By the time we'd tidied
up after last night's dinner party it was rather late. Even so, we
sat and watched telly for a bit. There was a dodgy moment when I
stood up - my knee bent backwards. If I hadn't grabbed the table it
might have done some serious damage: as it is, the knee has been
quite painful today.
Having had a late night
I was hoping for a lie-in this morning: instead I was woken at about
7am by next door shrieking at their dogs. I tried to get back to
sleep, but didn't. Instead I dozed fitfully. I really should just get
up on these weekend mornings rather than lying there, unable to sleep
and bursting for a tiddle. I eventually got up, and had the weekly
weigh-in. Another pound gone. I've now lost fifty pounds and am under
fifteen stone for the first time in years. In fact, I only have to
lose two more pounds and I will no longer be obese, but merely
overweight. According to the figures I still have to lose another
thirty seven pounds to get into the "healthy"
range. I wonder if that will eventually happen?
There was a bit of a
disaster in the garden - three of the Koi were dead. I'm putting it
down to old age - fish do die from time to time, but three at once
is a tad excessive. I'm hoping that there's nothing serious going
wrong in the pond. It was my plan to leave the pond alone until it
gets a bit warmer; I didn't expect to have to do anything with it
until April at least.
And then I popped round
to see Brian: he had some masking tape I wanted for artistic
purposes.
I came back home to find
"My Boy TM" visiting. He had
stayed overnight with a friend who had during the course of last
night struck up a friendship with a young lady of dubious morals.
"My Boy TM" had been unable to
sleep because of his friend and the young lady "going at it
like a pair of bison". Which was nice for them, but not so
good for anyone in the general vicinity who was trying to get some
shut-eye.
I set the washing
machine loose on my shirts, and then delivered the vacuum cleaner to
"Daddies Little Angel TM" who was
helping her pal move into the house just round the corner. I came
home and ironed the shirts whilst "Daddies Little Angel TM"
and her pal used our table to eat their KFC. Apparently the tables at
her mate's house house are under several feet of clutter, I wasn't
complaining: I got to scoff the left over chicken.
Pausing only briefly to
pull another dead fish out of the pond (what's going on !),
the Rear Admiral arrived with Stevey, and we set off for the
evening's excitement. Earlier in the week I mentioned about the BBC
program "Stargazing Live". Whilst I wasn't
personally impressed with the TV show, it certainly raised the
awareness of astronomy in the minds of the general public.
We were using the scout
hunt in Woodchurch, Personally I prefer the Memorial hall, but that
wasn't available. We arrived early to set up, but found a hive of
activity already going strong. And once we'd set up, the punters
arrived. Drew gave an excellent talk involving the audience, and just
as he finished speaking we got the message that the sky had clouded
up. Which was just what we needed for a stargazing event (!).
So we had tea and a chat, and then we used the stellarium software to
show people what they would have seen had there been no clouds. And
then I wittered on about the Fermi Paradox and the Drake Equation for
fifteen minutes.
Being still unable to see
anything through the clouds we rounded the evening off with an "ask
an astronomer"
session in which the
assembled throng had the opportunity to ask questions of a panel of
experts (and me!)
For all that I've been
rather unimpressed with the Stargazing Live TV show, the evening went
really well. This was the astro club's fourth big event, and again it
was done excellently. With seventeen members having volunteered to
help the committee this evening, the club is going from strength to
strength.
Mind you I must admit
that I felt for my father-in-law: on this his first ever visit to the
astro club he was dragooned into doing the washing-up. And I feel I
need to make it clear that the catering was not done by the club, but
was provided by an outside concession. The club makes great show of
the fact that we run on a "not for profit" basis -
we just cover our costs. So (on that basis) I couldn't believe
that burgers were being touted at four quid each. Next time maybe we
might do the catering ourselves: I did hear someone volunteer to do
just that...
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