Remember Tommy Dickfingers? They found him in a wheelie bin, with snooker balls for eyes.

After a very long week, I have been having a really lovely weekend. Wednesday, Thursday and Friday were very intensive at work as on each day, we had a meeting lasting from 9am to 6pm, making the necessary changes to the Mathematics questions that will be used for this year's tests. It was extremely tiring but very satisfying work, and I felt very proud with the contribution I had made.

I was on the 6:30 train out of London and Nic met me at the station in Leamington. We walked up through Jephson Gardens as the sun was setting and got some chips from the Lansdowne Fish Bar, which was a very exciting treat! On the way up I bought a bottle of wine, and we had a very pleasant evening of watching a DVD and enjoying the fact that I didn't have to get up for work the following morning! I did get up reasonably early, however, as I had arranged to meet my a friend for breakfast at Cafe Corleone. We sat by an open window to enjoy the sunshine, and had a very delicious breakfast - I had a crepe with banana and nutella and she had scrambled eggs and smoked salmon, which looked great! We pottered around in some of the shops afterwards, and I found Pair of Shoes No. 23 in Oxfam:

I also found a copy of Rani and Sukh by Bali Rai in a charity shop, which I decided Mrs Z must read, so I'll be interested to see what she thinks of it when she has time to read it.

After Mrs Z headed home, I paid a visit to Web of Wool to buy some crochet hooks - all of mine have been dispersed among my various friends and family! I had some reservations about the shop because I'd had a weird shopping experience in there previously, but it couldn't have been more different this time and I left feeling very satisfied with my ergonomic crochet hook and also a beautiful wooden one. I've photographed them here alongside another new acquisition, my owl handbag:


I walked down to join Nic in the park to take in some of the sunshine, and shortly after Tom and Sugar Plum came along. I felt very happy to feel the grass under my feet, and to be able to spend time with the people I love. Sugar Plum and I went off into town to do a little bit of shopping and to catch up, and before I knew it, it was 5:30 - it's amazing how quickly time goes by when Sugar Plum and I are nattering away to one another. Nic and I had made plans to go to Tom's house to watch the new episode of Doctor Who, and we had some time before it started to sit out on the roof terrace and enjoy the end of the sunshine. I had many reservations about the episode - I wasn't convinced by the first episode of the new series, and I really hate the RTD era of Who. However, I loved this episode. It helped that it had been written by Mark Gatiss, who pitched the Daleks just right. He even included one of my favourite ever Daleks, the Tea Tray Dalek from the first Dalek serial. I think that Matt Smith is really excellent as the Doctor, and I thoroughly enjoyed watching the episode with Nic and Tom. Our evening was great craic - we drank wine, ate pizza and watched this episode of Frasier and some Laurel and Hardy. Although I was very tired by the time we walked home, I felt happy and completely relaxed. I have truly wonderful friends, and spending time with them is a tonic.

Today Nic and I spent some time in the park, and I broke in my new shoes:

The first time I've worn my Laura Lees dress this year.

We had lunch in the park and then decided to come home, and our plan this evening is to watch It Happened One Night. I have to rest up for the very busy week I have ahead of me. If I don't get enough rest, I'll end up looking like this:

That wouldn't be ideal at all.