Near-Sibling Rivalry

The Naming Non-Ceremony heralded the end of the first stint in sunny Ipswich, I beg your pardon snowy Ipswich for the first tentative flurries began to fall heralding what the media advertised as a "Snow Event" which I think was an unwanted elevation of the expectation but may in fact have been a man-trap for British Rail and the transport system in general.

Next day we were headed Gamlingay-wards. There, along with Nicole's parents were her brother Chris along with lady-friend Nicky who you will no doubt remember from our adventures at Rainbow Beach. She is brewing Cousin Number Three in her little but rapidly expanding oven.

Soon after we arrived Cousins One and Two arrived, Maisie and Voilet respectively. Skype almost-conversations aplenty had set Maisie and Eloise up for a burgeoning cousinly relationship which soon blossomed into skirmishes of parrot-like desire and the inevitable conflict which resulted from a pathogenic inability to share on both sides.

Of course conflict was not to be permitted and adults were soon becoming ragged with mediation fatigue, eyeballs tired from continual upward rolling and children exhausted by the constant flip-flop from argument to play and back again.

And that night the snow began to fall.