Mud, Mud, Glorious Mud!

Today Sara had an open house all day demonstrating and taking orders for Vie at Home products with a percentage of her profit going to the Clic Sargent cancer charity. I decided it would be a good day to go into Salisbury and deal with my end of the month banking exercises when I move funds around. This entailed visiting three banks. I parked at Waitrose, as I needed to attend to some business in the post office, and then went into the city centre. I bought Easter cards to send to the children's godparents and relations and sat down in Cafe Nero for an hour drinking a large latte and writing the cards. I really enjoyed the relaxing morning and felt under no pressure to be anywhere else or doing anything else. I returned home just as Hilary L was leaving. It was good to see her and she briefly told me some of the news from the old Company. Serena turned up just as I was about to leave again, following a low-caloried lunch (I started my Weight Watcher's diet in earnest today!), to play golf at Otterbourne with Richard. We arrived at the golf club at about 3 p.m. and played nine holes in the most wretched muddy conditions imaginable. Every hole was full of water and we literally squelched our way round the course. I hit a par at the first hole and after that it was downhill all the way. We were cold, wet and covered in mud. The rain held off but the wind was biting. We were both sprayed with mud every time we struck the ball. Balls turned from white to brown well before they reached the greens! I now remember why I decided to be a fair weather golfer! We finished the nine holes and decided that we would go to the Lion's Head in Winterslow tonight - which we did, at 9 p.m. However, because my latte this morning was full cream milk (I should have asked for a "skinny latte" apparently) I had used up my allocation of points so had to drink diet cokes in the pub rather than my usual London Pride and restrict myself to a pickled egg whilst I watched Richard tuck into his porky scratchings. I went to bed hungry tonight. Sara did very well and made a good contribution to the charity.

The Hungry "Oruga"

Another day at home today and yet more rain. Sara spent the morning shopping at Tesco's and I did a little more clearing of the study shelves - finding all sorts of things including a cheque given to me by a Chinese friend for my 50th birthday in 2003! Can't cash that now. I also dealt with a few queries from clients. At lunchtime, Sara and I started our calories counting. This afternoon I went with Sara to attend a special assembly at Winterslow School being put on by Mary and the children of Years 4 and 5. It was given in Spanish and told the story of The Hungry Caterpillar in that language - demonstrating the children's language and IT skills. Very well presented. After a tea of tacos I took Mary swimming at Five River's Leisure Centre in Salisbury. It was really lovely to spend some time with her (I seem to spend more time with Tom) and she really enjoyed showing me how proficient she is at diving and swimming underwater. A real delight. I have ordered some ice skates for myself and look forward to taking her ice skating with them soon.

Sarum Rehearsal

A relatively quiet day today after all the excitement of yesterday. The weather was poor again with rain for much of the day. I left the Saints flag on the pole to continue the celebrations. Quite a bit of tidying up to do and a large amount of mail to deal with today. Mary was feeling unwell after such a hectic weekend so stayed at home today. She did some school work in the morning and watched DVDs in the afternoon. Tom went to his friend Sam's house after school so we had a quiet afternoon. During the afternoon I received an email reminding me that there was a Sarum Lodge rehearsal this evening and as Bryant, our Director of Ceremonies couldn't make it, it fell to me as his Deputy to act as preceptor this evening. The meeting started at 6.30 p.m. and I was able to push it along to an 8 p.m. finish with a swift pint at the New Inn afterwards. It went reasonably well although there were only five of us present and I had to double as the candidate.

A Perfect Day (at Wembley)

What a fantastic day - one to be remembered for many years to come. It started very early with an early wake-up call at 6.30 a.m. (really 5.30 a.m.) as we had put the clocks forward last night. Tom had to be woken and after a quick breakfast of cereal and tea we set off for Wembley calling in Norman Court School to pick up Hamish. Although he has followed Saints for all his life this was the first ever live football match he was going to attend. We arrived at Uxbridge via Basingstoke and Reading at 10.30 a.m., parked the car for free on a side road near the tube station and caught a tube to Wembley Park. The place was already buzzing with Saints supporters, both on the train and around Wembley itself. Indeed, it was hard to find a Carlisle supporter anywhere and you had to look hard to spot one. The place was awash with red and white! Hamish was absolutely bowled over by the facilities and "plushness" that is Club Wembley and I had tell him that this was not usual for the average football supporter. We found our seats and ate hot dogs. I had a strange premonition that Saints would win 4-1 and I placed a small £1 bet with Betfred the stadium bookie! Saints were awarded a penalty about ten minutes into the game when a Carlisle player to pushed a Southampton attempt on goal out with his hand. A blatant hand ball. Ricky soon finished off the advantage with a fantastic strike into the back of Carlisle's net. A second goal came just before half-time from Lallana. Saints went in at half-time 2-0 up. Two further goals in the second half finished off Carlisle and at 4-0 I was then hoping Carlisle would score to provide my winning scoreline for the bookies. They duly obliged with a goal towards the end. My premonition came true! The excitement as Saints went up to collect the huge Johnstone's Paint Trophy was electric. With an attendance of 73,000 (44,000 Saints supporters) today saw the biggest attendance ever for a JPT Final. Anthony G gave us a lift back to Uxbridge and we were back home by 7 p.m. - very tired but elated. Sara and I celebrated with lobster and champagne (the lobster prepared and cooked by me). Mary has performed brilliantly at her Dance Show again today and will now take up tap and the next ballet grade. It was lovely to see the children both having such a wonderful day with their differing interests. I was so tired that I went to bed at 10.30 p.m. A great day! A perfect day!

Sara's swollen foot

Mary had the first night of her dance show in Salisbury City Hall today. She was required to be at rehearsals again today before the full performance at 6.30 p.m. This meant taking her to and from the city hall three times today. Sara took her this morning but injured her foot returning from the City Hall this afternoon. She is now laid up with a swollen foot as I write this. I have had to take Mary in again this evening. Tom and I played eleven holes of golf at Grateley this afternoon. I managed to go round in 38 (a respectable number as confirmed by Roger M). It had been raining heavily in Hampshire and the greens were slow and rough. I am sure with smoother greens I could have done better. Anyway, this is the first time after a long absence that I have gone round 9 holes in under 40 so I am pleased even if some of the shots were a little wayward. Tom did very well too with some great shots. He needs to learn not to hurry his swing. Grimsby Town lost again today against Rochdale (4-1). Fortunately so did Cheltenham so the gap is still 4 points but only 8 games left now. It's not looking good. Their defeat was nothing in comparison to that of Aston Villa who went down 7-1 to Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. Mary came back tonight exhausted but very content with her performance. Sara's ankle has swelled up quite badly and she cannot walk hardly. She will need to get Sarah McC to take her to the dance show tomorrow if she cannot drive as I shall be at Wembley in the afternoon for Southampton's match against Carlisle in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy Final.

Lunch in the Lord Nelson

This morning I went into Salisbury first thing to pick up a pair of steps from Argos and also bought a new DVD player for our bedroom TV as the old one we had acquired on "Freecycle" had stopped working properly. It was time to consign it to the recycling skip at the amenity tip. The steps will be useful for painting and decorating and for sorting out the high shelves in the study and family room. Other than that it was a quiet day in the village today. Tom wasn't feeling too well so stayed at home. Sara worked in the Lord Nelson's Arms this lunchtime and as I hadn't really expected Tom to be with us today, hadn't organised any food for lunch. Tom and I, therefore, went down to the Lord Nelson for lunch. The pub was very full with "Seniors" and Roger only had Sara and Will to help him. Sara was having to manage the bar and serve the food with Roger and Will cooking the meals. Tom has a burger and I had scampi and chips to keep things simple. We went into the bar and played darts whilst we waited for our food. It was quite clear that he has insufficient resources at busy times and less patient customers would be likely to take their custom elsewhere. This evening I took Mary into Salisbury for her rehearsal of the dance show at the City Hall. Sara and I watched Eddie Izzard again doing his 43 marathons around the UK.

A Day of Prayer

A day at home today - in fact apart from a brief trip to post some letters and to attend Mary's parent's evening (a ten minute chat with her teacher) I didn't leave the house. Sara went off to the Oasis Ladies' Study and Prayer Group at St. Paul's Church in Salisbury this morning and I dealt with the correspondence and made further inroads into clearing the study. I moved some boxes out to make room to get to the bookcases and in so doing discovered many items I had been looking for including Klynn's Ethernet cable which I was convince I had returned to him! Sorry Klynn, I know you've turned your own house inside out looking for it. Searching through the study is going to be quite an adventure. Sara and I received letters from our former company advising us of the bonuses they were going to pay us for last year's work. Quite frankly, I was pleasantly surprised! Very useful for our proposed foreign trips (must remember to book the flights to Raleigh!). Mary's teacher advised us, this afternoon, that she is pretty well on course for her age and going well in literacy and numeracy. We agreed to help her use a more "ambitious vocabulary" in her writing. We had a torrential thunderstorm this evening and the roads were flooded with muddy water. We had a lake in front of our door which, fortunately, did not rise high enough to flood the house. We gather many were not so fortunate. Sara pulled her back this evening whilst removing a beef casserole from the oven and went to bed early in pain. We had seven for the House Group this evening. Following the Lent Course, we talked about prayer, the power of prayer and the methods of praying. The Group was quite lively and the discussion did not flag. It was interesting to hear others' views and find that where we, as individuals, struggle with prayer, we are not alone. It was interesting that few couples ever pray openly together but individually. Klynn stayed behind for a couple of hours over a bottle of wine discussing his new position and matters connected with the church. After he left I watched a very interesting documentary about the assassination of Lord Louis Mountbatten in Co. Sligo in 1979. I remember the event well as I was staying with a friend in Gloucester that Bank Holiday Weekend.