An OXO Mothers Day

Recently those good people at OXO contacted me to ask if I wanted any help making Mothers Day a fun and special day by sending me one of their ‘Mother’s Day Magic’ Meal kits.  I was looking for a bit of inspiration anyway, the kids had been nagging me about wanting to cook a meal for her anyway, so I accepted.

Later that week the package turned up, games and stuff to keep the kids occupied, some memorabilia  to keep all my knick-knacks and recipes tidy, a food voucher, and more OXO cubes than you can poke a stirring spoon at.  Oh, and some scoring cards, apparently our cooking was to be judged, no pressure then.

So the day of Mothers Day Eve (as my lot refer to that Saturday) arrived and with a vague plan of action and a list of ingredients written on the back of takeaway menu, off we went to the shops.  Ingredients were chosen, flowers were picked and booze was stockpiled.  We were ready.

The morning came around, gifts were given, homemade cards were cooed and ahhed over and full English was cooked and consumed as I explained to the Mrs the plan of action.  After I had done my own dutiful son duties and after we had been to the restaurant for the already booked (although not by me to my shame) Mothers Day lunch, we would drop her to her own Mum so she could have a few drinks with her and we could make our meal par excellence.

For starters we had plumped for homemade tomato and basil soup which was always going to be a messy affair with a six and eight year old helping out.  Much to Kaedes disgust I wouldn’t let them do any of the chopping but I did make them chief throwers-in and stirrers.  After sautéing the onions, carrots, garlic and celery we added our toms, salt and pepper, basil, two of our OXO vegetable stock cubes and 1.5 litres of boiling water.  We then let that bubble away to be dealt with later on.

For the main course we were having venison in red wine pie with roast potatoes and tender stem broccoli.  A bit of a gamble on my part as I had no idea how the kids would react to eating Bambi, but fortune favours the brave and all that.  After chopping up all the ingredients, including two beef OXO cubes and the best part of a bottle of wine, the kids took it in turns to throw everything into the HomeCooker (thank you Jamie Oliver) and all seemed to be going swimmingly until disaster struck.

In her haste to put the carrots in before her brother, Kaede had knocked over a bottle of olive oil and before you know it we had our very own Deepwater Horizon situation.  Five tea-towels and a large glass of wine later and the oil spill had been dealt with.  Whilst the pie mixture was bubbling away the Mrs returned and luckily for us, was none the worse for wear.  I decided it was about time she spent some quality time with her offspring and gave them the finger puppets to make, leaving me in relative peace to sort out the rest of the dinner.

I part boiled the roast potatoes and before I put them in the roasting tin I gave them a liberal sprinkling of some crushed up chicken OXO cubes, just to give them an extra special tang.  I then blitzed the soup and much to the kids disappointment, I remembered to keep the lid on every time, they were hoping for a tomato volcano eruption.

The kids seated the guest of honour attended to her every needs (topped her glass up) and starters were served.  The soup was a hit and we were rewarded with a score of 9 but you’ll have to take my word for that as I was so busy rushing around I forgot to take any pics of our triumphant scores.

Next up was the mains and I started to do the pie, pots, veg juggle – all whilst slurping away at a moderately large glass of wine, multitasking at its best.  I personally thought the pie looked the business, initials added at behest of Nate, but the truth would be in the tasting.

Another huge success (even if I may say so myself), the kids devoured theirs like food was being outlawed tomorrow, but I fear that next time they watch Bambi they will be on the side of the hunter.  The potatoes were some of the best I had ever served and I will definitely be repeated the stock cube trick in the future.  We scored another 9, with an addendum that it would have been a 10 but there was no ‘0’ supplied with the scoring cards, ironically something I was grateful for when I first opened the pack.

Empty plates were returned to the kitchen and whilst the kids entertained Mum with some magic tricks, me and my trusty Gaggia started making dessert…home-made Minstrel ice cream.  Obviously I didn’t home make the Minstrels, I just battered the hell out of them and added them to the ice cream mid-way.  I was tempted to somehow add a stock cube but I feel it’s a cardinal sin to muck with ice cream too much - I love Heston but if he serves me up beef ice cream I’m not going to be happy.

Although it was never in doubt, I can report that the ice cream was a hit and received the more than obligatory score of 9. 

I decided to leave the clearing away and washing up for the next day as quite frankly, I was feeling so full and had put on so much weight during the day that my face had gone from looking sarcastic to jolly.  The triumphant chefs stood up and received a one woman round of applause and we finished the night off with a game of Frustration.

Many thanks to OXO for all the free goodies and Charlotte at Ketchum for putting it all together for me.

The Absence

A few weeks ago we kept Kaede off school because she had been up all night coughing and looked generally unwell.  We still had to take Nate to school, so as she walked past Kaede’s classroom The Mrs spoke to her teacher, told her the situation and that was that.  Or so we thought.

A week later we received a letter from her school, Our Lady of Perpetual Motion, which said the following:

“We do not appear to have received a letter concerning Kaede’s absence on the Wed 3/10/12.  WE would be grateful if you could complete the tear-off slip below, stating the reason for absence, and return it to school as soon as possible.  If no absence slip is received by the school then, unfortunately, the absence will be registered as unauthorised.”

Well they wanted a letter and a letter they got:

Further to your letter dated 10 October 2012 querying Kaede’s absence from school on 3 October 2012 and further absence of a letter explaining said absence.

On the day in question my Wife made the heinous error of actually informing Miss ****** in a verbal face to face type fashion that Kaede would indeed be absent on that day and the reasons for that absence.  Unfortunately I was not at the morning drop-off as I had stayed behind to look after Kaede.  If I had of been present I would have patiently explained to my wife that she should have stood outside the school office and rung the school phone number to report Kaede’s absence.  Of course, it now seems that that also would have been erroneous as a letter is now required for a single days absence.

Firstly I apologise for the lack of a hand written letter but unfortunately my calligraphy skills leave a lot to be desired.  In fact they have oft been likened to the trail a diarrheatic spider leaves as he crawls towards a toilet.

The reasons for Kaede’s absence from school on 3 October 2012 can be simply explained but I feel that, due to my previously mentioned administrative error, you deserve a full explanation for said absence.  I hope the following will be indeed that.

Kaede was born on 23 February 2005, it was rather a cold and wet day, and in fact at one point we actually had snow.  This prompted, a rather rash one as it turned out, a suggestion by myself that we should give her the middle name of Yukionna – which means ‘snow fairy’ in Japanese.  Despite the copious amounts of gas and air, pethidine and adrenaline running through my Wife’s system, she still had the good sense to verbally slap me down for the idiot I was obviously being.  To this day Kaede remains middle name free.

Five days later we brought Kaede home for the first time, it was a joyous day for all of us.  Well I say all of us, Kaede cried a lot and when she did smile I actually think it was wind, although I didn’t tell her mother that, sometimes it’s best not to shatter illusions too early.

The first six months were hectic, of course they were, but we struggled on through with the dangled promise of a night of uninterrupted sleep on the horizon – that day never came.  From aged six months Kaede would cough throughout the night, waking first herself and then us up.  As is the want of anxious parents, we took Kaede to our local GP and we were prescribed the first of many liquid paracetamol prescriptions.  After a further six months I was actually convinced that she drank more paracetamol than milk, although I’m sure that’s an exaggeration on my part.

From aged 12 to 24 months we saw a plethora of Doctors (I once read that the collective for a bunch of Doctors was a Quack of Doctors but I remain unconvinced as to the veracity of that), all of whom had a different explanation as to her ill-health.  Six different explanations with only one thing in common – the problem was not of their speciality.  Kaede became the equivalent of a human pass-the-parcel with your reward being a hacking two year old.

It was at aged two that fate and the NHS finally shone on us.  Upon witnessing my Wife’s near-on physical breakdown in the surgery reception, a kindly old Doctor finally recommended a specialist in chest and lungs and arranged an appointment.  We attended this appointment with not much hope in our hearts, after all we had had the health carrot dangled in front of us before.  Like doubting-Thomas’s we trudged into the room only to find the light at the end of the tunnel.  Kaede had a form of acid reflux that began with G and had too many vowels in it.  The acid had been creeping up from her stomach as she slept and like an unwelcome traveller in a disused car park, started to camp out in Kaede’s lungs.  With the help of one pill, taken thrice daily for two weeks, she was all but cured.  She had to remain on antibiotics for a solid two years, but eventually all was good and she started to sleep through the night.

All this leads to the night of 2 October 2012, an evening that started as normal but soon went to hell in a hand-cart.  At approximately 20.17 I heard a slight cough emanating from Kaede’s bedroom.  It was only a slight cough and your average parent probably would not have heard it.  We are not average parents however and despite the slightly high volume of the TV (we were watching Boardwalk Empire and it can be a little loud in places) we sat up like a pair of hyperactive meerkats.  I placed my hand on my Wife’s arm to calm her, reduced the volume on the TV and cocked an ear towards the front room door.

There it was again, definitely a cough and definitely Kaede.

I trudged up the stairs with some reluctance it must be said, fearing the worst but trying to remain optimistic, it may have been a dust-bunny or something.  I sat outside Kaede’s door playing Angry Birds on my iPhone to pass the time (with the volume off of course) and waited to see how bad it would get.  The cough persisted and started to get louder and chestier.  I started to fear that her old illness was back, although the chances were that  it was because she had been running around the garden without a coat on despite being told to put one on four times.

We administered the standard duo of cough mixture and paracetamol suspension and crossed our fingers.  By 22.00 the coughing still hadn’t stopped, it wasn’t at an alarming level but just enough to keep her awake.  She slept with my wife in the family bed that night, with myself decamping to the sofa bed we have downstairs (a sofa bed that was bought with exactly these situations in mind).

Both my Wife and Kaede had a sleepless night that night (which may explain my Wife’s mistake in actually telling the teacher face to face what the problem was with Kaede) and we decided that Kaede should stay at home that day and try to catch up on some sleep.  Her cough seemed to have improved and we felt that a day of rest and maybe some educational television, such as the Discovery or History Channel, would do her the world of good.  This was indeed the case and she steadily improved throughout the day.

My Wife and I had a rather frank discussion that night and we decided that unless we had a repeat of the previous night, Kaede could return to school the following day.  A quick perusal of your attendance records will show you that Kaede did, in fact, attend school the next day as we did not have a repeat performance of the previous nights coughing.

I hope this letter is sufficient for your records, in fact it may be a good idea to carefully glue it to the front of her file, thereby saving me the trouble of explaining what we call ‘The Sleepless Coughing Years’ again.  If you have any further questions or if there is anything else you need explained regarding this unfortunate situation, please, please, do not hesitate to write to me and ask.  I have also decided to carry a pad of Post-it notes with me at all times, this way I can write the reasons for any future absences on them and hand the note straight to you.

Jamie Harding,
Parent of Kaede Harding.
Well one of them, she has two.
The other being my wife Patricia Harding.

Child's Play

I have an important announcement to make, THIS IS A SPONSORED POST.  You may by now know that those lovely folk over at ASUS have given me one of their new Eee Pad Tablets to play with and to see how I use it in my day to day life.  Well this week I nearly failed in that most simple of tasks.  You see, I lost the darn thing.

I know, I know, I'm an irresponsible fool, I've only had it for 3 weeks, I should take better care of things and this time I really thought I had.  I realise that it's quite small, after all that is the point of a tablet, but it's not small enough that it could fall between the cracks in the floorboards.

I searched high and low, I searched all the obvious places like the tables and my work desk, and all the unobvious ones like the garage and the toilet.  I found things that were lost but not important (the duct tape I needed last week to fix a draw), things that were important but not lost (a diamond earring that my wife supposedly knew the location of but as that location was in my toolbox, I somehow doubt it), and things I didn't even know existed (sorry, I've been sworn to secrecy on that one.)

I started to curse the ASUS developers for the not having the foresight to add some kind of app that would aid my search. Something where you could whistle and the lost tablet would bark back at you would have been perfect.  I think I may suggest that to them for the next update or something.

So three hours of fruitless searching and cursing still left me light one Eee Pad and in one hell of a predicament.  I decided to go and lie down in my bedroom and try to compose an explanatory email to ASUS.  Maybe it was my sense of panic that made me overlook it, but I suddenly noticed how quiet the house was, a silence I should be thankful for, but one that made me (like all parents in that situation I guess) suspicious.

I poked my head around Kaede's bedroom door, and I saw her in full-on performance mode.  Her innocent antics put a smile on my face and made me forget about the missing tablet, well it did for the two seconds it took me to notice that it was the tablet she was performing to. 

After a quick check to make sure the tablet was in one piece, it was, and a few reprimanding words that would undoubtedly fall on deaf ears, I asked her what she was up to.  She informed me that she wanted to make a movie to put on YouTube so people could see her performing.  I pointed out that she was only six and that if she wanted me to film her then I would.  In a rather haughty manner she informed me that she didn't need any help in the making of it, but I would have to post it to them. 

I checked the tablet and found she had made not one, but five film clips.  I'm not sure I could describe the clips with any great justice, let’s just say they have a feral quality.  I have attached one of the slightly less bizarre clips for your perusal and maybe as an excuse as to why I like a beer or four. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfyOmLW2f-c

I know Kaede has enjoyed playing some of the games I've added to the tablet, but I was quite surprised at how easy it was for her to start using the camera and making videos with it.  It does go a great way to explain why I've found the Eee Pad so easy to use though.

For the technical minded amongst you all, the front camera is 1.2 M Pixels and the rear one is 5 M pixels.  The tablet also has a mini HDMI port so you can plug it straight in to your HD TV and watch your creations in all their glory, if you so desire of course.

ASUS have also just launched a competition to give away an Eee Pad Transformer.  All you have to do is visit this link http://techinstyle.tv/category/products/pads-and-slates/  , comment on any one of the Eee Pad blogs there and Bob’s your Uncle, you get entered into a prize draw.  Good luck.