Busy busy busy

What a weekend. Spent all day Saturday cleaning and primping to get the place into a state habitable by others (for our part we can cope with life in sub-optimal conditions, largely by necessity and the fact that the average day comprises only 24 hours, but it's a different thing when you've got friends descending). Lucky for us we were able to bank on M&B being late, in the time honoured fashion that has endured since our university days, and sure enough we got a couple of hours' grace to cram it all in.

Sid came home with a GAS BARBECUE. This is bad and wrong in a religious sense but it was either that or build a fire as the local garden centre didn't have any proper ones left. It does have one small benefit though in that you don't have to wait an hour for it to be ready once lit.

M&B arrived with their two kids and after much bravado in the car about riding the horses, it turned out that in fact they were quite worried about stroking the big animals with all that hair, all those teeth and feet, but we got there eventually to sample the soft velvety texture of T's nose.

Sid pulled out all the stops for another splendid barbie and we all ate ourselves senseless, followed by a game of belote and lashings of wine. Thing is, sometimes it can take 45 minutes to play a single hand so the punchiness and attention usually required for the game can often be said to be somewhat lacking. I had to crawl off to bed at a shade before 2am fearing that I was in danger of actually yawning my head clean off.

Left the cats out overnight for the first time, partly because it was warmer and partly because of Danny's appalling habit of pissing and shitting in the kitchen, something which could catch the unassuming visitor very much unawares.

Fell out of bed about 9am (!) and discovered two things in quick succession:

1) That the cats had tried to get in through the porch cat flap and Binky was no longer in there with her kits

2) That T had got about a third of the fencing down in his paddock.

Arses. Big fat hairy arses.

Went looking for Binky, trying not to flap, but she was nowhere to be found, so I did the only thing I could which was to open the porch door and leave some food inside, brief our chums about the situation without alerting the kids to the presence of the kits and go fix the fence.

T had managed to mullah six insulators so that took me a while to fix. I don't know what it is they do out there at night but I wish they'd stop.

By the time I got back to the house, I was unspeakably relieved to see that Binky had returned and was in with her babies :phew: I don't know what I'd have done if the night's doings had scared her off. Clearly she's made of sterner stuff.

M&B's kids are great: Jess and I had fun playing with Dora and she helped me feed the horses, getting over her fear of both to a large degree. Nice to spend a bit of time with her and equally nice to have quiet restored now that they've gone, Binky back with her babies and the fence reconstituted - for now.

All I have to do now is find some energy to work those boys, which I intend to do by sitting on my arse for a while.

Such a pleasure to see M&B though; it doesn't matter how long it's been, it's always as though we got together last weekend. Our oldest, dearest friends :)