Almost caught with Laura's hand in my pants!

Friday May 15th

Today was the last in this season's International Concert season, we saw the Warsaw Philharmonic with a two item programme - Schubert Symphony No 3 and Beethoven's Choral Symphony. We seem to have seen quite a few of Ludwig's symphonies this year. I have a soft spot for the No 9 as I know all the words to the finale; Ode to Joy.

In fact it was quite a source of mirth at the end of the fourth movement when, singing along, relatively quietly, I tried to lower my natural contralto tone down to a basso profundo for the 'Seid umshlungen, millionen! Diesem Kuss der ganzen Welt...' section. This caused a certain gorgeous blonde sat next to me to start giggling. In turn I began to giggle, too. Eventually there was a whole small group of gaggle concert goers who were trying not to giggle any more at at this silly young woman singing along.

I am sure half the people who were sniggering or suppressing their amusement had absolutely no idea why they were laughing.

I think it was the very act of try to stem the tide which caused so many of them to join in. I was quite mortified by what I had done but at the end, after the applause and encore, it seemed those who had participated were happy to have done so. I was simply relieved that we hadn't distracted the performers on the stage. I guess being up in the Circle put us at quite a remove form the players - thank goodness.

Saturday May 16th

We snagged a copy of the new International Season brochure last night, and after much discussion this morning, and detailed pouring over the said document, we decided to book the whole 13 show package. This will save us over £80 each on buying the tickets individually. Once again there is a Christmas Brass Band concert included and, once again, I have been able to persuade Mum that she would like the tickets.

The timings this year will make the post Christmas concert a bit of a red-eye one for us. It is just two days after we fly back from our Australian Christmas.

We went to rock this morning and had a mega scramble about over Stanage Edge. By the time we had packed up and driven down into Hathersage to the Scotsman's Pack for lunch, the place was heaving. That's the major downside of it being such a nice day and the rock being so close to the big city!

After our lunch (filled Yorkie for me; Scampi for the Lollster) and being so close to Mum's we decided to pay her a visit and maybe cadge tea. I was all for just turning up but Laura - ever the social etiquette expert - said we should call her from the pub to tell her we were on our way. I may be just imagining things, but she took forever to answer and when she did there was a slight edge of exasperation to her voice.

On arriving in Holmesfield I was sure we saw Tony's car driving past us as it headed to Totley. Mum looked a bit more tousled than we usually see her too. I wondered if we had disturbed them bonking and if we'd not bothered to call we'd have found them in flagrante! Naturally I didn't ask the old dear if she had been having an afternoon f*ck with her boyfriend - it isn't the sort of thing you ask a parent is it? I bet she was! It is kind of sweet and at the same time just a little gross to even imagine that happening. I remember once, as a child, accidentally hearing Mum & Dad, obviously indulging their passion and I was so embarrassed when I saw them both afterwards, as if they'd somehow know that I knew.

Mum invited us to stay for tea, and that was when we asked her about the concert tickets. Naturally she was keen to have them and when she called up the programme on her computer she decided she would attend but not the full 13 package but the one of the lesser ones - the Silver subscription, which gives her five performances of her choice over the year.

That took me back to 2010 when I came back to the UK from Australia. Mum accompanied me to half a dozen concerts, at the City Hall, The Firth Hall and even The Crucible until I snagged the services of Christopher from accounts to go with me. That is a whole other story and one which just gets me annoyed. Irritating little tick that he was!

Life does have a way of seeming to organise itself so that certain things happen, or don't happen as though the Goddess Fortuna really is playing chess with our every waking moment. If I hadn't started dating Alan then maybe Chris's advances wouldn't have been rebuffed so vehemently. If Alan hadn't proved to be a bit of a dead loss, ultimately, then maybe when Laura kissed me on that railway station I wouldn't have responded in kind and we wouldn't be where we are today. It's all maybes, isn't it? Maybe if I was a pig I could whistle! [If I hadn't given Alan a consolation f*ck when I dumped him maybe I wouldn't feel so guilty about the whole thing?]

Sunday May 17th

I killed my electric hedge trimmer thingy this morning. I was scalping the lavender bushes, in the raised beds, when it died on me. I have absolutely no idea why. i did the obvious thing - change the fuse  in its plug but it was still doing a first class dodo impression.

Luckily Steve was out in the back garden when all this happened and he did two things: one, he leant me his trimmer to finish the job then two he took my dead machine and promised to see if he could find out why it was unwell. He is a bit of a whizz with stuff mechanical. I tend to think about things whereas he takes them apart.

For example we bought a new wireless printer as the last one gave up the ghost completely. I couldn't get it to work wirelessly at all. Eventually I realised I was entering the old Home Hub details instead of the new one BT kindly gave us last month. This wasn't because i took the damn thing apart, though. It was applied brain power in action. I simply sat down and thought about every possible thing that could have gone wrong. We knew there was no fault with the printer as the wired connection worked perfectly. The eureka moment came when I realised I had merely copied the password from the post-it we had swapped from the old printer to the new one. I hadn't written the new Home Hub's password on a new post-it, to slap on the new printer! Problem solved!

Steve said it wouldn't take him long to sort it out but he hadn't returned it by bed time!

In the afternoon we took Callie to Bradfield and did the circumnavigation of Agden Reservoir. I love this little walk, especially as it means we end up at the Old Horns pub. Two small bottles of White Zinfandel later, we headed back to my little house and proved that alcohol does fuel desire and doesn't diminish performance in the fairer sex. Laura wouldn't even let me shower first she just wanted to get into my knickers at once. Who am I to argue?

When the gate to the front garden squeaks it means someone has opened it. You then, usually, have three to four seconds before a face appears at the front door. (A pair of double glazed french doors as it happens.) The face which appeared was Angela's, followed by Peter's, then his Mum's & Dad's and baby Sophie's. Luckily we hadn't stripped naked or anything, Laura had just unzipped my walking trousers and wriggled her hand down inside the front. I had been rubbing her mound of Venus through the material of her trousers. Phew.

Laura opened the door and I re-arranged my vest top so that my crotch and zip were covered. After swift hugs all round I headed into the kitchen to make some tea, Laura came in with me licking her fingers and telling me she just had to taste the real thing later!

Phil & Jane had been at Jane's folks for Sunday lunch and had dropped by ours on the off chance of finding us in. It seems like ages since we've seen them and baby Sophie has grown. She has started to progress from sounds to the odd word or two. She is fascinated by the phrase "Oh No!" which she repeats at every available opportunity. I made the kids laugh by pretending that their Dad's first repeated phrase had been "Oh Bugger!". He got a bit short and snapped saying I was making it up and how could I possibly know and other unpleasant things like that.

Laura had a quiet word with him while the kids and I sorted out some drinks and cake. We had a sit in the lounge, on the very spot where we had been bonking a few minutes earlier and gossiped and drank and scoffed.

After our bite and drink we wandered out into the garden and the kids ball-wanged for Callie in the back field, which both she loves and they enjoy. They enjoy it because being a trained retriever Callie gives up whatever she has fetched instantly on command. After about twenty minutes it was the kids who were flagging and Callie was as fresh as a daisy. It is almost impossible to tire her out.

I had taken the time to commandeer Sophie and we were sitting on the back wall of my garden; I was explaining to her what Callie and her brother and sister were doing, and how one day, when she was old enough, she'd be able to do the same as well. Jane came and sat along side us, she said she loved the way I never talked down to the kids, but always behaved as they were just small adults. I had to admit I had never even thought it. I asked Sophie if I should start talking down to her and she went "Oh dear!"  We all laughed at how appropriate her words seemed.

Once they'd gone I had a talk with Loll to see if she had sensed that there was anything amiss and she thought that Jane and Phil seemed a bit strained with each other. I had felt that too. I hope we are wrong.

After our evening meal we decided to continue our afternoon's activities but upstairs. She got to taste the real thing and so did I.