Well, it’s still sunday, just.

I’ve just watched David Blaine be released from his perspex cocoon on TV, and have basically had today as a lazing-day… but more of that anon.

I am holidaying at home and have a reasonably packed schedule of gardening works to do, started last friday by a buying spree; I went to B&Q, got myself some tin-nippers, an angle-grinder and some other bits and bobs that I lack, thereby increasing my sense of commitment and purpose to the project.

I also spent a couple of hours removing abut 18 inches from the left-hand end of my rockery bed; this space will permit me to install a wooden-sided and metal/fabric lined box that will serve as my compost and clippings heap.

There are pictures of this and more at [crypticide.org] where I shall be accreting some sort of photodiary of my efforts. I hope to finish he composter on monday, and thereby vacate another part of the lawn from the heap of rotted cuttings and clippings that currently occupies it.

I can then move on to the dozen-or-so other tasks.

Saturday – ah, saturday, that was when I went motorcycle shopping and goofed, slightly. The salesguy named a price that was so far below what i was expecting, so I just had to buy one, and totally forgot to haggle. I shall try and make it up to myself by arguing the point for some freebies when I pay the outstanding lump. A nice little stock drz400s is en route, i’ll let you know when it arrives.

Saturday afternoon was the first-half of box building (see website) and a frenzied rush to clean up in time for Alison and Rhun’s housewarming party.

They’ve been married a year now (entirely coincidental that their housewarming should be on this date) and it’s always lovely to see them, not least because:

1. Rhun is a most excellent and generous host,
2. Alison is a good friend and it’s great to catch up, and …
3. I cannot remember the last time that I went to a party which not merely got better as the night wore on but actually survived until past daybreak.

Even having met many of these people at the wedding last year, I wimped-out at 0330hrs after:

• the immediate chili-spuds upon arrival,

• the beer and more beer and more beer,

• the rugby analysis,

• Tom Jones on infinite loop,

• a pleasant chat about mountain bikes with a geek who’s working for Oracle/Ellison but who (like everyone nowadays) wants to get “into security”,

• the beercan grenade explosion – that was at about 0115, i was beginning to doze off at that point but the shock kept me awake for another two hours,

• the beer-thievery and extended chicken-pie consumption,

• the guy who lost it slightly and went into the back garden hunting hedgehogs armed with a mop in case they attacked him,

• the other guy who had recently berated the new owners of his nearby garage for no longer stocking pornography, and who bent their ear saying that this was not acceptable customer service,

• a search through the garage for poles – mops, brooms, tentpoles, etc – so that the girls (and later, the boys) could demonstrate their pole-dancing skills,

• a slightly insane German named Till, wearing a WRF jumper and surreptitiously photographing everything, whilst cheering-on Namibia on the TV “because it was ours before it was yours before it was theirs” as he so concisely put it.

• the other Alison, an attractive, single, blonde, well-dressed former-schoolfriend of Ms Bailey’s, epitomising vivaciousness, popularity, and over whom most of the attendant men spent the evening making fools of themselves. Steve (reading this) will understand this as The Myk Effect, but otherwise it defies easy description.

  To me the most impressive thing was noting how rare person it is, who can drink and dance until past 5am, crash on a sofa in a sleeping bag, sleep rough for five hours and still manage to make an ad-hoc colour-coordinated ensemble of blue pyjama bottoms, a tube top and 2″ heel boots look good, when the rest of us are just plain wrecked.

We mundane remainder were as you would expect after such an ordeal – from caving early I was better than most, although had not managed to sleep through the repeated 4AM serenade of Proclaimers, 500 Miles and Swing Low, Sweet Chariot to some poor person’s answering machine. Rhun was repeatedly sliding off the sofa as he castigated Wales’s inadequately thrashing victory over Tonga. I was grateful to sit back and let the organised people like Till cook bacon sandwiches for everyone.

I regretfully evacuated around noon when the others were off for a walk in the fresh air, got home, cleaned up, had a kip and spent the rest of the day doing domestics and organising for the rest of the week. Insurance requires urgent attention in the morning.

I have also started an effort to systematically rip every CD that I own, in part to use up some of the gigabytes of storage that are at my disposal, but also because some of my older attempts are at a lower bitrate and sound inferior. If I get an ipod for christmas, I feel that I should have something nice-sounding to put upon it.

That said, some of this music is embarrassing, especially compared to what I listen to nowadays. Maybe I need a clean-out.