June 3rd

After a particularly lazy morning interrupted only by a visit to Waitrose for the week’s shopping, Beth & I took the papers down to Brunswick Square where we lay down on the grass in the sunshine and marveled at the amount of flesh on show. It wasn’t even that warm and yet the square was packed with folk who were clearly suffering from sunlight withdrawal and desperate to feel the warmth of the Sun on their pasty British skin. Maybe I’m being a bit harsh here after all as Beth & I did miss one of the worst winters on record apparently by being out of the country for four months.
We rendezvoused here with Es, Neil, Adam and Alex and their friends Anne & Nigel and headed en masse to the seafront to play Petanque. Oh how I’ve missed Petanque. It’s not so much the game I’ve missed more the chatting with friends, drinking pop, eating ice-cream and generally basking in the Summery-ness of living in a seaside town. I love it. There realy is nothing like it and it made me yearn for the Summer more than ever.

Anyhow, rules established, the Petanque began in earnest, we’d agreed in advance that talking was allowed but not to the detriment of the game. This decision however went right up the pictures and the next two hours were spent chatting, insulting Adam’s technique and generally taking part in a rather half-arsed manner. It was this lack-lustre playing that enabled Es to sneak ahead with three games under her belt. Es, of course, would swear she’s just a better player but I know it was because everyone else was playing so badly. Bitter moi? Of course I’m not.

After Petanque it was time for Pimms in the square. This has become something of a tradition amongst our friends and one that signals (to us at least) the start of the Summer sun. Alex & Es dived into Waitrose and bought a hundred-weight of baked ham along with many other fine foods and we picnicked in the glow of the afternoon sunset. Steve, an old college colleague of mine, also popped along to join us and, once the food had gone and the Pimms had run dry, we took our party (minus Beth, she’d gone to a hen-do) along to the Coopers where we whiled away the night playing the Marshall’s new game ‘Slug or Snail’. Essentially you ask a question with an ‘either / or’ answer and everyone answers it without justification. It didn’t sound like much of a game to me but I quickly found myself hooked. The answers tell you a lot about your friends and it’s kinda fun building up a mental ‘blueprint’ of their psyche.

Tea drunk: 5
Petanque games won: 1
Glasses of Pimms drunk: Several