Tat Nav

Well. Another week of contrasts.

Started off so well with me cool, calm and collected. I'm successfully meditating. Let me qualify that. It means that in my part time role as Car Park Attendant I can 'lie'. On Monday when the car park was full and one lady got blocked in by about four cars, one of which wouldn't identify itself (the driver wouldn't anyway)I took the highly unusual step of closing the car park. When people started getting aggressive and trying to run me over to get into it I said there'd been an accident and we didn't want to disturb the scene.

Then after a couple of other disasters at work me and Phil got food poisoning from what was my favourite local curry house. Damnation, as Dad would say. Hours of puke.

But we had a day's holiday booked yesterday and had a wonderful time skiing. It started off badly with me wanting to leave the house while Phil was still in the throes of passion 'downloading' with the other love in his life (the computer). So we ended up leaving at about eight o'clock giving us about an hour to get to the other side of the universe (Milton Keynes - Snow Dome). Milton Keynes is how I imagine Los Angeles - you don't know if you've got there or just left. It's ideal for car lovers, and lovers of roundabouts.

We arrived an hour late, but the teacher was lovely, a woman in her fifties who smiled and welcomed me immediately. I had to ski the second I got there but managed to stay upright. There was a hilarious bit when I fell over on to the travelator and the lovely instructor lady fell on top of me, whilst trying to help me and we both went heading straight for the mechanics of the machine. It reminded me of Raiders of the lost ark, when the boulder was rushing for them, the instructor was screaming at one of the others 'press the red button, press the red button' and just like Harrison Ford, we were saved in the nick of time.

Basically, she was a brilliant teacher who made it so simple, with us all together as a team, skiing backwards and everything. I was amazed as to how good we were at the end of three hours (two in my case). Very lucky to have such a good teacher for my first experience of skiing.

On the way back I navigated a bit, showing Phil the shortcuts around Stokey - Tat Nav.

Have gardened almost all day. Planted all the stuff we bought at Columbia Road about six weeks ago at Phil's Mum's Birthday; pansies mainly. Also planted lettuce seed, pruned the climbers and tidied up the rubbish. Spring is the busiest time for gardening. Summer is just for watering and sitting.

When I look out of the window I can see the mini daffodils, the pansies and primroses, and the hazel is against the cream expanse of wall, twiddling its catkins waiting for the summer calm.