Dogs and Babies

How quickly time flies.

Why, it seemed like only yesterday when I was telling you about the set of twins, and the pair of dogs, and wondering what life would be like once they were here. And now they are here, and I have realised that life is pretty much like it’s always been, only now there’s a set of twins and a pair of dogs in it.

My sister’s twins are tiny. They are so, so small. And they don’t DO anything. Like, myself and my brother were trying to race them the other day, and we had it all set up, had the stopwatch out, even had the prize agreed upon, but the saddles kept sliding off and we just couldn’t stay upright. My sister came in to find us sitting on the babies and she said some things she probably regrets now- hurtful things about our unsuitability as uncles- and took the twins away from us.

Stupid babies. Getting me shouted at.

My parents’ home has become some kind of weird museum to infants. My mother’s tasteful colour scheme has been thoroughly ruined by an influx of pink. The dining room table is covered with nappies and baby... stuff. Things. I don’t know what most of them do, or what most of them are for, but they look weird and unsettling, and I try to stay away as much as possible.

And all anyone talks about are the twins. If another subject is broached you are guaranteed it will flick back to baby talk within thirty seconds. Even this blog is now about the twins. MY blog. That should be talking about ME.

Friends and neighbours come over to visit, to drop by, and do they ask about me? Do they ask about the famous author, the genius writer, the teller of tall tales? No they do not, so I have to, and that just makes me look self-obsessed. So THANK YOU, Rebecca and Emily, for making me look bad in front of the people who should be worshipping me.

I suppose, if I had to say something nice about them, I would probably say they are mildly cute with squashy heads. I was holding one of them earlier today and she smiled at me, and my heart glowed, and I felt a connection, and so I told everyone, Look, she’s smiling at me! And my mother said no, it’s probably just trapped wind. And then the baby burped, and a moment later a strange smell arose from somewhere underneath, and the baby looked at me with her evil eyes and I knew we were enemies.

I don’t know which one it was, unfortunately. Everyone is having difficulty telling them apart. I suggested we get a magic marker and draw a large X on one of their foreheads, just so we’d be able to differentiate. The baby without the X would be the good baby. The baby with the X would be the evil one. My suggestion was voted down, as my suggestions usually are. I tried to implement my plan anyway, and I almost succeeded, but my family dragged me away from the evil baby before I managed to mark her.

We’ll meet again, Evil Baby. We’ll meet again.

Probably tomorrow, when I go home to my mammy for tea.

The dogs have settled in to life at my house with ease. Mable and Sherlock sleep in the kitchen, and they also pee in the kitchen, which apparently is great fun. I take them to the garden out back and let them run around and sniff the shrubs and try to track the cats, who are far too smart, quick, young and agile to ever feel threatened by these new arrivals.

When the dogs reach the far end of the garden I like to call them back, clapping my hands, encouraging them to run. Sherlock is younger, but he’s fat, and so he can’t really run without waddling from side to side. He has to take a few rests in between, so it generally takes him quite a while to reach me. Mable is older but faster, and yet she takes even longer because she is so bow-legged that she is incapable of running in a straight line. Many course-corrections later, she finds me, lies down, and pretends to be dead. We all laugh about it. Except for Mable.

I still find time to write, however. I have a deadline looming, and a tour on the horizon, so when I’m not laughing at dogs or battling Evil Babies, I write my books and update my Blog. Which is what I’m doing now.