The last two weekends

The week of low self esteem the week before last was followed by a family weekend. I went home on Friday night and Mr A and I became reacquainted - I recognised him straight away, and I think he knew who I was, even though he denied it. I reminded him that I'm the one who used to do most of the laundry. Then we went to the pub. He says that without me there, the house is rather quiet, mysteriously messy, and his clean clothes don't magically appear on the kitchen chair. We had a lovely evening, but all too soon I was away down south to visit mum and dad and meet up with Lola II.

Lola II has been reading me books at bedtime whenever we're in the same location. We started with 'My Friend Mr Leakey', and we're now coming to the end of 'The Phantom Tollbooth', and were wondering what to read next. Lola II had forgotten to bring a book with her this time, so I chose a book of Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen from the bookcase, and asked for the last story, which happened to be called 'Booby Hans'. Booby Hans follows his brothers to see if the princess will marry him, and brings her presents that he found on the way: a dead crow, an old shoe and some mud. I think it's the translation that made it so funny. It's definitely going to be our next bedtime book.

Then this weekend I was off to Sheffield and meeting Lola II and sister D on one of their rare journeys into the North. On Saturday we experienced a large number of policemen, which was unexpected but could have been anticipated, because the Liberal Democrats were having a Spring Conference. We caught a tiny bit of a demo from a distance, but the police were far more prominent than any rabble.

In brief, we went on a geological walk in the city centre looking at different rocks that have been used for paving, shop fronts, benches and decorative stuff, visited a shop that sells amazing hot chocolate four times, ate Japanese, Korean and Moroccan food, saw a film, went to a museum with a Sports Science exhibition and an Art Gallery whose cafe was closed, spent a short time in the botanical gardens and the Winter Garden. It only rained on Sunday morning. The Bed and Breakfast where we stayed was astonishingly good and thoroughly recommended, and we all had a lovely time.

Back at work now, and I'm going to be doing stroke and diabetes for the next three weeks, which I am looking forward to a great deal more than what I have done so far. I have a lot of things I ought to be catching up with at home, but instead I have been to badminton this evening and will do the same tomorrow, and may even go out on Thursday as well. It's slightly frustrating that I am not devoting much time to blogging, but I'm sure I'll get back to it when time allows - I still have lots to say!