Felicitating

I was searching photos of Mark on Google today (as you do) and came across one of the funniest things I've seen in ages, I'm still crying with laughter as I type. Scroll down to the bottom and note the picture caption...

Marathon man

Mark presenting a cheque to the Southend Educational Trust at Roots Hall this afternoon. They'd printed his story in the match programme, too, alongside a pic of him and Logan. Fair to say he was a happy bunny! Especially when they won the game.

I snapped a pic of the mascots backstage, sans heads, but I can't publish it on pain of death (I don't want Sammy the Shrimp to be the last thing I see before I die).

Dada?

Mark got excited a few weeks ago when Logan pointed to the Star Trek action figures on the telly and the Batman one at home and said, 'Dada!'; when he did the same to a cartoon leprechaun on a postcard he was less impressed...

Last week Mark was in Montreal but Logan saw dada in all sorts of places - the pic above is 'Pat' (left) and 'Dada' (right). He spotted him judging Britain's Got Talent (Piers Morgan) and even started counting daddies on the bus - 'Two dada, two dada, four dada'. Thankfully he recognised the real one when he came home on Sunday, but if he carries on much longer my reputation is going to take a serious battering.

Run Lola run!

Mark, like the madman he is, is going to run the London Marathon in little under two weeks. He's been a superstar, fitting training around Logan stuff - I don't feel like a marathon widow at all!



Mark's raising money for two charities, Asthma UK and Southend United Community and Educational Trust. He's set up a Justgiving page for the first (he can explain the significance of it much better than I can, so check out the page), and he's waiting on the second one to join Justgiving but of course you can sponsor him the old fashioned way if you want to give to the Southend scheme.



Both causes are close to his heart, and to mine by default (Logan is toying with taking up asthma too so it's even more important now!). Please give something, it'll really help spur Mark round the course and get even more sweaty and horrible than he is planning on!

Enjoying the sunshine

Had lunch at Kenwood House, miraculously the sun came out so Logan spent the afternoon running down hills on the heath (and in the Flask pub...).

Dave's birthday bash @ Junction Tavern

I know, I know, this could be a photo of absolutely anyone, but you'll just have to trust me that Dave M (who my husband insists on calling Filmstar Dave) is on there somewhere. I don't like the flash dammit!

Birthday tea at Liberty's

Spent a lovely birthday with the hubby at Liberty's near Oxford Circus. It's the quintessential independent British department store, much cosier than Selfridges or John Lewis and much more old-fashioned too (there's a whole floor given over to quirky vintage furniture and a huge haberdashery department).



Sadly we forgot to take our gift vouchers (they wouldn't have made much of a dent in the price of these gorgeous set of drawers we spotted, anyway, though we could almost have afforded a cool Rob Ryan tile) but we did enjoy a delicious high tea in the tearooms.

I think they must be feeling the credit crunch (four finger sandwiches between two?) but the scones were warm, there was almost enough clotted cream (I nabbed some extra from the table next to us) and the sponge cake was divine (I also nabbed a spare slice that the couple next to us had left - it was my birthday, I'm allowed to thieve things!).

If you look closely you can see me in the reflection in the teapot furthest away, crouching tiger-like behind the other pot of tea.

Snow day!

This is what happens when Mark works from home...

Muswell Hill is snowed in - I'm sure when there was a blizzard at home when I was younger the buses didn't grind to a halt (even if the school boiler broke with alarming regularity). That's what I get for deserting the north east for the bright lights of the big city.

Snow pics to follow later for those of you on another continent.

Mark's birthday jaunt

Breakfast at Chorak



The jukebox at Big Red rocks, but I suck at pool, boo



Big Red toilet graffiti



Sake bomb! Dinner at Charuwan, just what we needed after an epic movie and a snow storm



Mark's folks AKA The Babysitters