Sunday night. It's been bucketing outside. Luckily there wasn't quite as much Sunday night mess to clear up as usual, so I have a bit of time on the computer, and Sunday night blues aren't too bad, probably also because we had a good weekend. Peter's parents came for their weekly visit on Friday, which is not their usual day, and offered to stay the night so we could go out. It was good to get out on our own. I envy some friends of ours who have a babysitting arrangement once a week. Still, on the flip side we get all-nighters from time to time when the kids spend the night in PMB. We went to the Pav, ate dinner, played adventure golf (I'll be tactful and modest and not say who won), and saw Pride and Prejudice. Now Pride and Prejudice is A Big Deal in our family. It is Peter's favourite book and he pretty much knows it by heart. The girls are also fans. Since we have the BBC version on three video tapes (they love 'The Pride and the Prejusters') Lauren assumed we must be going to see Pride and Prejudice 4. I loved the movie, even though the characters weren't totally true to the book.

Unfortunately the dinner before the movie wasn't quite as nice. Our waiter was a wee bit too caring for my liking. A few too many 'Sirs' and 'Mams' and comments like 'So what are your bellies yearning for tonight, folks?' I'm afraid I don't like waiters at the best of times. My responsiveness tends to be inversely proportional to their enthusiasm. My ideal waiter would consist of a touch-screen monitor and a conveyor belt.

Saturday morning we were up early(ish) and took Peter's parents to breakfast at Sprigs (local totally hip restaurant and deli), and then drove straight down to the yacht club to go sailing in and beyond the bay on the African Queen. We went with friends. She and I know each other quite well, and Robyn and her daughter have a somewhat up-and-down though continuing friendship. Peter doesn't know her well, and neither of us knew her husband, but still it was a good day. We had lunch at the yacht club afterwards and made plans to go to Midmar in two weeks time. We've not been since our sailing aventure almost a year ago (not sure where that year went) and it's been something of a point of contention between Peter and me, because I adore sailing and he finds the whole thing rather alarming in terms of the kids' safety. He's happy to go if we go with other people though, so that it isn't necessary to take the entire family out on the boat whatever the conditions. With some other adults there some can go out while some stay on the shore (swimming or whatever). So hopefully that works out.

There was a bit of a damper on the African Queen experience for me as I got totally sea-sick. I've never been sick on a boat before! Oh, the shame! It must have been a combination of the dinner the night before (which didn't agree with me, wouldn't stop arguing in fact), the big breakfast, and the complimentary champagne. I felt worse and worse and eventually during a very lurchy few moments circling around some dolphins I had to lean discretely over the back of the boat and offer up the totally hip Sprigs breakfast to the sea. Fortunately everyone was gazing to the front of the boat, at the dolphins, at the time.

Today was also unexpectedly pleasant as we went to a one-year-old's birthday party where we don't know many of the people and the girls are much older than the other kids there (mostly toddlers and babies) so there was potential for four of us to feel at a bit of a loose end. Luckily there was lots of bike riding space, so the kids had fun, and I ran into an old acquaintance who is also into Extreme Kids Parties so we traded ideas happily for half an hour or so.

So. Good weekend. I'm looking forward enormously to next weekend too, as we are going down the coast for the weekend. Tuesday the 21st is a public holiday and the kids have Monday off school too, we we are making a long four-day weekend of it.

I wish I could say I was looking forward enormously to the week as well, but I'm not, or at least, not to the work aspect of it. I'm still working off-site and I've had more than enough of the people I'm working with, or at least within earshot of. They are all young males out to outwit, out-annoy, and out-swear each other. They know only one adjective, and it's not repeatable here. Other parts of the week should be okay though. There's the usual round of kids' activities, the friend-pregnant-with-twins-who-has-a-boy-a-bit-older-than-Dan coming on Tuesday, playdates for the girls, visits from both sets of grandparents, work on the wendy house (we are starting on the wall panelling - I must update the pictures - tomorrow *yawn*) a visit to the opthalmologist for Danny (we are due for a checkup but I'm a bit worried as his 'good' eye is wandering at certain angles), and a 'Boerewors and Books' social evening at Robyn's school at which she gets to give us a tour of the school and her work.

And I also need to get on this week with the extensions. I have three quotes now and have a firm favourite. The next step is to get some references from him and then hopefully we will able to get started!