The Book of Ashes

Cute 11:26AM

Winter is slowly fading, as will soon our memories of the cold, to be replaced by warmth and merriment and the smell of something old. Soon it shall be spring and with it comes change...

Today after work I went for a run up the hill. I'm still on the sprint, walk, sprint, walk thing but will soon be able to sprint about half the way up. Gonna really cut into that 12 minute record thats currently standing when I try for the entire run again without walking. I stopped off at my uncle and aunties for a catch up. I am quite appreciating friends and family at the moment so am hanging out with people rather than trying to do to much stuff at once (or watch tv). My uncle and auntie have the 4 cutest kids ever and also highly intelligent. They were climbing all over me as I read a book to them then Mereana said, my turn to read and started reading amazingly fluently for being only about 7. She is really intelligent. It almost makes you want to have kids. Myra (their mum) said I could have them for free :) They were quite excitable and hard to put to bed. Joel, the oldest showed me their new computer which had MDK on it, the coolest game I used to play back when I was at uni. This has the best atmospheric music and the coolest ideas. The guy that you play has a chain gun built into his arm and these cool ribbons that fall out of his back when he jumps and are just enough to catch the air and allow him to float harmlessly down to the ground. This is a great idea, the whole game rocks. Anyway after they all went to bed we sat around and caught up over a coffee. Once Myra found out I was drinking again that turned into a Cointreu or two. This is not a bad drink, it is rising on my list of drinks to buy for my liquor cabinet. Oh yeah, the littlest girl, whos about three and looks at you through these big brown eyes, was climbing up and standing on the arm of the couch and balancing there by herself. Her mum just let her, obviously she trusts her balance and I was really impressed with this. There are a few essentials in life I think kids should learn, control of the body such as this, and they should get a head start at school, being read to, taught maths, etc, etc, without being pushed though, actually they need to be taught a love for learning, that is more important than the actual learning as that can come at any stage. Also things like sense of fun, adventerous, etc...

So I jogged back down the hill in record time and came over to make sure Amy wasn't going to wuss out on her run tomorrow morning. She's still keen which is sweet. So I hung around for a bit and talked to the girls, argueing with Amy whether my cousins were cuter than hers or not. We're going to have to compare I think, but I tell you now, mine are the cutest you've ever seen. I know this is going to sound bad but I so hope I don't have ugly children, of course this is virtually imposible when you look at how cute I was at a young age :)

A tip in life - Always be alert, especially when you have a little kid wanting to walk onto your lap and plant herself there. She doesn't know you have vunerable spots and will step anywhere. I repeat ANYWHERE. I am always cautious in this situation, as I was tonight. I remember when we were kids and Dad came home. All four of us used to run and jump on him and wressle him to the ground. Quite often this would result in someone getting hurt. It is going to be harsh being a parent, kids are just made to wear you down. How the hell my parents handled four of us, I don't know, we had heaps of energy, we sure put enough holes in the wall in the house we built - opps