NotSheep

Okay, it’s been nearly three whole days without email now - and I’m not a happy camper :-(. At this point I’m looking for a new hosting company, despite having paid up to July on one website and up to next January on the other. Of course the email I should have received in the last three days will be gone forever if I do switch hosts now - so do I hang in there and hope we’re back up tomorrow, or do I cut my losses and run?

Today wasn’t great overall, really. Barney and George had circus school this morning instead of last night (because of the Easter holidays), so we had to walk into town for 10am. Normally Scratchy would take the train so I could have the car, but the train service to where he works has been suspended until about December so they can upgrade the line. There’s a bus replacement service, but a) it’s slower and b) you can’t take your bike on the bus, so he has to walk the bits at either end.

Anyway, circus school was fine, though I didn’t have time to eat beforehand, so by the time it finished at noon, I was really ready to stuff my face. The kids had asked if we could go to Pizza Hut, so we did - to find queues outside it, which would have been understandable had half the tables inside not been empty! According to the manager, they didn’t have enough serving staff - and it didn’t really matter that most customers wanted the buffet so didn’t actually need a lot of serving, nor that all the customers in the queue agreed that they’d much rather be sitting inside waiting to be served than standing outside waiting to be seated! After about 20 minutes we gave up and headed off to look for somewhere else - unsuccessfully, since most places weren’t open. There really isn’t enough restaurant competition in this town; there isn’t enough of anything positive really. A friend of mine once called it “a wasteland of chain-stores and housing estates” and that pretty much sums it up. Anyway, I went to the bank, then phoned a taxi to take us home. The “be there in 5 minutes” taxi took half an hour to show up, and then refused to take us because there were five of us - never mind that the same company has taken us all at least twice before now. To say I was annoyed would be an understatement

So - we ended up walking home; by the time we got here, I was ready to just rip my pelvis out altogether. I swear this baby is going to come out and head straight for the trampoline. It was about 3pm before we got home, kids hadn’t had lunch, I hadn’t eaten since last night - we were not a happy bunch. So cheese toasties and quick-cook ravioli all round, and then collapsing-in-heaps for everyone.

Booked a few more house-viewings, still waiting to hear back about some others. This house-hunting lark isn’t half tiresome - let’s just hope we eventually find somewhere that makes it all worthwhile.