‘garlic’ was. He thought we’d been to the cook shop. Phnark.

Finally… he’s doing phonetics at the moment so he has a song about the letters c and k which he sings. He whispered it very quietly to me in church.

“Well done, that’s great,” I said when he’d finished.
“K, k, k, kite, kit, kate, can’t, CUNT!” he shouted. It was very innocent, he was just making noises but… hmm.

Never let it be said that having kids is dull!

Stop Press: He has just asked if I could show him some “pictures all about onions” on the computer.
“Onions?” I said. “Do you mean Daleks?”
“Yes! Garlics.”

Latest (20:30): Apparently he went upstairs to find McOther shouting, “Extra-erminate!”

He will kill me for this when he’s grown up… 😉

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21 May 2012 · 8:57 pm

More Light fluff from McMini

Here are a few more class quotes from McMini.

1 Week ago:

McMini enters the kitchen, crawling on all fours so he can wheel Action Man Motorbike – on said motorbike – up to my feet, where I’m standing at the counter chopping up things and announces.

“Action man is desperate for a pooh.”
“Ah. Right,” I say. “He’d better go have one then don’t you think?”
“Yes.” says McMini and Action Man is turned round and wheeled away.
A few minutes later the loo is flushed and he returns.
“Action Man has had a wee and a pooh because he has a special hole in the back of his trousers where the wee and pooh can come out.”
“Well, that’s good to know.” I say.

A few hours later, McMini comes in looking pensive. He thinks a bit and says.

“Dinosaurs don’t do any wee or pooh.”
“Well actually small fellow, I think they did.”
“No they don’t,” note present tense, “I have looked at all my plastic dinosaurs and not one of them has a pooh or wee hole.”
“That’s just because they’re made by prudish toy manufacturers who want to torture parents by not giving toys any naughty bits so that children ask their parents difficult questions.”

Two Weeks Ago:

McMini trundles into the kitchen with his plastic pretend mobile.

“I am on the phone. I am talking to somebody at my work so you must be very quiet.”
“Who?” I ask.
“Shush Mummy You must not make any noise.
A pause and he says.
“Hello? Hello?” another pause. McMini rolls eyes and snaps phone closed. “He cannot hear me.”

Latest…
“Mummy, I am going to do a pooh.”
“OK.”
“Will you look after me.”
“Alright.”
“This will be a stinky one. It will smell out the house. It will smell so badly that it will kill you and you will die.”

A couple of days later.

“Mummy, I am going to do a pooh. Will you look after me.”
“Alright.”
“Good. I am going to stink you out, it will smell the whole house.”
“Oh dear, I’m not going to die am I?”
“No no Mummy. It is not a kill pooh, just a very smelly one.”

He also has the most lovely way of getting things wrong. So for example, his Star Wars favourites are RD8 and the Lemington Falcon.

Then there’s the very clever grammatical stuff; wrong but very clever.

He says “ear wack”. But as a friend pointed out to me the other day – because her daughter does it – he’s actually being very clever. He doesn’t know spelling so he doesn’t know the difference between the x and the s. So he thinks Ear Wax is a plural.

He also says ‘somebolly’ as in ‘somebolly is sitting here Mummy.’

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