Kids...They're Funny

My neice, oh that's right...there are billions of them; I'll start again.

My sisters daughter, Alice, is a darling; she's three and a half years old, pretty, energetic, hyper-sensitive, emotional, demanding, strong, loud and CONSTANTLY on the go...bless her. Fortunately for my sister, Alice went to stay with her nanna for a couple of days; maybe there is the possibility of some rest time for mummy.

I called my mother, Alice's nanna, last night; I just wanted to make sure that they were getting on okay, you know, make sure that nanna was still moving about and that she hadn't popped her clogs under the stress. Mom picked up the phone and, in the background, the wailing of a banshee...Alice's dulcet tones of course.

"What's wrong with her?" I enquire...it's the polite thing to do.
"It's only Uncle Jamie Alice" says my mother, seemingly trying to calm the child;
"She wouldn't go to bed" she continued "so I told her that she ought to, because Santa Claus was watching her...and then the phone rang, and she thought it was Santa".

How I laughed.

After a while the constant noise that children make is all the same; screaming with joy; shouting with excitement; balling their eyes out; it's all cacophonous and abhorent...notwithstanding the hoards of...traditional folk that don't become rancoured when subjected to it. So it was noise, just noise, the usual noise...but I enjoyed it.

It tickled me that this, particularly loud, noise was my fault; I was Santa, watching the naughty girl who wouldn't go to bed, and, having completely ignored her nanna who wanted her to go to bed, she was suddenly mortified and repentent...but mostly upset.

I might even enjoy Christmas this year.

Ho Ho Ho.