Stanley Mill, with vineyards

CleanSteve went off to the market in the morning. He brought me a cup of tea before he went, but I fell asleep again and didn't wake up until after ten!

I seemed to have loads to do, as always after oversleeping. Mostly it involved placing online orders. I was expecting my sister Kate and her daughter J to arrive, but had no idea when they'd arrive. They did actually makes good time from mid-Wales until they got to the final stretch of the M5, where there was a bottleneck. I decided to make some biscuits to surprise them when they arrived, but the main surprise was that they got there before the biscuits were in the oven! Once we'd had a cup of tea, I suggested a walk, and we drove to Stonehouse for the vineyard walk, my new favourite walk. I knew Kate wouldn't have been there before. The views from Doverow hill over towards Kings Stanley, Leonard Stanley and Stanley Mill, the mill building, are stunning.

As per usual, we found ourselves trapped towards the end of the walk. This the third time it's happened. The first time we were trapped IN the vineyard, the second time in a crescent-shaoed council estate with a railway line running through it. This time we were locked OUT of the vineyard, and had to scramble under a barbed wire fence, getting covered in yellow clay that looked like dog poo. This led us down a lane that took us back to the edge of Stonehouse. That was handy, as we'd left the car in the community centre car park.

On the way back, we spotted a Chinese takeaway /chip shop. Went in to get chips and were asked if we'd ordered online. Of course not! we replied. The chips were very hot, so we walked up and down Regent Street while we ate them, because it has some fine houses and I wanted to see if my sisters share the same taste in houses. My elder sister, the blipper TMLhereandthere, expressed a preference for the very large one that is actually a care home. Kate and I would prefer a simpler style of house, while my niece J liked the one with the fancy porch.

When we'd finished eating chips and choosing houses, we drove home and later watched a film on Netflix called 66, about a boy in England whose Bar Mitzvah clashed with the 1966 football world cup final, when England played West Germany.