Twins: Ten Thousand Letters To My Children

It is probably not a gross generalisation to say that many middle aged men do not prepare properly before significant bouts of exertion. Not Me! I am not alone in this but few can compete with my preparatory neglect. Acquiring a suitable bike is a start but squeezing into lycra is not a substitute for training. Take my first triathlon. This was a formidable commitment for any man on the wrong side of forty-five and should have been approached with a good deal more rigour. Instead, I consigned the training plan to a pile of dog eared papers on the counter top, filed it as a 'job for later' and unsurprisingly, never saw it again. No matter how far ahead I plan, there is still never enough time. Once I have outlined the sketchiest of plans, the motivation always ebbs until I reach the point where it is too late to pull out but too early to begin weeping. I undertook the triathlon in some tennis shorts that last saw the light of day during Tim Henman...

Alex had his first proper hair cut today. He's four and a half. Before today he had only experienced two official haircuts; one in a wonky rocket chair and the other in a slightly cramped plastic sports car. Before that Grandma wielded the shears and at various stages the plucky young chap sported a variety of looks including the curtain fringe, the unforgivingly truncated cow lick, the bed head and a splendid junior mullet. He has carried them all off with a degree of indifference but it won't be long before he is teasing his hair into what ever passes for fashion at the time. But today marks a first; Father and son having their hair cut together in a proper barber shop. I have had two barbers in the last twenty-five years. The first was Aldo, a chain smoking Italian on Regent Street in Clifton. He was old and sallow when I first walked through his door in 1995 and he still seemed to be snipping away until very recently when his yellowing salon was reborn as something...

For most of his short life, Alex has wanted to visit the Eiffel Tower. Like so many of his ambitions, Go Jetters is responsible. Alex is not alone in his admiration. So impressed was the 1887 Mayor of Blackpool, that after a brief visit, he built a pocket sized replica, but only after refusing Gustave Eiffel's offer to dismantle and ship the original for a song. He could have driven a hard bargain as Eiffel had cash flow problems and expected to have to demolish the tower after 12 months anyway so was in need of a willing buyer to defray his costs. When we finally got there, Alex was visibly fizzing with excitement. La Tour quite literally towers over the 7th arrondissement and it is a pretty narrow street that obscures it completely. Even then it peeks out periodically between the buildings and at night the summit casts a rotating shaft of  light across the sky like the Eye of Sauron, given the Baz Luhrmann treatment. As the rain was falling, the queue was merciful...

Periodically, you hear a story of some hapless tourist who stumbles in a museum or turns a little too quickly in an art gallery. A priceless vase shatters as they regain their balance; they turn in horror to see a tear in the Rembrandt. Small children induce that fear in me. I reassure myself that things can't really get too far out of hand at Bristol City Museum where we often while away a Saturday morning. Their stock in trade is stuffed animals and a collection of gem stones. There may be priceless artefacts but they must either in deep storage or on very long term loan. Not so at Rodin's House in Paris. Perhaps foolishly, I volunteered to chaperone the children while Clare, Ann and Bernie pursued more adult interests. The choice was half an hour in the garden with a perfectly good lawn to romp across or an ornamental pool to throw stones into. The alternative was braving the interior. I honestly do not know what possessed me to choose the latter; perhaps it was...

The things you thought you'd never say. "Must dash - I promised the children I wouldn't be late for the suffragette march!" For most, The Representation of the People Act 1918 isn't a gripper. We file it away with constituency boundary changes and electoral expenses. It hasn't been a hotly debated topic in the snooker halls and drinking establishments of the nation for precisely a century but when it was, there was blood on the cobbles. It was genuinely a seismic shift in British politics when the old world of privilege and fob watches got robustly hand bagged by the new. Had there been a passing omnibus from which to alight, the historical echo would have been complete but, despite this, we all managed to rendezvous at the march which started somewhere near the top of Park Street in Bristol. It was a sizeable gathering at the heart of the Georgian Establishment despite the driving snow and biting wind. I found Jane and the children huddled in the...

I do like nice things but I recognise that I can be a bit parsimonious. Quite rightly, this is usually enough to disqualify me from making the important decisions that ensure the smooth running of Family Carter. Clare has her roadmap to happiness and while I may meander the B roads casually searching for it, she always opts for the direct route where deviation is a dirty word. The result is that we are always well housed and amply fed when we go abroad; were it left to me, the children would go hungry and we would all sleep under a park bench. But Clare's single mindedness can have unexpected consequences. Our recent trip to Paris was a good example. The apartment she booked was on the narrow Rue de Varenne in the 7th arrondissement. It was on the 1st floor of a typically Parisian building; constructed in ubiquitous creamy limestone, the ground floor given over to a café adorned with the statutory awning and the perpetual gaggle of well heeled smokers. 7th arrondis...

As a boy my Dad lived in Ealing, London and our slightly far fetched family stories record his credits in more than one of the classic Ealing comedies. A Sunday afternoon family favourite was his brief screen time shared with Terry Thomas in Those Magnificent Men and Their Flying Machines . This was a gap toothed tale of aviation chicanery during a winner takes all air race from London (RAF Booker) to Paris (The Eiffel Tower). This was the golden age of flying tomfoolery, leather goggles and the handlebar-moustache. What a Cad! Ever since, Paris has held an enduring appeal for me. I have been there so many times, always intending to climb to its highest point for a view of the city but never managing to do more than get a stiff neck. Standing between the legs of the Eiffel Tower and gazing up her skirts, I often wondered whether the vista from the top was a view to a kill or just one to die for. It's smaller than it looks. Only with the encouragement of ...