I’m outta here! We’re about to leave for the airport; I fly out at 17:00. Sadly Jamie can’t come with me due to work commitments, but it’s going to be a good three weeks back home: a week in the Lake District for the family holiday, and birthday parties for several friends.
Watch this space for [...]

I’ve finally finished the spice rack project. Woodworking always seems to slow down once the construction is finished, and the sanding, staining and varnishing starts. At least the staining only needs to be done once, but the sanding and varnishing gets so tedious! In the sun yesterday, the water-based varnish I’m using was taking only [...]

We celebrated Jamie’s birthday yesterday, three days early, with a surprise meal out at the Langham Hotel (which we rode past the other day) and a semi-surprise small party afterwards.
In the afternoon we’d gone for a three-hour hike with a picnic lunch up into Griffith Park, home of the Hollywood sign. It’s a surprising little [...]

We went for a swim yesterday at the Mahomars’ – family friends of Jamie’s. OK, less of a swim and more of a relax (or ‘chillax’) for the entire afternoon. It was much needed … the weather’s been so hot lately, Jamie’s worked three days in a row, and I guess I’ve been quite stressed [...]

Another trip to Los Olivos in the Santa Ynez valley on Friday, this time for a whole single day-trip of wine-tasting, with a picnic lunch we took up with us. Duty-bound, we went with the top down as it was sunny. Left at about 9am…

…admired the scenery as we started off up the 210 freeway, [...]