Nine to Three Thirty

Last weekend was a lot of fun.  On Saturday night I went to the pub and met up with friends, including some that I hadn’t seen for a while.  On Sunday I had a day out in Birmingham as part of a blog post for another of my blogs.  This picture is of Gas Street Basin which is very close to the city centre, but its full of narrow boats and it was the perfect place to hang out in the sunshine.  I’d planned a canal themed day out with a boat trip, meal in a restaurant with views above the canal and then a drink with a view of the wharf.  It was a lovely day.

I had thought I might do some hedge cutting on Monday, but it was too hot to think about.  I decided to have most of the day off and spent the afternoon in the garden with a book.  It was lovely and something I so rarely do.  The hedge is still waiting to be done, although I have started the job.  As ever it’s the getting rid of the clippings that is the biggest job – if it had just been the cutting to do I’d have finished it long ago.

This year I started well with the vegetable garden, but it tailed off a bit.  This year’s successes have been runner beans and apples.

Here’s a picture of Amber, my cat, asleep.  I wish he slept as well as night as during the day.  He has got a bit better with the howling over the last week or two, but sadly it’s a very small improvement.  I might try the hormone plug in thing again and see if that helps.

H and I took some pictures for a campaign this week: we decorated mugs, made hot chocolate and popcorn, and played a board game.  This one shows him playing one of his favourite games: Skull. He’s looking very grown up these days – he’s about to go into Year 8.

Another double week for me. I don’t seem to have been at home that many weekends this summer.  Last time I’d just returned from Scotland where we were visiting my sister and her family.  We had a few days at home and then H went off to Madrid for a holiday with his dad.  The only contact I got from him whilst he was away was a picture of a plane at the airport on the way home.  He’s very much a teenager now, even if he is only 12.  I did manage a nice meal out reviewing Bill’s in Birmingham’s Bullring.

It’s been a while since I won a holiday prize, but a few weeks ago I heard that I’d won a trip to the Edinburgh Book Festival.  I’ve been to Edinburgh before, but never whilst the festival was on.  Basically the prize was two nights at a very swanky hotel, The Balmoral with the address 1 Princes Street, plus tickets to four Book Festival events, so it was just travel and spending money to find. The hotel is basically just above Waverley station, so it couldn’t be more central really.  I loved the bathroom with its Sean Connery pictures on the wall.

The Book Festival is very relaxed and there are so many events on each day.  It was difficult to pick out who to go and see, but I picked non-fiction writers as I thought their talks might be more interesting.  The first two talks were very interesting and both were broadly speaking history related – that doesn’t really do the second one justice, but it’s difficult to describe as it was about how things like geology and ocean currents affected mankind’s actions.  There was also a talk by the founders of Aardmann Animations, who are responsible for Morph and Wallace & Grommit, and I really enjoyed that.  I was flagging a bit by the last talk I’m afraid and it didn’t seem as interesting, but three out of four isn’t bad.

It wasn’t all Book Festival events though as there was plenty of time off for eating and drinking.  Sunday was mostly spent watching Fringe street performers and watching the world go by.  Trips to Scotland have a good record for seeing someone famous for me.  I once saw Hugh Laurie at Waverley Station and I saw Jeremy Irons on my way to Scotland at a service station on another trip.  This time I saw Eddie Izzard who was staying at the hotel too and eating breakfast when I came down to eat.

It was a lovely trip and I’d like to go back again during the festival another year.  It was a bit difficult to find seats in pubs, etc. and the streets were busy, but there was a real buzz.