A blipper of two halves

Bright and sunny this morning... Well the weather was anyway. CarbBoy, sadly, did not make it through more than one spoonful of his morning carbs before needing to throw up. A day on the sofa beckoned for him...

Meanwhile, TallGirl was delivered to school and I bowed out of my morning lessons (so much for all that panicky late night preparation). Instead, I took advantage of the morning shade on the terrace to finish work on the mighty shade structure that will protect us as we eat. Mr B had authorised use of the terrifying nail gun (left) which, despite all my memories of it being used as a weapon in movies, turned out to be not only extremely safe, but also very satisfying to use. I'm a convert. (Though the sound it makes is still a bit scary.)

So, alternating between nail gun, drill and other-drill-as-screwdriver, the job was done. Next task was to try out the screening originally purchased for use in TallGirl's new den as a roofing material. All was going well until I unrolled what was clearly an ant nest. All of this happening, of course, directly over my head... Having just had to dust a thousand black flies off me after a rather closer than desired interaction with the elder tree, the ant shower really was not welcome.

Now we'll just wait for Mr B's input on the masterpiece.

Later, the caramel shortbread (right) finally had it's chocolate coating - mainly so I had something to nibble with my very strong cup of builder's tea. That's the problem with DIY - having to do the work AND make your own tea...

The day clouded over later, so it would have been a fine afternoon for hanging out in the red kite field to get some photos of their acrobatics (and worm eating - which just looks odd: huge birds like that eating worms while tasty looking rabbits wander by), but CarbBoy wasn't up to a trip out - having had a relapse when I mentioned some jobs he could help me with...

So, Mr B is on his way home - with a car full of goodies from Britain and lots of wine (I know I know, coals to Newcastle - I'll explain it all another time) and I am waiting for a Skype appointment which I thought would have already happened, but I think I made a time zone error...

Earlier I had several very long chats with my UK mobile company to try and unblock my voicemail - and just when we had sorted out a convoluted way to deal with the security requirements... I found where I had jotted down the required code... Oddly, as soon as I told the person who was helping me this - she then issued me with a new code straight away, with no proof of the old code. Very odd.

Ok, my Skype appointment is over and done with so I can go and wipe off the mascara and get on with my evening....

Oh, and the fish are still alive. Phew.