Hello everyone. I hope that you are ok. We are fine. Pooped as usual, but well. We have just got back from a couple of days staying with friends in Stroud. How groovy is Stroud? We went out for lunch to a place called The Long Table where people just pay what they can and then eat the food - cooked on site after being donated. The tables are long, by the way, so that strangers can talk to one another - my worst nightmare, but it was very quiet when we went. The mill it is based in also has a massive second-hand bookshop, a children's clothes exchange and a pre-loved furniture shop. Really impressive.
Our friends - Richard and Teena, as they are known because it is their name, really are some of the nicest people in the world. Blessed with ferocious intellects, they still manage to make you feel that your stories about trips out to Ashburton and watching Ludwig are the most riveting conversations that they have ever had. Although we did meet their grandchildren, and one of them seemed very pleased that, at last, he could hold an informed conversation about Wayne Rooney. Our chums don't really do football. Anyway, one of the many curves they are ahead of us on is diet. Both are pescatarians but are doing very well on the 30 a week plant thing. (I know, I'm sorry, I said 30 a day last week. I hope no one came to any lasting harm because of that. But if you did - seriously? You took my word as law? No sympathy.) HOH, and I feel that we may have hit the 30 mark after just staying two nights. Everything tasted delicious. Lots and lots of fruit and veg, but we may have peaked too early and were feeling the effects in the bathroom department when we got home - if you get my gist. Also, Richard was doing something with kefir which involved stabbing something white and lumpy in a jar, sieving it, and then adding fruit to make it palatable. He didn't offer it round. I didn't ask for it either. Anyway, some of my favourite people to visit, so there you are.
HOH, and I reckon that is it in the going-away department for the rest of the year. Kids are back at school, B&M is full of tinsel, and Strictly is about to start. I haven't watched it for years, but it is a good reminder that by the time it finishes, it's usually in the week before Christmas. So this must be Autumn then. Although it is still flipping warm here.
Our church welcomed its new minister this morning. He seemed very normal - which is always a plus. The church was packed, mainly with nosy people (including me), and we had the top worship band on - well you would wouldn't you? The Deputy Mayor was in attendance - it's quite a big church, so she could probably smell the votes (sorry). It all seemed very nice. I was a bit distressed by yet another hymn being updated. This morning it was "Be Thou My Vision", which now no longer has Thees and Thous in it. To be fair, though, I do remember being in a meeting and singing - "nought be all else to me save that thou art" and seeing my son mouth the words "What? Seriously? What is that?" from his place with his chums. So I suppose they have a point. My point is..."You are very talented songwriters - write your own stuff!" Lots of people stayed for cake after the meeting - not us; we walked home and had a lie-down. I can't be away for two days socialising with one set of people and then be expected to come home and socialise with a completely different set.
HOH has banished me to the bedroom this evening because I keep making fun of Vigil. I don't understand why all that trouble in the Arctic needs a lady from the Scottish police to sort it. AND when things go even more wrong, why do we have to bring her boss/girlfriend in to keep an eye on her? AND, didn't they just have a baby? What if something awful happens to them both? Surely it should be like Saving Private Ryan, where you try and send one home? For myself, I am enjoying Ludwig very much, even though I did not have the faintest idea how he solved last week's murder by looking at a diagram of a lot of wedding guests doing the Gay Gordons and this week with the CCTV cameras wasn't much better. Apparently, the Christmas Special has David Suchet in it. I'm hoping for a Ludwig/Poirot mash-up.
For those with an interest in how the replacement cladding is coming along, please see the photo above. Most of the cladding material/equipment is being stored in the garage and, on Friday, someone helpfully parked their car in the entrance to the garage and stuck a label on their window saying "I work here". (They don't.) Our plucky Residents' Committee put another label on the car - which you can just see - saying "Please don't park here", which was completely ignored, so all work was delayed on Friday as they couldn't reach any equipment. So, it's all going very well, and I hope you are the same. Have a good week.
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