Highlight of today: chips, with lashings of salad cream.

Rearranging my sitting room has led to the discovery of all sorts of things that I'd forgotten I own. The opening of every box or file meant new wonders being revealed: my PGCE assignments, the girls' evaluation forms from the trip I ran to Sweden, a classic set of photos that I thought were lost forever. There was also, of course, lots of useless tat, which I dealt with using the good ol' fashioned technique of chucking it in the bin. It was quite satisfying to watch it all go.

I just hope that I didn't thow out anything important.

Today I have been mostly distracted by finding things that I didn't know I had (oh - the joys of moving furniture around) and by the evilness that is called the internet, especially this site here.

Today I carried out a sneaky manouvere to liberate two sofas from capitivity in Cheltenham. That mission accomplished, I am now struggling to fit everything into my sitting room. Despite the pushing, shoving and occasional rude word involved with the re-arrangement, it's giving Fatso something to watch, so that makes it all worthwhile. Maybe hamster entertainment is my vocation in life.

It makes you laugh, doesn't it?!

Isn't science great?

I've just paid over £140 to get my car cleaned and valeted, which seems a bit steep, but it's good quality work. I dropped the Madmobile off in its usual dirty state at 8.30am, and found it sparkling clean at 12pm. Magic! I'm lead to believe that nice men in boilersuits did some tinkering under the bonnet too, but that's not really relevant. They even managed to remove the mud ground into the carpets by hoards of Guides on numerous camps and canoeing trips.

Luckily the garage people didn't open the boot, which contains a large number of empty packets of Galaxy Minstrels (food of choice for long drives), a couple of old newspapers and a Super-Soaker. I feel that this says something about my character. I'm just not sure what.

Spam count: 68 accepted, 198 rejected.

Mua ha ha ha!!!

Home, sweet home. Sighs of relief for the following reasons:
1. My car's still where I left it, complete with all wheels.
2. No-one's broken in and nicked my computer/CD collection/viola. Mind, not many would find these items nick-worthy, but it was a slight worry.
3. Fatso is looking remarkably mobile, ergo, not dead.
4. Assorted others, including my own bed and being able to watch the reams of spam being rejected by my mail filters. Woo hoo!!

Holiday thought for today: human bodies really do come in all shapes and sizes. But speedo swimming trunks should be banned.

Have just finished reading The Map of Love, so 3 books down, 5 to go...

Both Poisonwood Bible and Map are based in countries about which I know very little - respectively The Belgian Congo as was (which is now, of course, Zaire) and Egypt. Both books are set against a background of political turmoil, intervention by the USA and the negative impact caused by this foreign intrusion into domestic politics. It made me realise quite how little I know of the world in which we live - I feel quite ashamed by my lack of knowledge - and on my return to the UK I am going to search out some good books that fill in all the gaps in my understanding of the world.

On a similar subject, I found a passage in Small Gods that made me laugh, seeing as it was echoing sentiments I expressed to Kate only yesterday:

The Ephebians believed that every man should have the vote. Every five years someone was elected to be Tyrant, provided he could prove that he was honest, intelligent, sensible and trustworthy. Immediately after he was elected, of course, it was obvious to everyone that he was a criminal madman and totally out of touch with the view of the ordinary philosopher in the street looking for a towel. And then five years later they elected another one just like him, and really it was amazing how intelligent people kept on making the same mistakes.

So true, so true. Maybe I can get it typed out, laminted and put on the wall in my classroom.

Holiday - all the usual superlatives and hyperbole apply to the hotel, the pool, the food, the weather.... I shan't go on about it because it gets quite tedious eventually. The big decisions of the day are of the magnitude of "Swim or sleep?" "Lie on front or back?" "Salad or pudding?" I've coped OK so far, but suspect that inaction will be driving me barmy by the end of the week. I've been saved by the books - I've managed to read 2 so far (Small Gods and The Poisonwood Bible - cheers Charl for the recommendation!). I've also listened to oodles of CDs and eaten my way through several squillon calories. Now I've discovered the internet terminals in the hotel's lobby I am feeling much happier: able, at last, to catch up with news that is not related to Iraq.

Finally for now, something that made me laugh (discovered via Mal's site).

Changed me mind. Couldn't be bothered to unpack (not since it all went so neatly into Kate's littlest suitcase first time round) so looks like I'm heading off out of here after all. Catch you in a week's time!! Enjoy...

A holiday-related reminder from a reader:

ice cream is not a breakfast food.

That's blown all of my plans then. Forget it; I'm not going now. After all, who'd want to go to a place named after a big yellow bird?

Packing all done. Even whittling the CD collection down to a transportable number was achieved with very little pain. Smug grins and self-congratulatory back-slapping all round.

One last minute shopping trip to Burton has solved the Ribena crisis. It's also filled one or two gaps in my collection of sun creams and other holiday-type potions. The packing is progressing steadily (which is teacher-speak for not really progressing at all) and although nothing has actually made it into any sort of bag/suitcase, I have now assembled the books I intend to read during this week, which are, in no particular order:

Feet of Clay - Terry Pratchett
Small Gods - Terry Pratchett
The Map of Love - Ahdaf Soueif
Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow - Peter Hoeg
Miss Wyoming - Douglas Coupland
Possession - A. S. Byatt
Cat's Eye - Margaret Attwood
The Edible Woman - Margaret Attwood
The Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kingsolver

Some of these are favourite reads, others are brand-spanking new and bought on a whim or a recommendation; either way I'm looking forward to a week spent immersed in other people's words and worlds. The only problem I can envisage is that of persuading the nice people at the airport check-in that I'm within my luggage allowance! :-)

OK, it's crisis time. I've run out of Ribena. Yaaaargh.

Have just realised that I've not arranged a holiday home for Fatso... Anyone able to look after a hamster this week - he's very cute, easy to care for, doesn't bite, unlikely to die? No? Oh dear...

I have a sneaking suspicion that packing is going to turn into a last minute frenzy, with piles of clothes, books and other assorted junk scattered across the flat in a seemingly random way which is nonetheless highly structured and deeply methodical. It's the chaos theory approach to holiday preparation, working on the theory that chaos now means that it's going to be just fine later on. At least, that's what I'm trying to persuade myself.

Am very sleepy. Not just due to Mr Worthington's finest, you understand, but also due to the overall excitment of today: baby piggies and sheepies in Liverpool this morning; a train journey; a haircut (An haircut? I'm not sure, grammatically); a jaunt to the Red Lion and the Legion; and then 2 games of snooker (sadly losing both). How can a mere mortal as myself cope with such frivolity? Have just spent an hour catching up on tonight's news, and am now due a little snooze.

I go on holiday in just over 24 hours time. I haven't packed. I haven't even thought about what to pack. The most important thing is 'Which books to pack?' I've run out of decent stuff here at home and within the next 24 hours I will have to hit Ottakers/Waterstones/anyone else who considers themselves to be purveyors of fine literature in an attempt to sort my holiday entertainment. Suggestions of decent reading material via the box to your right, please.