Well, the wanderers have returned and I am writing this from my own bed in our tidy house.
Better still, the sun has obviously been shining on the divorce solar panel, because when we got here we had hot water, even though the fire went out on Tuesday night.
It is nice to be home, and we have got a boy. He is much the same as always, that is, exhausted from a term of Plus Est En Vous, taller than ever, and too thin. He has been sailing and dancing and swimming and has got lots of credit slips and he was happy. I could ask no more from a person.
We had to collect him at lunchtime, so we set the alarm for half past eight this morning in order to get a good walk before we went to school, but of course when it rang we just turned it off and slept on for another hour. We had eaten dinner late, and chatted to some hippie in the woods who had selected a life of permanent van-living. He was not on holiday in his van, it was all that he had got. We tried to make enthusiastic noises, but really we were aghast at such an outcome to a career. Imagine no washing machine or freezer or even an electric mixer. Imagine spending your entire life worrying about finding somewhere to empty the loo and refill the water tank.
We asked him how he was occupying himself, and he said that he had been staying there for a week and was exploring. We made enthusiastic remarks about the beauty of the beach, but it turned out that he had not found that yet. We lost interest in him then, and went off to empty the dogs in the woods. The cats came as well, not to be left out.
We did go to the beach when eventually we managed to rouse ourselves. We slept so long we would not have been surprised to have awoken in a thicket of thorns with a handsome prince trying to hack his way through to achieve a non-consensual kiss. He would have had to ask Mark for that. I do not like being kissed before I have cleaned my teeth.
Also I am sorry to say that the vegetable curry had all the effects I might have predicted. I think that no matter how delicious it was, I might avoid that culinary experiment in the future.
We went to the beach then. It was very briskly breezy, and we were astonished to encounter an extremely scantily-clad gentleman, attired only the briefest of swimming costumes, emerging, dripping, from the waves. Probably he was on his way to find some thorn thicket somewhere, or, more likely, he was a Gordonstoun housemaster, they are all like that.
I took my flip-flops off, not to be left out in the undressing stakes, and paddled a bit, but it was icily cold, and after a few minutes my feet were numb.
We walked all along the beach in the grey morning, feeling the wind tugging our hair and wondering at the changes in the sand-sculpture of the coast, until it was time to go and find Oliver.
It was a happy journey back. We stopped on the mountain-tops and ate so much chicken and chips and banana pudding with home-made ice cream that we would have all liked a little sleep, except we didn’t. We set off on the long drive south.
Fortunately there is a new Thursday Murder Club book out, which we had got on the storytelling App thing. We played it through the camper van radio and it kept us rapt all the way home, which happened at about eleven. Also we had bought some grapes in Aldi which turned out to be so surprisingly nice we demolished the entire boxful on the way.
I do not usually go to Aldi, because of trying to be middle class, except it was right opposite the petrol station on the way up and fortuitously convenient. They do excellent sausages as well, although we think that is mostly because they just add loads of sugar.
Anyway, I can reassure you that we are home, that we have survived another trip to the frozen north, and I am in bed.
Good night.
