Thanks Terry

Dad collects a small dent in the side of the C4, thanks to "posh bloke" in Peugeot 406 coupe who obviously needs more practise parking. Posh bloke was looking like not reporting this and seemed to have his eye on some kind of cash transaction to make it go away. Dad is having none of it as the terms of his 'lease' involve the main dealer doing the repair and the associated insurance company being fairly feirce but it all works out Ok in the end. Posh bloke does notify his insurer and claims responsibility, so dealer waives Dad's excess and all is sweetness and light. This is handy given that C4 will likely get chopped in as part of Project Erroll.

Talking of which, a mountain of paperwork arrives from the conveyancing legal beagles, and Mum and Dad have to sign away in detail what's included in the sale. How many people seriously decamp with their loft insulation bagged up under their arm? They even had to sign they were taking Albert who is legally a 'garden ornament' (HA! ROFLMAO! as we teenagers have it*). Mum and Dad must also prove they are not money launderers, although quite how you'd launder the profits of a highly visible house sale into a more legal format, I know not. Perhaps we all have too innocent a mind to think up anything so devious.

Meanwhile we are up at the allotment weeding yet more onion patch today and we meet up with all those folks who we never used to see when Dad was in full time employ, John G and the rather portly "Maxie" for one, Dave P and his scruffy terrier, Drayman Nick and the new plot holder who lives on a boat in the Iron Wharf who Dad can not currently remember the name of.

Deefs

*Rolling on floor laughing my a** off

Hottest Easter

The hottest Easter for ages continues, all be it with a bit of a chilly evening last night, when Mum and Dad had been invited round to Diamond's for a superb roast lamb dinner. We dogs were left behind on the grounds that it was too hot, but I suspect that my 'ambivalent' feelings towards Rags may have been taken into account. Diamond jokes around with Mum and Dad about them 'deserting her' when Project Erroll comes off and cooks superb food to make sure they miss her! Dad's favourite gratin potatoes and Diamond's home made ice cream feature.

On these really hot days, Dad takes us for our main walk really early - we were out by 20 to 7 this morning when the dew is still all over the oil seed rape and the bunnies have not yet woken up to the fact that humans and dogs may be up and about. At one stage a rabbit runs away from me down the lane but then turns left into the waist (on Dad!) high rape. All Dad can see for a while is the tops of flowers twitching as I crash about out of sight in the field. He whistles and claps and shouts. Eventually, I am done, and I emerge looking like a drownded rat but with a superb bright yellow slick up my spine, of rape petals.

Dad's been down at the barge, of course, over the weekend, painting 'below decks' and re-oiling the top mast. The Creek is starting to empty of barges now, as each one emerges from its poly-tunnel cocoon, gets its gear up and slides down to the Swale on a Spring tide. Greta heads for Whitstable, Lady Daphne and Repertor for London. Only the infirm and locally-owned are still around, and of course the 'not-quite-ready' like Cambria herself.

It is a Spring tinged with sadness, as no-one is certain whether the over-wintering in Faversham will continue and the barges return in the autumn. The Landlord of the Standard Quay has not renewed the lease of the operating company, and looks like , in effect, turfing all the shipwrights, boat builders and dry-dock users with their noise, clutter, tools and piles of wood, off in favour of wine bars, restaurants and the like, keeping some barges in place just for show. Where they will go for repairs, servicing, winter refits, sail-dressing etc, nobody knows - maybe Essex? Medway? Iron Wharf? Whitstable?

It seems like the end of an era.

Deefs

ps - Dad is baking bread, so we have to keep putting down this keyboard and doing baker stuff. Mrs Silverwood would be proud of us.

Huskies!

Lovely walk this morning all down round the Creek and the Iron Wharf, where we got a chance to corner a tabby cat. Scary. Up close the cat transformed into an enormous beast of twice my weight, with big teeth and big slashing claws on long front legs. I was contemplating how to withdraw with face saved, when Dad pounced on me by the collar and dragged me away - I noticed that even he was giving the cat a wary, wide berth. Haggis and Megan were nowhere.

Dignity restored then, tonight when we can shout bravely at the yapping huskies on the Top Gear North Pole Special (a repeat but Dad had missed it first time round). He loves that programme but I must admit we normally sleep through it. Not this time - every few minutes something would set the dogs off and Haggis and I would have to charge around the living room and out to the back door, just in case the sledge dogs were upon us!

Deefer

Pics of the Iron Wharf

Hi. I keep talking about the local creek and the boat yard (Iron Wharf and Standard Quay) where the old Thames Sailing Barges are restored and maintained, but it occurred to me that I've never given you any pictures. Here are a couple to sort that out.

The first (if they stay in the same order when I press "publish") is of me chasing around on the quay-side with Greta's barge-dog Alfie. who is great fun. Sorry about the back view of the ship-wright man who snuck in there.

The grassy one is the three of us approaching the boatyard along the creek side path. In the distance stands a typical reefed in "sprit-sail"rig but this boat, the "Alice of Rochester" is, I am told, not a "real" old sailing barge, but a converted lighter, made to look like a barge top-sides. The rigging and masts look genuine enough to me, but then, I'm only a pup, so what do I know?

Finally, that's me chasing Alfie and a passer-by terrier "Dotty" around the quayside again, with the blue and yellow striped sprit pole of Decima behind us, the gear lowered for winter maintenance. The quay side is actually streaked with the oily mixture (I think lanolin, veg oil and ochre) with which the guys paint the terracotta coloured sails to preserve them. Lovely smelly mess, great for a white dog to roll in and chest-plough through till they get shouted at. Personally, I can't think of a nicer thing for a westie to "ming" of, but Meggie prefers dead slugs or fox poo.

The gear is designed to be lowered, by the way, so that the barges could get under the Thames bridges. They'd sail up to them, getting plenty of way on, then quickly drop the rigging and let the momentum carry them under, before raising the masts again the other side. So Dad says anyway.

Coo - what an educational post we're having tonight

Deefer