I enjoyed church this morning. Last week I was unnerved by the couple a few rows ahead of us. The guy kept stroking his partner's hair as though she were a cat, and I found it disconcerting and distracting. I didn't mention it to Bobby at the time, so it made me happy when I said to him a day or two ago "You know that guy at church with the blond ponytail?" and he said "Yes, let's not sit behind them again". Times like this I realise how many years we've been married, and how glad about that I am. So this week we sat elsewhere and were able to focus on the sermon.

I'm sad that there are no UU's in England. I think we may visit the Unitarians and the Quakers, though, and see if we'd fit in with either of them.

We went climbing after church, and the gym was a nightmare of wild birthday party kids and overly competitive redneck boy scouts from some godforsaken small town in the middle-of-nowhere-florida. Fortunately we could take refuge in the lead-climbing area.

Hint : a helmet is really not necessary for indoor climbing. It's not like there are rocks that are going to fall on your head. If you must insist that your child wears a helmet, then at least fork out the two bucks and rent him a climbing helmet. A huge unwieldy bicycle helmet is really going to cramp his style. As are his enormous clumpy tennis shoes. Also, you might like to suggest that he not stand directly beneath my daughter as she boulders along the roof of the cave. She could injure herself if she fell and hit that helmet.

At least Bobby and I got some decent climbing in today. We won't manage any later this week; the kids'll be training hard for Saturday's comp. so we'll be forced to be their belay slaves.

Later tonight - if we have the energy - we're going to list a whole lot of our stuff on ebay. I wonder if I can list the trampoline as a pick-up only item? I'll be sad to say goodbye to it but we certainly can't take it with us.

I just re-read that last sentence and it sounds awfully death-bed-ish. England as the after-life?