Kung Fu Fighting

Very very very cold today. The car has a thermometer thingy in it, and the highest temperature I saw on the morning or afternoon trips out was 0.0. And that was at a sunny moment. The birds have been spoilt with fat balls today, and this obviously gave them enough energy for lots of entertaining fighting. One of the blue tits has become particularly aggressive, scrapping with anyone who shows up on the table when he's there. As you can see they had to have two bowls of water - the one in the back was not only full of ice this morning, but also frozen solid to the table all day.

Last night I decided not to disturb the kids and slept in our dressing room. Now I know that sounds all Brideshead-ish "Darling I have to catch the early train up to London tomorrow. I'll sleep in my dressing room so I don't wake you." But it's not. The dressing room has no door (yet) between it and the hall. The hall (in a thighbone's connected to the hipbone kind of way) is connected to the loft by a big hole above the stairs. And the loft is connected to the sky by many smaller holes. Therefore, our dressing room at night is the same temperature as outside. Even under two thick duvets and my huge dressing gown and with two hot water bottles, there was a lot of shivering. More of the same tonight, though with -8 forecast, I might sneak into Katherine's double bed and cuddle up with her.

No other news. My world has shrunk to painting window frames, watching the birds and staying warm. Brrrr. Tomorrow's exciting task is trying to learn enough Spanish to get someone's bank account details in Panama to send them some money.