It has come to my attention that turtles require a bit more thought than I have previously ever given them. Specifically, what it is about them that might make you like them, and what it is about them that might make you kick them.

The argument for liking:

They are cartoonish, and you can often find a soft toy version in various soft toy departments, or cute little rubber ones, and even plastic. Probably.

They lay eggs, which is a bit interesting. And they give birth on the beach in Thailand, I think. And actually, in Turkey too – see below for polite “Turtle and Nature” poster from Patara Beach, Kas Peninsula:

They swim, and they are quite old. Eventually.

They are quite undemanding I would imagine. Not very noisy, and only a bit snappy if you go and dig up their eggs, and put sticks in their faces and tease them. Which you wouldn’t because you LIKE THEM.

Some people eat them.

The argument for kicking them:

(Obvs, actual kicking would be a little bit mean. But if you felt like kicking a turtle, it might be because of the reasons below:)

They can look a little bit unpleasant when their head rolls back into their scraggy pointy neck. If you know what I mean.

They snap.

They are unwilling to perform tricks, and have no time for ball games or curling up next to you by the fire. They would also be awful at guarding your home.

They probably have the whiff of a fish about them.

And so, Dear Reader, should anyone ever ask you anything at all about the relative pros and cons of a turtle, you can point them RIGHT HERE. A veritable hotbed of Turtle Knowledge and Associated Thoughts.

But all this turtle-talk is a thinly veiled attempt to avoid talking about the whole eBay thing. As it is, I am sitting here on a Thursday night, waiting for a courier to drop off a huge primary school double desk to be placed somewhere in the living room, destined to never fit very well and to always bruise me in the hips, and hit the baby on the forehead as he drunkenly totters past on the way to dropping things into the toilet bowl. The desk is supposed to be a homework desk, but we all know it will never actually be used for homework, but as a handy surface to put small pieces of paper on, bank statements, bits of food and mugs of tea and endless bits of Playmobil which I won’t throw away because I think they might form part of a tractor/pirate ship/ice cream cart. And I have had to pay more for the couriering than the actual desk.

What happened it this: I got really excited about the possibilites of eBay and all of the bits of furniture I thought I would like, and I bidded on lots of things, and I WON NEARLY EVERYTHING. And most of the things were pick-up only, and they were scattered around the United Kingdom. So, like, more than a Sunday afternoon’s drive away – HOURS away in lots of directions. Oh, how I died inside when I kept getting emails that once again I had won a french school desk/pine table/crocheted blanket/silver butter dish/lace bedspread/embroidery sampler etc etc. And I had to fess up, and tell Mark that all of our weekends until early June would be booked up in driving around the UK, picking up bits of ‘antique’ furniture and old blankets. He was a bit cross.

Anyway, there will be no more of the eBay foolishness. Quite probably.

Here is a photo taken last week in our garden. This is all six of us, after ingesting cake and blackened sausages:

And me, fond of a drink in the afternoon: (note wildly asymmetric hair billowing like a lampshade AGAIN)

And the baby after his easter eggs were eaten and smeared as only a dirty baby knows how:

And the Royal Wedding flyover:

And a Royal Wedding street party. Note the two guys on the left who are a little bit OVER being photographed by me, the passer-by with the hungry eyes who clearly had no street party of her own to go to: