Wow, this was the first weekend since last summer when I had absolutely nothing planned, nowhere to be, no study and two entire days to do with what I wanted. Total Bliss. There was the guilty pleasure of sitting in the baking sun reading a trashy Tom Clancy (my 3 favourite words to make up a news headlines so far this year: 'Five Day Heatwave' - it was 32 today); the almost two hours pottering about with my plants on my balcony - I somehow have 11 tomato plants and 4 chillis - they sprung up from last year's crop! - so repotted some of them, pruned and tidied and fed and watered all of them; the webcam and phone calls home; the BBQ on Sunday night for which I made no less than 6 salads!; the pork belly marinating in the fridge for dinner tomorrow night; the banana pudding I am sitting scoffing with the remnants of the cherry clafoutis (like a pie); watching England in the World Cup (and feeling again what I felt when the Socceroos were inexcusably and IMHO unfairly removed from the next stages - we could have had Ukraine, come on Germany!); having a little beauty session with mud masks and delicously scented face and body scrubs; and generally trying to remember what it is like to not have a million things to do before yesterday! There's always something, but this weekend I made it all wait til next weekend. I feel as relaxed as Stumpy the cat in this photo (not her real name but she has no tail, only a stump, hence our 'witty' moniker for her!). Finally!