1. A very small victory -- but I managed to grill a lamb chop without setting the smoke alarm off. I did it on low heat with the back door open.
2. "Did you have a nice afternoon?" asks one of Alec's practitioners. "We were having some husband and wife time," I tell her. She doesn't ask what that involved but... we crossed the street on the red man, bought cake on the way home and then ate it in bed with -- hot -- cups of tea.
3. When we try to put Alec in his backpack, he throws a wobbler right in the middle of the nursery hall. I nurse him, which calms him down, and we try again. This time he's so cross and loud that they send for one of the practitioners to help us. "He's been fine all afternoon," she says, trying to distract him. And the manager says: "My children would do that to me." I thought that if it happened to a nursery manager, we can't be doing anything wrong. We carry Alec home in the end, and hear no more about it.
