Thomas 'worse than crack', mother warns

A warning for all parents of young children. Do all you possibly can to avoid the Cult of Th*m*s gaining a foothold in your home. It starts innocently enough, a book here, the odd video there, perhaps a trip on the Sodor express and you kid yourself it's just a harmless bit of fun. Then comes the train set for Xmas. The train set is the point of no return. From there it is only a matter of time till you find yourself in the kind of situation I was in today. O, 3 years on from getting his first train set, still a Th*m*s-phreak. We already have a huge box of track and associated paraphernalia (4 different bridges, water tower, turntable, coal hopper, moving points, buffers, stations etc) and another huge box of trains.

Having acquired some funds of his own to be spent as he saw fit, O headed for the toy shop. He looked at the Power Rangers and Spider Man and Action Man and Thunderbirds and etc etc boys toys, pronounced them all 'kewl', then said 'lets go and get a train now'. Wouldn't you like a powerranger/ spiderman/ turtle/ etc? No, I want a train, lets go mummy. Then another half hour of deciding which of the myriad engines to get [1]. Then he took it to the station and played happily with his train while watching trains while waiting for a train to come in. I do try to be interested in things he's interested in, but there's a limit to how many times you can feign fascination with another train pulling into the station.

For small boys, Th*m*s is more addictive than crack. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Other news: Trin's here woooooo. She arrived safe and sound and on time. We came home for cup of tea then spent a couple of hours worshipping at the local Temple of Mammon. She was most impressed, I don't think they got shops like that down south. They certainly don't got them with faux Grecian statuary and a food court modelled on the deck of the Titanic. She also v impressed with O's beautiful diction. I think she's wrong to say that O loves her for the chocolate, tho - it was the über-kewl cars that did it. A lovely evening of eating, drinking, chatting and chocolate followed, marred only by the Voice of Th*m*s turning up on TV.


[1] He decided on Gordon in the end