first weekend

On the Saturday I took the eldest to a friend’s birthday party at a massive trampoline place. I had a quite depressing 90 minutes wait trying to play with busted arcade machines that all just swallowed coins and didn’t let me play! The most annoying machine to eat my coins was a drinks vending machine. The place was hot and I really wanted a drink. The cafe at the location was also pretty bad. Other than my personally disappointing 90 minutes it was actually a great day because the eldest hung out with his friends and didn’t cause any “incidents”. So massive win!

On the Sunday I took the eldest for a 2.5 mile jog in the morning and then went to a friend’s house for an epic late lunch. Their house is lovely and their hospitality legendary. It was nice to see them and to meet up with my guitar playing friend on their way to tame the high seas (as they went sailing off Largs). Unfortunately on my return home I found the kids had destroyed a part of the wall in the living room and had a massive party with the dust. So that angered me a bit. I rounded out the evening with a few rum & cokes while playing Football Manager and watching Star Trek: TNG. Saved.

Overall this was a great weekend.

second weekend

I took two days off work and made a long weekend of it. We went to the coast and $eldest threw themselves into the sea with abandon and ended up with a fever for their troubles. While $youngest had a pretty insane number of sweeties and bounced off the walls. This was a great weekend away.

Nice and relaxed and I ended up with a “project” guitar to go and setup/tinker with. Not had a new guitar in a really long time and this is definitely different from any I have already.

Also notable because I drove for several hours for the first time in years. I did have some wee nervous bits but generally kept that in check and got there and back safely.

third weekend

This was a low key weekend. We went out to get our passport photos taken to renew my passport. That was about it.

fourth Weekend

A babysitter came by and my partner and I went out. Had a slap up mean at Dhabba in the middle of town and attempted to go to a Ceilidh. Sadly it was too apocalyptically hot inside the venue so even though we’d paid £5 a ticket we turned right back around and left. But it was still nice to be out on a Saturday night for the first time in many years. We had a lovely evening anyway.

Week Off

I tool a week off here with the idea of decorating the kids bedroom. As with everything in this house you are fighting the crappy plastering at all times. A few months back I had taken out a built in wardrobe and behind that there was some old wallpaper. It took 2 days just to take down this 2m wide section of wallpaper.

In scraping that off several bits of plaster broke and lots of tiny bits of wallpaper adhesive remained. Day three was spent sanding those little bits of paper, scraping out the broken plaster, and then trying to seal the broken bits with watery PVA glue. Then pollyfilla to all the most obvious holes in the wall to prep the area for a first paint.

Eventually prepped I spent one day painting the walls and returned it to a bright boring neutral white. Next month or so we need a carpet installed. I’ll have a go at installing skirting boards and possibly coving to end up with the first nice room in the house!

Last Weekend

After my week off I moved the kids furniture back into their room, played with the kids a bit and made a bunch of Pizzas out in the sunshine on Saturday.

On Sunday we went swimming as a family and then I met up with a friend for dinner on Sunday night which was good.

short bits

An electrician came round and fixed a bunch of minor stuff in the house like a broken light fitting, and made safe the wall socket for the cupboard I smashed last month. I was very impressed with them turning up when they said they would, doing the job, and then saying “because there was less time spent onsite than anticipated we will invoice you less”.

In health news I have been regularly jogging sorta 2-3 miles about 3 times a week for about two months. A huge achievement getting back from that sore ankle and immobility last year. I have been feeling physically and mentally a lot better as a result. I also got another scan of my liver and was told it is firmly in the normal range again. Though I still need to drop about 26 pounds ideally before they scan it again next year so now I have an actual goal and a deadline.

In my week off I didn’t do any jogging at all. This was mainly because I was doing tonnes of manual labour getting a room decorated. I was exhausted and eating dreadful food all week so this has been a little set back. As I am late with blogging July I already know I have been out now that I am back to work so hopefully just a little holiday.