Another busy week

Since my last post life had been quite fun, but a bit too busy. No matter how hard I try to slow down, so far I am having real difficulties in succeeding. Prior to my trip into town I was trying to get some overdue stuff done, especially that we were expecting two days of power cuts.  As it happened, they failed to explain that the Northern half of the village was having the outage on Wednesday with the Southern half on Thursday.  We live in the Southern part, so I needn't have rushed.

A pensive Callum

I bought the plane tickets for our Thanksgiving visit to Canada in October, which I am already looking forward to. Callum is 7 this August, I can't believe how fast time goes with children. We saw a bit of him on Skype the other day and he was his usual anarchic self. The two little ones in Hassocks, whom we will see soon, were in a little video which Lucy sent on, playing hopping rabbits in bed.  Sweet!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypEb1CddoSs

I managed to finish an interesting, if somewhat weird, Hungarian novel this past week and while the topic matter was fascinating, the author's rendering of it left me nonplussed.  I only bought the book to see if my previous opinion of never buying contemporary fiction was still valid.  Yes, it is!! I can see the relevance of personal angst to the state of the world and I also appreciate that literature doesn't necessarily have to offer a way out of the abyss, its role is more often than not, to point out the contradictions and the agony of life.  Still, I'm a political animal and really have no truck with the agony without a proposal of at least one solution, even if I don't agree with it. So, I am not likely to purchase any more like this book was for quite a while, which is just a well, as the pile of books on the shelf awaiting to be read is too long as it is.

Part 2 of the mining trilogy: Mine Blindness

On Thursday I had a totally uneventful bus journey to town, followed by a hairdresser's appointment giving me a very short back and sides, just as I like it. In the evening my friend Jutka and I went to see part 2 of the mining trilogy, which was definitely a better play than part 1. It combined humour with the sarcasm and hopelessness of the characters to such good effect that the entire audience laughed aloud most of the time, even in the face of tragedy, both human and historical. While there, I purchased some more tickets for some of their March performances, as I have definitely fallen in love with this little, alternative theatre.

Paart 3: Mine Water

On Friday I visited Ros and Ian and had a lovely couple of hours drinking tea and chatting away. Their flat is an absolutely lovely space, not very big, but it is furnished with such taste and flair, that you wouldn't believe how reasonable the costs were for many of the items. I suppose when you have good taste and style with some considerable flair, it is not that difficult. I loved the new French crystal chandelier, which came from an auction in a dreadful state needing restoration, costing about £80, but after cleaning, some DIY repairs and rewiring, it looked a million dollars. Hopefully I should be able to go to the hash this coming Sunday, otherwise I will not see them for months now.  They are off to the US for 5 weeks and will not be back until probably May.

Ros and Ian's chandelier was similar to this

Finally I had all the details I needed to post the two books to Briony and Jamel in Ockley, so I did so. Jamel never sent me his office address, so I sent both copies to Briony and then he should arrange with her to fetch it or have it sent.

On Friday evening part 3 of the mining drama was pretty good, but I still think part 2 was the best. On Saturday I caught the early bus and was at home by 9.15am. The sun was shining gloriously, but it was too late to go caching by the time I thought of it.  So we went on Sunday and it was a lovely day out. We left about 9am and go home at about 5pm. We managed to walk about in a nearbly town, getting to know its history and buildings, followed by a variety of visits to the hills and forests above said town and some quirky places in neighbouring villages and on the outskirts of the town.

Franciscan parish church and monastery

We saw churches, palaces, museums, water towers, lookout towers, forest springs, an old Russian airplane and a little Zoo. All in all I collected 6 caches, which was not an unduly large number, mostly due to a couple of bloody long multi parter caches: one had 4 parts and another 6 parts.

The forest en route to part 6 of the town multicache

Still, the last bit of the 6 parter was up in the forest North of the town and a really nice little hike did me the world of good in the sparkling sunshine. We had lunch in a restaurant that we liked to eat in a couple of years ago, when there was a 5-day orienteering event in the area. I had the most delicious and beautifully prepared trout that I ever had.  Roy's gypsy roast was equally delicious.

The old Antonov AN2

Today it rained, so we stayed indoors, watching TV, reading, sleeping and generally taking it easy. I am off again to town on Wednesday and will not be back until Monday.

A small chapel a few miles from town up amongst the vineyards