A father’s ponderings on twins and their devious ways
Sorry the blog’s been so dead recently! I thought I’d try and liven it up a bit with this video I put together a few years ago which I’ve just uploaded to video-sharing site Vimeo. I think you’ll like it… 
The Happy Adventures of Hannah and Lauren from Mark Whitaker on Vimeo
Since September the girls have been at junior school (I think that’s 3rd grade to US readers). The change in them has been amazing: they’re just drinking up facts and information like… well, like things that drink up facts and information, I suppose.
This morning, as they were getting dressed, they wanted to know about mammals. No, actually, that’s a lie: Hannah wanted to shave her arms because they’re “all hairy” and we sort of managed to divert the issue by talking about mammals. I told them all mammals have hair all over their bodies.
“What, even pigs?”
Yes, I said, even pigs.
“Even whales?”
Even whales. (Please don’t correct me if I’m wrong: I’m a parent, not a zoologist. Remember the primary aim here was not to educate, it was to prevent shaving.)
“Even monkeys?” And so on.
I asked them if they knew the two other things that all mammals have in common. They ummed and ahhed for a bit. Nicola hinted it had something to do with babies.
“They all like babies?” said Lauren.
No, we said. Think about what they give birth to…
“Kittens?” said Hannah.
I think at this point we gave them the live young vs. eggs thing as a freebie. (It was getting close to school time.) This just left the milk thing.
“Think about the little piglets we saw at the farm,” I suggested.
“It’s got something to do with boobies…” hinted Nicola.
“And babies…” I added.
“Oh, I know,” said Hannah with a confident nod, “babies don’t have boobies!”
“And neither do piglets!” chimed Lauren.
Genius.
The King awoke one morning to the sound of great commotion coming from the drawing room beneath his bedchamber.
“Oh bother,” thought the King, “whatever can be the matter?” And without further ado he swung his legs out of the bed, slid them into his royal slippers and reached for his royal dressing gown.
On entering the drawing room the King was confronted with the most distressing of scenes. The Queen was sat between the two Princesses, both of whom were a-wailing and a-howling as if the sky had just fallen down. The poor Queen was trying to calm them with kind words, but seemingly to no avail. “Things break, my darlings,” she was explaining to her daughters as the King entered the scene, “things always break.”
“Now then!” announced the King gruffly (for there was little that pleased the King less than being roused from his slumber by the silliness of his Princesses), “what in heaven can have caused such a terrible hullabaloo?”
“Oh Papa,” cried one of the Princesses, whose name was Lauren, “our shoes, Papa!” She was scarce able to speak through a face that was a veritable mask of misery and mucus. “Look at our shoes!”
The King cast his glance in the direction of Princess Lauren’s outstretched finger and there he beheld two pairs of little dancing shoes, each shoe in the most wretched state of disrepair. He crouched down to inspect them at closer quarters.
“And pray what,” he inquired at length, “has turned your little Highnesses’ royal shoes to such sorry, ruined articles, as might be found in any of the paupers’ houses down in the village?”
There was a pause and then the other Princess, whose name was Hannah, said quietly, “Dancing, Papa. Too much dancing.”
The King thought for a moment. As a ruler he was feared throughout his Kingdom, but he had rather a soft spot for his little Princesses, and he had to admit, their dancing did always seem to fill his heart with the lightest and warmest of feelings.
“Tell me,” he said to the Queen, “does not the merchant in the village, Mr Tesco, sell dancing shoes?”
“I believe he does, my dear,” replied the Queen, but behind her the two little Princesses were nodding so vigorously that the King could tell at once that the answer was beyond doubt.
“And please, Papa,” said Princess Hannah, “I believe that Mr Disney in the centre of Trafford also sells the most beautiful dancing shoes!”
“Yes,” chimed her sister, “at eight ducats a pair!”
“Eight ducats?!” exclaimed the King. “Do you believe me to be made of money? Perhaps you fancy that, when I turn the tap in my bathroom of a morning, it is not water that flows forth from it but ducats!”
The Princesses went rather quiet again. “Well my dear,” said the Queen, “you are the King.”
“Very well,” sighed the King, “so be it. Have one of the servants ride down to the village and inquire at the premises of Mr Tesco and Mr Disney about new dancing shoes.”
But his pronouncement was not met with the joy the King had expected. Indeed, he had rarely in life seen a threesome of more downcast faces.
“But my dear,” said the Queen, “we have no servants.”
“No servants?!” roared the King. “What madness is this? I am the King!”
The Queen responded with an embarrassed shrug.
“Very well,” said the King, “in that case fetch my valet, Richards. He will not receive the news at all well, but Richards will have to ride down to the village to fetch the shoes.”
“Richards does not exist, my dear,” said the Queen, scarcely meeting his eye. “He is a mere figment of your imagination.”
The King looked about him in sheer astonishment. He was beginning to wonder if he had indeed been woken up at all this morning, or whether he was in fact still in his warm feather bed in the grip of some horrendous night fright. He rubbed his eyes and pinched himself firmly on his royal rump, but alas, none of it seemed to alter the situation. At length he groaned in despair.
“I can see I have no choice,” he grumbled. “Princesses, dress yourselves promptly. I shall ride you into the village myself, to the premises of Mr Tesco and, if need be, Mr Disney.”
And there was great rejoicing.
I came down for breakfast this morning to find the girls practising writing their names backwards.
Lauren: Daddy, from now on my name is Nerual! [pronounced to rhyme with Beryl]
Me: OK Nerual.
Lauren: And your name is Kram!
Me: OK.
[Perfectly timed pause]
Hannah: You can just call me Hannah.
Hannah and Lauren established a revolutionary Pregnancy Post Office in our living room today. It’s like a normal Post Office, but where the postmistress (Hannah) is also a trained midwife. It’s the kind of diversity I feel all Britain’s post offices have been crying out for.
Two conversations overheard this morning. First, Before:
Lauren (on toy mobile phone): Hi, is that Hannah?
Hannah (also on toy mobile phone, about 1 foot away): Yes
Lauren: Are you a nurse as well?
Hannah: Yeah, I am actually.
Lauren: Good, ’cause I need your help. I’m having a baby!
Hannah: OK. When’s it due?
[Thud of Lauren hitting the floor]
Lauren: RIGHT NOW!!
And then, After:
Hannah: There you go, there’s your little baby.
Lauren: Is it a boy or a girl?
Hannah: Er… well, it’s just a baby really.
I’m beginning to doubt this postmistress’s obstetric qualifications.
It’s been a long time coming, but toothlessness has now come to visit, and it’s looking like it’ll be a long stay. Lauren’s currently ahead with 3 out, but Hannah’s got some great “wobblers” in there so she’s bound to catch up.
For the record, the first tooth to come out was Lauren’s bottom right one, on 1 June 2007 - aged 6 years, 9 months and 23 days. 
We had a surprising update yesterday to the Slow to Zoom system. It turns out there is a speed even faster than Zoom, known as A1. This in turn is outstripped by B2, then C3 and so on, right up to the frankly interstellar… Z26.
All of this is pure theoretical physics, of course. I’m not convinced we’ve ever seen Zoom in our house, let alone A1. Hearing Hannah and Lauren talk about Z26 is like listening to Stephen Hawking on black holes: it all sounds very clever but you can’t quite imagine what it would actually look like.
I can only suppose it would be a bit like “VOOM” in The Cat In The Hat Comes Back: a tremendous release of energy, a blinding flash of light, and a fraction of a second later two girls would be standing there in their school uniforms, hair combed, shoes done up, coats on.
I can’t deny it sounds attractive, but their current method (lying on back, singing, reading, waving legs in air) probably causes less structural damage.
The girls got recorders for Christmas. They’re both downstairs abusing them now.
So far they have only learnt one note: that piercing one you get when you blow too hard with all holes uncovered.
Shriek! Shriek! Shriek-shriek-shriek!
Mike Oldfield this ain’t. I am approaching the point of despair.
A word from the wise: if your children ever come into posession of recorders, buy ear muffs or leave home.
Hannah and Lauren revealed an amazing secret to me today: their five-level heirarchy of Getting Dressed Speeds. Ranked in order, these are:
Rather than defining each one precisely the girls offered rather scattered titbits of information, a bit like one of those logic puzzles where you get mismatching information about a range of items and have to work out the rest. What I now know is the following:
Don’t tell them, but they’re going disco dancing anyway. It buys us a whole hour of peace and quiet.
All quiet on the blog front lately, but I’m sure it won’t be long before the girls catch me in a creative mood again.
In the meantime, here’s a montage of photos of their latest obsession, Jenga. They discovered it while we were visiting friends on a rainy Sunday afternoon last week and have been hooked ever since. (They also fell in love with Scrabble, but being less of a physical sport I didn’t take any photos of that.)
A conversation in bed this morning. Nicola was wisely staying out of it and trying to get more sleep.
Hannah: Daddy, you know when you’re a grandad…
Lauren (interrupting): Will you be a grandad or a grandpa?
Me: Oh… a grandpa I think.
Hannah: Why?
Me: Well, in my family we’ve always had grandpas and in Mummy’s family they’ve had grandads. So I’d like to be a grandpa.
[pause]
Lauren: What about our husbands?
Hannah: Yeah, will they be grandpas or grandads?
Me (after a short think): They can be whatever they want to be, girls.
We never did get to hear what Hannah started to ask me. As ever, I’m left thinking that a bit of forward planning is commendable, but all things in moderation.
Another overheard conversation from this morning. I’m ashamed to admit I’m not 100% sure who was taking which part, but anyway, here it is.
“One elephant, two elephant, three elephant…”
“No, that’s seconds. Minutes is like, one……… two……… three………”
“Oh yeah, that’s right.”
They were clocking roughly 3 seconds per minute.
Hannah was wandering around at bedtime tonight singing a little song about car insurance, as you do. Actually, the song was Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend, with the phrase “car insurance!” thrown in at random. Apparently it’s off an advert.
“Do you know what car insurance is, Hannah?” asked Nicola.
“Yeah!” chirped Lauren’s voice from the toilet. The family reconvened at the open door to the smallest room to hear more. “And it’s not the only kind of insurance,” Lauren continued, beginning to count off on her fingers. “There’s pet insurance… life insurance…”
“Home insurance!” chimed Hannah.
“Yeah, home insurance…”
“How do you know all this, girls?” I asked, feeling somewhat impressed.
“Well, you know at Tesco’s, near the till, yeah?” said Lauren. “They’ve got all those leaflets, and there’s pet insurance, life insurance…”
“Home insurance!”
“Yeah, home insurance… and… there’s one you’ve forgotten, Hannah!”
Short comedy pause.
“Peg insurance!”
Whereupon Lauren laughed so much she fell off the toilet.
I knew this whole Grease thing was a bad idea.
Hannah and Lauren are having an unexpected day off today due to a burst water main at school. We’ve also brought one of their class mates home with us, so I’m working upstairs while the three girls play in the living room.
I just went to check on them and, of course, they are watching Grease. Their friend bounded across the room and grabbed my hand.
“Mark! Mark!” she shouted, “Isn’t it right that you need to have sex to have a baby?”
Hannah and Lauren looked on with wide-eyed curiosity.
“Erm… what… well…” I explained.
“My mummy told me,” she continued. “I know what having sex is, but don’t worry, I won’t tell them.”
I have now escaped to the spare room upstairs where I’m sitting with the door closed, typing this and planning my next move. Frankly, I’m terrified. They’re only six! This is all Travolta’s fault. Would sex have reared its ugly head if they’d been watching Wallace and Gromit? Of course not.
Oh hell, someone’s coming up the stairs. Perhaps I can climb out of the window and make my escape? Help!!
This is just one of the terrifying questions I’m anticipating now that the girls have discovered the institution of girlhood that is Grease. Actually, “discovered” is a coy understatement: they’ve recorded it and have taken to watching it several times a day. I’d never seen it before and I had no idea just how adult the dialogue is, not to mention the pelvic gestures.
Nicola, on the other hand, is taking it all in her stride, assuring me that she went to see it at the age of 6 with her grandmother and it all goes over your head at that age.
I suspect I’m just “being a dad” on this one. Do any readers have any Grease-related personal stories they can share which might calm my troubled mind?