Sunday freakout

Poor little George had his first public meltdown today - Sam and Mary kindly invited us to dim sum at City Hall, and so we jumped in the KKmobile and headed down there just after 1pm.  The first hour or so was ok - George played nicely with Mary... but then tiredness took over, and the little man completely flipped out. He was completely overtired but couldn't get to sleep, and the poor little man had a complete freakout in the restaurant (thankfully it was one of those super large restaurants where a few hundred people were busy feeding their faces.  Sam and Mary were totally understanding about it (esp as we had no cash and needed to leave midway through the meal - so they paid for us), and the other tablemates were also really nice about it. We beat a hasty retreat to the car and then after a bit of lane confusion found ourselves going via the longer (but probably faster) way to Pokfulam - through the Aberdeen tunnel.  We had a few moments of silence in the car, but it wasn't until he was tucked up in his cot that he actually decided that he'd get some sleep and stop screaming. Poor wee kid.

Here are a few photos that obviously weren't taken during said meltdown:

Meanwhile, life goes on for our feline flatmates - here is a moment of slumber from this afternoon. Seriously, I don't know how Poppy sleeps like this:

A busy Saturday

One of the hardest things about updating this every day is finding a title.  "A busy Saturday"?  Please.  Luckily for you, I have cute photos to make up for the stupid title. Today little G had his first proper swim. I forgot to take the camera downstairs, but Emily (also from our building) too some photos for us, so I'll hopefully be able to show you some soon.  That said, I have a photo of him all dressed up in his unused togs (complete with swimming nappy underneath), and a neighbour from the other block kindly lent us her daughter's floatation pillow - so George got to sit in this life ring and just observe the happenings around the pool. He was pretty stoic (although admittedly the water was pretty warm) and happily sat there in his ring and enjoyed the sun.  Verrry cute, I must say. 

Other than that, just a few photos of George enjoying a lazy Saturday.  Tonight he heads to Kylie's place for babysitting action while we head to Dublin Jack for Kylie and Alex's going away drinks.   As a special treat, we're taking the car (Rachel won't be drinking).  How exciting.  It's weird that in New Zealand we get excited when neither of us has to drive, and in Hong Kong we get excited that we get to drive...

Post-bath photos

More touching family photos...

A few from before and after bathtime tonight:

...one from after dinner as Poppycat hung out on the window seat:

...and one of George and Rachel using the computer camera (they emailed it to me at work):

Morning playtime with Daddy and photoshop madness

While drinking my coffee, I took a bunch of photos of George playing on the ground this morning (and of his lordship chewing on some delicious injection-molded colourful plastic rings).  Rachel is watching some cooking show based in Tuscany, so I had a bit of time to go a little photoshop crazy (I was just experimenting with a few different photo editing methods). Sorry.  At least you can still see George under the photoshop madness:

I like to call this one "I have a dream...":

And this one is simply called "Munching plastic":

A few random photos from my phone

Of course a little one of the kiddo:

...and one of Ben and Pop having a Sunday afternoon cuddle on the spare bed:

Please note that this is actually how Ben (on the left) sleeps - on his back and legs splayed.  He's so classy.

Transfixed by his farm animal mobile

He does love this thing:

Tired

After the excitement of buying a car yesterday, our little family was a little knackered today.  So, a nice leisurely lunch with Team Saunders / Williams was the perfect way to spend our Sunday afternoon.  John cooked up a delicious storm in the kitchen and Kate ensured that George's first encounter with Oscar and Lucy didn't involve teeth, tongues or doggy drool.  He actually seemed pretty cool with the dogs, even when Oscar was right in his face.  I suspect George was actually wondering how he could get Oscar's entire head in his mouth (these days everything ends up in George's mouth).  I took a few photos, but only managed to edit one of them (I'm too tired to battle photoshop at the moment), but here is one of Lucy and one of George (that I actually took this afternoon at our place).

30 seconds in and we need to remind George that he has to breathe

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That new car smell

...will soon be ours.  If you replace the word "new" with "14 year old".  That's right - we're (almost) car owners. Buying a car in HK is a peculiar experience.  We went to a yard that had been recommended by a few people online as having good warranties and honest sales dudes.  Got there just after lunch, and in the sales room there were four people standing around, all of whom were studiously ignoring us.  The salesroom had three cars, the cheapest of which I'm guessing was HK$250,000  (two of them were Porsche).  Unsure what the hype was about this place (four salesman, three cars and still no service? Please...), we stood around for a bit longer until a young chap walking into the shop from across the street cocked his head and asked us if we needed any help.  There was nothing about him that suggested he actually worked there, but we took a punt (it was a nice change from being ignored by the old guys) and said that we were looking for a second hand car. "Louis" (as we found out later when we exchanged names) said that he'd take us to the second hand lot, and proceeded to take us to his car across the street.

After packing George and his throne into the back, we hit the motorway and ended up in a carpark building in Quarry Bay, about 10 minutes away.  We went up and up and up the building ramps until we ended up at their second hand "showrooms".  Well, replace "showroom" with "top floor of a very random carpark building", and you'll have a better mental picture.

Louis happily walked us around the "lot" and pointed out which cars were within our budget.  The first one we wanted to drive was an old Renault which didn't start - even with a jumpstart.  Perhaps the engine immobiliser was still on (quite possibly the case if Louis was inadvertently trying to sell us a car that someone had innocently parked there while heading to the shops - after all, it was a carpark).

We were then pointed in the direction of a blue 1995 BMW. Now we were in the market for something like a late 90s Toyota Corolla, but apparently there is a "Cheap Toyota Black Hole" somewhere in Hong Kong. Reasonably priced Toyotas in Hong Kong are as easy to find as real chicken in a Chicken McNugget.

Anyway, after Rachel took the Beamer for two pedestrian-paced laps of the car yard parking lot (I still haven't got my Hong Kong licence and was happier in the back with George anyway), we decided to take the thing out for a proper street drive. Apparently it was a pretty easy car to drive and we ended up - unsurprisingly - back at the car sales offices, where a lovely chap called Toby put on a rather slick performance in sealing the deal.  We figured that it wasn't really a popular car, as he knocked 15% off the price before we even thought about haggling.  To cut a long story short, once the insurance and transfer papers are sorted, and once they get a new warrant of fitness for it, we will be the proud owners of this little beast:

We have yet to name this fine piece of German machinery, but are open to suggestions.