Friday 9th August

My body clock still kicked in at five thirty but I read for a while and managed to go off until seven.  Very little rumbling from the jungle so made a coffee and headed for the computer and suddenly the house was alive with the sound of a clattering of a keyboard from my son's old music room.  My student was awake and computer active.  Breakfast was delayed until nine but even at that time I couldn't tempt him but we had FB contact with his mother, the friend who has just bought the school and Gouldjan from my village so it was all systems go.  I sent his mother an email with the fotos of the rock climbing yesterday so maybe she was checking that he had come through the ordeal OK.

So off on the bus to Brighton and the intention was to get two new pairs of trainers and anything else that might take his fancy.  He has money in his pocket and despite the fact that I keep putting water on it, it is getting too hot to stay in his pocket.  I suppose the theory is that he has worked for it and so is able to spend it...but there was just so much that he wanted that I had to remind him that he has only been here two days yet....   The shoes are purchased...in his room....and the photograph has been taken, .I'm thinking lunch, he's still not interested in food but maybe I am making more of it than his mother would.  

Brighton races on today and we saw the first horses head for the starting gate.  Unfortunately the traffic lights went to green and we missed the off but twenty five years of living here and that's a first.

Down for a coffee...beans on toast I think...Heinz at that.  Catch you later...

Saturday 10th August

I'm late tonight....I've had a super day with the two boys down in Brighton at the amusement arcade and finished with ten pin bowling and a trip to Asda.  We won lots of goodies and tokens in the arcade and CJ had a large mushroom, and my student ended up with a Union Jack money box....silly presents at the end of a silly day.

Ended up with a taxi from Brighton since the bus fares would have been the same by my calculations and goodies in the fridge from Asda but no one is interested.....too busy playing downloaded computer games...

So I'm going to say LN....my other computer didn't want to load my page so we're now having a postmortem as to who's done what to knacker my connection from my main computer here....big LN and wait for the fallout....boom boom Basil.....LN

Sunday 11th August

No one admits to having downloaded anything that would have created a problem with my big PC so I am sticking with this little one.  

The boys have found the game Happy Wheels and we are running over homeless people, appearing to be committing carnage on the roads and blowing up test dummies by the score......I'm washed ready to go to lunch...getting the boys away from their machines and into the bathroom seems more effort than it is worth...boys...don't you love 'em....

Lunch at one.....

Sunday 11th August


Very successful day.....food brilliant...my daughter's husband turned chef for the day and entertainer by night by letting the boys play with his PS3 on the giant screen in the lounge while we chewed the fat at the other end of the room.  Time up...nine thirty....and eventually managed to get the boys to bed at eleven despite loud protestations that they weren't tired.  I was so they had to go....result...

Monday 12th August

I'm showered and shampooed and ready for London...student watering himself down (I think) and grandson sitting next to me on the other PC...there are three pcs working overtime this morning on pogo games, FB and me on this one.  We've decided that a lift into town to the train station is better than paying out parking fees for the day in Brighton or taking a taxi.  We are heading for Madame Tussaud's first off and after that the objective is to get as many ticks as we can in the 'I spy book of London'.  We're on a mission and I'll update you later....have a good day....I'm sure we shall....

Just got back from a super day with my daughter and the two boys and we have had such a good time.  Lots of photos, lots of laughs, plenty of food ending with a picnic on the train home.  Most of the I Spy book is ticked off....might just need one more day in London to finish it off.  LN...I've got one boy to get to bed and the photos will get posted tomorrow when I've sorted them out...between us we took so many....LN....one glass of port and bed....

Tuesday 13th August

So I had to wake up sunshine superman to get him to bed last night....I think I almost walked his little legs off.  This morning was taking stock of the photos that we took and he posted several on FB so that his mother could see what he is getting up.

Today has been a day of rest.  Neither of us got dressed until lunchtime although I'd washed and not dressed and he had dressed and not washed which is par for the course for a fourteen year old.   I think he's been a little twitchy....it's not very often that he stays in the house all day but the weather wasn't brilliant and he has been ridiculing my attempts at playing 'Angry Birds' but I'm a real novice at laptop games.  I intend showing him though that old birds can become very angry birds when fledglings start niggling.  Supper tonight was shepherd's pie with a lovely crispy topping, peas and carrots and runner beans freshly picked from the garden.  

The television is on and the Adams Family is now playing which seems to be going down well.  Lots of blood shooting all over the place and exaggerated acting.  I've come upstairs to recharge my tablet so that I can get some Angry Bird practice in.

So tomorrow we are going to my daughter's school to have a look round and then possibly into Brighton to take photos that we didn't take the other day because we both forgot our cameras.  This might happen to entail another trip to the amusement arcade....it was fun.  LN....I have tablets to exercise...hehe...

Wednesday 14th August

Lazy start this morning and breakfast was toast with cream cheese and blackcurrant jam topping.....as for my student, it was a cream cheese, ham, tomato and cucumber wedge...result.

Princess arrived at eleven thirty and we went round to the school that she works at with the 'naughty / alphabet children' when they get taken out of classrooms for being disruptive.  She's got a hard job but one of the things that I liked about her workspace was a book of four hundred excuses which she hands to her students telling them that it has to be original since she has heard most of them.  I also like the fact that she has fairy lights and has cards that she hands out to her good students which in everybody else's eyes are not particularly good.  She deserves her holidays.

So next stop Brighton and a shopping expedition to buy the presents that my student wants for his family.  What a good day.  I shan't spoil the fun because his parents read my blog but we have a dilemma....what do we charge to his mother from the things that he has purchased.  Tomorrow morning we are sitting down with the list and deciding.

Back on the bus and I realised that I only purchased a single ticket for my student so should have brought a return one.  I somehow managed to get a concessional ticket despite the fact that I told the driver on the journey into Brighton that my Old Age Pensioner's ticket had expired....should I worry...someone who doesn't consider it 'jobs worth' is to be appreciated these days.

Supper was gammon joint with potatoes and veg and I forgot that a Bulgarian needs the statutory half loaf of bread before they feel that they have had a meal.  I just sink into English fare....but it all ended up as a sandwich.

Time for bed said Doogle...I'm pooped today after steering a fourteen year old through the Brighton shops and the relevant pitfalls.  As I said though, a super shopping trip....his parents will be very pleased with what he decided, with a little guidance, to buy.  LN...the day of reckoning will come tomorrow and he's probably got about fifty pence to see him through the second week....tomorrow will tell...LN

Thursday 15th August

So today we were destined to go to Portsmouth and do the old ships but the weather was looking decidedly grim so it was put on the back burner.  There was an idea that we would get number one grandson and go over to Newhaven and swimming but he's got a new lead for his PS something and wasn't really interested.  I played on the computer for a while, spoke to my student's mum, sent her a link for a sports outlet and she decided that they would take a pair of trainers for her husband and by eleven they were ordered and hopefully they are on their way.  She was really impressed with the service...that's ours not the sports company....we can spend anyone's money with ease.

Being a little lost for something to do I mentioned that we had bikes in the garage and bearing in mind that I'd not really been on one for about five years...we dug them out, cleaned them off, pumped up the tyres, did a test run along the street to the school where my daughter works, rode round the sports field and then decided to set off on an adventure.  My hardest part was keeping my student on the right or rather the left hand side of the street...and there's a little wayward tendency that I have to try hard to curb.  Anyway...on to the main road and down to the village...walked over the main roads and on to the undercliff walk and cycled along to Brighton Marina.  Stopped off at Asda to get a picnic, over to a bench overlooking the boats and we drank our alcohol free and ate tiger bread and sausages.  Unfortunately the mini Scotch eggs were lobbed to the seagulls...we both decided they were unfit for human consumption.  Back onto the route and we cycled down the far side of the sea wall to the entrance to the Marina and it's something I haven't done before despite living here for a good few years.  And where are the photos....you may well ask.  Both cameras, both phones left at home and nothing to prove what we were up to.  Having said that, it was so successful that we shall be doing it again.  My only problem was that a child came to overtake and went to go into me, I braked quickly and the pedal shot down my shin and took off the skin.  There was quite a lot of blood but back home, got out the TCP and it's clean and drying off nicely.  I would load the picture but it's not for the feint hearted....

Super over, chocolate on the go, tomorrow unsure what we shall be up to but we might even take the bikes out but with the cameras this time or alternatively it is the Eastbourne Airshow so if the weather is good....we might head for that even though we saw most of the planes over the Marina this afternoon.  I'll say LN....I have to rest my leg if I am pedal pushing tomorrow.....LN

Friday 16th August

My resolve to catch the World Championship at six thirty this morning was achieved at six fifty and I settled in for the morning until breakfast called at nine.  I had company for some of it from my student but his morning was interspersed with facebook games. chocolate pickings and a threat that if he touched my nut and raisin chocolate again he was dead....   Eastbourne wasn't on....the weather was so naff that there would be no change of watching the airshow and I wasn't up for standing out in the rain.

Had my first bath for this holiday and it has made me realise that mine should be installed at home,  Showers are all very well but at least you can read in the bath unless you're very tired and you wake up with the book floating upside down and I've lost quite a few  that way.  So bath, hair wash, shopping trip this morning to fill up on enough grazing food,  Came back with another tiger loaf, ham, cheese and rolls for tomorrow, two lots of doughnuts, fizzy drinks and still orange and tomorrow some of it will come with us.  Lidl first and then Asda and he really was like a kid in a sweet shop'  As I've said ....there is so much choice in the UK.

Booked the tickets for Cutty Sark for tomorrow and sunshine superman reckoned that we could go over to Stamford Bridge and watch the football but I advised him that ticket were probably out of his price range and that his parents, I believed, wouldn't dream of funding it.  Just a thought.  I think the Cutty Sark will be enough to take in and there are several interactive areas so I'm reliably informed so at least he will have something to play on / with / at.  

Eight fifteen my time....I watched the athletics this afternoon and such a wonderful achievement by Mo Farah.....double gold and well deserved.....and now I am thinking of settling down with a book....I find British TV...well all TV quite off putting.  LN....I think I hear a custard doughnut calling from the kitchen....hand to ear....yes I do...LN

Saturday 17th August

So all ready with out boots blacked and out of the house for nine this morning....and on our way to the Cutty Sark which I found out was what they called Scottish girls short shift.....and that was news to me.  A full bag of food was there for the inevitable hunger pains that rattle out of a fourteen year old and the rest would do us for lunch.  Angela was ready and thanked me for being early in so much as the hoover was standing and had not been put into action...we waved fond farewells to her husband, on to the 23 and up to the big city.  We lost our way, which is normal, the map came out, the arguments ensued, the car was stopped and we were pointed in the right direction.  Any way as we approached it, since my son and his family had lived near there for a good few years, the pennies dropped and we found our way to the super secret car park next to the Cutty Sark.

Beautiful reconstruction and renovation and loads of interactive things to do for children and adults and it kept us busy for a couple of hours.  On to the banks and found a wall to make the sandwiches and get rid of the cakes that were part of the picnic and to fill the rest of the time we decided that a trip down river to the Thames Barrier was in order.  Very informative but unfortunately we hadn't enough time to go up river to see Westminster although we had only been there last Monday,  Another day was the chorus.  Home, well Angela's home for about seven and we ordered fish and chips and mushy peas which seem to have become a firm favourite of my student, two types of cheese cake to follow with icecream and we left feeling very full and clutching the rest of the bottle of the red stuff that we hadn't managed to finish.

Brilliant day...informative and I think he has loads of memories of the day and playing with Angela's dog while we were waiting for supper....he's a happy bunny...in fact we all are...LN