More catching up of backlog.
Friday July 3rd to Sunday July 26th Inclusive.
THE MAJOR EVENT - On Friday July 10th the student webpage at Uni went live with the end of semester results. A certain Miss Laura Thomas, of a distant Parish in Cumbria, who was reading Pure & Applied Mathematics gained a First Class Degree in that aforementioned subject. Why is this important? It means she will be doing a two year, part-time, Master's Degree in Mathematics (or at least a very specific branch of it). It also means she will continue to be part time at XXX & Y solicitors in the city, where I also have my part time job. Laura's hours there will increase to about 20 per week which will also give her a commensurate rise in salary. My hours are still 15 per week depending on my negotiations with the powers that be at Uni in September.
Musical events over the period: The 16 performing the Flight of Angels Choral Pilgrimage 2015 at the Cathedral in Carlisle. Works exclusively by Guerrero and Lobo. Absolutely sublime.
Things theatrical:
The Mousetrap at the Lyceum, Sheffield. I will not reveal the twist ending even though you can find it out on line. I had already seen the play, in London, with Mum when I was younger so I already knew and I challenged Laura to spot the culprit. She didn't!
The Woman In Black. This is its spiritual home, with the adaptation and first ever production performed here in the old Stephen Joseph theatre before it moved into the old cinema opposite the railway station. We saw this touring production in Sheffield (also at the Lyceum, as it happens) last year. It is still as scary. Yet again Mum and I saw this in London at the Fortune Theatre when I was about 14. I screamed at that performance, I am ashamed to admit. It scared the beejesus out of the whole school party who went to see it with Mum and I few weeks later, too!
Confusions. Also at the SJT. I had not seen this before and was very impressed and amused. The theatre is putting on a series of shows which are relevant to its 60th anniversary. This was part of that series.
Travel:
We saw the last two shows in Scarborough. We went up on Friday 17th and returned home last Tuesday evening, the 21st. Our real reason for the trip was to watch Yorkshire County Cricket Club's four day match at North Marine Road. They played Worcestershire and won! We saw the first three days only, having taken two days leave for the event. It was the first time Laura has been to a four day match. I have taken her to one dayers (usually disappointing form Yorkshire's point of view) and two T20s (extremely disappointing from Yorkshire's point of view). Last year I cam up for two days by myself, whilst Laura was visiting her folks but this year she said she'd like to come and see why I was so entranced by the game.
The fact Yorkshire were in the brown and smelly very early on, but fought back enough to post a total which meant when Worcestershire collapsed and had to follow on meant Laura watched some very enthralling and nail biting cricket. I did a sort of commentary for her on the first day, much to the amusement of the people sat around us. One old guy, who was obviously a bit of a wag, asked if I had ever thought of applying to test match special? Cheeky bugger!
She said she had enjoyed the experience, the proof will be if she agrees to come to another fixture in Scarborough next year. The weather on the whole was good. We didn't get wall to wall sunshine and blue skies but we did have weather conducive to good cricket. We sat in the North stand by the radio commentary box, right high up, which meant we were almost in line with the wicket. We snagged the same spot for each of the three days and by the end of the third day we had made a heap of new friends in the group sat close by, who also sat in the same places for those three days.
The 'wag' had been coming to the Yorkshire matches at Scarborough for years and years. He'd been through some of the 'Festival' Games too and recounted with pleasure how he had watched the West Indian players performing in a Calypso Band during a lunch interval way back in the 1990's. He distinctly remembered Ritchie Richardson playing bass guitar!
Other points of interest:
Mum looked after Callie during our sojourn to Scarborough and even brought her back to my house and had a meal ready for when we arrived back on Tuesday evening. How good was that?
I bought tickets for the niece and nephew to see the Horrible Histories touring show in Sheffield, I gave them to my brother and wife and he thoroughly enjoyed it too. Maybe there is hope for him yet? I was sad to have missed seeing it but we had a clash of fixtures, as they say. I got two very nice hand made thank you cards from Peter and Angela afterwards which was a lovely surprise - you can guess that wouldn't have been Phil's idea!
Physical side: I haven't counted the number of lengths of the pool we've swum since my last entry, I could work it out but that would be even sadder, wouldn't it? We did some great climbing near Higger Tor again when the rain wasn't beating down on us as though we were getting another Flood to purge the world of the sinners!
Dad and Louisa (and baby Chloé) have headed up the caravan on Arran. We are all set to take over from them on the weekend of August 8th. We will share that weekend together and then Dad and Louisa head home, prior to a trip to Germany to show Chloé off to our rellies in Magdeburg, Saalfeld and Cochem. They are planning on being away three to four weeks. Luckily they have booked a DFDS crossing to Hamburg, which will avoid all the crap that's been happening at Calais for the last few weeks. The dogs are being looked after by Dad's friend Gilbert.
That's about it really. I have signed lots of petitions protesting about the Nasty things the Nasty Party are doing to the country now they have come to power. I have even posted something on Twitter! Steady the buffs, old gal!
Laura and I have indulged our passion with vigour and invention. She refused to make love in the grounds of Scarborough castle last week. Bloody good job, as the safe and secluded location I'd selected was overrun with a Brownie pack minutes after I had tried to inveigle my fingers into her undies! Phew, that was a lucky escape! She made up for her reluctance with interest later that night though. I imagine it would have been quite traumatic for a whole load of under 10 year old girls encountering two women having sex. God knows what it would have done to their little psyches? I know what it would have done to mine! I used to die of embarrassment at zoos and the like where animals were bonking, when I was a child. Funny how it didn't put me off trying it out for myself when I could find a safe guy to do it with, though. [I digress!]
Monday 27 July 2015
Thursday 9 July 2015
Almost kissed by another woman?
Monday June 29th
Officially I am still at work until tomorrow, so I dropped Loll at XXX &Y and then put my nose in at Uni. I taped a note to the door with my mobile number on it and headed up to the solicitor's myself. I didn't expect anyone to call and I was right.
The office is a buzz with talk of what we are all doing during the two weeks shut down. (Technically it isn't, as there is a skeleton staff at work, but it seems like a shut down.) As you can imagine there are a huge range of destinations and activities planned. Canada is the furthest anyone is going. I guess two weeks are a bit restricting. Alison (and partner) are off to Iceland. I told her to take lots of photographs as I would love to got there too and it would be interesting to see what it's like. She thought doing a Small Planet Guide just for me would be a great idea, so that is on the cards. Isn't that sweet of her?
Truth be told not much else happened that warrants a journal entry.
Tuesday June 30th
A Radio Stars' song day today. I reposted my mobile number on my office door and headed up the hill to join Laura. We worked through lunch to gain extra time to zoom off to Dad's in a week and a bit - we are seeing The Sisxteen at Carlisle Cathedral on the 10th of July (Friday) so we are working like stink to gain the hours to take all of that Friday off.
Wednesday July 1st
Long Skype with Australia this morning. Jill has passed her driving test! She now has the green P plate on her folks' car for two years. She is obviously delighted. She was less than happy to find she isn't old enough to even think about a Light Rigid Licence which will allow her to drive the Camper Van. Suze kept making thumbs up gestures behind her. I think she is pleased her cherub can't wander off in the Camper just yet.
The girls were all excited about Freo's winning streak continuing and I was up in the air about Yorkshire Cricket Club beating Durham. Both teams are top of their tables and looking on course for glory. The AFL works in a different way to Count Cricket. Here is we finish top we are the winners outright. In AFL there is a play off system. Pretty silly if the team heading the league has lost only one game all season!
I am now officially at work with Laura until September. Rah rah rah.
Spent the day with Alison and her latest case research. (Well most of the day.) We had an awkward moment where I thought she was going to kiss me. I was pointing something out to her in one of our huge tomes and she turned her head to me. We were so close I could smell her breath (slightly minty) and I had this instinct that if I didn't look away she would kiss me. She was signalling the same way that Laura does before an oral assault. (I have learned to spot her tell-tale pattern over the years). In order to avoid any embarrassment I thought it best to be an ingénue in the matter. She isn't gay at all, what would happen if she did kiss me? Would it f*ck up my situation here? I can't risk that happening. In a way it is worse than what happened with Christopher, as we are roughly equal on the food chain but Ali is in the stratosphere compared to me!
I agonised all afternoon about what to do and decided the best course was to keep Mum and not say anything to anybody. It would not serve any useful purpose at all.
Thursday July 2nd
I just imagined the incident with Ali. I am sure I did. She wouldn't really have wanted to kiss me. I am just being stupid and have interpreted what one person does with me and assumed that another will do the same. I am just a stupid cow.
Laura is beginning to fret about her result. I tried to reassure her but it is only natural to think the worst especially as she has s much riding on the grade she achieves. I suppose the older we are the more we realise the importance of things like this. I was Miss Blasé about my results at school. I knew I was going to do well because I always had, and my work ethic and methodology hadn't changed at all. It proved a successful strategy for me. I guess Loll could have been undermined by her Dad's attitude but I am doing my best to make her see she has nothing to worry about.
As a species we are quite neurotic, TBH.
I prefer the erotic, though Uncle Tom's on his way, so that puts paid to eroticstuff for a while. (It's my OCD and cleanliness issues.) Speaking of OCD I managed fewer than 20 hand washes today. It was a challenge but I made it. I find it hard to explain to people how the compulsion to do something controls your life if you are not super strong willed about it. I am getting better, though. Even my Mum says I am not a wappy as I used to be. (If only you knew how wappy, Mum!)
I booked a room in Scarborough for our visit to the cricket, Friday 17th to Monday 20th inclusive. Mum has agreed to look after Callie for the weekend. The match doesn't start until Sunday so it gives us time to explore Scarborough and get in a couple of shows at the Stephen Joseph Theatre.. Loll is a bit unsure about going to watch a match over several days but I have tried to reassure her that she will be fine. I hope she is.
We had long, slow and loving sex tonight - a thing we often do before onset of Tom. The double ender combined with scissoring is amazing even though you can't get to kiss as much during the action.
Officially I am still at work until tomorrow, so I dropped Loll at XXX &Y and then put my nose in at Uni. I taped a note to the door with my mobile number on it and headed up to the solicitor's myself. I didn't expect anyone to call and I was right.
The office is a buzz with talk of what we are all doing during the two weeks shut down. (Technically it isn't, as there is a skeleton staff at work, but it seems like a shut down.) As you can imagine there are a huge range of destinations and activities planned. Canada is the furthest anyone is going. I guess two weeks are a bit restricting. Alison (and partner) are off to Iceland. I told her to take lots of photographs as I would love to got there too and it would be interesting to see what it's like. She thought doing a Small Planet Guide just for me would be a great idea, so that is on the cards. Isn't that sweet of her?
Truth be told not much else happened that warrants a journal entry.
Tuesday June 30th
A Radio Stars' song day today. I reposted my mobile number on my office door and headed up the hill to join Laura. We worked through lunch to gain extra time to zoom off to Dad's in a week and a bit - we are seeing The Sisxteen at Carlisle Cathedral on the 10th of July (Friday) so we are working like stink to gain the hours to take all of that Friday off.
Wednesday July 1st
Long Skype with Australia this morning. Jill has passed her driving test! She now has the green P plate on her folks' car for two years. She is obviously delighted. She was less than happy to find she isn't old enough to even think about a Light Rigid Licence which will allow her to drive the Camper Van. Suze kept making thumbs up gestures behind her. I think she is pleased her cherub can't wander off in the Camper just yet.
The girls were all excited about Freo's winning streak continuing and I was up in the air about Yorkshire Cricket Club beating Durham. Both teams are top of their tables and looking on course for glory. The AFL works in a different way to Count Cricket. Here is we finish top we are the winners outright. In AFL there is a play off system. Pretty silly if the team heading the league has lost only one game all season!
I am now officially at work with Laura until September. Rah rah rah.
Spent the day with Alison and her latest case research. (Well most of the day.) We had an awkward moment where I thought she was going to kiss me. I was pointing something out to her in one of our huge tomes and she turned her head to me. We were so close I could smell her breath (slightly minty) and I had this instinct that if I didn't look away she would kiss me. She was signalling the same way that Laura does before an oral assault. (I have learned to spot her tell-tale pattern over the years). In order to avoid any embarrassment I thought it best to be an ingénue in the matter. She isn't gay at all, what would happen if she did kiss me? Would it f*ck up my situation here? I can't risk that happening. In a way it is worse than what happened with Christopher, as we are roughly equal on the food chain but Ali is in the stratosphere compared to me!
I agonised all afternoon about what to do and decided the best course was to keep Mum and not say anything to anybody. It would not serve any useful purpose at all.
Thursday July 2nd
I just imagined the incident with Ali. I am sure I did. She wouldn't really have wanted to kiss me. I am just being stupid and have interpreted what one person does with me and assumed that another will do the same. I am just a stupid cow.
Laura is beginning to fret about her result. I tried to reassure her but it is only natural to think the worst especially as she has s much riding on the grade she achieves. I suppose the older we are the more we realise the importance of things like this. I was Miss Blasé about my results at school. I knew I was going to do well because I always had, and my work ethic and methodology hadn't changed at all. It proved a successful strategy for me. I guess Loll could have been undermined by her Dad's attitude but I am doing my best to make her see she has nothing to worry about.
As a species we are quite neurotic, TBH.
I prefer the erotic, though Uncle Tom's on his way, so that puts paid to eroticstuff for a while. (It's my OCD and cleanliness issues.) Speaking of OCD I managed fewer than 20 hand washes today. It was a challenge but I made it. I find it hard to explain to people how the compulsion to do something controls your life if you are not super strong willed about it. I am getting better, though. Even my Mum says I am not a wappy as I used to be. (If only you knew how wappy, Mum!)
I booked a room in Scarborough for our visit to the cricket, Friday 17th to Monday 20th inclusive. Mum has agreed to look after Callie for the weekend. The match doesn't start until Sunday so it gives us time to explore Scarborough and get in a couple of shows at the Stephen Joseph Theatre.. Loll is a bit unsure about going to watch a match over several days but I have tried to reassure her that she will be fine. I hope she is.
We had long, slow and loving sex tonight - a thing we often do before onset of Tom. The double ender combined with scissoring is amazing even though you can't get to kiss as much during the action.
Saturday 4 July 2015
Little deaths in the afternoon. (Orgasms are called little deaths, BTW)
Friday June 26th
It's over. The longest two weeks of my life ended today. (Actually we had a hiatus at the end of the final semester last year too, and that seemed equally as long! I suppose my gorgeous one does need time with her Mum & Dad once in a while...) I snuck off from Uni before lunch, collected the woofie from her palace and was in Cumbria by 2.30pm.
I texted Loll from Scotch Corner so she had an idea of the time I was arriving and I arrived at Dad's to find a naked, slender, blonde waiting in my bed! After three hours my fingers, tongue and important little places ached! (So did hers!)
As I knew Dad would be home at about 6 pm I set to and made the evening meal from stuff I'd found in my fridge, back in Sheffield, I even located some apple cake in the freezer (one of mine from March) so I defrosted that. Aren't cool boxes wonderful things?
When they arrived I helped take care of Chloé whilst Dad & Louisa unpacked and got themselves sorted after a week in Lancaster. I changed her, and then took her for a stroll in the baby sling round the village circuit, accompanied by Laura. She is still so cute and loves being bounced up and down in the sling. She's started to giggle when I do it. [Not broody, not!]
Back at the ranch the meal was cooked, laid out and ready when we got back so we tucked in whilst Chloé had a nap. (Oh - it was spicy home-made burgers, double fried chips and salad BTW, plus the apple cake.)
We went down to the pub at about 8 pm and were greeted as long lost strangers by the people we know in there. They all thought Laura had been in Sheffield too, she must've kept a really low profile all fortnight. The number of younger people in the pub varies, I assume it is because most of them have now grown up and left home. Some of them are still living at home but they tend to head for the bright lights of Cockermouth on a Friday night instead of a sleepy old village! LOL
Dad is finished for the year (academic) now, too, and when we got back, over a mug of hot chocolate each, the focus of discussion was the occupancy of the caravan on Arran over the summer. We don't want to give my big brother the opportunity to use it as he refused point blank to join us in the venture but feels he has a right to ask to use it in the school holidays. Well, bugger that!
We arranged that Loll and I would go up on the second Saturday in August and that we'd stay until Tuesday 25th or Wednesday 26th depending on how we felt. Dad, Louisa and Chloé will be going up on the 9th of July for a month. We will have an overlap on the weekend when we arrive which will be nice. I foresee a delicious meal out together...
By filling up the van's usage over the summer we can claim, quite justifiably, that there won't be space for my sodding brother to freeload. Is that wicked of us? Maybe. But what the hell.
Saturday 27th June.
It was Laura's cousin's 21st party today. A weird affair which was a barbeque party starting about 5 pm and ending when the last guests departed. Helen is a student at Newcastle University, or I should say was, as she is now in the limbo period too, waiting for her result. I think it is a sign of how accepting some elements of Laura's family are that we were invited as a couple. Not everyone is as Caveman-like as Loll's Dad!
We bought her a Tassimo coffee maker for her pressie and she was overjoyed with it. (I mean we had asked what she'd like and then we bought what we thought would be best.) In order to let her use it immediately we had also bought her a double set of the disc things so she could make everyone a coffee if they wanted.
I actually drank a coffee for the first time in years. It was quite nice although I needed to add my daily allowance of sugar to make it so! Loll has wondered if we should get one too. I think we could as it does hot chocolate and tea as well, so she could have the foul coffee and I could have hot choc. Win win situation.
Helen's Dad thinks he is a barbeque expert, sadly he is mistaken - to a very large degree. He had this f*ck off big gas monster barbie in the corner of the garden and spent from about 5.30 to 7.30 incinerating anything he put on it. We were told if we wanted to bring any speciality meat instead of burgers, sausage, kebabs and chicken we were free to do so. I decided to bring some of Mr Thompson's steak (it is wonderful) to eat instead of mechanically recovered meat products (or chicken), Laura concurred.
This almost caused a rumpus as I wouldn't let Davy cook it for me. he asked why not and I, unthinkingly, said, "...I don't want it crozzled to a crisp..." He got most offended by that and called Charlie over (his wife) to help intercede. I explained that I wanted the steak 'blue'. He didn't know what that was (neither did she). I explained that if I was frying it, I would place it in the pan for between 30 seconds to a minute on each side.
They both baulked at that and said it would be uncooked. When I told them that was exactly what I wanted they couldn't believe it. I said that I needed to be the one to cook it so it wouldn't get over cooked and spoiled. Davy was not a happy bunny but Charlie couldn't see the problem, in her words, 'if I wanted to give myself food poisoning then I ought to be allowed to do it' . What a fuss over such trivia.
I cooked my steak, and Laura's (although hers had two minutes each side) and we went away pleased with our meat. Charlie came over after a while and asked what it was like and we explained that it made it much nicer than an over cooked piece which became as tough as old boots. To her great credit she saw how much we were enjoying it and asked if she could try some. Laura gave her aunt a small sample from hers which was not as bloody as mine and she actually thought it was lovely! It was like a revelation to her that steak could be so tender and so tasty!
She did say that I had broken the cardinal rule of barbequing by insisting on taking over from the man doing the cooking (burning). I told her I knew it was a 'man-thing' in Australia, I hadn't realised it was the same over here too. She asked what my Dad was like over barbie-ing and I told her he was such a lazy git he didn't mind who cooked the food as long as it wasn't him. We had a good chuckle about that.
The one fortunate thing about the incident was that Laura's Dad (Davy's brother) didn't witness what had transpired. he could easily have used it as further evidence of my corrupting influence on his daughter - denying a man his right to turn perfectly good food into charcoal! LOL
Another brother, Tom, had brought along a 'Splat the Rat' game. (I digress here to enquire what sort of parent, whose surname is Thomas calls their son Thomas? I mean Thomas Thomas? Get real. [This is not the silliest Thomas I have heard of though. I visited a friend from Uni once who lived near Sleaford in Lincolnshire. They took me to see a gravestone in a churchyard of what had been a Gilbertine Abbey at Sempringham; the Thomas there had the surname Ato! Thomas Ato! Tomato? I mean, what were they thinking?]
Back to Splat the Rat. Tom had brought a drain-pipe attached to a pole, a small stick and a furry rat. The idea is he let go of the rat at the top of the drainpipe and you had to whack it as it appeared at the bottom. Simple? Erm... Not so simple after all.
We each had ten goes and there were prizes for the winners. I thought it would be fairly easy to allow for the speed that everything falls, a swift swipe with the stick on a count of one after Tom had released the rat should be enough to splat it. Mmm.... the best laid plans etc. After three hopeless missed I just decided to swing as soon as he let go of the rat. This proved a bit more successful and out of the remaining seven tries I splatted it three times.
My feeble score was recorded and we went round everyone at the party, there must have been almost 40 people there altogether. When we'd all had a go, including Tom himself, we had a three way tie for the winner: Laura, Lorraine and Lucy (quite a coincidence that, we all thought). They had to have a splat-off to see who won the big prize. Best of Five. Sadly the Lollster bombed out with only two splats. Lucy and Lorraine tied again on three each. This meant a sudden death decider. I don't know what had happened to their hand eye co-ordination but after five goes each, neither had hit the damned rat. Eventually Lorraine missed and Lucy splatted it to win the prize. It was a tin of Minions chocolates. 2nd Prize were Minions Chocolate bars and third a Minions stationary set.
Despite being very childish and silly, it was great fun. Tom has been invited to three other parties if he'll bring his "Splat the Rat" game!
We drank an absolute swimming pool's worth of booze and as a result we were a little the worse for wear by about 11pm. It was still quite light but a bit chilly so the remainder of the group decamped into Davy's large summer house and squabbled for the few seats. Loll and I squeezed our torsos into a wicker chair and just snuggled. She sat half on my lap and half on the seat and we were thrown a blanket to wrap ourselves in against the chill. We gossiped for about a hour being silly and teasing and rude and annoying. At about 12.15 our taxi arrived and we bade our farewells and head back to Tallentire.
Imagine our surprise when on arriving the Aged-parent and his younger bride were sat up watching the Women's World Cup quarter final. It had just started. Dad asked us if we'd like a cuppa. We agreed and ended up watching the match all the way through. I had two mugs of hot chocolate and Loll had a couple of coffees.
England won; rah, rah and indeed rah! I was quite impressed, to be honest. It was just as quick as the men's game but there was none of that crappy prima donna-ism that those overpaid male footballer twats perform almost all the time.
I was pleased England had won. Which surprised me.
We were really late hitting the charp and because of the hour, the booze and the hot drinks swirling around in our tummies, we sensibly decided we could forego sex tonight.
That lasted until about 3am when a little voice said, "Vic... You awake?" I mumbled assent. "Oh good..." I was subjected to a ferocious assault on my important little places which meant I simply had to retaliate.
Sunday 28th June
Had a bit of a lie in today. I didn't appear from the pit until about 7.30! Callie seemed resigned to the fact her mistress was an immobile hulk in the bed and didn't even bother with the wet nose in the ear routine or, if she did, I was too soundly asleep to be cognisant of the fact.
As a penance for my over indulgence of the previous evening I took all four dogs for their first walk up Tallentire Hill - all the way to the Trig point. (Usually I get to the bench round the corner and stop for a rest then turn back.)
The Lakes looked wonderful and I determined to go to Smithy's Fell before lunch.
When I got back down there was the wonderful smell of cooking bacon wafting through the house and a surprised parent being the chef. I mentioned the idea of hitting Crummock and he was all for it to. So after a heap of bacon butties we trooped down to the Lanthwaite Wood car park in Dad's Land Rover.
It was idyllic. The woods were speckled with dappled sunlight, piercing through the leaves, there was a coolish breeze and hardly any people about at all. We looked for red squirrels but spotted nary a one. We were surprised it was so quiet for 10 am! There were jut five cars in the car park when we arrived.
At the fish ladder we hit the water, with Loll and I wading out to throw sticks for the dogs to retrieve from the lake. Dad looked quite comical standing in his shorts and water shoes up to his knees in the Lake with his little daughter strapped to his chest in the baby sling.
I could tell he was aching to play with the dogs so I did a swap with Chloé and let him throw sticks and have a serious paddle about. I kept the bebé as we continued on round the shore, past the draw off tower and the fallen trees to the secret bay. Here we had more throwing of sticks and splashing about in the shallows for the humans.
Even Louisa joined in the stick throwing, which is something she doesn't often do. It was she who suggested we walked on round to the Kirkstile so we sallied forth to find the centre of the West Cumbrian Universe. It opens at 11 as usual on a Sunday but doesn't serve food until 12. We rolled up at about 11.25.
Louisa's rucksack was filled with the baby stuff, so I went and changed Chloé, then handed her back to her doting mother so I could settle down with a glass of red wine.
We ordered the Sunday roasts all round, except for the little one, of course. Yummy in our Tummy.
A leisurely stroll back to the tower and then round by the lake side again saw us arrive at a heaving car park at about 2pm. According to Dad he was the only one still awake by the time he'd gone under the A66 at Cockermouth!
At home we all joined baby Chloé for an afternoon nap (not literally, obviously - the cot's too small).
We zoomed back to Sheffield at about 7 pm.
Laura insisted on driving as I had seemed so sleep, I let her and guess what? I slept again!
At home, we did the usual trick of Loll dropping Callie and me off in Wharncliffe Side and then we walked back home giving the woofter her last walk of the day. I was expecting to just flop into bed but it seemed my wicked woman partner had other, more intimate ideas. Who was I to argue?
It's over. The longest two weeks of my life ended today. (Actually we had a hiatus at the end of the final semester last year too, and that seemed equally as long! I suppose my gorgeous one does need time with her Mum & Dad once in a while...) I snuck off from Uni before lunch, collected the woofie from her palace and was in Cumbria by 2.30pm.
I texted Loll from Scotch Corner so she had an idea of the time I was arriving and I arrived at Dad's to find a naked, slender, blonde waiting in my bed! After three hours my fingers, tongue and important little places ached! (So did hers!)
As I knew Dad would be home at about 6 pm I set to and made the evening meal from stuff I'd found in my fridge, back in Sheffield, I even located some apple cake in the freezer (one of mine from March) so I defrosted that. Aren't cool boxes wonderful things?
When they arrived I helped take care of Chloé whilst Dad & Louisa unpacked and got themselves sorted after a week in Lancaster. I changed her, and then took her for a stroll in the baby sling round the village circuit, accompanied by Laura. She is still so cute and loves being bounced up and down in the sling. She's started to giggle when I do it. [Not broody, not!]
Back at the ranch the meal was cooked, laid out and ready when we got back so we tucked in whilst Chloé had a nap. (Oh - it was spicy home-made burgers, double fried chips and salad BTW, plus the apple cake.)
We went down to the pub at about 8 pm and were greeted as long lost strangers by the people we know in there. They all thought Laura had been in Sheffield too, she must've kept a really low profile all fortnight. The number of younger people in the pub varies, I assume it is because most of them have now grown up and left home. Some of them are still living at home but they tend to head for the bright lights of Cockermouth on a Friday night instead of a sleepy old village! LOL
Dad is finished for the year (academic) now, too, and when we got back, over a mug of hot chocolate each, the focus of discussion was the occupancy of the caravan on Arran over the summer. We don't want to give my big brother the opportunity to use it as he refused point blank to join us in the venture but feels he has a right to ask to use it in the school holidays. Well, bugger that!
We arranged that Loll and I would go up on the second Saturday in August and that we'd stay until Tuesday 25th or Wednesday 26th depending on how we felt. Dad, Louisa and Chloé will be going up on the 9th of July for a month. We will have an overlap on the weekend when we arrive which will be nice. I foresee a delicious meal out together...
By filling up the van's usage over the summer we can claim, quite justifiably, that there won't be space for my sodding brother to freeload. Is that wicked of us? Maybe. But what the hell.
Saturday 27th June.
It was Laura's cousin's 21st party today. A weird affair which was a barbeque party starting about 5 pm and ending when the last guests departed. Helen is a student at Newcastle University, or I should say was, as she is now in the limbo period too, waiting for her result. I think it is a sign of how accepting some elements of Laura's family are that we were invited as a couple. Not everyone is as Caveman-like as Loll's Dad!
We bought her a Tassimo coffee maker for her pressie and she was overjoyed with it. (I mean we had asked what she'd like and then we bought what we thought would be best.) In order to let her use it immediately we had also bought her a double set of the disc things so she could make everyone a coffee if they wanted.
I actually drank a coffee for the first time in years. It was quite nice although I needed to add my daily allowance of sugar to make it so! Loll has wondered if we should get one too. I think we could as it does hot chocolate and tea as well, so she could have the foul coffee and I could have hot choc. Win win situation.
Helen's Dad thinks he is a barbeque expert, sadly he is mistaken - to a very large degree. He had this f*ck off big gas monster barbie in the corner of the garden and spent from about 5.30 to 7.30 incinerating anything he put on it. We were told if we wanted to bring any speciality meat instead of burgers, sausage, kebabs and chicken we were free to do so. I decided to bring some of Mr Thompson's steak (it is wonderful) to eat instead of mechanically recovered meat products (or chicken), Laura concurred.
This almost caused a rumpus as I wouldn't let Davy cook it for me. he asked why not and I, unthinkingly, said, "...I don't want it crozzled to a crisp..." He got most offended by that and called Charlie over (his wife) to help intercede. I explained that I wanted the steak 'blue'. He didn't know what that was (neither did she). I explained that if I was frying it, I would place it in the pan for between 30 seconds to a minute on each side.
They both baulked at that and said it would be uncooked. When I told them that was exactly what I wanted they couldn't believe it. I said that I needed to be the one to cook it so it wouldn't get over cooked and spoiled. Davy was not a happy bunny but Charlie couldn't see the problem, in her words, 'if I wanted to give myself food poisoning then I ought to be allowed to do it' . What a fuss over such trivia.
I cooked my steak, and Laura's (although hers had two minutes each side) and we went away pleased with our meat. Charlie came over after a while and asked what it was like and we explained that it made it much nicer than an over cooked piece which became as tough as old boots. To her great credit she saw how much we were enjoying it and asked if she could try some. Laura gave her aunt a small sample from hers which was not as bloody as mine and she actually thought it was lovely! It was like a revelation to her that steak could be so tender and so tasty!
She did say that I had broken the cardinal rule of barbequing by insisting on taking over from the man doing the cooking (burning). I told her I knew it was a 'man-thing' in Australia, I hadn't realised it was the same over here too. She asked what my Dad was like over barbie-ing and I told her he was such a lazy git he didn't mind who cooked the food as long as it wasn't him. We had a good chuckle about that.
The one fortunate thing about the incident was that Laura's Dad (Davy's brother) didn't witness what had transpired. he could easily have used it as further evidence of my corrupting influence on his daughter - denying a man his right to turn perfectly good food into charcoal! LOL
Another brother, Tom, had brought along a 'Splat the Rat' game. (I digress here to enquire what sort of parent, whose surname is Thomas calls their son Thomas? I mean Thomas Thomas? Get real. [This is not the silliest Thomas I have heard of though. I visited a friend from Uni once who lived near Sleaford in Lincolnshire. They took me to see a gravestone in a churchyard of what had been a Gilbertine Abbey at Sempringham; the Thomas there had the surname Ato! Thomas Ato! Tomato? I mean, what were they thinking?]
Back to Splat the Rat. Tom had brought a drain-pipe attached to a pole, a small stick and a furry rat. The idea is he let go of the rat at the top of the drainpipe and you had to whack it as it appeared at the bottom. Simple? Erm... Not so simple after all.
We each had ten goes and there were prizes for the winners. I thought it would be fairly easy to allow for the speed that everything falls, a swift swipe with the stick on a count of one after Tom had released the rat should be enough to splat it. Mmm.... the best laid plans etc. After three hopeless missed I just decided to swing as soon as he let go of the rat. This proved a bit more successful and out of the remaining seven tries I splatted it three times.
My feeble score was recorded and we went round everyone at the party, there must have been almost 40 people there altogether. When we'd all had a go, including Tom himself, we had a three way tie for the winner: Laura, Lorraine and Lucy (quite a coincidence that, we all thought). They had to have a splat-off to see who won the big prize. Best of Five. Sadly the Lollster bombed out with only two splats. Lucy and Lorraine tied again on three each. This meant a sudden death decider. I don't know what had happened to their hand eye co-ordination but after five goes each, neither had hit the damned rat. Eventually Lorraine missed and Lucy splatted it to win the prize. It was a tin of Minions chocolates. 2nd Prize were Minions Chocolate bars and third a Minions stationary set.
Despite being very childish and silly, it was great fun. Tom has been invited to three other parties if he'll bring his "Splat the Rat" game!
We drank an absolute swimming pool's worth of booze and as a result we were a little the worse for wear by about 11pm. It was still quite light but a bit chilly so the remainder of the group decamped into Davy's large summer house and squabbled for the few seats. Loll and I squeezed our torsos into a wicker chair and just snuggled. She sat half on my lap and half on the seat and we were thrown a blanket to wrap ourselves in against the chill. We gossiped for about a hour being silly and teasing and rude and annoying. At about 12.15 our taxi arrived and we bade our farewells and head back to Tallentire.
Imagine our surprise when on arriving the Aged-parent and his younger bride were sat up watching the Women's World Cup quarter final. It had just started. Dad asked us if we'd like a cuppa. We agreed and ended up watching the match all the way through. I had two mugs of hot chocolate and Loll had a couple of coffees.
England won; rah, rah and indeed rah! I was quite impressed, to be honest. It was just as quick as the men's game but there was none of that crappy prima donna-ism that those overpaid male footballer twats perform almost all the time.
I was pleased England had won. Which surprised me.
We were really late hitting the charp and because of the hour, the booze and the hot drinks swirling around in our tummies, we sensibly decided we could forego sex tonight.
That lasted until about 3am when a little voice said, "Vic... You awake?" I mumbled assent. "Oh good..." I was subjected to a ferocious assault on my important little places which meant I simply had to retaliate.
Sunday 28th June
Had a bit of a lie in today. I didn't appear from the pit until about 7.30! Callie seemed resigned to the fact her mistress was an immobile hulk in the bed and didn't even bother with the wet nose in the ear routine or, if she did, I was too soundly asleep to be cognisant of the fact.
As a penance for my over indulgence of the previous evening I took all four dogs for their first walk up Tallentire Hill - all the way to the Trig point. (Usually I get to the bench round the corner and stop for a rest then turn back.)
The Lakes looked wonderful and I determined to go to Smithy's Fell before lunch.
When I got back down there was the wonderful smell of cooking bacon wafting through the house and a surprised parent being the chef. I mentioned the idea of hitting Crummock and he was all for it to. So after a heap of bacon butties we trooped down to the Lanthwaite Wood car park in Dad's Land Rover.
It was idyllic. The woods were speckled with dappled sunlight, piercing through the leaves, there was a coolish breeze and hardly any people about at all. We looked for red squirrels but spotted nary a one. We were surprised it was so quiet for 10 am! There were jut five cars in the car park when we arrived.
At the fish ladder we hit the water, with Loll and I wading out to throw sticks for the dogs to retrieve from the lake. Dad looked quite comical standing in his shorts and water shoes up to his knees in the Lake with his little daughter strapped to his chest in the baby sling.
I could tell he was aching to play with the dogs so I did a swap with Chloé and let him throw sticks and have a serious paddle about. I kept the bebé as we continued on round the shore, past the draw off tower and the fallen trees to the secret bay. Here we had more throwing of sticks and splashing about in the shallows for the humans.
Even Louisa joined in the stick throwing, which is something she doesn't often do. It was she who suggested we walked on round to the Kirkstile so we sallied forth to find the centre of the West Cumbrian Universe. It opens at 11 as usual on a Sunday but doesn't serve food until 12. We rolled up at about 11.25.
Louisa's rucksack was filled with the baby stuff, so I went and changed Chloé, then handed her back to her doting mother so I could settle down with a glass of red wine.
We ordered the Sunday roasts all round, except for the little one, of course. Yummy in our Tummy.
A leisurely stroll back to the tower and then round by the lake side again saw us arrive at a heaving car park at about 2pm. According to Dad he was the only one still awake by the time he'd gone under the A66 at Cockermouth!
At home we all joined baby Chloé for an afternoon nap (not literally, obviously - the cot's too small).
We zoomed back to Sheffield at about 7 pm.
Laura insisted on driving as I had seemed so sleep, I let her and guess what? I slept again!
At home, we did the usual trick of Loll dropping Callie and me off in Wharncliffe Side and then we walked back home giving the woofter her last walk of the day. I was expecting to just flop into bed but it seemed my wicked woman partner had other, more intimate ideas. Who was I to argue?
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