Eid

Poor Sid; there we were, ready to set off for his birthday lunch and discovered that there wasn't a gettable taxi to be had. Some had answering machines set to say "Because today is a religious holiday, we are closed until tomorrow", most didn't answer, and the best offer was a 3 hour wait. Hmmmppphhh.

I made Sid get on an omnibus. That's what they called them when he used them regularly, I'm sure. We *could* have walked into town, it's only about a mile, but the knee still whinges and I get bad-tempered when it does that. The little leggie is much improved but I decided to take the stick 'just in case', which turned out to be a little embarrassing when the three aged pensioners at the bus stop, two with their own sticks, held back and insisted I got on the bus first.

So, La Tasca, using up a 50% off voucher. It was class, we managed to spend four times as much on wine as we did on food, and thoroughly enjoyed both. 1996 Faustino, it was mmmmmmmmm. Recommend that teenage wine to anyone.

We did manage to get a taxi back, in a nicely fuzzy haze, and I blame the fine spanish Brandy for causing me to sleep through most of the first DVD when we got back. Watched "I was a teenage vampire" afterwards - class B movie, I loved it.

Last working day of my holiday and I've done mostly jack, de nada. Flirted with the dentist and gave him a lot of money to do unpleasant things to my mouth; spent a whole four days with mother doing mostly nothing. I had sworn I'd take her to see Les Miserables but she declared she'd rather see Les Enfants aka the shorts at home. I decided the best way for her to get to the airport was to park in an hotel (not that) near Luton airport and get a taxi. I wouldn't mind the £1 charge for dropping someone off; but it's simply not possible to drop anyone off next to the terminal and she was exhausted by the walk from the pickup/dropoff bit (I had fondly imagined a taxi might be able to get us closer)

At least the 'got to get your boarding card first' assistance counter let us use one of their wheelchairs to go an queue for almost half an hour to get her checked in. Extremely unamusing.

Barrelled off into the night to surprise Vikki only to find she'd given Dom the night off and had to work in the bar all evening. You'd think having your own pub would prevent that kind of thing. It's a bit alarming to find that my 'nearly-nephew' Robert will be 17 next month, has grown almost a foot taller despite taking up smoking and has managed to convince his parents to let his girlfriend move in! We missed the last couple of HP movies as he grew up faster than Harry Potter did, but he told me he still has the HP watch I gave him and considers it a treasured possession. Say AWWWW

Four day weeks till Christmas from now, then off till next year, using up the holiday I should have had much much earlier in the year. Early resolution, I will NOT have almost three weeks holiday still to take when it gets to next November, I'll - I'll - I'll..... not be able to take a whole week until April at earliest, later if the project overruns

Short people have been round several times; Paul is off to Amsterdam this weekend for his mate Simon's stag do. I've bought my sister's Christmas present, I have two more days before I have to go back to work, and just remembered I forgot to order a corporate heaven.