With the kinderbesten to myself all weekend, I’ve planned ahead and booked this Monday off work for some well-earned respite. Almost on a whim I finally download Pokemon Go, thinking that it will give Rach and something to do together when she gets back from Melbourne (among my wife and all of my friends, I’m just about only holdout when it comes to Pokemon Go).

I head off to Freo for some breakfast at Chalkie’s and deliberately park on the other side of Esplanade park thinking it will give me the chance to hit up some Pokestops. It begins so quickly …

Breakfast is awesome, and I take the time to catch up on my diary posts. Then I walk back to the car and hit up some Pokestops. I realise I’m quite enjoying getting stuck into the game.

Back home I start a rewrite of an older story of my called 1-UP–there’s an upcoming anthology that it might be suitable for. I collect the kinderbesten from school and get a resounding ‘yes’ when I suggest we head off to Woodman Point to do some Pokehunting.

Despite all this, when we get home the Elderbeast still puts up mountains of resistance when it comes to doing his homework. I have limited capacity to enter into battle with him.

Meanwhile the Kinderbeast is in the front room playing Just Dance as I dish up dinner. I hear him sniffing. A minute later he comes out and asks me if he has a ‘blood nose’. Given that he now resembles one of the vampires from 30 Days Of Night I’m forced to say yes. I grab some kitchen roll and try to soak up some of the blood. I then grab some more kitchen roll. The blood is starting to drip over the kitchen floor, so I engineer a swift relocation to the bathroom (stupidly not bringing the kitchen roll with me). The blood is not stopping. I grab a flannel and get the Kinderbeast to hold it under his nose. It’s not enough. I get him to hold his head over the bath, just so the blood has somewhere to go. I’m shocked to see how freely it’s flowing, now that he’s not holding any tissues or flannels under it. Within a minute there’s a small river of blood flowing towards the drain. It’s not a nosebleed, it’s a bloodflood! I start to think that hospital might have to be involved.

I leave him briefly in the care of the Elderbeast while I consult the internet. I then return, armed with more kitchen roll, and decide to give it another few minutes to slow down, which it does. Finally, after about ten minutes, it stops. The Kinderbeast is greatly distressed, but pulls it together quickly enough. I give the bath a wipe down, and squeeze out the flannel. The place looks like a crime scene–blood spatter everywhere, water flowing red as I wipe it all down. Finally it’s down and I return to the table to eat my cold dinner.

After the kids have gone to bed I find another anthology that might give a home to my story, Between The Devil & The Comfy Chair. Unfortunately the story is almost 600 words over the specified word limit. I manage to cut 300 words out and send it off to see if they’ll give it a look.