Leave them alone and they do wonders

Grit has abandoned her children today. She is busy arranging her life, organising her family, mentally preparing for seven nights in a concrete bunker, and typesetting a load of pompous academic twaddle from an undistinguished lecturer now on holiday somewhere in England who spends his days drawing foolish pictures of verbs.

Since I am occupied, Squirrel and Tiger amuse themselves digging pits for unicorns. Shark, left to her own devices, sails through the kitchen and prepares delicious miniature souffles.

I think if any of those scoundrels from the DCSF are lurking around they would probably deduce, on a judgment of today, that a nine-year old child is probably the primary carer, all the children certainly neglected, and the house is filled with hazards, so that's a sure sign we need to be inspected and closed down on health and safety alone.

From our point of view, we see Tiger and Squirrel follow an extraordinary fantasy of deep play which involves one unicorn becoming a master bricklayer and designing mud houses for everyone to live in peacefully. We then see Shark's astonishing culinary ability, ambition, and confidence. We see not see the coating of soil and not the mess left in the kitchen.

We do not want thanks for what we do, we just want to be left alone to do it.

And here is a blurred photograph of one of Shark's souffles, before I snatched it and scoffed it.