30th March 2010 (Tuesday)

Caveat: this one's a 'we're not dead-in-theditch-post' and there's nothing exciting to post. We can't even think of any amusing new things or discoveries we've made today. Littles had a good day at school, did her work reasonably nicely, but is definitely running low on fuel. Watched Little Man in the evening, which shows just how tired she was. The Mr gave two OK lectures, by all accounts it was an incredibly boring subject and he only had one person fall asleep in it, which I count a great success but there we are, not stimulating either. I spent the day doing riff-raf bits-and-pieces and googling odds and ends which need doing, also utterly unstimulating. So there's the day.

One slightly amusing thread for the day (or rather slightly less mind-numbing) - after school drop off Anna popped in for a cup of tea and by the by was talking about her son (he's about ten) and doing Tae kwon do do up self-esteem and self-defence - he's very thin and is apparently showing signs of being bullied. She says she's talked to the teachers and warned them that they ought to look out for this because one day she's afraid he's going to crack and give them all a horrible bashing and get suspended or something. Apropos of which I sympathised entirely and regaled her with the Miyashita story (bully, big and sudden punch on the nose, lots of blood, no more bullying ever again) and opined that it's better to defend yourself and get the buggers off your back even if it means you have to take on some red tape. Apropos of which AGAIN I  now heard a new story from the Mr, which was that Aylesbury Grammar and the local Comprehensive had a regular 'fight club' thing going on and the Comprehensive set up dates for sparring matches - teachers wised up to it and made sure no-one left early on those days. At which the Grammar school boys who left in ones and twos were pounced on basically by thugs and dared to matches. One of these apparently was set on by about three boys, and warned them off saying no you don't want to do this, go away. Well they wouldn't take a hint so the Grammar school boy ended up breaking a couple of their arms and a whole load of ribs, hospitalising the lot of them because he was half-Chinese and a black belt in Karate. He got suspended for a week but ended up being a bit of a local hero, and I don't blame him.  Better get the buggers off your back, I say, and never mind the red tape.