Was really good this year, I went with my mum after work, so got there pretty late in the day. The stalls were open just long enough for me to buy a burgundy stockmans coat (very handy for swishing around soggy vineyards I suspect), look at lots of pointless but entertaining crafts and enter a competition to try and win a diamond ring. At this point everything but the food and drink tent and the main show ring shut so we bought beer (Branscombe and Otter) and duck burgers and after communing with some alpacas (animal of the moment in Devon) we settled down to watch a really good show jumping competition. All very gentle andjust what we needed!
I haven’t done a whole lot else apart from work for the last couple of weeks. I did go to Liz’s leaving BBQ on Saturday night, which was fun. Bizarrely PGP Alisdair was there, at my friends houe in Crockernwell. Serendipity! His parents live there and he was down for the weekend. Very odd a I met him in Edinburgh and he lives in London, Crockernwell maybe a contestant for smallest village in the world (this may be a slight exaggeration) so I was quite surprised! Weplayed killer rounders in waist high grass with surprise cowpats, ate lots of food, then had a bonfire, all before the rain descended so we did pretty well! I may have taken the rounders a touch too seriously as I still ache two days later!
It’s now bank holiday Monday, which does nothing for me except make the d a little less interesting as it’s my day off anyway and just means the shops and banks are shut. Boooo! I’ll g and ride Scampi and stop whineing though!
Just got back from Manchester where Gareth hosted the first official Madagascar reunion (the first official one because we attempted to let everyone know about it, I met up with Gareth, Ros and Olivia months ago for The Mikado). It was lovely and very gentle but fairly poorly attended, only myself, Gareth, Judith and Ros could make it. We all watched Eurovision (why did Serbia win? Was an utterly unmemorable song!) Cooked beans (under protest!), then played ‘the really nasty horseracing game’, which is, but is also fun. We stayed awake for many hours chatting about Madagascar, reminiscing and looking at photos, which was great as the trip seemed almost like a dream so having some corroborative memories was nice and reassuring! The next morning Judith and I wandered around the shops in Manchester until she left to go to her grandparents and I went to meet some of my uni friends.
I met up with Jen, Tall, Leila and Mahinda to go and see 28 weeks later, which was a bit nasty and definitely not something I would have watched off my own bat, but that is what friends are for! I did actually enjoy it but had some rather graphic dreams last night…I’m not really a horror story fanatic as my overactive imagination still gives me gypp in the wee hours as it did when I was seven…maybe one day I’ll grow up?
We then lost Mahinda to go and pack for Philadelphia (hope it’s fun!) and the rest of us went to, for a change, drumroll, Wagamamas! In the restaurant we bumped into Dan and Gesine (MUGSS), and also Aiden (I know him from many places starting with middle school) who works there. I think I was doing pretty well for sightings of friends in a place I haven’t lived for a year! It was lovely catching up with the girls and felt like it used to, Tall and I felt we should be heading to a rehearsal after dinner to burp and attempt to sing with full tummies, which always used to be entertaining (and was a fairly regular event)!
After Wagamamas we polished off a bottle of cabernet sauvignon and some pink cake in Fallowfield and then I went to Tall’s for the night (thank you!).
I met Simon in the station this morning for a quick catch up and coffee and then hopped on a train home to the shire.
I had a fantastic weekend and I’m really happy that I saw so many of my favourite people in one go! I miss Manchester and my social life 
Will have to do something about that! It is nice to be home though, Pekoe seemed pleased to see me and my dad was bouncing with excitement when he got in about a bottle of extremely nice wine he brought back and wanted to test me on (this is the kind of test I like!) It was a Chateau Talbot St. Julien (Bordeaux) 2004. It was really smooth and drinkable with medium tannins and medium body and blackcurrant aromas and flavours…in real language it was yummy and probably worth drinking some more of!
I do hope my Bordeaux plans work out…watch this space!
I’d just like to apologise wholeheartedly (mostly to Mahinda who must be cringeing every time he reads this) for my typos, errors and repetitiveness in this blog so far, I quite want to edit it, but I feel that would be somehow less honest than leaving the thoughts in their original format. I reserve the right to alter this opinion in the future. ("These are my opinions, if you don’t like them, I have others" G.Marx)
Also, I have a cracked rib* and am bored of it now, does anyone have any spares?
I’m going to Manchester at the weekend to reunite with the Madagascar gang, yay! I’ll be there until Tuesday if anyone wants to meet up (preferably people I already know!)
Tomorrow I’m going to Paignton zoo to meet the baby Rhino, which should be fun!
*An incident involving a bathtub, far less exciting than it ought to be.
