Help!

My toaster, like all toasters, is a fickle beast, and like all toasters, has Various Settings. One is for Pale and Uninteresting, another is for Perfect!, the third is for Charred, and the fourth for Smoke and Flames.

It seems others appliances within this household have taken note of the toaster's antics.

Last week, for example, the water pump which turns our bore hole water from meager trickle to mighty, er, trickle, changed its normal habit of being Irritatingly Noisy to one of Slightly Explosive.

Meanwhile the bathroom extractor fan, usually Irritatingly Whiny, became Oddly Quiet.

Today the washing machine, an elderly beast of at least a decade, discovered a setting for Shock and Awe.

Finally, Granny in the Annexe, discovered a new setting on her computer screen: Elegant, But Alarming, Plume of Smoke.

What's next? Who knows! My money's on the fridge freezer, normally Chilled or Ice Cool, discovering Alarmingly Warm or Flood.

Help.

Do you remember...?

Do you remember chalk hearts melting on a playground wall?

Do you remember dawn escapes from moon washed college halls?

Do you remember the cherry blossom in the market square?

Do you remember I thought it was confetti in our hair?

Kayleigh by Marillion (Misplaced Childhood, 1985)

I don't normally quote lyrics; I find them a little too much like poetry which can be - like the bible or Shakespeare - a little like someone scraping their nails down a blackboard. But these lyrics (and their accompanying tune) have been floating around in my head today.

Because today found me in Aberystwyth meeting new friends and having a terrific day all round. For me Aber is mired in nostalgia. I spent three years there as a student from 1987 to 1990 (BSc Agricultural Economics) and it hit me today, 20 years later, just how happy I was there.

It's odd to go back there now. I kept expecting one of my bunch of friends to pop up. Outisde the bank, for example, which was then Midland and is now HSBC, or on the sea front.

I found it extraordinarily poignant standing at the north end of the sea front opposite where the Sea View hotel used to stand - I say used to because it burned down a few years ago. There was a big Great Dane dog there and it was where we'd go for last orders. I remember a mad evening there with Sue and Ant and a hippopotamus puppet while Sam Brown sang "Stop" in the background. And someone lived there who I was particularly fond of for a while.

It was odd, too, walking past the sea front halls - Carpenter, Ceredigion, Plynlimon - looking up at the rooms where Fran, Sue, Tracy and Sarah lived and to see that the former Padarn Hall on the corner of Great Darkgate Street where Neill lived is now home to Corals the bookies.

Rummers Wine Bar is still there, tucked into its cosy nook by the bridge over the river. I wonder if it still serves foaming jugs of Stella to thirsty students. It had the best bar staff in Aber too, I've only seen better in kilts in Scotland.

Odd to walk past front doors that used to mean home and whose keys used to rattle in my pocket; the house at the bottom of Constitution Hill where I lived for a term in my third year and Frondeg in Portland Street where I lived for two years.

The town is chock full of the ghosts of Christmas past. Memories of running down the sea front in a ball gown and stilettos; the daily slog up Penglais hill to the campus; walking down to town from the students union at night on the white line in the middle of the road to avoid the rapists in the bushes; sitting in my room in Portland Street in the summer with my legs hanging out of the window as I bashed out another essay; the telephone box at the bottom of Constitution Hill where students would queue to phone home and beg for money.

The sea is a big memory too: Crashing onto the pebbly beach, spray clearing the sea front buildings and coming into our kitchen window two streets in; the night we had a really high tide and the sea came in through the front door; the snorkeler who scared me across the road once (I thought he was a dead body, floating in the sea); walking Richie home to Alex Hall after watching a horror film at the cinema (Alex Hall was a bit too Gothic in the dark, even for a big rugby player!)

I remember the days we couldn't walk on the sea front because the weather was too windy or the sea was too rough; and the storm in October 1987 when I ran home to Frondeg through the streets as slates rained down on the road from the roofs high above me.

Gosh, so many memories. Listening to Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon at night in a car parked on the sea front with someone whose name escapes me now; buying bars of Galaxy and bottles of Coke from Arkwright's after a night in the pub; walking up Constitution Hill on Sunday with a hangover; fending off insults as I walked through the fair in my army kit on TA night; dancing with (another) Richie at the football club on a Saturday night; making popcorn in Frondeg's kitchen in a frying pan without a lid (we'd had wine).

Those three years passed in a blink of an eye. I remember Andy saying one night, probably in Rummers, before we graduated, that we would never have it all again; that we would go our separate ways and lose touch with each other, that life would move on and grown-up things like careers and mortgages, families and children, would take over.

He was right, of course, but I think, at the time, we probably just said: "Nah!" and ordered another jug of Stella.

Spooky

I had one of those evenings last night, you know one of those evenings where everything is full of sinister danger. Outside was a howling torment of wind and rain, inside was all a rattle and a tattle of doors and window frames. It was a bit like being at sea in a big, dark creaking galleon.

So I decided to watch Spooks series one on DVD. Now I'm not the bravest of watchers, it has to be said. I'm okay with things like the Tellytubbies and In the Night Garden, but real proper horror, such as Eastenders and Casualty, scares me witless.

Odd, then, that I should have developed a passion for Spooks. Odder still that I should choose to watch Series One completely on my own while Brian suffered a late shift at work.

So, there I was, crouching terrified on the sofa, half hidden behind a cushion as hero Spook Tom and his attractive blond colleague had their husband and wife cover blown and were in mortal peril. To non-Spooks watchers, said pretty blond then comes to a sticky end courtesy of a deep fat fryer (face first) and a hand gun (which, after the frying incident, was probably the kindest thing to do).

All pretty shocking really, at least for the easily shocked such as myself.

So, I was already in a pretty sensitive state when suddenly my peripheral vision caught sight of Something Nasty walking along my leg in a very furtive and particularly creepy fashion. In a nano-second a blood curdling scream had issued forth while I swatted the beast off.

Once I had restarted my heart and ceased the screaming business, I thought it sensible a) to check exactly what the foul beast had been; and b) to establish whether it was alive or dead.

So I followed its elegant trajectory and found: a shrimp.

What?

Yes, a real, live shrimp, or, to be exact, one of the algae eating shrimps from the fish tank.

"You bastard!" I yelled unkindly at the tiny crustacean.

"Boing," it did back.

Now we paused for a moment of the heebie jeebies, probably on both parts, before I pulled myself together, fetched the goldfish landing net from the cupboard and recaptured the beast. It took three goes, the shrimp being of a bouncy persuasion, but I finally had it in custody and returned it to its tank in the dining room.

In the dining room?

Oh yes. Said shrimpy was a whole room away from home, the wrong side of a closed door.

How?

Now that's a very good question indeed. To get from the tank in the dining room to my lap in the living room is the shrimp equivalent of walking from here in the Preselis to the tip of Everest in Nepal.

So he/she is back in the tank again after his/her adventure. I had a good look to make sure that his/her wife/husband/life partner was also still in the tank too. He/she/it was. After all, one shrimpy shock during an evening of Spooks is enough for anyone.

An autumn holiday

This was our autumn holiday.

Think mists, think mellow fruitfulness, think SUN!

Think swimming in an outdoor pool, the warm water steaming in the chill of the autumn air, think cycling through leafy glades, leaves drifting down from the canopy above, think SUN!

Think hot chocolate on a misty morning while a doe tiptoes daintily past, think goldcrests, robins and great tits flitting through the branches above, think SUN!

Think tall giraffes, stripy zebras and playful lions, think grumpy tigers, frisky wolves and slightly too close for comfort rhinoceroses, think SUN!

Think beautiful gardens turning golden in the rays, think peaceful river turning into wild water rapids, think happy feet skipping across big flat rocks over a river, think SUN!

Think big glass of Guinness with a thick creamy head sitting in the garden of a pub, think bacon, brie and cranberry stuffed into a warm ciabatta roll, think sitting under an oak tree for shade, think SUN!

Think fragrant apples, russety and rosy, ripening in heavy armfuls, think barbecuing juicy steak in in the dusk as deer rut not three fields away, think hot air balloon rising secretively through mist into the azure sky, think SUN!

Cycling at Center Parcs Longleat

The giraffes 'next door'

Stourhead gardens

The lake at Stourhead

Woods near Tarr Steps, Dulverton, Exmoor

River Barle

Apples (variety unknown) at Petton Cross, Devon

The road home: Hot air balloon in the mist above the Wivesliscombe to Taunton road

The last week

Well I was a Determined Woman. The weather wasn’t going to spoil the last week of the summer holidays. No way. I think I scared the rain away. For a whole week it only rained at night or while we were in the car.

Our week started on the Sunday morning at about 7am when Much Maligned Husband woke up, peeled open an eyelid and said: “I can’t face the kitchen today. Where shall we go?”

“Cotswold Farm Park,” I replied, thinking nostalgically of my own childhood visits there.

So off we went. We stayed the night at the Express Holiday Inn just south of Gloucester, which for Hannah and Rosie was an adventure in itself, dined on Sunday evening at Gloucester Frankie and Benny’s then spent August Bank Holiday Monday at Cotswold Farm Park. It was almost as I remembered it, save for a new big barn by the entrance. There were lots of nice soft-lipped goats to feed and squeaky piglets to tickle. We bounced on the bouncy pillow and managed to lose one tooth (H6) and sustain a bruised cheek (R4), but only because M41 was “bouncing too high” to quote the injured.

We went home via Waitrose at Abergavenny which is a treat in itself being Not Tesco and Full of Nice Things (such as Tiffin, eaten on the hoof in the car park).

Tuesday saw Bri back at work and me, H6 and R4 round at a friend’s house for lunch. H6 and R4 played happily with E4 and F1.5 while us two mums discussed how nearly six weeks of dawn till dusk rain had us contemplating Thelma and Louise-style driving.

Then on Thursday M41 (ie me) became M42 (which is quite appropriate, really, considering I was born within earshot of the darn thing - or would have been had it been built in 1966). Anyway I had to have breakfast in bed, and then soak all morning in the bath reading a book. It’s a tough life.

Lunchtime found us at the best deli in the world: Ultracomida in Narberth. No chance of a table for tapas in its teeny restaurant, so instead we made do with its superb sandwiches. Freshly made on ciabatta with olive oil not butter if you prefer (I do) and fabulous deli fillings. I had blue cheese and honey with salad, the others had Serrano ham and salad. We devoured them overlooking Carew Castle (another childhood haunt, although it’s been ‘touristed’ now and you can’t climb the walls). Then we walked the block around the castle and its tidal mill, which is a lovely gentle stroll.

We drove on from there to Lawrenny, a village on the Cleddau estuary where we used to moor our boat when I was a kid. We had a wander around the beach, collecting shells and stones.

Friday arrived and I was assured by the two smallest people that I had promised to take them to Folly Farm. I don’t remember promising, but hey ho. So, armed with a fistful of Tesco vouchers, off we went. Folly Farm is THE BEST family attraction, ever. It even beats Cotswold Farm Park. The ‘farm’ part is a small clue – there are farm bits, such as animals to pat, goat kids to bottle feed, piglets, ponies etc, but it also has a zoo with cute ring-tailed lemurs – actually three different types of lemur, including babies. (Lemur babies are possibly the cutest of all babies.) There are also zebra, an ostrich, zebu, oryx… the list goes on.

But then there are the outdoor play areas. Three of them. From little nautical and dragon themed climbing and sliding things, to three ‘wrecked’ pirate ships and a thing made of thick logs and tyres, so beloved by orang utans and children.

But then there are the indoor things – the Jolly Barn full of goat kids, donkeys and piglets, a pet cuddling barn, and whopping indoor play area, floor to roof in slides, ropes and bridges, and an old fashioned fair, complete with carousel. We LOVE Folly Farm.

Saturday found us in birthday mode again. This time for my Dad’s 68th. I spent the day making the cake, roasting a chicken alongside various garden produce, and then drinking Pimms, followed by pink Cava, before scoffing the aforementioned cake.

Sunday was a cooked breakfast, followed by a quick examination of the progress of the sloes, bullaces and blackberries. Not much of any of them yet. Then I did my Long Run followed by equally Long Bath and hid under the Observer for the rest of the day.

Monday was the last day of the holidays and we had decided to go to the beach No Matter What. It was raining, so we stuffed the car with clothes for wet, dry and swimming, kites, picnic, wellies and more dry clothes. We arrived just as the tide was heading out in the general direction of Ireland and the sun was winning its battle with the clouds. The beach was at its most beautiful and was almost entirely deserted.

We climbed all over the rocks, dabbled in rock pools, picked over the pebbles and shells and explored the many little caves, then we paddled and jumped in the sea (which as the tide was going was ridiculously warm. Once it turns it comes in cold.) Then we flew kites, built sand castles and fell sleepily back into the car after a fabulous day out.

At bedtime H6 threw her arms around my neck and said: “Thank you mummy for making the last day of the holidays so nice.”

Last day of the school holidays...

It really was a gorgeous day.

Summer at last...

... the sun finally came out.