.... random rants and rambles. no agenda. yet.

I am back in blogland, and am lucky enough to be able to say that holiday was just what I (and C) needed. So, here I am, like a neatly rolled ball of string, with a respectable suntan and a un-stressed heart.

Will it last? I hope so! Especially the tan.

France, particularly the place where we stayed in Charente Maritime, was magnificent. Both of us would highly recommend it, as long as you like total peace and quiet and don't mind driving along in the middle of nowhere amongst miles of vineyards (C did that for the first time, and she was great!).

What is it with rural French signposts?! They're TINY and can mostly only be seen from one direction - i.e. usually the WRONG direction - so you've driven past them before you realise you needed to turn, and you then have to drive another mile to a farm to turn round and drive back e-v-e-r s-o s-l-o-w-l-y just to make sure that you don't miss it second - or third - time around. What's that about?

But yeah, it was brilliant to get away and just lie around doing nothing much, as well as drive past many signposts in attempts to visit places and stuff. The flight home was rather eventful, however, because there was a large group of hungover rugby players from Bacup on our plane. For some reason, they were all dressed in "traditional" outfits (flat caps, waistcoats, neckties and, er, clogs), and insisted on talking to everyone on the plane... though I was lucky that "my" rugby neighbour only asked me how to sign thank you after I helped him to find his seatbelt.

Anyway, if anyone fancies that place I linked to above, drop me an email and I'll be happy to er, answer questions(!) Right now I'm knackered - I don't even know why I'm blogging. Perhaps it's because I'm too tired to go on MSN and somehow it's easier to talk to oneself than to other people. Er, I don't make a habit of it.

So now I'm home and decidedly un-grumpy and delighted to see the Harrys and Brian and very grateful to KR and Ce for looking after them and hoovering up all the fur that they shed during Prime Moulting Season which happened to be last week. Last week was also The Week That Everything Grew - no, not the Harrys, thankfully (they're actually smaller without all that fur) - I'm still shocked by how LONG the grass is and how BIG the plants are, especially the tomato plants, which have made it look like our spare room is being used for something illegal. It's also at the front of the house, which means we have some emergency gardening to do.

Photos will be on Flickr at some point this century; i.e. as soon as A nags me into submission.