1. My mother tells me that she has come across a photo of her father as a small boy. 'He has just that sad, thoughtful expression that Alec has sometimes.'
2. Nick comes home with a new pair of trousers for Alec. They have a badger on the pocket, which is as close as this family gets to a totem animal.
3. To watch Bettany gnawing the Kinder Hippo that Nana sent home with her. Alec ate his in double quick time and now he is hanging round her high chair with a pathetic look on his face, hoping she will be generous and give him bite. He is daft: the hippo is a mess of stick and dribble and Bettany is oblivious.
