This weird Lego thing

Hamish doesn't really like drawing. Unlike Orla who is forever making birthday cards, and Easter cards, and especially Valentine cards, it's just not his thing. Instead he likes to make things from Lego. So for my birthday tomorrow, I might get something special made for me instead of a handmade card. I don't mind this: I don't get the chance to keep these creations, but I love the thought that goes into them just as much. In the past couple of weeks his Lego or Duplo building has taken on a life of it's own. It's not so much that the creations themselves are particularly amazing, but it's his knowledge or the description when you ask "What's that?" that has started freaking me out a little. So above, we have a boat made from Duplo, with a diving platform on the front. That's fine. I'm happy with the simplicity of that. That's what a 3 and a half year old does.

Next up (above) we have a crane. I like his cranes. They always have a counter-balance which strikes me as a good realistic touch. Again, I guess that's a pretty normal construction for someone his age.

Here (above) we have a submarine. With periscope. He had been playing in the same room as his dad and I assumed when he brought me a submarine that Stevie had finally told him the awful truth that he doesn't make meatballs for a living, but indeed is an engineer, and I assumed that he had been telling him that he used to work in the submarine section of Rolls-Royce. But he hadn't, and I have no idea where Hamish has seen a submarine before. Bear in mind that we have a very limited selection of tv programmes here, and I know we don't have a book with a submarine in it. So I thought, oh that's kind of good.

Then he made this, above. It looks like a crappy car, and normally he makes better cars than this, but then he started telling me about that bit on the right at the top. And this is where it started getting freaky. Because apart from the blocks holding it still under the middle, the reason they are needed apparently, is because what it has on the back as he described it to me and Stevie is a jet engine. Not that he knows that, or called it that, but he described it's functionality, and told us about how the cold air enters into the bit that rotates at the front and then goes through the middle portion which is attached to the car and makes it drive and then the hot air goes out through the bit that rotates at the back....in fact he probably described it better than I did. Don't quote me. 

The next day, he built this. Looks like a tower, or two towers really. But he told me that what it does is that it takes dirty water in at the bottom of the wider tower. Then the dirty water is forced upwards through various levels where the dirt gets trapped each time. The big dirt gets trapped lower down, and then as you get up near the top it's taking out the small dirt. The water then travels over the top (well apparently it shoots out of the top in an arc like the fountain we saw the other day in the shopping centre, you know where it looks like the water is 'jumping'?) and then it travels as clean water down the narrow tower and at the bottom goes underground and is taken by pipes into peoples houses. I'm no civil engineer, but isn't he describing a water purification system???? I must ask my dad if that's how water purification systems really work, but anyway, HOW CAN HE KNOW THAT??

Is that not weird? So in case he ends up being some kind of genius engineer, I have started taking really rubbish photos of his early career. But I needed to be able to describe what he was telling me, so sadly, you may be getting a few Lego/Duplo updates.

Update: Well I went and did a bit of Googling, and apparently the closest thing to what Hamish has built is a micro-filtration system. Singapore (according to Wikipedia) is the only country currently to filter it's waste water to the point of being able to pump it back into people's homes it's called NEWater - though I always thought that they said that the tap water you drink in London has been through about 7 people before you??? No? Googled again, Thames Water tell you that only a tiny amount of recycled water will go through your system, which is because of the 150 litres each person uses per day, they only drink on average 2 litres of that. But it is treated and purified seeing as around 80% of London's water comes from the Thames and the River Lee. Yum! Right, as thrilling as this is, I'm done.