DAY 24 – The Crying Game

Well, today was more disaster than success.

So far my time as the daytime parent-in-charge has been marvellous, wonderful, amazing. Not today.

Proceedings started on the wrong foot due to a lack of sleep for all of us because THE COUGH kept her awake while the Milk Lady and I were running around trying to find new remedies. Vapour rub on chest, vapour rub on feet (that's a new one for me), Olbas oil in water, and nasal spray. The patients was greased to the max while her room smelt like a cross between a sexy spa steam room and a rugby changing room. Didn't seem to work though.

A breakfast of blueberry muffin was given a bit of attention with some going down but the effort was lacklustre. The bottle of breast milk was guzzled but not at the usual rapid speed.

Then for nap one at the new, pushed back time of 0930. "Not a chance" was the vibe I was given via body language and eyes popping out of The Lady's head. After 50 minutes of songs, squats, reading and lunges, I gave up. There were no tears but she did not want a sleep.

During this farcical attempt to put her to bed I had received a message to say Baby Sensory was cancelled. Something about The Leader being stuck in traffic (or being drafted in to lead a brainwashing seminar elsewhere).

From 1100 onwards M'Lady made the decision to spend the day mostly crying or at least whinging. Fun times. I even took her into the loft room with all the window open to chill her out a bit.

After failing to get her to take a bottle I decided a walk was in order so we donned our voting attire and plodded off to mark an X on the EU Referendum ballot paper. I followed the advice of the creatures from Day 23.

The walk was punctuated by the sounds of half-arsed crying and a cough that was more smoking veteran than seven-month-old baby. Inside the polling station, aside from casting my vote, I was quizzed by a pregnant electoral officer on the effectiveness of Sophie the Giraffe, which was being chewed on by my partner in voting.

"It's a mandatory purchase," I explained. 
"Some things are negotiable but for whatever reason ALL babies must have Sophie. 
"Buy it. Soon". 

After voting it was onward to a cafe to buy caffeine and a sandwich. The motion sent M'Lady off to deep sleep, which was ideal – except the fact that she was snoring and sounded like a pickled tramp.

Woke up an hour later, crying. Crying didn't stop until 1500 at which point it was feeding time. Again, she didn't want any so I brought the 1600 solid food session forward to try to get some sustenance in her. Delicious selection on the menu too: Steamed Apple, Rice Cakes, and Tarragon Chicken. The miserable so and so had a suck on the rice cake and turned her nose up at the rest of it, while crying and making an annoying shrieking noise.

Sprints were then undertaken to try to stem the sadness and that was a winner, so much so that she fell asleep. We went to Deen City Farm to meet friends Rosie and her own A-baby, which was lovely if a bit rainy.

Back home, crying commenced and attempts at feeding were batted away by a little (fat) hand with  aggressive disdain.

So, very little food taken on and very few smiles dished out to me. Added to that was the general feeling that people might vote to leave the most successful union for peace in history.

Then while I was bouncing the little munchbunch on my lap she fell asleep mid-bounce, which was a tell-tale sign that she was not herself.

Thankfully Mama arrived at 1800, which brought some inescapable smiles from our girl ahead of bath and bedtime, which all went like clockwork.

Not long after, Wifey ventured into the loft for a shower. She returned quickly. That was Ominous.

"Did you open the windows?" 

Yes I did. 

"Yes, there's been torrential rain today hasn't there?" 

Yes, there has. Oh.

Oh dear. No excuses. I had left the windows wide open to allow cool air in for my daughter, allowing the monsoon to water the bedroom contents like prize plants at the Chelsea Flower Show. Not even my sleep-deprived state could be blamed for the oversight, which meant we had to sleep on a different mattress, which was about as comfortable as a concrete floor.

It was one of those days and goes down as the new LOW-POINT BENCHMARK.

DAY 23 - THOUGHTS ON EU REFERENDUM

SOMETIMES I can go hours or even days without speaking to another adult.

Of course I say bye and hi to my beloved wife at the bookends of the working day but if I'm talking about seeing and conversing with other real human adults, days can pass without any grown-up interaction.

If as a stay-at-home-look-after-the-baby parent you find and take one second to think about who you have spoken to on a regular day you will often find your chats have been with your baby as well as his or her toys.

I also find that I these days I tend not to speak my usual language, it's more of a gobbledegook noise that is the universal tongue that us adults think a baby understands better than English, or whatever the parents' tongue is.

So, with the EU Referendum looming over the UK, I have found that my discussions and debates on the merits of REMAIN and LEAVE have been held largely in my own head, with the people on television and radio, with my seven-month-old and her friends.  Her friends are, on the whole, cuddly and plastic toy animals.

Now, without becoming too political on what is a blog about being on Shared Parental Leave to look after my baby, I thought it was only right to at least mention a vote that will undoubtedly have a huge impact on my family. For the first time I have had to (well I didn’t have to but I have) think about how the result will affect my daughter, who has no say on things.

It is right that A-bomb doesn’t have a vote, because what she says is largely drivel and in fact, dribble. Nevertheless, if talking unintelligible garbage was a reason to withhold voting rights a fairly large chunk of the population, including members of both the LEAVE and REMAIN campaigns would be denied their ballot papers. The fact is that you only need to be of the correct age to be given permission to put an X in a box and decide a nation's future. 

So after having the various arguments with myself and attempting to work out what truths were hidden in the carpet bombs of lies, damned lies and statistics dropped by politicians via the media, I decided to conduct my own interviews with a cross-section of society that I associate with most at the moment.

Before I set out the thoughts of my interviewees I should give a few opinions on the prominent figures in the so-called BREXIT/BREMAIN campaign:

 - Boris Johnson, a hugely intelligent man, has let himself down for feeling the need to peddle lies on stats rather than give intelligent reasoning

- David Cameron has inspired nobody

- Jeremy Corbyn has shown himself as a weak leader by not speaking up strongly enough for either camp. 

- Michael Gove has excelled himself in making himself even more hated than when he attempted to destroy the education system

- Nigel Farage has done himself justice by sticking to his principles and living up to expectations. He has remained utterly xenophobic/racist, myopic, ill-informed and utterly useless.

Now to the interviews, with the most sensible bunch I could find at short notice:



SOPHIE THE GIRAFFE

I can see what all of the OUT lot are saying about immigration. I agree, there are loads of 'em coming here. But getting out of the EU isn't going to stop 'em coming in. We will have even less power to stop the flow of immigrants if we are acting alone. Also, I don't have a problem with Johnny Foreigner coming in to work... it seems that they're doing a bloody good job at fair prices. There are plenty of BRITISH freeloaders milking the system... can we have a referendum on getting rid of them? Don't get my blue tongue started on the Jeremy Kyle brigade.


WEIRD CRINKLY DOLL FACE

I've listened to all the debates and it seems like a lot of lies have been told, especially about us paying this £350 million a week to the EU. It's simply not true. I'm sure there are other stats that would support an OUT vote but the Out campaign chose to use an untruth. Weird.
Also people are banging on about us losing our sovereignty. I disagree. We have been blocked by the EU so few times in comparison with when our wishes have sailed through.


TWO COWS AND PIGGY

As a collective we find it ironic that a lot of nationalistic, chest-puffed-out Brits want OUT. These are the same people that are proud and humbled by our Armed Forces. Do they not realise one of the key reasons why the EU was formed? It was borne out of the Second World War, when the smart European nations decided to club together to make sure that never again would they fight each other. Its seems to have worked. We are so proud of our current boys and girls in the Army, Royal Navy and Royal Air Force and we are in awe of what their predecessors did in the World Wars... it seems remarkable that we want to opt out of a system that these men and women fought for,  and that has served us well in terms of bringing relative peace.


LITTLE BEAR

Get me out! Bunch of refugees coming in here nicking my porridge. Let's close the borders, get Boris in charge and get rid of anyone without a British passport. Does anyone know if I'll still be able to get into Europe with my current passport? Will it still be easy to fly to Spain?
Actually I've got mates and grandparents that have retired in Europe, will they have to come back the UK?! Can we close the borders if we are just the UK? Will I still be able to get my loft converted by foreign workers?... it's just that they are the best value and get the job done at rapid speed...? I don't mind the Eastern European lot if they're doing the manual jobs because they're top notch and don't charge silly money. And they're on time. The rest can get out though. Except the doctors. And nurses. They're good too. But the others! Bloody immigrants.


SMUG SHEEP

If people are voting OUT just to get David Cameron OUT then they are maniacs. We chose Cameron at the General Election and if we want rid of him now we will have to wait until the next General Election. Yes he is weasel of the highest order but I am pretty certain that Boris is even more of a right-wing nutjob and will systematically destroy the NHS, tighten the purse strings on the poor and will look after his own people. He is a dangerous man.


BLUE WHALE

Farage makes out that he is the champion of fishing while stating that fishermen are better of OUT of the EU. If he's such a hero of the fisherman why did he only attend ONE EU meeting on the matter when he had access to loads? To be honest, I don't think I would be welcome in Farage's country if we're not in the EU - I'm not white and my parents were not born here. Oh dear, all of my lot will be frogmarched out if we don't vote IN.


Good to get a few views from my new mates.

Now to vote to protect ourselves and the future of the next generation.