Taking to Scally yesterday about the funny things children say reminded me of the time Stephen asked my parent's next door neighbour for a sprig of mint. The gentleman in question grew every kind of herb in his garden and was always passing them on to his friends and neighbours. Mr Mantle asked Stephen how much he wanted. Stephen pondered on the question for a few seconds and then declared that he would need a lot. Why's that, Steve? asked Mr Mantle, 'cause we've got a lot of potatoes, was the reply.

I can also remember finding Matthew sat in the fish tank, which was on a low table at the time. I'd only gone in the kitchen to put the washing machine on. He must have been about 2 or a little older possibly. When I asked him what he was doing - he told me he was swimming with fishy fingers. Unfortunately the poor fish wasn't swimming at all, it was gasping on the floor. I'm surprised it lived, but it did and for a good few years afterwards.

My mum told me that she found me putting potatoes down the toilet when I was small. I didn't walk till I was about 18 months - I got everyone worried. I'd done the round of professionals, mainly because they weren't sure if I'd suffered brain damage during that traumatic birth - but basically I was just lazy - no comments needed on that one, thank you very much. I could get around just as quickly by tucking my leg under me and scooting around on my bum, I didn't need to walk. We lived in a row of cottages at the time and she used to keep the sack of potatoes in the bathroom, which was downstairs. She's shut the door and because I wasn't walking thought it was safe. Big mistake - it was obviously just the incentive I needed. I'd nearly filled the toilet to the brim before she'd noticed and then walked over to her carrying a potato in my hand. She was just ecstatic that I was walking, it hadn't dawned on her at that particular moment that I could now reach things I couldn't get to before.

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I've just remembered something else my mum told me - but this time about the dog, a black and white spaniel called Paddy Paws. Dogs in those days could pretty much go where they wanted, without the owner. She answered a furious knocking on the door to find Mr Hopcroft, a next door neighbour, demanding that she remove her bloody dog from his garden. At that very moment Paddy wandered past with a daffodil sticking out of his mouth - which he then sat in front of the fire to finish eating. Apparently he had bitten the heads of every single flower in Mr Hopcroft's garden. Mum was horrified and couldn't apologise enough - Mrs Hopcroft found it extremely funny even if her husband didn't see the funny side until a lot later.

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For those of you that also read Chris's blog - please note that I have refrained from making any comments about his interest in 'knockers'. Heaven forbidden I lower the tone when he's having one of his cultural moment :-p

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Scally sent me the link to this funny the other day - she finds some great one. I meant to publish the link yesterday but forgot. It certainly made me laugh - thank God I didn't go to university!

http://www.stupidity.org/video/1009

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Let’s play a new game today, it’s called: I wonder who hasn’t taken the library books back? Yes, it’s difficult one that – you’ll never guess. As I was waiting for the computer to start up this morning I started to look through ‘Teach Yourself FrontPage’ and noticed that the renewal date was 23rd October – surely to God, it’s never been that long! I would go on-line and renew them now, but the card is downstairs and I’m upstairs – I’ll do it when I get to work – hopefully.