And there's more...

So the kids were up at 6.30 am... so early in fact that Nobby wasn't even up for work yet. On the up side it meant that he was able to give them breakfast instead of me but bang went my lie-in; I knew I shouldn't have mentioned them on my Blog yesterday. Would someone mind telling me why the little monsters can't manage to drag themselves out of their pits for all the Lego in China on a school day but they can appear, awake, dressed and on-the-lum by my bedside at sparrow's fart when we really have nothing to get up for except the early showings of Sonic The Hedgehog on Pop? I blame the nutters who set the datelines that made Hungary the same time-zone as France - the sun gets up at 4.30am here at the moment (trust me, I've seen it, and clearly so have the kids) and it's pitch black at 9pm. I also blame the Hungarian house builders who designed this place with triangular windows you can't cover up. Pooey.

I suppose I should be grateful that I was up in time for a shower before the water was turned off. But then Poppet dogged my every footstep thereafter begging me to make her a dress out of a length of a material she'd 'found' in my sewing crate. Let me make this clear: I have never made a dress in my life. Despite my loathing of shopping I would sooner take my chances with two small children and a branch of C&A than dig out my sewing machine. That machine is strictly for cushion cover repairs and the occasional bedsheet for the Barbie dolls. However, I decided to give it a go and I can report that she is very pleased with the results and I am chuffed to bits that I even managed to do a zip! Now, of course, I seriously need to go and hide all other 8-year-old-girl-sized pieces of material lying about before I have to create something else.

So then we heard the familiar brum of the Postman's moped - he was early too, what is going on here? - and I rushed to the mailbox hoping to find this week's English newspaper; it's amazing how much you can miss sensationalist, biased narrative about the goings-on in the world when it's not readily available. To my delight, there it was, alongside an exciting-looking jiffy bag. What a bonus! Care-Parcels from home - my Mum's specialty. Even though it was addressed to Nobby I decided to have a sneaky peek. In hindsight the sellotape came away a little easier than normal - you usually need a crowbar to get into my Mum's offerings - and the bag was strangely thin. And what do you think it was inside? Absolutely nothing. Mum has since confirmed that there was a Steve Berry novel in there for Nobby when it left the UK about ten days ago. Somewhere along its curiously long journey across Europe someone has seen fit to burgle my post and nick a second hand English-language book. Seriously, what is the world coming to?

Anyway, I was going to tell you about Rose's kitten. The one a friend of hers found heading traffic-wards across the footpath outside their school and decided Rose was the one who could help her work out what to do about it. I've known Rose for a few years now and had I been in the loop I would have told her friend to choose someone else; Rose is not a cat person. Rose is a tortoise person. We are both reserving the cats for our dotage when we plan to have matching retirment cottages, zimmer frames and grumpy attitudes, with at least a dozen cats between us to terrorize the Meals On Wheels guys.

Rose texted me for suggestions. I texted back - 'drop it off with a local vet'. Little did I know but by then the kitten had already been to the vet and been declared freshly born but abandoned and in need of hand rearing. You know the drill: feeding with a dropper every half an hour, 24 hours a day for the next 4 weeks, then weaning, then house-training... then the new furniture, carpets and curtains as it starts to systematically wreck the house. Piece of cake really. Not. Even I wouldn't take that on and I am the world's biggest softie. So imagine my surprise the next time I Skyped Rose and found her with a small mewing bundle on her lap and a mini-feeding bottle in her hand...

She's called him Claude and he seems to be doing really well. Rose seems to be coping with the sleep deprivation. She's now fluent in 'mieow' and the proud owner of a homemade 'kitten sling' so she can keep him close by and still get stuff done around the house. Which is good because the house, in her words, is an inch thick in microbes given that Claude now poos every ten minutes and they've been unable to fashion a kitten nappy yet so she normally dashes to the sink at the first whiff.

So today I gladly pass on my World's Biggest Softie crown to my best mate. And the best of British luck to her. At least I can also put away my wet kipper - I suspect she won't be needing any more 'No, you do NOT want another baby!' beatings after all this.