Sandy

When left to my own devices I tend to naturally wake up around 8-8:30am and then laze around in bed for a bit. Today was no exception and I wasn’t up until about 10am. We’d made a list of some of the things for the flat and decided to get them this morning rather than add them to a list for our next visit. We didn’t really find what we wanted but it was a little walk in the sunshine. The skies are blue and the weather is surprisingly warm. The beach looked lovely and, after all, that’s why we embarked on this Isle of Wight adventure.

When we got back to the flat the indoor thermometer was showing 27 degrees. We’ve only kept one of the night storage heaters on when we are not here and I was worried that the place would be cold but it’s sufficient to heat the flat and, when the sun is shining into the living room, maybe it’s even a bit too warm.

The previous owner had left a wall bracket to mount a television in the living room. We don’t want such a big TV, nor do we want it wall-mounted. When we returned from the shops I started looking to see what tools I would need to bring next time and, to my surprise, saw that the are nowhere near as many fixings as I imagined. Within ten minutes we had it dismantled. That’s our big win for the day.

The journey back to London was surprisingly easy given the direct train from Portsmouth is only going as far as Woking at the moment. We opted for the joinery that needed a change at Guildford and took a couple of minute longer than the two change version via Woking and Wimbledon.

On the way home I finished ‘Tracks of My Years’, the Ken Bruce autobiography. It’s almost ten years old now so doesn’t cover the last few years when his mid-morning Radio Two programme became the [most listened to show on the UK radio](https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/feb/05/how-radio-2-veteran-ken-bruce-became-a-no-1-hit). It was a lovely read. I was particularly interested in his months as breakfast show presenter when he took over from Terry Wogan (in the 80s when Terry went to television). I often wonder about people how take over from such a big show: how can you make the slot your own?

Back in London we had a bit of a lazy evening. I put some washing on but messed up the settings for a longer wash than I planned. It didn’t finish until almost 11pm. PY went through the cupboards to find dinner (Tuna-pasta bake) and we had an enjoyable evening with the new series of the Masked Singer (which gets more ridiculous the more I watch it) and another episode of Slow Horses.