The Eleanores

My Dear Princess, Loulou and Fellows,

Day 4 of Bumpaddle but my spirits are being kept up by dear Fazzy who amused me this morning by announcing that she is allowed to stop fasting because errr... it's... errrr... well ladies don't have to when... 

Well, you know.

"I feel quite awkward telling a man this," she said.

"But you'd like a hot chocolate wouldn't you?" I asked.

"Oh my god yes."

She got lucky and it was someone's birthday so she got to have cake too. She even ate a chocolate bar in front of her husband yesterday, which seems just cruel to me.

"Couldn't you wait until sunset?" I asked. 

"I didn't want to share it," she replied, with impeccable logic. "But I did stop to tell him how good it was."

She told me that her daughter misses her two best friends at school. Both called Eleanore. 

"Do you have Eleanores at work, mummy?" she asked Fazzy.

"Well, I do. But they are called 'Symon' and "Gromit"," Fazzy replied. 

I felt very proud.

People around the office are used to seeing the two of us together. We are practically joined at the hip because we're on the same projects. It was for this reason that Kath, who has been at Kāinga Ora forever, asked the pair of us to provide the voices for a training video she was making.

It was easy. Only about two minutes of audio each. 

I told Fazzy about my podcast and how I have a dedicated listenership of (it seems) mainly middled aged men who write reviews about my relaxing voice and how some of them like to listen to it as they fall asleep.

"I mean," I said, "it's about horror movies. What sort of dreams are these people having?"

So I did my best Val Thomas voice for Kath's video and she started editing it all together. At one point she interrupted Fazzy.

"Isn't Symon's voice GORGEOUS?" she said.

"It makes you wonder what all those blokes are up to in bed when they listen to me," I observed. And Fazzy nearly spat her Ramadan loophole hot chocolate across the desk. 

I love being her Eleanore.

S.