Fave Friday

Welcome to the Great British summer.


This picture was just taken. The water on the paving slabs is roughly a cm deep. This is because the twit who owned the house before us laid plastic sheeting under the slabs, to stop weeds growing through. As you can see (because I have a pathological fear of the strimmer), this has not worked - but it HAS prevented correct drainage! What a clever guy.

It has been raining for about 24 hours, on and off, but we just had a particularly heavy spell.

I am not whining. I love British weather. Here are my five favourite things about British summers -

1. You don't have to water the plants too often. There's always a downpour nearby.
2. After it rains, everything gets so very green, and plants flourish. Witness: my monstrous courgette plant, which you can make out in the top left portion of the picture. Also, the tomato plants, which are heavily laden with big tomatoes.
3. Barbecues. The Z-Bunny Mansion barbecue is half an oil drum, so it takes a lot of charcoal to get it going, but it's totally worth it. We try and barbecue often when it's sunny. I kind of want a gas barbecue to make it easier but ... actually as I write this I can imagine the evil look Mr Z would be giving me were he here, and I don't feel the need to explain that "but" anymore.
4. It's rarely TOO hot. It was TOO hot in the week of my operation, but only for a day or two. I think that's the first TOO hot time since 2006.
5. Hammock time. Do, do-do-do, doo doo do! Hammock time. You can see the hammock. I've talked about the hammock before. I haven't had much hammock time this summer, so I am hoping for a fine weekend and maybe a few fine days in the summer holidays.

With thanks to Kelli, as always. This week her Fave Friday is all about her vacation, which has got me all excited about mine, which is now ONLY TEN DAYS AWAY! I asked some of my pupils on Tuesday if they thought it was too early to start packing. The boys said yes. The girls said no. Big surprise, there.

This morning, I used my (hopefully) last day of quarantine to buy travel insurance (I got the enhanced kind to cover high altitude walking, white water rafting, parascending, zip-wire, mountain biking and kayaking...I hope I can cover at least half of the list) and to book a fancy motel for our first night. I got a recommendation from a bizarre source - more on that shortly - for a motel in Visalia and when I went and looked it up it has a hot tub and is walking distance from the centre of town and all good restaurants and bars. I went for it. It can be our wedding anniversary celebration, and our last night of luxury before spending 10 nights under canvas.

Now, the bizarre source. I was browsing the neighbours tab on Ravelry looking for people with similar pattern tastes. This time there was a hit with 36 matches, which is quite high for me. And this person.....lives in Visalia. The coincidence was too great to ignore. So I messaged her and she suggesed the motel I booked. I *heart* Ravelry.

The swine flu has abated. I have a slightly stuffy nose and a sore throat not bad enough to warrant paracetemol. The tamiflu is making me feel a bit sick, though.