I had a lovely weekend with some online friends from Feminist Parents. It was our second such weekend, not as many of us made it as on the first occasion and indeed that first one had been so perfect it had a lot to live up to really.
There was something of a comedy of errors with regard to the appartment we’d booked. Initially we’d been staying in two, four bed appartments but the company had phoned C, who had made the booking as her plane was on the runway (she came over from Ireland) to say they had been double booked and they’d move us to other appartments in London. That plan was then rearranged again and we ended up in four two bed appartments near St Pauls. As several people had dropped out (some very last minute, some a while ago but too late to cancel) we managed to just take three of the two bed appartments in the end as one of the seven attendees was just a day tripper.
I’ve no idea what the other two sets of appartments (our original booking or the second replacement) would have been like but I was quite unimpressed with where we ended up.They were nice enough inside and well-equipped but had NO view at all, no balcony and were crazily hot and airless despite it being October and windows being open so I’ve no idea what they’ll be like in summer. I suspect we were very spoilt with our fab appartment in Canary Wharf with balcony and lovely views last time but if I’m paying to stay in London I’d quite like to see more than the odd pigeon and another block of appartments out of my window!
Ady had had the crazy idea of driving me to save money. And I’d been even crazier by agreeing. It did save about £30 on train and tube fares but it also meant he and the children spent about 4 hours in the car on Saturday and the same again on Sunday when they came to collect me. It is just over 50 miles to London and the satnav said it should take an hour but it was closer to 2.5 as Brixton and Croydon were nose to tail traffic and the satnav isn’t intelligent enough to know about road closures and diversions. I was therefore slightly stressy when I finally exited the car and had already decided to just get out and walk around and find Borough Market where I’d arranged to meet my friends. As it happened it was literally across the road so I was soon being hugged and kissed and soon forgot my woes :).
I met two friends who had already met and we were soon joined by a fourth. We went to a posh coffee shop place that literally only sold coffee. No tea, no hot chocolate, nothing. Just coffee. I don’t drink coffee – it’s for grown ups 😉 but we managed to get them to give us a cup of hot water and I put one of my own teabags in it that I had in my bag anyway. I took great pleasure in drinking my illegal tea and took every opportunity to say the word ‘TEA’ and watch the coffee people recoil in horror 😆 We had a good old catch up, in particular with one friend who has all sorts of life changing stuff going on at the moment.
We were then joined, in roughly ten minute intervals by the other three of our friends including Ali. When there were five of us we popped into a nearby shop and bought a couple of bottles of chilled fizzy wine as we had originally done an internet alcohol and snack shop to be delivered to our appartment. This was being taxied over to us but given our two hour delivery slot time and how long it might take to arrive we were worried about being without wine after dark 😆 . We also all had a can of pimms which we drank on the steps of Southwark cathedral and felt suitably downmarket and upmarket all at the same time about. At least two of the party claimed never to have ‘drunk out on the street’ before 😆 .
Another friend arrived bearing chocolate for all and finally when we were all there we walked across London Bridge (which was not falling down but we sang about it anyway) and to our appartment near St Pauls.
We then proceeded to do what seven women, with alcohol, in a hotel room, without partners or children for the evening are bound to do and talked, drank, ate, laughed, gossiped, sang and generally had a good time :). Very good for the soul, spending time with friends :).
Sunday morning (and there was the briefest of interludes between Saturday night ending and Sunday morning starting believe me) we did tea and toast in the appartments and then some of us went for coffee, some went off to do shopping and some left for home. Ali and I stayed together until she headed for the station and I found somewhere to perch and wait for Ady to collect me.
I’d been very sensible with my drinking levels and interspersed my wine with plenty of water so despite being very tired I didn’t have a hangover and was able to cook roast dinner and spent lots of time snuggled up with the children in the afternoon. Last time I’d felt really ill and had to take to my bed when I came home :lol:. We watched Shrek 3, they both got in my bath with me and Ady and I had a lovely roast pork dinner. I didn’t manage to stay up so late a second night though and was in bed by about 10pm catching up and enjoying being in a bed with bedclothes next to Ady rather than someone else ;).
The big news of the weekend back at home was that 4 of the eggs that our broody hen has been sitting on hatched. She has another 3 still under her although the chances of them hatching decrease hugely every day. They are eggs from Tom’s hens so will be speckled bantams. Given the poor success rate of leaving them outside (only one chick made it to adulthood, our current cockerel, out of the four chicks that have hatched under hens), the turn in the weather and the politics of the coop generally we’ve brought them inside under a brooder lamp. That does sound a little cruel, letting the hen hatch them and then taking them away but actually chickens are not that reliant on their mother once they’ve hatched and feed themselves from day one; they only really use her for warmth.
So we have four chicks currently installed in Davies’ room (warmest room and least at risk of being bumped into by hoover or blind cat or children playing) that we will decide the fate of once their gender becomes apparent – I’m getting rather good at that now and reckon I should be able to tell by about five weeks old. Tom would like one hen and we will keep any others, cockerels will have to go but Ady has a home for them should the need arise.