I feel as though we have had a very idle day.
It was not exactly idle, although it felt like it because it has been so very interesting.
We did not do any of the things we had intended to do, apart from the usual minimum of daily tasks like dog-emptying and laundry. Mark was supposed to spend the day emptying the old van, and I was going to do some calendar painting, but in the end we could not resist.
We dashed off to Camper Van The Sequel and started making plans.
This involved a lot of detailed measuring and some scowling contemplation.
We are going to raise the floor up a bit and make the door narrower. We are going to move the roof windows and the big window in the back of the van. This latter has got a big sign in it proclaiming that the van is a member of the Knitting Network.
I do not know what the Knitting Network might be, nor why it might have felt the need to drive about in a colossal library truck, but the sign rather amuses me, so it can stay where it is for the moment.
The back window is going to be removed eventually, though, and put in the side of the van instead. This is because we are going to have our bed where the window is, and we do not want to have to drink our coffee whilst leaning against a window. Our bed is going to be high up because we are going to build a door into the back and keep bicycles underneath it.
We think we would like electric bicycles because there are a lot of hills in the Lake District, we do not live in Blackpool or Cambridge, and even if we did it is still nice not to have to pedal quite so hard when you are over sixty.
We are going to have a big bathroom. This is because we thought one of the hardest things about the old camper van was that the shower was a bit too small to slosh about comfortably. I have been looking at pictures of beautiful bathrooms on the mighty Internet, and decided that I would like gold and marble, preferably with an inlaid brass frieze around the ceiling
Mark hardly rolled his eyes at all when I told him, although he said that he did not think we would be able to fit the pillars and archways in even if we made the bathroom absolutely as big as the space would allow.
I do not mind this very much, we have measured it very carefully and there will even be room for a washing machine if we put it on the other side of the corridor.
I can hardly tell you how exciting it has been. We spent ages in the van, and then came back and spent even longer ages poring over the plan and cutting out little squared pieces of paper with things like Fridge and Bathroom Sink written on them.
We think we have settled it now. There is not enough room for an office and a home cinema, but we can have the bicycle garage and a wardrobe and two tanks of water so that we do not need to worry about running out. We can have the solar panels and enormous batteries and a table and chairs that can be folded into a bed in the unlikely event that any of the children ever come to visit us or that we pick up a hitchhiker.
It is going to take ages and cost us a fortune, but when we have finished we will be able to go on a world tour without the smallest inconvenience.
I do not know if we will want to go on a world tour, but we will certainly want to go to Blackpool occasionally.
It is going to be wonderful.
