under another sun

Another swelteringly hot day. Lorraine off to work, and out this evening seeing Carolyn. The plumber arrived this morning, and work recommenced on the bathroom. I managed to do some fairly good writing first thing despite this. Somewhat cheesed off by the fact that the house looked like a bomb had hit it just in time for Toby's arrival. The Tobster confirmed his imminent manifestation on the train from Victoria, so I happily left the banging and crashing stuff, and mooched down to Brighton. Great to see him, and we walked down to drink coffee and sweeter in a cafe on Trafalgar Street. Then we took a long walk around town and down alongside the sea. It was almost too hot to walk, so we dodged between what shadows there were, and settling briefly in the Lion and Lobster in Hove where we drank refreshing bitter shandies. Then after contacting Beth and John we made our way to Hove Place were we met them for a drink. We started with pints of soda and lime. Good to see Beth and John, w...

Maureen's eightieth birthday today. She had too many cards to count. And phone calls coming to the house. To celebrate Beth had booked us a table at Hove Place, not far from where she lives, and we drove down there. A really nice time there, and the food was excellent too. I had fish and chips and the fish was beautiful, and the peas served three ways, in pea shoots, pea puree, and mushy. Maureen was on top form and I took lots of photos of her. After lunch we ambled down the road to the sea for a bit of bracing air, before coming home. Later there was a cake for Maureen too, which was great, and then we had a bit of the US Masters golf on, which both Pat and Maureen love. Below  Maureen, always with a mischievous twinkle in her eye, looking pretty chipper for eighty.