Day 3.154: Chalk it up

After the excitement of yesterday, today has has been a fairly grey day. It has been cool, wet and dreary outside and kind of sleepy inside. One bright spot was a Skype conversation with the rest of my immediate family who are all together. Skype is difficult at the best of times and with big groups on both ends it is far from ideal, but it was nice to be part of the get-together.

The whole thing had a profound effect on E5N1 who, when we were leaving for church six hours later, was convinced we were going to see his nearly-ten year-old cousin. When we finally convinced him we were not getting on a plane, he just readjusted his expectations - we were picking up cousin A at church and he could sit next to Exile #3. We're all coping with the difficulties of distance from family and uncertainty about the future in our own ways it seems.

When he's not being unbearably cute, he is a bit of a menace at the moment, terrorising his sisters very effectively. I was amused by this image from the drive a week or so ago - Exile #2 has been drawing around him at his request while he lies on the driveway and he has been adding faces. This one looks to me like happy E5N1 has suspended his alter-ego by the ankle and is enjoying the process of torturing him. Now why would I think of that?