The weekend saw the girls and I in Wales. The weather lived up to its reputation, with the rain and gusty wind mixing it up with sunshine, just enough of the rays to trick us on to the beach ( in wet suits), with time for A to make one sandcastle before we were retreating to the car, bath and watching a DVD of Annie under a duvet. Claire and Ingemar live in a very comfortable little estate house in a village a few miles from the coast at Porthcawl. I went for a run from their door, within 2 minutes I was in proper countryside with stawberries growing in the hedgerows. Dragged the girls up there for a walk later, they liked the muddy puddles but we didn't cover the same ground. We got to Wales by train, which is something between a challenge and a joy. the train reservation system seemed to break down on the way home, when another lady had the same seat reservation as me, so she sat on my lap from Bristol to Swindon. The girls were generally good, with me displaying saintly patience for most of the miles, except the Bristol to Swindon ones.

The beaches around Porthcawl are fabulous, sandy, but sadly the wind made surfing lessons impossible for us, we just watched from a steamed up car. We had fish and chips in a smart retro style diner, with a Dyson airblade hand drier which always elevates establishments into my top 3. The chips were a bit pasty looking, clearly the Welsh like their chips semi raw.

Several times I noticed a van which was advertising 'Dunromin' double glazing, with the tag line 'your dreams - our reality.' Now, that is weird. My most recurrent dream is the first day of term eve one ( all teachers will get this one in some guise or other) where I am a teacher, but all the children are the ones who were in my class at junior school. So there I am trying to keep control over Rolf Neset, Jo Pank, Jo Lobo, Lizzi Huggins, Mark Lane ( holidayed in Greece - how posh - dad a police officer), Adrain Stockbridge ( lived near me and we once did homework together)Mark Blakely Smith (holidayed in Crete, dad also a police officer), Richard Pierce (one of my favourite funny boys), Lydia Rushton (burnt lip kissing her reflection in a kettle), Vicki Woodhouse, Mel Cross, Andrew Osborne, Martin Poet, Emma something ( mum into organic food - this is the 1980s!)Anna Gosling, Nikki Smith, Carla Mc Gilchrist, Jenni Lynch, Michelle Wells( think she may have died of a brain tumour - along with 2 other people who lived on the same road - surely not a coincidence?), Patrick Barker, David Billet ( hole in the heart, mum's a faith healer hippie type)... sorry if I missed you off the list. I was the clever girl with lots of black curly hair who was really good at maths back then...)

Anyhow, the point is, how weird that this double glazing firm live in that kind of reality, where the teacher is surrounded by her peers who slowly begin an uncontrollable riot.

We went to Claire's church on the Sunday, an interesting mix of total devotions to Isaiah 58 and serving the poor in their community, with a very Welsh take on the big worship experience thing. As the most charismatic our gatherings get is a shut eye or two, the girls were a bit clingy and no sure how to take the loud utterances of Jesus and Alleluia etc etc from the stage. I really don't do churches with stages and lights on the worship team, but forgave them as they are so good at the gospel! If you wondered where Mark Knopfler ended up, he's playing the guitar in a church near Bridgend. Man, he sounded worse than Pete Kitts on his toilet guitar. I mean better, if that's possible.

Further to my plan to get around Easy Jet's tight baggage allowance by wearing our wetsuits on the flight, I tried mine on today ( it arrived at the weekend). Wow, its tight. Wished I had told R I was a size 14 and could have had a chance at lung function. I recall this problem with a wetsuit before, when I bought one in 2000 from a lady in Warsash. I passed that on to Deb, so if you know her, you get the picture. ( For the benefit of non Deb fans, she is one of the thinnest people I know).

I have found a couple of new triathlons to enter, so please holler if you want to join in. It's fun! And you might surprise yourself. Sadly the sailing wetsuit seems not to cut the mustard (huh) when it comes to tri suits, so will be continuing in pools only, can't bear the idea of a lake yet. My new school has a swimming pool, which will hopefully make up for it not having a projector in the classroom. I cycled there today to meet my new jobshare partner, and if I had just taken a dip and ran around the field I could have invented a new triathlon. The school field is huge, bigger than any I have ever seen. Literally stretches to the horizon. It was a rough bike ride, due to the bad wind (not my own), with the twin towers at the top of the hill causing a funnel effect I was literally cycling and getting nowhere. I came home through a steelement that is very near my home but which I had never come across before, its called Buttocks Heath, and is near Netley Abbey, it has a store and 2 pubs, and seems to be a pleasant enough little place. Weird that I had driven and ridden so near it but never through it before. It's really near Tescos at Burseldeon.

Butlocks Heath. Sorry.