Eitan rips "Stairway to Heaven"

Rock out

Yesterday I take Eitan and Madeleine to the Richmond Arts Centre to make music and choose an instrument. On offer are the majors: winds, strings, keyboards and of course drums. Both kids are drawn to the guitar - and Eitan goes electric. Long-haired rocker and instructor Gary strums Iggy Pop's "Free Bird" and the boy is committed. Madeleine takes her time and investigates the acoustic guitar, reeds and piano. She is also intrigued by the drums but that is a non-starter. Neither wants to leave which is a good sign - make them beg for their medicine, I say.

Madeleine and Eitan Swing

Duckie Brown

This is a photo of a Duckie Brown ensemble, taken by me at the V&A. According to Sonnet: "Duckie Brown is a joint venture, founded by Steven Cox, who had spent over a decade in New York designing for others, and Daniel Silver, who had worked as a glove designer and television producer. With no financial backer to satisfy, they design to please themselves, juxtaposing classic tailoring with whimsy. Thus, a conservative silhouette may come in unexpected colours or it may feature unusual textiles or embellishments." Friend Joseph Porterfield and I meet at the V&A to see the program. We then meet Ritesh at Aubaine nearby to have lunch. None of us dressed in colour.

Wagamama's

Madeleine weighs in with her chop-sticks Sunday afternoon. With interest I watch her technique: one in each fist gutting the target. When a gentle bit of instruction is offered she replies: "STOP IT! DADDY!" which turns a few heads and makes me blush. Eitan has a better outcome: "See Madeleine, this is just like a Chinese." Eitan and Madeleine still believe that Asians live upside-down as China is on the other side of the planet. Sonnet rolls her eyes and I do not correct the mis-perception: let them have fun with the idea, I say.

White Shirt Club

Here we are this evening at our favorite local which, conveniently, is two minutes from our house and has a play-area for the kids. There is a coal fireplace for the winter or grey London spring. Today I'm up at 0415 to catch the second flight out of Heathrow to Zurich. I have several meetings then catch the return arriving home by 1700. As I tell Sonnet: "at least I got to wear my new tie." I might also add snobbishly - at least it isn''t Cleveland.

Sonnet to Madeleine: "Do NOT shout out the window at the Tesco Man!" (Tesco being the grocery delivery).

Madeleine finds a slug: "Can we bring it home and keep it as a pet dad?"

Madeleine climbs to the top of a tree: "Woo-hoo! I'm on top of the world!"

He Must Be A Republican

Tommy Thompson, a presidential candidate from Wisconsin, sited a dead hearing aid and an urgent need to use the bathroom in explaining why he said at a Republican presidential debate that an employer should be allowed to fire a gay worker. Speaking to reporters after giving an address at the state Republican convention, Thompson also said Saturday that he had been suffering from the flu and bronchitis and had been admitted to a hospital emergency room three days prior to the May 3 debate. Photo of Butt Head (left, in AC-DC) from the WWW.

Chop-sticks

It's a rainy day yesterday and Eitan and Madeleine are cooped up in the house all morning. After a wind-fall two hours of cartoons, Sonnet and I motivate and take the kids to Wagamama's, pictured, and a movie - Road to Terebitha, which has a PG rating for scary scenes. Madeleine asks a lot of questions earning a turn-around glare (at a matinee!) while Eitan quietly absorbs the action. He then chooses a toilet-run at the key father-son reconciliation scene. Ah, well.

Beloved horse Charlie in Colorado passes away. Both kids wail real tears of anguish at the news. Madeleine asks if we can remember Charlie by bringing some grass, a few apples and a dandelion to the dinner table - I agree, of course. She also water-colours her friend and asks that we remember him in "horse heaven."

Zzz

Madeleine asleep. I often tease her that she snores - she doesn't - but this always gets a rise from her. I guess she views it as unladylike.

Yesterday, the family completes the school Fun Run of five miles in Richmond Park beginning at Richmond Gate. Both Eitan and Madeleine are up for the challenge and we join 500 or so runner-walkers on a bright, cloudy morning to complete the race. Eitan and I charge ahead and he does a great job jogging (most) of the course. During our breaks we discuss things like the circulatory system and why one's heart beats faster during exercise. At completion we rally at the school for a BBQ and make-shift game of footie where 30 or so kids joined in.

Story time

Madeleine during story-time. Photo is blurry as Madeleine is never still, even when transfixed. We are reading chapter books, like James And The Giant Peach, which offer complicated plots and emotional under-currents. Eitan's focus is laser beam while Madeleine drifts in and out with a question. Eitan has a 16 month advantage and the trick is to find a balance so I read a picture book or tell a home-spun story on alternate evenings. Sonnet logs plenty of time too.

Rave

London's late night dance scene is alive and kicking and rest assured that Sonnet and I are no part of it (photo www). The last time we disco'd was pre-kids so I'm guessing 1999 (excluding weddings, but that doesn't really count does it?)

Eitan, Madeleine and friend Jackson and I have dinner at Pizza Express to congratulate our week's survival without Sonnet, who returns today. Madeleine FYI loves salami and Eitan is going through a Margarita phase.

Skyline

Tony Blair gives his Bon Voyage in a brief emotional speech broadcast on all UK channels. He apologises for when he "fell short," and asks the nation to make their own decision on Iraq. He also notes that there are "more jobs, fewer unemployed, better health and education results, lower crime and economic growth in every quarter" since his arrival. Tony will remain in office until 27 June when, presumably, Gordon Brown will become leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minister.

"The British are special - the world knows it, in our innermost thoughts we know it. This is the greatest nation on earth." Tony today

Zit

This morning Madeleine points at my chin and says "what's that daddy?" and I explain it is a zit. After a brief explanation of the zit, I tell her she can expect to have them when she is a teen-ager. She sobs.

Eitan and Madeleine had their Spanish lesson yesterday and were wiped out when I arrived home around 7PM. Madeleine adjusts to the full-day ending at 3:20PM and I remember Eitan being cranky when the hours were upped. Both kids making progress with their reading and writing - Eitan is working on "chapter books" while Madeleine completes sentences. We all look forward to Sonnet's return tomorrow. Hurray!

Franzosischer Dom / Luftangriff

This post-card photo from Berlin in 1944. It is a particularly chilling image of End Of Days.

Today, the cathedral remains, but gutted, on Gendermanmarkt. The first parts of the structure were built from 1701 to 1705 by the Huguenot community and was modelled after the destroyed Huguenot church in Charenton-Saint-Maurice, France. In 1785 Carl von Gontard modified the cathedral and built the domed tower - pictured.

4X

This collage of Madeleine taken at Lego-land in, and I am guessing a bit, autumn 2004 making her under three. Flash forward to today, when she gives me a huge hug and says: "Dad you are the best!". She also tells me matter-of-factly on the school-run not to step on anything round because "it might be poo."

The most recently reviewed book in my book-club is Flaubert's Parrot, by Julian Barnes, chosen after we thoroughly enjoyed M Bovary earlier this year. (Retired Goldman Sachs partner) Erich remarks from the book he has learned that "parrot soup" in French means bread in red wine, that Nabokov supposedly gets the phonetics of the name "Lolita" wrong, that for a while one could rent a closed carriage by asking for a "Bovary", in reference to the famous scene of passion in one such, which we learn may have been quite cramped. "The whole parrot angle, starting with which stuffed version is the one that sat on Flaubert's desk, is not too interesting, really." It may explain why the Peter Seller's Pink Panther gets such an immediate, if mis-understood, guffaw.

Bath

We head West to Bath, where we stay with friends Dave and Tabitha and their children 'Netta, John and A-C for the bank holiday weekend. We have known them since Maida Vale when Tabitha and Sonnet shared notes on pregnancy and babies. Shortly after graduating Amherst, Tabitha biked around the world on a BMW motorcycle. Dave is a Managing Director on Morgan Stanley's emerging markets desk and his team of 70 is responsible for p&l of €1B - most productive at the firm. On the way home we visit the RAF airplane musuem and see the old spit-fires, Lancasters, mustangs, a euro-fighter and others. Fun!

On the weekend when asked to say one thing, Madeleine: "on holiday, me and 'netta had fun on the slide and we pushed our buddies in the wheel borough." The photo of 'netta during books-before-bed.

Rancho

Rancho de Taos in New Mexico was built in 1772 by Franciscan Fathers and enjoys its patron Saint Francis of Assisi. More recently, the church has been made famous by Georgia O'Keefe and Ansel Adams. I took this photo last summer.

Madeleine and Eitan each score a goal at football this morning - Madeleine has three break-aways and on a rip. Perhaps its her purple "all England" shirt. From footie we head for the Prince's Diana playground in Hyde Park and picnic with Iranian shwarmas - a real treat - and carrot juice, which nets a protest from the pip-squeaks. At Diana, the kids fascinate themselves transporting water from a nearby fountain to the sand-pit constructing a "damp castle." My effort to roll up their pants and keep sand from their crack a failure. We stay three hours which is a long time to contemplate life from a park bench.

Sonnet leaves for the Big Apple

Madeleine cries big tears as Sonnet leaves for New York City to promote her book. I show Madeleine and Eitan this photograph of the skyline so that they know where she will be. Eitan immediately identifies the Empire State Building and says: "you found it on Google" demonstrating Goggle rates with Mickey Mouse and Ronald McDonald.

Eitan tells me: "Madeleine, seeing a man playing snooker on TV, wants to marry him." He carries mud into the house from the garden singing: "I have some mud, mud, mud. I have some MUD" before I scream at him.

He Must Be A Republican

Paul Wolfowitz yesterday blames the World Bank for his woes, stating that the the unclear bank rules are responsible for creating questions about his handling of the hefty pay raises to his girlfriend. Recall, of course ,that Wolfowitz's girldfriend Ms. Riza had worked for the Bank when Wolfowtiz arrived in 2005. She was moved to the State Department to avoid a conflict of interest but stayed on the bank's payroll. Her salary went from $133,000 to $180,000 with additional raises to $193,590 while she was no longer at the Bank and receiving a salary from State. Wolfowitz has made his main-stay mission... wait for it... the elimination of corruption where the Bank lends money.

Ants

Madeleine and I spend the afternoon together mano-a-chica. We head to the common taking reading materials and other entertainments. She is, of course, immediately bored so I tell her the story about Rikki-Tikki-Tavi. This lasts ten minutes. "Come on dad, I thought you said we were going to have some fun" she exclaims. We sit on the park bench and I tell Madeleine that "if you are bored you are boring" and she rolls her eyes at me. Finally, she breaks through her barrior and follows the travails of a lonely ant returning to its ant home. From there she imagines herself as one with the ants and I watch her imagination at work. It is a good afternoon.

Last night I attend our PTA meeting - me and 20 women. Our main discussion is the fast approaching Summer Fair, which I am overseeing (theme: Wild, Wild, West). Yesterday also was a fair all-hands meeting following the morning school drop. I am happy to report that the mums are coming out in full force, thank goodness (our goal is to beat last year's £14,000 fundraise). During the pow wow, it became known to me that there has been some grumbling about the entrance fee of 50p ("why should the children have to pay?!"). Last night I raise the issue with the PTA and in true PTA fashion we debate the 50p charge for 30 minutes. Time... stands... still....