I had a day off work today, I mean well it does feel like I’ve never been in the office of late so what’s another day eh?! Seriously though I’ve had this one planned for a while and if I’d known how the last fortnight was going to pan out childcare wise I might not have taken today as leave, but well the plans had been made.

And those beautiful plans were centered around an outdoor swim with my pal C. We hit jackpot with the weather - sure it was cold, but I mean come on, it’s November, but the skies were gloriously blue and there was just a little swell as we reached the beach at Sandend just after 11.

The swell fairly quickly picked up a bit which would have been ace had I brought the boards but we just had to try and navigate swimming along the beach line while stopping to jump shoulder high waves every 20-30 strokes!

We didn’t expect we’d be in for long but managed 25 minutes in total and reckoned we swam about 400m in all, which yes my fish boys thought was ridiculous when I told them (they being able to do that in about 6minutes or something....) but I reminded them of the cold and the wetsuits and the waves and they mellowed.

There are few feelings as smug as the warm glow you get from sitting on the beach wrapped up in warm clothes and hats knowing you’ve just been in the sea.

In the afternoon my eldest boy’s class presented their assembly on natural disasters which was impressive, informative and fun. They have a great teacher and have learned loads in this topic in really exciting and diverse ways.

Tonight’s Friday night post swim supper club cake was made by my eldest, who has recently moved to another squad and now trains an additional morning rather than with his brother on a Friday night. It was a Victoria sponge sandwich and boy it was good.