A Birthday Party

Right. Pay attention. You're going to need this family tree. And it gets very complicated!!

First of all there was The Builder. At a young and tender age he married Pip, also of a young and tender age. They had two children. Ian and Jeanette. In the fullness of time, Ian married Donna and they had Chloe and Sophie. Jeanette married Matt and they had Rebecca. So far so good. Matt's parents are Mike and Rosie and they live on a farm in Devon with assorted animals, a very, very ancient terrier called Bessie and a young and bouncy Alsatian puppy called Simran.

Time passed, as it does. The Builder and Pip split up and sometime later The Builder married Barb. He is her second ex-husband called Jim. Made it easy not to get the names wrong! Barb has a son called Mark. She also has a brother by the name of Greg. For the purposes of this exercise you don't need to worry about Greg and I can't think of any likely reason for you ever to have to think of the First Mr Barb ever again. I just thought it was an interesting snippet of gossip. You can forget about him for the time being. You'll need to remember all of the rest (except Greg) for the telling of this story. For we were *all* present!

It was Rebecca's 8th birthday yesterday and we had all been summoned down to Portsmouth for the celebrations. I was working on Saturday (and very, very quiet it was too) so we sauntered off after work along some of the most stunningly empty roads I can remember ever having seen in England. The motorways were empty. No traffic anywhere. It was quite spooky. In part I suppose it was because it was Saturday evening. Perhaps people had all got to where they were going by then.

Anyway. We arrived and found that Mike and Rosie with the dogs were already there. We had a Chinese takeaway for dinner, with lots of wine and chat and I got to torment the puppy and Rebecca. That was fun :-)

It was Rebecca's birthday on Sunday. The same day as Simon's. We got up at a reasonable time, had bacon, egg and sausage butties for breakfast, then The Builder and I abandoned Portsmouth and trotted off to Salisbury to visit his parents. A brief visit. Time for a cup of tea and not much else really. But I can't think when we'll get another chance to see them until sometime in mid-July, and brief is better than nothing. Then we trundled back to Portsmouth. We managed a bit of exploring at the same time. No need to go the same way everytime. But the weather was absolutely AWFUL. It was like driving through heavy, heavy fog and the roads were very, very wet. It was very scary really.

However, we arrived back at Jeanette and Matthew's place in one piece to find that everyone else had also arrived, apart from Ian and Donna. A nice complicated tangle of family relations all jumbled into the lounge room. All the grandparents had contributed to buying Rebecca a bicycle for her birthday. This was duly presented, Rebecca was duly terrified by being made to get on it and try to balance, then we all went off for the party.

It was still raining. The roads were very, very busy. We were with Mike and Rosie and eventually abandoned their car in an overflow carpark and walked. In the rain.

The party was at the Gunwharf Centre in the bowling alley. Deep, deep joy. Lots of little girl type creatures were there. Ian and Donna, together with Chloe (15) and Sophie (8 but nearly 9) turned up. The giggling girlies all went a-bowling. Most of the adults repaired to the bar where they drank cola or soda water or coffee. The Builder and I had wine. Of course. Everyone chatted amiably. I met Pip and Tom for the first time (you could hardly call it "meeting" them back in the lounge room. A nod and a hello does not a meeting make!) I also met Barb's Mark for the first time. More chatting went on. There was much interest in the new house (though I don't think Barb was especially delighted to discover that we are buying and not renting as she had supposed). Further chatting.

Time passed. As it does. The girlies finished playing bowls, ate their party food and all went away (well, apart from Rebecca, Chloe and Sophie -- we kept them!).

And so to the grown up bit of the party. At the Horse and Jockey in a village called Curbridge. http://www.thehorseandjockeycurbridge.co.uk/ The food was fantastic, absolutely fantastic. I had tiger prawns with rocket and a lovely sweet chilli sauce. Then I had pork fillet in a tempura batter. I've never had pork in tempura before and it was sumptuous. The Builder had the prawns as well, then he had a fillet steak. I nicked a taste and it just melted as you chewed it. But they struggled a bit with so many orders, particularly as we had multiple orders for some things. They miscounted the tempura pork and mine had to be done when they realised they didn't have enough. And I think they simply forgot to bring Barb's pasta bake. I think they'd had to reheat it! Matt tells me that there are some lovely walks around there. I think I can feel a Sunday lunch followed by walk coming on one time when we are down (good heavens -- I'm turning into Margaret!!!!!)

When you think about all the possible causes of friction and irritation in amongst that load of people, it was a quite remarkably lovely time. No arguments, no bickering, no sulky silences. Just the occasional barbed comment (pun intended!). And I think Rebecca had a just lovely birthday.

Jeanette and Matt are in the process of buying a house. The one they thought was theirs has fallen through. On Sunday morning (ie yesterday) they looked at another one and put in an offer. On our way to the pub (we had transferred to their car for the trip to the pub) they took us past it for a look. It's a 3 storey town house in a village called Whiteley about 15 miles from Portsmouth. The Stop Press news is that they were rung today and told that their offer had been accepted. It's a new build on a new estate so there shouldn't be any problem with chains breaking or straining or anything. Good news then.

We came back this morning. The weather was absolutely horrid. So was the traffic. There were nose to tail lorries on the motorways and the arterial A roads. Lorries are a perishing nuisance. They pull out to overtake other lorries and take about 20 minutes to do it cos the original lorry is going at half an inch a month and the second one is going two thirds of an inch a month. You end up with two lanes of nose to tail lorries (it's better on 3 lane roads because lorries aren't allowed to use the third lane. But it's only marginally better). It was worse today because they were throwing up loads and loads of spray. We need to do something about the lorries. I have devised a solution. I think lorries should all have their own lorry ways. Only lorries will use them. And all lorries over a certain size will be compelled to use them and not other major roads. In order that the lorry drivers should recognise these dedicated lorry ways they will need a new name. I think they should be called -- RAILWAYS!!!!

Time to go home. More anon.

Someone has declared the blog to be like watching Home and Away or Neighbours. I am tempted to be deeply insulted! Fortunately it's home time and I can hear a gin and tonic calling. No time to be affronted then.