Where we're at

Me, I have The Rambles. Possibly brought on by extended periods hiding in my room, pretending to be busy, when really I am drinking gin and watching crap on the iplayer.

With nothing else to deliver (except what's new in those soaps and reality shows), here is a round up of our happy band.

Dig.
He can be Chief of Tribe. No, seriously, he can. He captured this enormous tree spider, sitting on the curtains. It was ENORMOUS. It would cross your palm, EASY. All the ladies swooned in adoration. No way would any of us go near that monster.

We live close to wildlife on these outlying islands. Insects, spiders, snakes, dogs. The snakes I am used to, and quite like. I saw one the other day, black, with a hood and a yellow V. (Don't tell me it was a cobra because I stood by it going Oooh! Look at that! Isn't it amazing!) I haven't found a picture of it yet, although I tried.

Dig, by the way, has a very important deadline. REALLY IMPORTANT. So important, he has spent an hour ordering his collection of Standard Chartered $20 notes in date sequence, oldest first.

Banks in Hong Kong issue their own notes, which probably doesn't explain anything. The local expat bar accepts Standard Chartered $20 notes on Tuesdays, which is why ordering them by date is more important than completing work of global significance.

Shark.
She can be Cook. The tribe needs one of those. She is knocking out herb and garlic loaves like a woman who knows what she is about. At some point she sent me scurrying off to the village to find olives and rosemary. Yes, she has no competition round here.

Tiger.
Not sure there is a vacancy for Animator of tribe but she is pretty swift at producing computer cartoons involving dinosaurs.

Squirrel.
Is vying for role as Idler of tribe. I haven't much to report about her because she seems to be hiding away in her room watching trash on the iplayer.

So that is it. Rambling and incoherent.

Which is an appropriate moment to say you might have already seen this fine story about someone in Lantau who's taken a primary school to court because the children make a noise at playtime.

Yes, it says something about the Hong Kong Chinese attitude to child rearing. I bet it also says something about expat kids in a local environment, and I bet at the root of it is conflict over what is considered best land use.