Fun in the Sun

Another foreign collage but the opportunity is just too good to miss and I am after all of the diary and storyteller Blip Brigade.  And perhaps more importantly, recording a day of scorching heat in Ireland during the first week of May is probably some kind of record. Lots more images of topless men's torsos but the straining muscles and 6-packs of the three lads would have been far too much excitement for most female Blip members.

J flew into Dublin and this time he had pre-booked a hire car rather than take the bus to Cavan. Seemingly a great deal from Germany's Munich HQ'd Sixt - £18 for 3 days. However, at the airport hire desk, there was a queue longer than at Legoland on a Bank Holiday. Seemingly everyone had heard about the deal. When he got to the head, he was told the Nissan Micras were all gone and asked whether it was OK to have a German VW Passat automatic? He reluctantly agreed.

On arrival in Cavan, the first job was celebrating niece Charlotte's Official Birthday with Mum's second cake in three days. There then followed an afternoon of messing about in the garden and on the drive with Barry's German Munich HQ'd BMW motorbike. And as it got a bit cooler, the lads got to work on building a pizza oven alongside the terrace. At least I assume it is as there had been some WhatsApp chat between them earlier in the week. J seemingly doing his building foreman management bit while Barry does the hard work.

Photos of the rest of the day or better evening did not follow, I suspect matters got liquid. Although daughter Kate didn't show herself but kindly did the photographing, it was simply lovely to see the three lads and Charlotte having such a great time and especially uplifting that they all get on so well together. Nice for son in law Barry to also wind down after the trials and tribulations of his father's illness of the last few months and the funeral just three days ago. The one sad note today was that Auntie Laura couldn't join J for the trip. Charlotte in particular will miss having her very favourite female company.

It was lovely here too, I have had to connect the swimming pool heating as the pipes that run over a garden shed roof are threatening to explode in the heat. Angie complaining as always now that the temperature is over 20°C. However, we still aren't covering it and nighttime temperatures getting down to around 6°C. On the terrace in the shade today it was around 32°C.

Thanks to the lack of effort in previous weeks and months, I was banned to the greenhouse where it was over 40°C. I drank copious amounts of German/Bavarian "Radler" - 50/50 Beer and Lemonade. By dinner time, I barely managed to finish before crashing out on the sofa and waking up four hours later. Don't think I have slept that long in one go for last eight years (or in Charlotte's lifetime).

Flash did well despite the heat. Although he slept all afternoon in the cool of the tiled floor house, he did some long spells following Angie mucking up the horse fields and even at dusk helped her to take the horses out to the field outside the property. And he had a wonderful night, not wanting to go out once and I almost had to force him to get up at 6:00 am (Monday).

Not a (Bank) Holiday here in Germany/Bavaria on Monday. Here WE do the strange thing of celebrating events on the day they happen. So the 1st May happens on ..... strangely the 1st May, just as Christmas Day is celebrated on 25th December not as in the UK when that day happens to fall on a weekend.

I am quite enjoying writing "German/Bavarian". I hope my three-day membership of the nation is not making me nationalistic!