on our own...

A bit of a sad day today - I think we are experiencing something like empty nest syndrome as we no longer have our visitors with us.  We had such a great long weekend and now it is all quiet again.  We are exhausted so apologies to Diana but I just had to wimp out of gym this morning - the call of my bed was just toooooooooo much.

We were pleased to hear that Tommy and Sally had got home safely although they had pulled over for a snooze on the way home and didn't arrive until 4.00am - so glad they both had the day off today.

Without the gym we had a lazy day before going to badminton and pickleball - it gave me a chance to catch up with some bits and pieces but sadly not with the washing as we were going to be out this afternoon when the temperature cools and the washing starts to get damp - by the time we get home it can be wetter than when we put it out!

I had some wine left over from making the stifado for the weekend - it had been hanging about in the bottle for too long so I decided that I would use it to make some wine vinegar - after some discussion and Googling we found a nice easy recipe - three parts white vinegar to one part red wine and mix and leave for a bit - how easy is that and if it isn't any good I haven't really lost anything as I wasn't going to be using the red wine for anything else.

I hate throwing anything away so breakfast for John was banana smoothies as we had some of them looking well past their best lurking in the fruit basket!  I failed with the bread though - that had gone to meet its maker good and proper and was nicely green and fluffy - that had to go.

There was some stifado left over so with the addition of some boiled potatoes and stuffed into the slow cooker we had supper sorted for when we returned from Paphos - John just loves it when we get home and the house is nice and tidy, supper is on the go, the water is hot for a shower and we can snuggle up and watch some TV together with all the cats around us.

When I arrived at Pickleball someone had set the alarm off - last time that happened was when John inadvertently hit one of the sensors during a game.  No-one knows quite what caused it this time.

The hall has already been trimmed up ready for Christmas and (a) it is only mid November and (b) Christmas is not really a Cypriot celebration!

I read on the tintyweb today that for every decoration that goes up before December the elves kill a baby reindeer!!!  Any way it always tickles me that the security lighting in the room is made to look like Deputy Dawg!!!

So a good run round at pickleball and John had a good session at badminton and that at least made up a little bit for all the food and drink over the weekend and missing out on both the Gym and belly dancing.

I went off to Alpha Mega with Mum afterwards - this is a nice shop - it is our 'Waitrose' experience as it is rather more up market than Paps - we don't have one in Polis so I rarely go in but we had gone into the one in Scarinou on Thursday and bought some catfood that the cats seemed to like so wanted to get some more.  I also like to have a dig around downstairs in the homeware bit and was looking for a gift for Sharon's upcoming birthday - I managed to find something thankfully.

Dinner was ready when we got back - the water was hot and we did exactly what John wanted to do - battened down the hatches, lit the candles, put on some mindless TV and ate our supper accompanied by the four felines. We quite like the fact that winter is on its way!