Sun, Sand, Sea and Sausages

Coughed myself awake at 0400 but managed to sleep in till 8. Mr Nasty has devised a way to ensure I eat my breakfast - he turns off the TV, takes the remote and offers to swap it for an empty plate. In almost no time, the deal was done.

Our morning bottlebank walk was brief. It was so cold my ears froze off and I barely finished the genuine strawberry whip from the sweet shop before we ran home. The charity shop did yield one winner, though, 2 wine glasses in Jof's favourite shape but much larger. The PuddleMummies will fight over them, for they take half a bottle each.

Last week my intrepid Lego-buyer visited little-known Metroplex 'Waterlooville' but it was a poor area and the charity shops were impecunious and smelly. So we decided to try a richer place, with shops of higher quality. Consequently, Emsworth was chosen. Jof used to work there when I was still inside her and it hasn't changed. The first shop had a box of Bionicles "Vultraz" who is an angry red baddie with his own jet fighter with self-reloading gunball shooter with 3 in the breech and 5 in the magazine! It was unopened, and £3. Next to it were 4 large bags of Lego, colour-sorted. I could have burst, and nearly did, but settled for incessant babbling in a high-pitched voice. One shop in the square is called Mungo's Emporium. Don't remember licensing their use of my name.

We had a pub lunch in the Coal Exchange ( I had sausages) and went for a walk by Emsworth lake in the biting wind and threw stones into the gloopy mud - there was no sun, no sand and almost no sea, the tide was out so far. Jof had an out-of-date cereal bar in her cavernous handbag so we fed some swans with it. Some poor parking attendant is going to wonder why his ticket machine is full of 10ps from Gibraltar, the Isle of Man and Guernsey.

All 4 Lego bags have been taken for the Mungleton Orphan Box but I got the Bionicle, until Poppy and Trampolining Kiera came to my door and invited me to play. Being half way through a Bionicle assembly, I was in 2 minds about going with them but Bud said never turn down 2 girlies at your door so off I went. We played families, Bud said I should be so lucky.

Just when I was reprising the role of 'Dog', he collected me and we drove to the gymnastics centre, which is playing an increasingly large part in my life.

We jumped. We ran. We balanced. We slid. We hung there awkwardly. We trampolined (tramped?). We spotted an obvious target and chased him round and round the complex in sevens. Jof said he was like the pie-eyed piper, constantly followed by 7 girls in leotards all wanting a piece of him. I said he should be so lucky. Notice please that LittleMax (who has just bought a house in Highbury) and I are jammed together in a tight space with nine happy girlies.

We got an hour of sweaty battling and retired, pink, to the food room where I actually ate food instead of just cackling. It wasn't long before we all saw the space in the middle of the table square as the 'in place to be' and it was 630 by the time I reacquired my bionicle and beer was opened. I built the bionicle with added jet attacker and it's awesome. What a boffo day so far! Bath fizzer night was its usual madnessfest and my youtube videos were House Explosion, Nuclear tests and Earthquakes. Bed at 1040. What more can a 7 year-old require.