Busy, busy..

It's a dreary, dreary rainy Saturday. Luckily I got out into the garden yesterday for a rather belated Autumn tidy-up. I swept the leaves, cut the grass (it's not posh enough to be a lawn) and cleared leaves from my little pond. Sadly, there's only one fish left in there (I think) because I have fished out three dead ones over the last month or so. Not sure what has killed them off, but my biggest one was more than three years old, so I suppose he had had a good run, or swim! I can't be sure if there are any others because there's so much weed in the deep part that I can't see if any little ones are hiding. My frog hasn't been seen for a while, but that's normal. And I do think that my new neighbour's new cats may have been partly guilty for the demise of the fish. Young Thomas the tomcat may be frightening them to death!

Daughter is getting into a panic about moving, and has started packing boxes already. I have promised to go and help her, but I do fear that we may be packing stuff she will eventually throw away. I remember when Son moved to London, he just threw stuff into boxes which are now in my loft. If he ever looks at them again, I'm a monkey's uncle. Anyway, when Daughter finds somewhere, she can have her own boxes of rubbish in her own loft. My time for storing their cast-offs is over. I want my loft back. Actually, I want my loft empty.

Have listed a few more things on eBay, though nothing seems to have aroused much interest. I have such a collection of old pieces of linen, embroidery and lace, and I just don't want to hang on to them any more. It's a cleansing process, getting rid of stuff, and if I can sell them for a few bob it all helps.

I have some more French visitors coming next week: the auntie of one of my friend's neighbours (sort that one out), is coming on Wednesday for three nights. She wants some English conversation as well as B & B. And then next Saturday my French Student's parents are coming over to see how she is getting on in her job and her flat. I haven't seen her since she left a couple of weeks ago, but have had one message and she seems fine. It will be rather nice to have someone to talk to properly; conversation with my current Student is stilted to say the least. Today he had to resort to the dictionary for something or other, but I still couldn't understand what it was.

Some writing work has turned up, for a client in Portugal. They produce and sell high quality bathmats, ranges of towels etc. This time last year I wrote their new Catalogues and some Press Releases, which was pretty lucrative and good fun. This year they have contacted me by email, and seem to have done away with the services of the Designer I worked with last year. This could make the job quite tricky, because she was Portuguese and was able to translate their abysmal efforts at English. I have read through their 'brief',and it's obvious that I will have to do a lot of preliminary work on decoding what they actually mean. They use phrases like 'Young and Sport' and 'Spa-Terapy Hotel!' (the exclamation is theirs) to describe products and have suggested some slogans: 'Getting Up' and 'Surround You' are two examples (which sound quite rude to me). Their favourite is 'Premium Home Living Concept'. But perhaps their best effort is "Bringing a glance of Nature into your everyday Living." It's obvious how much they need me. Come to think of it, 'Premium Home Living Concept' sounds like something Tesco would be selling...