Tag Archives: Reasons To Be Cheerful

This week’s Reasons To Be Cheerful #R2BC

1.My stepdaughter’s return from Australia. She’d been out there for three weeks, attending a family wedding with her dad. She had a great time but it’s great to have her back. Despite the unbelievable bombsite of mess and devastation her bedroom has returned to since she re-occupied.

2. A phone call from my accountant. The taxman owes ME money!! Which shouldn’t be surprising, really, as I’ve earned sod all since I became a housedad.

3. Cuddling up on the sofa with my three kids and watching Up on DVD. The opening 15 minutes shot as a silent movie is one of THE great excerpts of film animation.

4. Making 5lb of breadcrumbs for 50 Christmas puddings to be sold at my sons’ school’s Christmas Fair. Boring, laborious, but strangely satisfying.

5. Raising £158 at my youngest son’s Class Tea on Wednesday. My chocolate and marshmallow cupcakes sold like hot cupcakes.

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This week’s…Reasons To Be Cheerful #R2BC

1. I know, it’s a strange reason to be cheerful, remembering the dead, but let me explain. This week I bought poppies for my sons. Their faces beamed with pride as I pinned them to their school jackets. and I felt like a  generational baton has been handed over. Just as my dad had told me about the sacrifices our forebears had made to give us the privileges we enjoy today, so I have told my sons, and one day, they will pin poppies onto their own children’s coats and explain to them the reason why.

.2. Sitting down with the headmaster at my sons’ school to talk about my four year-old. He’s an August child and I’ve been worried for a while that his speech and motor skills are a long way behind those of his classmates. The headmaster looked me in the eye and said: ‘Keith, your son is perfectly normal. He is bright, happy and intelligent.’ And do you know what? I burst into tears. I have never been so embarrassed in my life. I just wish he didn’t use his office to peel so many onions.

3. My wife Rebecca was nominated as Columnist of the Year in the magazine industry’s prestigious British Society of Magazine Editors’ Awards held at the Hilton Hotel in London’s Park Lane on Tuesday. She didn’t win (Times columnist Caitlin Moran received that honour) but I am massively proud of her nonetheless. Go Successful Other Half!

4. A night home alone with my boys. My wife and I had a wonderful weekend away re-connecting, but it was just as great re-connecting with my sons while their mother was at the above awards. They’re funny and cute, but best of all, they do EXACTLY as I say, which includes: ‘It’s 8 o’clock. Bedtime. NOW!’ thus allowing me a totally isolated three or four hours with a bottle of wine and loads of crap on the telly.

5. Eating chicken feet for the first – and last – time ever. It was a challenge set by colleagues at Handpicked Media. And one I shan’t be repeating in a hurry. It wasn’t so much the taste – think chicken wings – but the fact I got a toenail stuck between my teeth.

6. The kidless weekend away my wife and I had at the Bath Royal Crescent Hotel. Makes me fill up just thinking about it (yes, crying again). Only another three years to wait until the next one!

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This week’s Reasons To Be Cheerful #R2BC

1. This wonderful story cheered me up no end. A friend of mine and his girlfriend went with her brother and his pal to this restaurant to celebrate his girlfriend’s birthday.  It is a surf and turf restaurant – seafood and steak to me and you – and unbeknown to them, as they tucked in,  it had a special Unique Selling Point, more of which later.

It was a VERY special occasion so no expense was spared. They started with a £180 bottle of champagne, followed by soft-shell crab in tempura batter, scallops, and then for the main course, thick, juicy steaks.

When the bill came, my friend – a maths teacher, and therefore not loaded – almost started crying when he saw the amount: £600. Even more upsetting was that his girlfriend’s brother had seemingly vanished, so my friend would have to pick up the bill alone. He reluctantly but dutifully handed over his credit card, but just as he was about to punch his pin number into the keypad, his girlfriend’s brother reappeared.

‘Stop,’ he said. ‘It’s already been taken care of.’

‘What do you mean?’ my friend asked.

‘I’ve just won us dinner. We owe nothing.’

And then he explained the restaurant’s USP: at the end of your meal, you are invited to take a spin on a roulette wheel. If your number comes up, the bill is cleared, If it lands on a certain other number, you have to make a donation to charity. He’d guessed 28 Black – and 28 Black had won.

Their only regret? They hadn’t had two bottles of £180 champagne. But what a gloriously happy birthday, eh?

2. After a lot of resistance, my four year-old has finally started to enjoy learning some penmanship, thanks to these brilliant work books their mum bought them at the weekend.

3.  Getting a new kettle for just £15 from Morrisons, on the advice of Tweet @Tattooed_Mummy. It boils water. Which is all I really want from a kettle.

4. This Housedad’s Hangover Breakfast did the trick yesterday morning after I got to bed, pissed a newt, after talking rubbish with a mate until 2am. Chipolata sausages, smoked bacon, curried beans and melted Alresford cheese on wholemeal toast. Done!

5. Winning £101 million on the Euro lottery*.

(*This may be a lie)

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This week’s Reasons To Be Cheerful #R2BC

1. Sneaking up on my two sons as they watched TV together and capturing this photograph.

2. Holding my youngest in my arms as he fell asleep on the two-hour bus journey back to school after a class visit to the Science Museum in London. I still have the drool stains on my coat.

3. Catching up on all the gossip from my former work colleagues over a beer in midweek and praising the Lord that I no longer have to put up with what they have to put up with.

4. Enjoying the very last of the record-breaking Indian Summer with my kids in the park paddling pool and sandpit.

5. Being told by my middle son’s former teacher that his new teacher had said to her: ‘I feel lucky to have him in my class. He is such a joy to teach.’ (Unfortunately, this particular reason to be cheerful didn’t last very long as this morning I thanked his teacher for what she’d said, and she replied: ‘Really? I don’t remember saying anything like that!)

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