Return via Carlisle and Altrincham

The holiday feels like a long time ago now. M and Mr A both left us on 2 January, M to visit friends, Mr A to nurture his business. He gets very twitchy if it's left without him for any time, as if it were a delicate flower. Which I suppose it is.

It snowed! I love snow. We slushed our way to Carlisle and looked for somewhere to eat. We're picky about where we eat - it's got to suit both of us, and there are no hard and fast rules, although if there's anything Japanese or soup-based then I'm inside before you can say "Café Soya".

Carlisle had nothing Japanese or soup-based. In fact it had nothing at all that suited our mood, and I think we walked around most of the main roads in the town. We nearly settled for a Chinese buffet but thought we would both eat too much, and then after joking that surely this town would have a Café Rouge or Pizza Express, we stumbled upon Pizza Express, and that was where we ended up. I tend to sneer at restaurant franchises, but at least you know what the quality will be, and clearly they're handy as a last resort.

Then we went to see the new film 'Enchanted' - the afternoon showing with loads of kids and their parents. I probably enjoyed it even more than they did. Lovely film. Onwards to food and games with Helen & Gail, and Lola II inadvertently provided entertainment for the dogs when she emerged wearing those pink fluffy slippers - the best toy they'd seen this side of Christmas.

The last leg of the journey was home via Altrincham and a visit to Hugh and Bernadette. Hugh was very excited about the new 'standing up' machine, and I agreed to be a guinea pig so he could practise (he's not yet allowed to operate it on Bernadette). It's really clever, especially when it sits you back down on a chair. We also saw the new hoist at the back door of the flat (it's huge, much bigger than I expected) and the adapted bathroom.

When I got home, we had a new kitchen roof. They'd worked on it flat out for two days, and the previous roof was in bits on the lawn because we'd economised by not hiring a skip. It's all in the back of Mr A's van now (that was an hour of backbreaking work), ready to go to the dump at some point. Richard had watched them working from his attic, he told us, and it had looked good.

And then I carried on revising.