You say tomayto and I say tomahto

Ah well, it was bound to happen. You go away and bingo! you're back. I thought that 45 days would last at least 6 weeks, but something speeded them up. Bloody Einstein messing with time perhaps, I don't know. All I know is that, in no time at all as it were, tomaytoes turned back into tomahtoes, hoods and trunks became bonnets and boots again, cilantro coriander, eggplant aubergine, and, well, you get the picture.
Six weeks with the Munchkins has left me dazed but happy. Already I miss the hugs and the games and the runny noses. Kids are cute, but only to their parents and grandparents, so I won't gush. Just a line from each one to give you the flavour of the wonderful parallel universe they inhabit:

Kiki
In response to ANYTHING AT ALL that I said: "I already knew that, Grandpa" I tried quoting Euler's equation to her (you know, the one that incorporates 1, 0, pi, e and i) and waited less than a second: "I knew that already, Grandpa." (Check out the wicked grin)

Harry
"I want a boiled head."
"You mean a boiled egg."
"No, I want a boiled head."
(Check out the wicked grin)

Sophie
"That's my cousin."
This was her reaction to every primate we saw in San Diego Zoo.
(Check out the wicked grin).

Ten things that I loved about San Diego
1 The weather
2 The Zoo and the Wild Animal Park (Photo above taken at the latter)
3 Balboa Park
4 The birds
5 San Diegans' openness, smiles, friendliness
6 The crusty bread from the local deli
7 The buxom Mexican ladies working in the local supermarket
8 Breakfast at Zanzibar and the Big Kitchen
9 The canyons and the sea
10 Chicken piccata at Pizza Nova in Hillcrest.

Ten reasons to be happy I am back in Haddenham
1 My house and especially my marshmallow bed
2 Broadband (Sorry, Sarah, but dialup sucks)
3 Food (no disrespect to American food, but..)
4-10 er, sorry, can't think of anything else

The stack of mail awaiting me on my return contained the usual dreary bills - telephone, electricity ( HOW MUCH???) and tax demands. The Income Tax demand is intriguing. In fact they have not sent me a bill, but only a letter telling me that if I don't pay by 31 January, they will send round the heavy mob to beat the sh.. out of me, and maybe follow that up with a fatwa and a murrain on my cattle. So, I have to pay an unspecified amount by a specified date. Cunning, that.
Thank goodness I also had a stack of Christmas cards to open (What do you do about the people to whom you didn't send a card, but who have sent a card to you? What do you do about the miserable people to whom you DID send a card, but who did not send a card to you? Problems, problems).
Last Thursday, it seems, there were 100 mph winds. They blew my fence down, so now I can see my neighbour's dustbins and compost heap without climbing a ladder. There's always something, isn't there?