Sid's Show - Review

Do you remember last year, when I gave away a family ticket to see CBeebies' legend Sid Sloane in his very own stage show, Sid's Show? Well, I did.  And today, Squeaky and I got the chance to see Sid's Show for ourselves when the tour reached Cardiff.  Off we toddled to St David's Hall, along with about 600 other people for Sid's one & only visit to South Wales in the tour.  He's still going until June, but this was the Wales show, and we were going to make the most of it.  The rest of the tour dates are here, but you know that, right?

It's getting to be a bit of a theme when Squeaky & I go to shows, that we find ourselves in the audience alongside the glitterati of Welsh showbiz circles.  We sat in front of John Hartson when we saw Peppa Pig, bumped into Lucy & Rhodri Owen in the foyer of The Tiger Who Came To Tea, so it was only fitting that we were joined at Sid's Show by his fellow CBeebies presenter Alex Winters (No, not the guy out of Bill & Ted, that's Alex Winter. Different fella altogether).  Squeaky was convinced that the whole show was going to be Sid dipping some bread into sauce.  Specifically brown bread into tomato sauce.  Interesting concept, but I was hoping for slightly more than that!

We settled down in our seats up in the gods for the first half (and moved down right in front of Alex & his family for the second half - yes! That was me ::grin::)  Right on time, Sid bounded onto the stage, there's no other way to describe it.  Full of energy, and had the children and adults in the audience joining in straight away with If You're Happy & You Know It, swiftly followed by a crazy action song about getting up & dressed.

And getting dressed is where Sid's problems all start.  He can't find his favourite socks & shoes, and we're soon off on a fantastic adventure to find them, without ever leaving the comfort of his bedroom.  It's all in the imagination, you see, and Sid's box becomes a hot air balloon, a spaceship, a submarine.  Part of me was a little bit surprised, but it works.  Give Squeaky a box and it becomes a house, a rocket, or a car.  So for the audience, a simple box becoming the key to an adventure is absolutely right.

The box. Or the spaceship. Or maybe the hot air balloon!

We shifted downstairs at the interval.  Not so much for a better view, there aren't any *bad* seats in St David's Hall in my experience, but more so that if she wanted to run to the front, Squeaky would have the opportunity to do so.  She didn't.  Ah well.  During the interval, there was mayhem as children searched high & low (OK, low) for, well, I can't tell you that!  Something special.  No, sorry, wrong show.  Something to help Sid, anyway.  I'm not going to give the story away, but with a bit of help, and another very funny action song, Sid gets his socks & shoes sorted, and even cheers up his dog Fuzzy.

Cheering up Fuzzy

Squeaky was transfixed.  Even Peppa, who was in her bag, was transfixed.  I was amazed that the show was just Sid, and Fuzzy, on the stage for an hour.  No dancers, no supporting artistes, just Sid.  The energy coming from the stage was brilliant.  And Sid is quite a dancer.  I'm thinking of starting a campaign now to get Sid on the next season of Strictly. Are you with me?

A couple of things I loved about the show, just because.  The range of music was fab - there was a blues song, reggae, rap, as well as silly action songs & kids favourites.  And a very simple thing that made me happier than you'd expect.  In one of the last songs, Sid sings "Thank you" to us all for helping him, and he signs "thank you" as he says it.  I know I mentioned Something Special as a joke up there somewhere, but it's such a simple way to make the show inclusive, and such a nice touch.  I'm not going off into Deaf Woman Ranting territory here, it was great.  Thank you!

The foyer area wasn't Merchandise City either.  I've been to other shows where you can't get in without running the gauntlet of glowsticks, balloons, programmes and assorted stuff you never look at again.  I didn't actually notice any merchandise on sale, but that might have been due to being upstairs for the first half & not going into the main bar/foyer area.  Did my wallet the world of good!  We had a great time at Sid's Show, even if he didn't dip his bread into his sauce, Squeaky wasn't disappointed.

Sid's on tour until June, you can keep up with his tour dates here if you haven't already been to see the show.  Or you can keep up with him on facebook, and twitter as well.

Disclosure: I was provided with a family ticket to the show free of charge for the purpose of this review. I was not told what to write and all opinions are my own.  Links are provided for your convenience, I am not a member of any affiliate scheme & will not receive reward for their use.

Fingerspellathon with the National Deaf Children's Society

We moved house last month, if you follow me on twitter you'll have seen me go through the emotional highs & lows (lots of lows) of the whole house move saga.  Well, moving tends to mean clearing out a lot of old stuff.  Amongst the "stuff" I found was a set of OHP sheets and handouts I created as part of a "train the trainer" course I did in my last job, quite a few years ago.  We had to deliver a 20 minute training session on any subject, to our fellow course students, and I chose to teach fingerspelling.

I've blogged a little bit before about my deafness, and that was a motivating factor in choosing to teach the other students to spell their names using fingerspelling.  At the time, I'd had a few lessons in BSL, but dropped out because of other commitments, but I'd learned fingerspelling long before that, in fact long before I even lost my own hearing.  I remember finding the fingerspelling alphabet in an activity pack from a hotel, airline or something, when I was about 7, and being fascinated by this whole way of being able to communicate without speaking.  I tried to interest my friends in learning so we could talk in class without being told off, but they weren't quite as keen as me to learn something that involved spelling. Ho hum.

Since I delivered that course, I went on to complete 3 years of BSL, and I've got an Intermediate Level 2 certificate, which I'm quite proud of.  I'm probably a little bit rusty today, but given time & practise, who knows?  I wanted to go back and learn properly when I had the time & money to commit to it, as I don't know what the future holds for my hearing, but the thought of not being able to communicate scares me silly.

The National Deaf Children's Society want to encourage primary school children to, well, be a bit geeky like me.  They're organising their fifth annual Fingerspellathon in October 2012, aimed at teaching primary school children the BSL Fingerspelling alphabet, and breaking down the communication barriers between d/Deaf* and hearing children, while raising money to help NDCS's work.

As well as promoting understanding between d/Deaf and hearing children, the Fingerspellathon is a great way to encourage children's spelling abilities, in an interactive way.  It just strikes a chord with some children, as it did me.  d/Deafness can be incredibly isolating, NCDS recently published a study showing that 77% of hearing children didn't know how to communicate with their d/Deaf classmates.  Learning just one way to communicate can break down those barriers, open up friendships, and make school a slightly less lonely place.

Teachers who sign up to take part in the Fingerspellathon receive a resource pack containing posters, activities, lesson plans & worksheets.  And a warm fuzzy feeling.  Some of the ideas that have been used in the past include:

• Fingerspelling children's names during morning registration
• Eye Spy: fingerspelling clues & guesses
• Simon Says: fingerspelling instructions
• Level Challenges: Learning new words throughout the month, with increasing difficulty.

My students only had 20 minutes to learn, but they all managed to spell their names by the end of the session.  Children are far better at learning than adults, think how much they could learn in a month, and what a difference that could make to their d/Deaf classmate.

Teachers wanting to sign up can do so online at http://www.ndcs.org.uk/help_us/schools_fundraising/fingerspellathon/

Free fingerspelling chart courtesy of www.british-sign.co.uk

Oh, and if you're wondering, Justin Fletcher & Mr Tumble use Makaton, a variation of BSL designed for use  by those with other impairments to their communication abilities, such as cognitive impairments, Downs Syndrome, autism & multi-sensory impairments.  It shares a number of signs, but is not the same language.  You might recognise some of the above letters though.


*d/Deaf is a way of describing both those who were born without hearing, and those who lost hearing later in life. Deaf indicates a hearing loss from birth, and deaf indicates a later hearing loss.  These are terms that are recognised and accepted throughout the d/Deaf community, as there are different experiences and issues faced by each group.  As NDCS aims to help both groups, I am using this term to include all.

Cybher - I went to a thing!

Yep, that's where I was at the weekend.  Cybher.  If you weren't, where on earth were you? And if you were, sorry if I didn't say hello!  I was the one with hair!fail, very very pink nails, and looking a bit confused.

Rather than either making you wish you'd gone, or if you did, telling you the things you already know, I thought I'd tell you about my weekend, and what I learned.

I am paranoid about missing trains
I've always been one for being early.  But wanting to leave home on an earlier train to spend an hour hanging around Cardiff Station? Silly.   And then actually DOING that on the return journey, spending 1 1/2 hours hanging around Paddington on a Sunday morning.  Daft.

I am broken
Well, yeah I knew that.  Due to my hearing problems, I have slept with one of my hearing aids in since Squeaky was born, as I almost certainly wouldn't hear the baby monitor without.  But she was at my parents' house.  And I should have had the opportunity to let some air get to my aural passages, except that I could not sleep at all due to an overwhelming sense of unease & anxiety until I put one back in. Then out like a light.

Not a naked dude

Close the curtains
If you live in a 3rd/4th floor apartment in a city centre, directly opposite a hotel, you may want to consider closing your curtains before spending your evenings watching tv/using your laptop with no shirt on. If you don't a gaggle of slightly tipsy women will take your photo, and check on you every few minutes. It wouldn't have been so bad if he'd been fit, but he reminded me of my old driving instructor, who in turn reminded me of a serial killer.

I am bad at taking notes, and take photos instead.
This. If there are links to speakers' content online (I've found a couple, but any you've got would be useful), that would really help. There's only so much I can actually remember from a picture of a slide of a "thumbs down" image.  This actually ties in to I am Broken, as I can't hear and write at the same time, lipreading is a P.I.T.A like that.

I have serious techno-envy
The number of iPads, iPhones and general gadgetry made me feel woefully inadequate. The fact I can't work the gadgetry I have, and had to pay someone to make my lappy work before Cybher is clearly not the point. I like shiny!

My boobs are not the size I thought they were
Though I think almost everyone at Cybher made the same discovery (about their own boobs, not mine!)  Not so massively different that I need to burn all my undies & buy a massive stash of new ones, but enough different that I'll be paying the nice bra lady in my local department store a visit after payday.

London is never as intimidating as I think
And I should go more often, I have friends I should visit, and I'm sure I could couple visiting them with attending events, which would make me so much more popular.

I'd like to say a massive thank you to Siân, and all the team at Cybher for organising such a fantastic event, and to Cow & Gate Growing Up Milk, and the PR team at Frank for being fabulous sponsors and enabling me to go.


It's been pointed out to me that putting Naked Dude's picture on my blog without his permission could be an invasion of his privacy.  Instead, I've replaced it with a view from a different hotel window, this time in Canada, and no less interesting. It's inspired what might become a new semi-regular featurette - Views from a Hotel Window... hold on to your seats!  Sorry to disappoint anyone looking for a semi-nude 50-something dude, but there are plenty of other websites that might be able to help you.

A personal post

I figured that I write a lot about shopping, a bit less about food, and an AWFUL lot about Squeaky, but actually very little about me.  And maybe I should change that.  There's a few things that make me who I am, that maybe the world should know.

Right.  When I was 12 I had meningitis.  I don't really know the full details, there's a lot they don't tell you, even at that age.  As far as I understand it, I had Pneumococcal Meningitis, which is the variant that's immunised against with the PCV vaccine.  If that vaccine had been available or generally administered 30-odd years ago, I wouldn't need to be writing this post now.

I'm here.  I'm a survivor, ok?  I have severe hearing loss in both ears, with no indication of the long-term outcomes, whether it'll stay the same or not.  I don't know what tomorrow will bring any more than any of us do, but I know that it'll never get better, the nerves are permanently damaged and it's not the sort of problem that can be treated with surgery.  (NB, the level of hearing loss edited on 6/8/13 as I asked the audiologist for the official level)

That's kind of why I didn't try to go to CyberMummy.  I'm not good at crowds, I'm not good at having conversations in loud rooms, or working out different accents.  I worry that people will think I don't like them, or that I'm being rude because I'm being quiet & not joining in.  I worry that I'll get something wrong because I misheard and people will think I'm stupid. I worry all the damn time about something or other.

Having Squeaky gave me a whole new set of worries.  Would something be passed on to her? (how, I don't know, it's like a scar, and I didn't pass on the scars of 2 broken ankles!) Would being pregnant somehow do more damage to me?  Would I be able to hear her crying?  Will I be able to understand her when she starts to talk?  I still don't know the answer to that last one.

I could have got more help than I have.  But that would have involved talking to social services.  And that's not something I'm prepared to do.  I'll have stopped needing any particular bit of help by the time anything arrives, and I really REALLY don't want them in my life if I don't have to.  If I didn't have SqueakyDaddy, yes I would probably have to suck it up & accept that it's necessary, but as he's here, they're not.  And that's the way it's staying.

So what am I saying with this post?  Apart from that I'm pro-vaccination?  Meningitis kills.  Even when it doesn't, it still turns lives upside down.  Know the signs.

Babies & toddlers                                             Children
Fever, Cold Hands & Feet                                   Fever, Cold Hands & Feet
Refusing food, Vomiting                                        Vomiting
Fretful, Dislike handling                                         Drowsy, difficult to wake
Drowsy, floppy, unresponsive                               Confusion & irritability
Rapid breathing                                                     Severe muscle pain
Tense, bulging fontanelle (soft spot)                        Severe headache
Stiff neck                                                               Stiff neck
Dislike bright lights                                                 Dislike bright lights
Convulsions/seizures                                              Convulsions/seizures
Rash that doesn't go away when                             Rash that doesn't go away when
   pressed with a glass                                                 pressed with a glass

Not everyone has all the symptoms, and they can show up in any order.  If you suspect meningitis, phone your GP or NHS Direct or go to your nearest A&E.  Please.

Key facts

• Babies, toddlers and young children under five are an at risk group for meningitis, with over 50% of all cases occurring in this age group.
• With 2,500 cases of bacterial meningitis reported in the UK every year, more than three babies, toddlers or young children will be taken ill with meningitis every day.
• Meningitis kills more children under the age of five than any other infectious disease in the UK.
• Meningitis is the disease parents fear the most.

Why are babies and children at risk?

• Babies and young children are particularly vulnerable to meningitis as they cannot easily fight infection because their immune system is not yet fully developed.
• Babies and toddlers can’t tell you how they are feeling and they can get a lot worse very quickly. Keep checking them

For more information visit Meningitis Trust

I have not been asked to write this post, or been offered any incentive to do so. It is simply a topic that is close to my heart, for obvious reasons