08:00 Lois and I bounce out of bed and take our weekly shower. Call us a dirty pair if you like, but we're convinced that once a week is enough - so sue us haha!
This week we're in charge of our daughter Alison's house in Headley, Hampshire while she, Ed and their 3 teenage children are taking a Michael Portillo-style railway adventure in southern Europe.
Yesterday they were in Madrid, and Ali sent us some nice pictures of a pleasant-looking park, appropriately named "El Retiro" - which Lois and I think makes it sound just right for us, and any other retired people with a half hour to spare.
And what's the weather forecast for "El Retiro" park this week? Well, we haven't heard, but we assume it's going to be a bit "scorchio" - no surprise there!
Spanish "Chanel 9" presenters Poutremos Poutra-Poutremos (left)
and Kolothos Apollonia introduce weathergirl Poula Fisch
[That's enough "Scorchio" weather forecasts! - Ed]
two of Alison and Ed's children, Josie (16) and Isaac (13)
seen here relaxing yesterday in "scorchio" conditions in the wonderfully-named
"El Retiro" park in Madrid
09:00 Today Alison and family are taking the train from Madrid to Lyon in France, before embarking on the Italian leg of their holiday.
the route Alison, Ed and family will be taking today
11:00 It's not an onerous job being in charge of the house, massive though it is, and Lois and I are being laid-back about it - no "daily schedules", "to-do-lists", or anything like that. We're not in a hurry most of the time and we do what we feel like from moment to moment, and as long as all the household tasks are done by 10pm we go to bed with a clear conscience and "sleep the sleep of the just", which makes a pleasant change from when we're at home haha!
As part of her duties this morning, Lois checks the greenhouse. Alison has urged us to take and use any vegetables or fruit that become ready.
a massive cucumber and two tomatoes which Lois judges
ready to pick today - and they're all free, which is nice!
12:30 We drive a mile or so into Headley village and step inside The Holly Bush, the pub we've been gagging to try since we spotted it a couple of days ago.
flashback to Tuesday - we discover the village pub, The Holly Bush
We each order the same thing - toasted ciabatta with bacon, brie, and cranberry, plus side-salad, our favourite lunch.
When we go in the barman apologises for the noise in the bar: a couple of women with small children running about are setting the bar up with a load of balloons and all, for a surprise party tonight. I'm confused - why throw a surprise party for a young child, and in a pub of all places?
But Lois guesses the explanation - she says that the balloons going up are not children's - they're red, black, pink and silver, colours which have a sexier image, she explains. And eventually a sign and picture go up on the wall revealing that it's some poor sap celebrating his 30th birthday today who's going to get the unpleasant surprise tonight.
After all, if you're in your twenties, turning 30 is a major event, and a 30th birthday is the perfect occasion for all the guy's mates to embarrass him and have a good laugh at his expense. Poor bugger !!!!!
Thirty doesn't seem that old, when you're in your late 70's, like Lois and me. Do you remember when Lois and I both turned 30, back in 1976? We'd bought a house 2 years earlier and then we had a baby - surely you remember that! Well, let me remind you, it was Alison, coming up to 1 year old when we turned 30 that year.
flashback to 1976: Lois and little Alison in the backyard of our house in Cheltenham
me and Alison on the Somerset coast
Happy days!
13:00 And today we don't mind at all the noise in the pub as the beefy mums with their little kids set up the surprise party - we've guessed that it's probably for one of the beefy mums' partners or husbands, or something of the sort.
It's our first time in the pub, and it's got a really friendly atmosphere, with little toddlers running about. And the couple on the next table strike up a conversation with us, and suggest things to do and look at in the area, which is nice!
And the couple quite genuinely seem to envy our meal choice, which is also nice! We're having the toasted ciabattas with brie, bacon and cranberry. They are having the scampi and chips, which they say is "nice, but nothing special". Something for you to remember when you're next in Headley haha!
toasted ciabatta with bacon, brie and cranberry
washed down with a Guinness - what could be better!
16:00 After a spell in bed, we sit down with the puzzles from next week's Radio Times;
A poor result generally - perhaps affected by our pub lunch, but we're not sure. However, the questions are definitely getting more obscure, and we totally reject the hypothesis that our memories are beginning to fail!
And poor choice of questions anyway - it's only old codgers like Lois and me who are likely to be doing the puzzles in the back of the Radio Times, and how-come they expect old codgers to be familiar with Only Connect categories such as star-ship names, roller coaster names, and the names of the judges on "The Masked Singer" - be fair!!!! Have some pity, for pity's sake haha!!!! It's total madness !!!!!
21:00 We wind down for bed by watching this week's episode in the long-running sitcom "Not Going Out", co-written by, and starring, stand-up comedian Lee Mack.
Quite an annoying episode in some ways, because Lee and wife Lucy's romantic dinner is constantly being interrupted by a mysterious beeping sound coming from some electrical or electronic device in their house - but we sympathise. It's always a bit worrying in an undefined way, and also difficult to track down the source very often - see above picture.
The romantic dinner has been suggested by Lucy's friend Anna as a way to make her marriage to Lee "more passionate", and Lee is annoyed because he thinks Lucy always does anything Anna advises.
I know how Lucy feels, and I've often thought that when I've been at the sink drying the dishes: a lot of our tea-towels are so old it's hard even to read the writing on them any more - what a madness it all is!!!!
The romantic dinner seems to do the trick, and Lee and Lucy prepare to have sex on the table, and Lucy starts stripping off - but reality interrupts when they hear their children calling them from upstairs.
Oh dear!
The marriage of the couple's friends, Anna and Toby, is also in trouble, apparently, and we hear tonight that the two have just jetted off for a romantic break in New York, to see if that will put the spark back into their relationship.
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzz!!!!!
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