The astronomist and the swaggering action hero

During the first night of our holiday (at 3am to be precise), Betty claimed there was a whale in her bed so she came into my bed. Poor Tom had conjunctivitis so had been banished to the spare room. Above the master bed there is a skylight - it was a clear night and so Betty and I lay there looking up at the stars and watching the lighthouse light swooping past the window. It was very romantic. Betty sang: 'Is that the North Star, North Star...' (a la Peppa Pig astronomy episode). 'Yes, it might be, but there are lots and lots of stars all with different names' I said. Betty's eyes were wide (not something I particularly wanted at 3am) and then she asked: 'Mummy why are the stars in the sky?' 'Let's ask daddy in the morning' I said, 'now go to sleep'.

The following day, after a lengthy consultation with Tom, Betty paraded around saying 'the stars are in the sky because of the big bang'. We then took our little astronomist and Dolly, to the beach. The sun was out and the sky was blue but Betty insisted on wearing her swimming costume over her top and leggings. This was perhaps an indication that it was rather chilly.

I had the downright stupid idea of going for a swim in the sea. I went in as far as my knees (and that was only because a wave got me). I came out of the sea to be confronted with a Betty wielding a large, pretty disgusting piece of slimy seaweed at me. She then proceeded to chase me with the offending item across the beach to the point where she made me almost cry like a baby. Being chased by some vile seaweed, in my swimming costume, flab wobbling furiously, as people walked past, with me pathetically but slightly manically saying 'please stop Betty, I am serious, please stop', was a pretty ridiculous sight.

Despite my poor sea efforts, Dolly had other ideas. She went charging in, completely undeterred by the sub-zero temperature of the water, and the crashing waves that were well over four times her height. She thought she was invincible. Luckily she had Tom right behind her, lifting her up every time a monstrous wave roared towards her. She was seemingly annoyed at Tom's intervention. Similar health and safety issues arose when she kept trying to scramble up sharp, rough rock faces. At one point Tom said 'Dolly is hard work on the beach' in exasperated tones.

When Betty was not terrorising me with unsavoury sea produce, she continued to talk about the big bang theory, and cried at the mere mention of going in the sea. And when Dolly wasn't behaving like some sort of action-hero , she would elegantly walk across the beach, with a swagger not dissimilar to how a model might walk on a catwalk.