The Tale of a Lobster Named (Ka)Bluey… And Another Named Bud.

Because, if nothing else, I am a glutton for punishment. 😀

She wants to hold all kinds of critters. That’s Bud, btw. And it could be a scorpion or a snake and she’d probably be fine with it too… This round they wanted salamanders, but we couldn’t find any, last minute

(For real though, thought we should wait til Kings could make it lantern-shopping for Mid-Autumn – so we went uh, critter shopping, which we do now and again as well.)

Some weeks ago the Backyard Safari kits off Gilt.com that I’d gotten on a whim for HKD 100-something arrived:

pic from frogdecorideas.com

(Always on the lookout for new things to entertain the kids with and it continues to amaze me how much you can save by buying online, off-season, and selecting the absolute cheapest shipping options, compared to regular popular toy stores in HK.) Plus, if you don’t tell the kids you ordered something, you can happily carry about your regular business without them going WHEN IS IT GETTING HERE every 30 seconds and then squirrel away “surprise packages” around the apartment til you need them. Rockstar in particular often polishes off 3-4 slim kiddie novels during the week and then starts searching our home for things to entertain himself with 😀

So anyway that tank is meant for amphibians (frog lifecycle for e.g.) but for some reason the rockstars both agreed they wanted “lizards, not frogs”. I think cos they want to handle them and Rockstar doesn’t like the hopping in case they lose them and the dog eats them 😀

So if someone knows where to get these things in HK please let me know – I’ve seen them for sale in Singapore years ago, but not here yet, even when we used to visit Goldfish Street – pic from arkive.org

Which is how we ended up hopping in a cab and ending up outside this place in Tai Hang. Literally got in the taxi when a class got cancelled and asked the cabbie where he knew of. We were in luck, he was a nice guy – glanced at the kids, pulled over and started calling around with the meter still off.

Newsflash: We just found a use for the unpleasant grouches of the world – they make us appreciate so much more, the kind and nice ones. Public service message: put in the extra effort for the ones who are nice. You want to encourage them to not give up being nice, right?

One of the well-known writers of derivatives-related materials – either Satyajit Das or Nassim Taleb – described the trader perspective whereby once you took on a position it sat in your portfolio and ever single tick up or down meant you were making or losing something.

Imagine what that does to the way you look at things, that every conscious market position you take is always In, Out, or very rarely right At, The Money. Imagine if, instead of “just” the trading markets, your every conscious movement in the world at large could be viewed in that way on some cosmic scale. The Kindness Portfolio. Every time you take a conscious position, respond positively, to an act of kindness. On some small level that someone else goes away even more encouraged to do another. And another. And another.

Don’t ever think you can’t change the world. Imagine instead how much you probably didn’t notice before that your actions might affect the world. My work here is dones <dusts off hands><trips off to play with the kids> 

(Why, yes, Rockstar’s been losing teeth too)

…And then my old love for catfish came back. As a little girl I had one that used to come to my fingers and root about on my hand looking for food. When he got bigger he sometimes sucked so hard on my skin that it hurt… Never got any other of these fish to do that, but I know someone else who had one that did that and so I keep trying every now and again…

We’re looking about for a very-much-in-demand taxi in crowded Tai Hang when the Miss alerts me to the fact the fishes’ bag is leaking. Kudos to her on staying calm and holding it that way because Rockstar totally freaked that they might die if he held the bag… (But the rest of the time I held the bag and the Miss’ hand in the end la)

But everyone makes it home alive.

Home, Sweet Home

Epilogue:

And for those of you who like that kinda thing, these two are named…..

The Dragon Of The Rainbow (from the Geronimo Stilton Fantasy Series), and Bud, Too! Yay!

These two have a way to go before parenthood anyway <shrugs> Y’know, how the (mis)naming of your kid could set them up for therapy someday……. Bud, Too! Yay! might be set up for life, though. Hard to pull off a cheer and 2 exclamation marks in your name without coming across as a poser but somehow this one makes it.

Just so 🙂