It's been a loooooong time. Though shorter than eternity.

Yo Boon!

Was so great to chat a bit with you the other day. I hope that the time with your Mum is going ok!

All is good here. I am studying for an exam on Thursday but am thoroughly uninspired. It seems that they cannot even find someone to write their questions in a manner that is understandable to an English-speaking human being. Alas. This is one problem with a country with at least eleven languages!

What are you up to with your Mummy? Is it all going well? How many jobs are you doing at the moment?

The other day, Shaun Pollock came to our church. He is fab. (He used to play cricket for SA and has red hair. I like him very much). This is my only news, really.

It is late and my brain is fragmenting. I love you!

xx

The video is of Nathan and Esther earlier today. I just wanted you to see a bit of them.

Rubbish I am, yes!

Beanery! I have taken ages to write anything, and this will be a meagre offering too! I am in the UK, and it has been hectic to say the least! It has been all go go go and here there and everywhere. As I put on good ol' Facebook, it is beginning to feel like a walking holiday because I have now racked up three days of walking more than 10km around London (today was nearly 15km... I think I might have gone a bit mad).

I'll be back in Dahab on Friday. I'm looking forward to it but they say it is very hot there right now.

EEEEEK I am running out of time before the bear grumbles!! BUT I have been mulling over trip to South Africa again. What say you if I were to put it back even more? I am just thinking that I will be planning to spend the hottest months of next year away from Egypt, so I am thinking June, July and August will be spent elsewhere. If that means I spend three months early in the year with you and then three more months in somewhere else, that will mean I am not much in Egypt and given there are two businesses theoretically in business by then, that might be a bit excessive. So what say you to the plan that I come to you for the hottest months? That might mean that i come for the winter with you, and this might not mean optimum greatness, but i don't mind that, for I will still be with you. What do you think? Would this be an error?

Right, I must go. There is work to be done and a bear who refuses to sleep. I also have an entirely pins and needly foot; it is very unsettling.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Yodles

Hello, Boon!

Am just about to tune in to da radio!

A generally unfocused round-up

Hello Bean.  It's taken me a while to write again.  I think it was because I wanted Grandad to stay at the top of the page - I visited a couple of times and then didn't actually write anything.

I'm not sure I'm going to write too much either, I feel like I am just putting off going to bed. Tis 1am and I should be rejoicing that I have no work to keep me up late, and just go to bed.  I don't even really have anything to write about!  There is not much news to be had.

The heat isn't so bad at the mo - I have been almost entirely staying out of the sun though, and we haven't had too many of those days where the air and the breeze is as hot as the sun.  So normally if you are in the shade, you are comfortable.  These are the good days.  I worry there will be less and less of them as we get into the summer.

I saw on something on facebook - I'm really not quite sure what now - that your bro and Paul went off on a journey to that other England football match.  That must have been slightly better than the Algeria one in the end - did they enjoy it?  What other matches did you and they go to?  Must be so exciting.  Bit rubbish of England to be so, um, rubbish, generally, but what can you do.  It seems like all the big teams wanted to crash out early, there must have been something they wanted to watch on TV.  I think some of the countries have gone a bit OTT about how much it actually matters, like France seems to be in a state of national crisis, and Nigeria has suspended their team from international matches... sounds a bit hysterical to me!  Have they all forgotten that it's only a game?  The England/Germany match was a shocker, wasn't it?  I was too blinded by the injustice of the denied goal that I didn't actually notice that apparently the England team was totally shit all the way through, but I have subsequently been told that they were.

Another Glastonbury has been and gone without me being there.  It's FIVE years since I went, I can't believe it.  I remember once when I was at a festival ----- I think it was Glastonbury, but something is telling me it was Reading, but I think Reading is too late in the summer --- calling you from a payphone there to find out your a-level results :)  Happy days.  You had done very well and I was so happy.

ARGH can i turn the clock back ten years, please?  I am so worried that when I look back on now from the future I will always regret that I have been sad the last few years.  Will I?  I feel like I will regret so much.  I really need to turn things round.  I'm super miserable about the situation I'm in now, and I feel like I am a simmering pot of resentment.  What can I do?

Probably the best immediate answer is go to bed, so that is what I shall do for now.  Besides, I think there are ants up my trouser leg - this is what we get for enjoying the outdoors whilst blog-writing - so I must remove said garment and purge myself of beasties.

Night night Bean xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Grandad

Last night Grandad died. It's been a long time coming, obviously, but nevertheless it was quite something to actually hear the words "Grandad died". It feels like such a strange concept and yet we have all been wanting it to happen on some level for months now - his quality of life has been so low.

The nursing staff at the care home have been great. They phoned Mum on Sunday to say that he had turned a corner on Saturday night be when Mum and Dad went in for their daily visit on Sunday, he seemed to have improved. After that, he got a chest infection and they simply chose not to treat it. I think everyone believed that was the kindest thing to do. He had no strength left to cough and always hated bringing anything up anyway!! So, this morning I heard the very, very sad news that Herbert James Matthew had passed away. What a strange concoction of sadness and relief.

HA!!!

 I posted this on facebook, but it was too good for you to miss.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfamTmY5REw

Ben Folds, being a genius.  You have to be slightly aware of what chatroulette is though - it's a weird website where you connect to random people to chat to.  You can't specify anything about who you talk to, just randomly connects you.  And thus becomes Ben Folds a bigger genius than ever.  :)

Hurrazzle

Ahhhhhhh that was great to see those pics! Were you all painted too? :) Surely you will be for the england match! I will try to watch it - I didn't watch the other but I will watch it and then we can talk about it afterwards!!! I will show Ehab those pics too. The stadium looked very very exciting! I find it funny how the vuvuzelas at the stadia (?!!!) have been talked about nearly MORE than the football. I have another friend who has flown from the UK to go to the england match as well. I wish we had coordinated ourselves to come!!!!!

Anyway the news that I wanted to tell you today is that my cousin Mike was working with your other bro today! They were recording something together for the BBC. Good, no?!

So there isn't so much news now. I've just been working and getting on. I don't feel as sad as I did a few days ago either, getting better. I blame hormones for utter loss of control last weekend.

The camp is quiet again tonight. We have had two empty nights this week which is a bit of a shame but also a bit of a rest! Everyone in town was expecting to be quiet now and then apparently it'll get busier as we get towards July.

Right, I'm off back home. I need some food and I have poop loads of work. I'm quite jealous of you doing fun things! I feel like I haven't done anything fun in a long time, especially with someone I love and loves me back. Booooo. I miss that feeling. I've been only a mum doing boring things for so long. People's facebook photos of all their fun make me bitter and resentful. This is not good. I must find fun. Not tonight however. I might be bad and smoke another cigarette and then leave. That is not good, but it is the way it will be.

xxxxxxxxxx