Quiet week

There's not much that goes on at this time of year. It's schools half-term in the UK so there are quite a few British families out here getting a bit of sunshine before the winter, but even so the beaches look mostly deserted. Not that we've been to the beach as such. When we live just a mile or so from the beach, we rather take it for granted.

So the days roll on by. The family staying here last week left on Tuesday, but cleaned the downstairs guest flat so thoroughly that there was nothing left for me to do, other than bring in the sheets and towels they had already washed and hung out to dry. In the mornings I do a bit of cleaning, some laundry, perhaps pop out to a local shop for something we need, or the PO Box to check for mail. When I'm in a regular routine I also study a bit of Greek and work on my tapestry, but with my mother staying and guests downstairs I've rather put those aside. Perhaps I'll get back to them in January... once Christmas is over.

I don't switch the computer on (usually) until at least noon, sometimes not till after lunch. Then I read email, check forums, do some writing, glance at the news, work on finances.... it's so easy to spend much longer than intended on the computer, particularly if Dan comes online via Instant Messenger, or if I have a lot of interesting emails to reply to. I generally switch the computer off by about 6pm - sometimes earlier, sometimes later - so I'm not popping back to it all evening. We eat around 7pm most evenings, due to Richard's work and Tim's various commitments. It's not often that we're all in together in the evening, and seems to have happened even less frequently this last few weeks. The cats appreciate it when I sit (or lie) on a sofa to read, though it's not often that I get two of them at the same time:



.. and on Monday we did realise that all four of us (including my mother) were in at the same time so we played a few rounds of Mahjong. The real game, not the computer solitaire matching game, of course! Tim managed to win three out of five games, much to his amazement. I don't think we'd played since Dan left home in January.

(That photo shows the end of a round, just in case anyone's puzzled by it. Everyone else had put their tiles in the centre to be washed - ie mixed up thoroughly - but I went to get the camera so the tiles I hadn't been able to play were still on my board)

For some reason, all our cats like boxes. But we didn't expect Sophia to attempt to settle in the Mahjong box, which was distinctly too small and looked very uncomfortable!