Marie's Web Log

Hello again. More stuff. I'll post below a few photos from my Mum's visit - these are from her digital camera. I took my film in to be developed today. Unfortunately, the photos from Scotland are on a film still in the camera.

The local paper is running a 'cutest kids' competition, so I took Amelia down last week to have her photo taken. Would she smile? Would she heck! Afterwards, she said to me, "I make a sad face." Kids! I went to look at the photos today, and they're still cute. I bought a couple, including one for you Mum. (In case you read this before I speak to you, sorry I didn't get to talk to you again before you flew home. Hope the journey went smoothly.) If my scanner was working, I could show you one. Maybe I will go and buy a new scanner.

So, Margaret Atwood is speaking at the Hay Festival, a gigantic literary festival held in the small town of Hay-on-Wye, not far from where Ian's parents live. At the end of her talk, she tells a joke, "A prostitute is having a bargain day - customers can have anything they want for free, if they can say it in only three words. An Englishman comes along and says, "Just three words? Lick my ears." A Frenchman comes along and says, "Only three words? Suck my toes." A Canadian comes along and says, "Anything I want, as long as I can say it in three words? Hey! Paint my house!"

Funny, huh? Sorry if that was a bit risqué for this audience, but it was printed in a national newspaper.

Now for more disgusting parent talk - please skip the next paragraph if you just don't want to know. Amelia is continuing with 'weeing' on the toilet. I bought her a folding seat that we can carry with us when we go out, and she used it successfully at the seaside yesterday (in the washrooms there, not in the sea). She has also - wait for it - done her bowel movements in the toilet for the last three days. End of disgusting section.

Suddenly, after months (read years) of no work, I have too much. I finished copy-editing the memoir I was working on, and that client asked me to also do the same on a leaflet and a novella. I got another enquiry from the SfEP Directory, which has now turned into work - copy-editing a 67,000 word business book that has to be done by June 19. And then my good friend Linden referred someone else to me - he's looking to restructure a business book he's written. Yikes! The cliches are true - it never rains but it pours.

Speaking of rain, we haven't had any. Not for weeks. It has been sunny and warm and lovely. Our only fear is that we are using up all the good weather and there won't be any left for the end of June, when our friends come.

Seaside, yesterday - we drove down to Budleigh Salterton in the evening and had fish and chips while sitting on a bench overlooking the sea. The beach there is not sand, but big, smooth, rounded pebbles. There were a few people in swimming, and quite a few more fishing. I'm not sure what type of fish they were catching - maybe mackerel. Plus some groups of young people barbecuing. It was quite lovely - pink stones, blue water, pink sky. Ahhh.

Are you still with me? Photos below, taken in mid-May: