Rather a busy few days in Cyprus

I mentioned last week that, unusually, I felt a little lonely.

Turns out it was probably a good thing that I had such a quiet few days. As an Introvert I need a fair amount of time to myself to recharge; evidently I was fully charged, so to speak, by the time I felt the beginnings of loneliness. Friday was a relaxing day, with our big monthly shop at Metro, and not much else happening. We played a couple of board games in the evening.

On Saturday evening, after I'd pottered around during the day making Christmas cake and mango chutney, we went to play Settlers with our local friends. We had a good evening; we finished the first game by 9.15 and the second by 10.30. Then we stayed and chatted, as you do.. and by the time we left it was 11.30. Way past my preferred bedtime.

On Sunday afternoon, we went to visit a friend with a six-week old baby. In the evening, we had our local friends plus children over for a light supper, and also two of Daniel's friends who are in Cyprus on holiday. They left about 9.30, then we had to go to the airport to collect some friends who are here for a couple of weeks in our guest flat. So it was another latish night for me.

On Monday morning, I went to the Larnaka Christian writers' group. In the evening, we had our guests from downstairs for a meal, along with some other friends who are leaving Cyprus at the end of the week.

This morning I helped at Tots, as usual on a Tuesday.

That might not sound like a particularly hectic schedule to those who like to be out and about continually, or who have social or other meetings almost every night of the week. But for me, that was a lot of socialising to fit in just three days, and I felt progressively more tired. It was all enjoyable - I like entertaining, and the cooking wasn't a problem even though I was almost falling asleep in my chair by about 9pm last night. I wouldn't have wanted to miss any of the above. But by lunchtime today I was, as Daniel sometimes puts it, pretty much 'peopled out'.

Still, an afternoon to myself with nothing much on (other than proof-reading one of Tim's essays) and I feel more balanced again. We're not going out this evening, as far as I know. But I'm very glad in retrospect that I had such a quiet week before this - to me - hectic long weekend.