He won’t go to the toilet without it now. We walk past distant gunfire, waiting for our turn on the loo while TAT conquers spy allies. Sometimes he catapaults birds. Puppychild has to thump loudly and tell him to stop playing with himself frequently which is wrong in so many ways.

“It won’t wipe your arse though will it?” I scoff at him when he finally emerges with a burnt matchstick and a pins-and-needles limp. “No app for that, is there?”

It’s all very affecting, this waiting around for TAT and his crapps. I don’t know if there’s a helpline, but I’m pretty sure there’s an easy way to look for one if there is.

I do have a Wii fit though, the melding of fitness and gaming is genius even if it does sit for months on end gathering dust. I used it to gauge my weight in my seventh month of pregnancy, just to throw it off guard a bit. It turned my avatar into a Pillsbury dough-girl and scorned my girth.

Then I used it again shortly after giving birth and realised that it’s not as stupid as it looks. It told me that if I wanted to, I could re-do the body test carrying an object, and it would give me its weight too… something like a pet, or a baby maybe?

So I did, and it congratulated me. I was impressed.

A few weeks later I re-took the tests, and after I’d bitch-slapped it for still claiming I was in the ‘overweight’ category, I found that thanks to breastfeeding, Sir Fartsalot had gained almost exactly the same amount of weight that I’ve lost. Ooooooh.

My child is eating me. I adore the chubbiness that is my thighs recycled.

Atkins my arse. The cannibalism diet is working well for me.

This is an arial view of the area of Knockree, Co. Wicklow.  I can’t describe this place because no english word would fit properly.  Past the prettiest Youth Hostel in the world lies a parking spot marked by a horizontal barrier.  Once you’ve debarked yourself from your wheels you’ll find yourself on a path lined by mysterious darkened faerie paths and wild honeysuckle and you follow this for ten minutes or so until you come upon a bit of wood with an arrow painted onto its top.  Follow this arrow, lep over the turnstile and then…

The wee hours of morning time are the best.  A haze floats below your view and hugs the river like a firstborn so that you feel like you’re either flying, or are standing on the tallest mountain in the world.  It is the start of one of those downward slopes that beckons you and casts a spell on you to make you forget the fact that you’ll someday have to climb back up again on the homeward stretch.

At the bottom of this path lies a river which shimmies through goblin groves and tree-filled troll hideouts.  On the banks of this river are various camping spots and tiny beaches for your freed sock-smothered toes to dangle from, with ropes hanging from branches (possibly put there by aforementioned trolls), so that you can swing into the centre of the river on a hot day and let go, to plunge into the guinness-coloured water below.

I walked there today with Puppychild and Sir Fartsalot and found this:

Heaven raped.  Small children denied from splashy footplay because of broken glass.  Human shit wrapped shamelessly in skidmarked bogroll and empty crisp packet carcasses gathering algae where fish should leap.  Shit from shit. 

How can a nation can gather arms and unite as a proud nation against some random French fucker on a football team, yet at the same time vomit all over this same nation’s natural wonders and rape it of its purity?

Shame on whoever partied here.  Shame on you assholes.  You don’t deserve this country.

Then there’s the question of life, death, and that whole afterlife thing, which Puppychild blindsided me with last night.

Out of the blue, she asked me why my grandparents were dead.  Then she asked me when her own grandparents would die and asked if they wouldn’t rather stay alive forever instead. 

“Everybody dies.” I explained, in a roundabout way.

The information sank in slowly and I watched as she bonded with the rest of humanity and the millions who have gone before us, fearful enormity plopped onto her shoulders like a big bag of spuds and I felt sad for her.  Her teddybear’s lip began to quiver.  I explained to her that she must try to stay happy, to love every minute she has with her Grandad and Granny instead of worrying about their demise.  The information was absorbed and absolved.

“But what happens to you when you die?”

I told her that we dissolve and turn into skeletons and get chewed into dust and soil.  There seemed no point in mincing words, I figured it was better for her to learn it from me, rather than learn it from maggotty dead roadkill at some point in the future.  I softened the blow by telling her that flowers and trees grow from soil, life from life, life from death, that sort of thing.  It seemed to work.

Then I explained about Buddhist theories of re-incarnation and she chose that she should return in the next life as a puppy.  No surprise there then.

I didn’t get to explain about heaven, for she had fallen asleep by then.  I’m not sure whether this is a pity or not, she didn’t mention the subject again until lunchtime when I mentioned we’d be visiting Grandad.

“Grandad’s gonna die!” she said cheerfully. 

This means she’s now either a psychopath, or she’s figured out the meaning of life.  Either way I become famous, which is nice.

I got a 500 piece jigsaw of a bunch of Alsatian puppies for Puppychild recently. Who am I kidding… it’s really for me. She watches with mild amusement at the torture I seem to love so much but soon goes back to her kennel to thread beads. She’ll be there for that final twenty pieces, we have an understanding.

One of TAT’s spurious friends was visiting last week and asked if I was going to glue it to a frame, a lot of people do that. They don’t understand the point of jigsaws.

Jigsaws are one of the few things you can make which are designed to be smashed up again. Yeah you can leave it on the dining room table for months but people eventually get pissed off that they’re not allowed within five feet of it, so all those long hours piecing the whole thing together will have to be undone, destroyed and wept upon, preferably during a seance. That’s the whole fun of it!

Here for your amusement is a cat-in-the-box just in case you’ve mentally diverted from all the nerdy jigsaw talk:

This rather complicated picture is of Laughingboy in his new stander, on loan to us during the school holidays. It arrived with a fanfare and took several grown men to manoeuvre into the house, coming to rest in the sacred junk spot in his room. I had moved the sacred junk into a parallel dimension the evening before, which was lucky.

With more straps than a Jimmy Choo and more velcro than a truck load of nappies, the stander needed a demonstration which was provided by Laughingboy’s physiotherapist shortly after its arrival. As she and I battled with limbs and folds and hoists and elbows and gaiters, The Accidental Terrorist walked into the room.

“Jesus.” he said. “Frankenstein’s monster’s after moving in!”

Laughingboy’s physiotherapist raised her left eyebrow subtly, and began to turn the winch that moves the table into its upright position from flat.

“It’s alliiiiive!!!!” shouted TAT, as Laughingboy flapped in delight at the shift in gravity.

Laughingboy’s physio scowled. Was she scowling at the inappropriate joke? Was she concerned over Laughingboy’s potentially hurt feelings? Maybe it was a scowl of jealousy because she has been itching to crack the same joke for the last five years of working with these standers but couldn’t.

All I know is that Laughingboy is going to have thebest Halloween costume ever this year. Now where did I leave that Hannibal the Cannibal face mask?

When I heard that a bunch of weirdos were gathering in town to attempt a world record at SpaceHopping I felt I had to be there, if not for the good of humanity alone.  Somebody had to be there to point and laugh otherwise our civilization would surely collapse under such a weight of silliness.

I attached my children to my person and marched in from the wrong end, to meet barriers and folk who didn’t understand the plight of a sweaty lady with a baby and a five-year old stuck to her.  So, I snapped photos and buggered off to lie around in Merrion Square for a while with my homies where I scored a big red SpaceHopper and a bag of Meanies.  Puppychild’s puppy eyes do come in handy when I’m on the scrounge.

I’m sure a big red SpaceHopper will come in handy for something some day!!

I wrote that sentence a week ago and got stuck, couldn’t find the right thing to say after that.  One child is a novelty and eclipses the other where adoration is concerned and that’s hardly fair.  Writing about it, even thinking about it is unfair to Laughingboy, but I can’t help it.  It’s frustrating that he hasn’t progressed, hasn’t passed a single developmental milestone since he was a year old.

One has tiny nappies that make my boobs hurt with the cuteness of them, the other has giant nappies, the type they don’t bother to print pictures of Pooh bear on.  One child stares into space at vague impressions of shapes but cannot make any sense of them, while the other has already learned to fix eye contact and goo toothless pleasantries at his admirer.

They both flail their hands wildly in an effort to suck a thumb and gauge mild surprise when they accidentally whack themselves in the face, but one has learned that a set of knuckles is just as nice to suck on, while the other is content to grind, grind, grind his teeth instead.

They both scream for my attention.  One is screaming because of short term mammory loss, the other because he has a whole array of possible annoyances and is quickly becoming dependant, if not immune to pain killers because he can’t voice his woes.

They both have a sister who is slowly learning to live without my attention, but who will soon have the adoration of a younger brother who will hang on her every word and will leave his older brother behind on his hopeless island of developmental delay. 

It’s pointless moping about it all, and stating that usual bullshit about Laughingboy being the light, an angel sent from above with smiling eyes just doesn’t cut it, it just makes me sad when I hear other mothers of disabled kids say it.  We have broken children, I feel like telling them.  Let’s just say it.  Broken children with no future.

Except that’s wrong too.  Laughingboy has a purpose, a glorious purpose that will enlighten somebody or something in time to come.  Just because I can’t figure it out doesn’t make it not true.

People goo over my youngest son and tell me how lucky I am, and I agree.  They jokingly ask me if I wouldn’t like him to stay at this adorable age for ever, but to this I don’t react at all.

Puppychild held Sir Fartsalot for dear life while the boutique assistant rummaged through cabinets full of bra boxes.  I shuffled cotton like an Amsterdam pro and called out letters of the alphabet while Puppychild watched in awe,  I worried if she’d be asking her schoolteacher some time in the future what words begin with double D.

Anything above a cup size E must officially be classed as industrial when it comes to nursing bras.  I watched with dismay as the pretty lacy black numbered drawer was shut and the plain white Fs were dragged out, but even they were no use.  She tucked me into a G and sighed with relief.  Her work here was done, bar a quick attempt to sell me two of them which was fruitless as I found out how much each bra cost.

€52?!?  Is there a milking pump built in?  Do I get a slave that’ll follow me around and prop them up for me?  No!  Oh well.  At least I’ve somewhere to put my spare change now.

It could always be worse I suppose.

Fuck. It’s lovely the way the f slides so neatly into the k like that, like the sound a golf ball connecting with a perfect 9 Iron swing would make, or the noise made by the bonnet of a very expensive car when you try to slam it shut. I reckon I’m doing the kid a favour by including as many sounds and words as possible while his brain’s developing as it is. That’s why my standard reply to scorning parents is ‘Ask me bollix’. It’s in the name of education.

Here be photos of d’holliers. No animal was harmed in their making.

TAT got very excited when Barney arrived on the scene. He wanted a photograph of him decking the big purple freak right on the jaw, but Barney caught wind of this and ran like fuck. It’s impressive how fast that dinosaur can run what with all that stuffing and stuff.