Saturday March 8th 2025 "Spring in the air, even for Yours Truly - (newsflash) I've changed into my slightly lighter-weight pyjamas!!!"

Yes, Friends, spring is in the air! Outside the house, anyway! Sometimes it "leaks in" however. I'm an inveterate "window-closer" but my medium-to-long-suffering wife Lois is an inveterate "window-opener", so there's sometimes some actual fresh air around, even in our house here in semi-rural Liphook, Hampshire, fresh air which is nice in small doses, even I have to admit! 

Looking out of the window nearest my armchair this morning, I notice not one but two butterflies flitting about outside, which must be "heralding" something!

two typical butterflies greeting the coming of spring

And there are other signs of spring too - even our local Onion News (East Hampshire) has got one on page 94 of the print edition: give your thumb a bit of exercise and make your way past all the more dreary stuff (!), if you will !

Fascinating stuff, isn't it!

And certainly, during our morning walk today over nearby Weaver's Down, Lois and I can feel the blood coursing through our veins as we see the daffodils etc just waiting to burst into bloom!

signs of the coming of spring are all around us today on

our morning walk over nearby Weavers Down

And yes - the rumours you've heard are true: my nightwear is changing! At night-time in our house here in sunny Liphook, Hampshire, I'm nowadays frequently to be seen in my what-I-call "blue set", which weighs around 12 ounces, accurate to the nearest 4 ounces anyway!

me in my what-I'm-calling "blue set" of pyjamas,

a sight getting more common these days in our house (!)

"Why have you been trying to get an almost painfully accurate weight-figure for your pyjamas, Colin?", I hear you cry (!). [Not me - I've already given up on this post and gone to see a man about a dog! - Ed]

Well, seeing as how you're "gagging" to know the answer to this conundrum (a query on many lips, which, incidentally, comes up regularly at this time of year, with almost monotonous regularity (!)), here's the lowdown coming up right now!

You see, for me, the weight of my pyjamas is quite a big deal. The first thing I do when I get out of bed each morning is to weigh myself, and I can't be bothered to take my "jim-jams" off just for that, so I just read my weight off the scales and then subtract the weight of my pyjamas from that - it's not exactly rocket science, is it!!! Be fair !!!!

flashback to September 2024: I take delivery 

of our shiny new Salter bathroom scales

And if you're a budding "mathematician", like some of our grandchildren are (!), here's an example for you to test your numerical skills, from my reading for this morning:

Yes, of course, the answer "as any fule kno" [sic] (!) is 9 stone 11 lbs 12 ounces, isn't it. 

Simples! Yet, when I tried the question on our 18-year-old granddaughter Josie, who's hoping to study for a maths degree starting this autumn at (hopefully) either Bath, Bristol or Durham University, she refused point-blank to give me an answer, and said, a bit curtly to my ears (!), "We don't do 'ounces' these days, Grandad!".

What a crazy world we live in !!!!!

flashback to February 15th: our 18-year-old granddaughter

Josie, staying a few nights with Lois and me,to revise maths and science

for her upcoming "mock" A-Levels, while her parents and

siblings were on a 6-night break to Copenhagen, Denmark

Yes, it's spring, and butterflies are not the only things emerging from hibernation - builders too are "coming out of the woodwork" - almost, but not quite, literally (!). 

Josie's family - that is, our daughter Alison, husband Ed and Josie's 2 siblings, will all shortly be moving out of their massive, but crumbling, Victorian mansion this coming week, to live temporarily in a slightly smaller mansion (!) for a few months while builders are carrying out extensive refurbishments.

(left) Lois outside the crumbling Victorian mansion where our daughter 

Alison and family live, the building being due for refurbishment this summer, 

and (right) the slightly smaller, rented mansion that the family 

will be "slumming" it in this summer until the builders have gone away

You can't see from the first of the two pictures above, but the family's "crumbling Victorian mansion", built in the 1870's for one of Queen Victoria's Vice-Admirals, is actually a so-called "semi-detached mansion". 

And Alia and Ed's planned refurbishments have caused some minor friction with the elderly couple in the other half of the building [not shown] - after all who wants next-door's builders around all day every day on their scaffolding, crawling over the roof, playing their radios and "singing their merry builder's songs" etc etc? 

Luckily Ali and Ed have managed to smooth things over with the neighbours, so that's all good. But the moral here, surely, is that you're going to buy a massive, but crumbling, Victorian mansion, built for one of Queen Victoria's Vice-Admirals, for heaven's sake go for a fully detached one !!! 

And that's not exactly rocket science, either, is it!!!!

Incidentally Lois and I are hoping to get a first look at the family's new temporary "slummy" mansion (!) this week, so watch this space !!!!

flashback to February: our daughter Alison, plus

husband Ed and Josie's 2 siblings Rosalind (16) and Isaac (14)

pictured here at London's Heathrow Airport, en route to

a 6-night break in Copenhagen, Denmark

Will this do?

[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzzz!!!!!