Treats not tricks

Woke up with a sense that obstacles can be surmounted, and that positive sunlit uplands can be reached.

An amazingly warm, sunny day. Lorraine had a meeting with a colleague, Sue, in nearby Cuckfield. I came too as they were meeting in a pub with a Wifi. Sue and Lorraine talked about work and I quietly got on with uploading yesterday's blog and drinking coffee and sparkling water catching up with some of my outstanding correspondence and reading The Rialto in which I knew four of the poets, including Robin and her pal Charlotte.

Lorraine and I then made off to Brighton where we parked near where we used to live, and walked into town to visit a Solicitor called Wendy who is in charge of our next purchase, which appears to be going smoothly. Then a walk around into the Pavilion Gardens with the intention of having a coffee in the art gallery, but the cafe was closed. It was our only chance to acknowledge that just over a year ago we got married there.

Then a mooch about in Brighton in the afternoon. It being Halloween, of course there were people with ghoulish white facepaint and various skullfaces and so on in broad daylight, as well as the usual drunks shouting at pigeons on New Road. We've only been gone for 48 hours and I miss it already. Crossing the road outside the Duke of York's theatre to collect the car, a man sped by, weaving through the traffic on a skateboard adorned with a small flying carpet. He was immaculately dressed in a fez and billowy pantaloons. Standard for Brighton of course, but I realize I need regular amounts of this sort of thing in my life that perfectly pleasant places like Haywards Heath can never provide.

Home a little before six feeling as if it were ten o'clock. A bit of supper, and Lorraine popping out to mingle with trick or treating toddlers (a three year old on her first sortie giving Lorraine a hug, so that my wife returned with tears of happiness in her eyes) and a few episodes of Frasier before constant yawning meant I had to go to bed, and Lorraine came too. It was around 9:30 and we were asleep before 10.