We all woke up super late this morning 😳 which is of course why Davies and Scarlett are so shocking at getting to sleep at night and then why we all wake late and then go to sleep late etc. I’d say it was a vicious circle but actually I think it is more a slightly disgruntled rectangle ;).
The chickens have been really comical today, I was in the kitchen and heard a tapping at the back door and opened it to see a whole gaggle of them looking expectantly at me. The main cockerel had tapped on the door with his beak and was looking really proud of himself. I rewarded them with some cereal that no one likes (why do we always have at least one box of cereal that noone likes? Even when I have fed it all to the chickens and thrown away the box a new one seems to get nominated) and some brie which one of them very entertainingly got stuck on her beak. A bit later I was in the kitchen again and could hear a crowing outside and one of the other cockerels came in and ate some bread off the doormat.
I’d semi arranged with my parents last night for them to come to the museum with us this afternoon but my Mum rang to say she wasn’t feeling too well so they wouldn’t be coming after all. I spent ages wrapping up a heap of stuff we’ve sold on ebay and after lunch we went out to the car with the intention of stopping at the post office on the way to the museum.
Except the car wouldn’t start 🙁 It has rained all night, all day and all the next night (and actually quite a lot of today) and the pavements were still soaking wet as the sun hadn’t got down as far as my car by then so I was not terribly surprised. It did mean no museum and actually as the bag was so very heavy I was not up for carting it all the way into Lancing it also meant no post office.
We were about to head back indoors but the kids asked to go for a walk. After some debate about which direction to go in we decided to do a penny walk, tossing a coin to determine left or right. The first flip at the end of our road determined towards the downs or towards the beach and on tails we headed north. The penny led us on a pretty straight route although right near the top of where the houses run out and it becomes the downs we did rather a lot of up a road (steep hill) along, down the next road (steep hill), along, up a road (steep hill) although we never actually did a circuit on ourselves. We got tantalisingly close to a field for about 10 minutes but kept turning away from it until finally the penny let us go that way. We then ran out of decisions to make so clambered to the top of the hill, admired the lovely view back down across houses to the sea, admired the downs and then caught sight of the rather gloomy black clouds heading our way so decided to head back for home. We decided to walk a different route as far as possible rather than retrace our steps so put the penny away and tramped across a field until we met the road.
At least it was downhill all the way, although the threatened rain did arrive about 10 minutes before we got home. I then cursed not having chopped wood before we went out so got totally soaked wielding the axe. A slice of Christmas cake and large cup of tea along with a change of clothes restored me though :).
Tea for the kids, fire lit, I’ve enterered a competition to win loads of outdoor clothes for our adventure (am sticking to one attempt to get sponsorship / writing deal / stuff a day. It would be nice but it really not what the year is about so I really don’t want it to take over and become that), Ady came home and we did bad, good, learnt today:
Davies: Bad: didn’t go to museum, Good: got PSP back, learnt: about a white dwarf, 1 tsp weighs a ton (from a documentary about space we watched this morning)
Scarlett: Bad: fell over and got mud on my toy, Good: nice walk with lots of animals, learnt: about penny walks (she really liked the idea)
Ady: Bad: Drove a long way for a meeting and the person was off work, Good: It’s the weekend! Learn: Europe is the only continent that has no desserts (we have observed that his bad and good is very dictated by his day at work, glad we are restoring that balance soon)
Nic: Bad: car wouldn’t start, Good: enjoyed where we live today, our penny walk would either have taken us towards beach or downs and both are lovely, Learnt: when you would use fish or fishes (in response to a question from Davies about sheep, deer, fish type words).
I read a chapter of Narnia, the kids were in bed, both happily as they said they were tired, by 7pm. Neither asleep still at 11pm mind you… Watched Penn & Teller, had dinner, Ady said lovely slushly things about him and I (awww ♥ ) and I’ve had another evening of sobriety by my standards as the cellar is looking pretty depleted and we have no cash to restock this month!
Europe has no puddings?? 🙂
Comment by Daddybean — 08 January 2011 @ 1:27 am
I spent quite a while thinking that can’t be right … wat about all those patisseries? … before realising what was meant 🙂
Comment by Alison — 08 January 2011 @ 12:02 pm
wat??? thhhat can’t be rigt either!
Comment by Alison — 08 January 2011 @ 12:03 pm
PMSL. Teach me to proof read and double check what people have learnt (they’ll make a teacher of me yet! ;)). Just googled and there is a desert in Poland, Italy and Spain (and indeed desserts in many countries 😉 ) so I’ll hand that one back to him marked with red pen 🙂
Comment by Nic — 08 January 2011 @ 3:18 pm