Saturday 21 April 2012: Monsoon

This should not really have been today's blip but, as so often seems to happen with me, the best laid plans went to pot - this time because I had the aperture settings on the camera all wrong and what looked like nice shots on the little screen turned out to be hopelessly blurred when I downloaded them to the computer. I usually do zoom in to check, but for some reason omitted to do it this afternoon - probably because T. and I were talking so much!

I went over to her wonderful home this afternoon to catch up with her over several cups of tea. I don't see her that often, but am always left with a good feeling when our paths cross and I wish it could be more frequently. T. is such a wonderfully inspirational person, always full of ideas, encouragement and often a refreshingly 'different' take on the bizzare situations that life seems to throw at us. Today, in between her regaling me with fabulous tales of her family's recent trip to Bhutan and listening to my account of The Nelson Experience to date, she managed to offer some very practical advice and recommend a good medical specialist in London in a field that I had been wracking my brains about only this morning!

T. is a very creative person and her light-filled house is beautifully decorated in vivid colours with an eclectic mix of fabrics, furnishings and treasures picked up around Bahrain and on the family's travels - it's a little like magic. When you add the whistles and clicks of the three parrots (all of whom just 'arrived' at the house over time!) in the background; the cat casually reclining on the dining table and the Salukis wandering in and out, the feeling of being on some sort 'feel-good' film set is complete. Both my daughters long to live in such a house!

Of course, I did take some photos but sadly they were too blurred to be blippable - though I have uploaded one to my blipfolio so you can see how nice it would have been had I not messed it up. I really surpassed myself today!

This evening Nicky, Hamish, Immy and I went to have dinner at Monsoon, an excellent Thai restaurant in Adliya. The last time I was there was on the famous progressive dinner, when we lost the scissors while making a scrapbook! It seemed very quiet this evening, perhaps because it's the Grand Prix tomorrow and there was a lot of high-profile entertainment down at the F1 circuit this evening, including some major international acts that Immy would apparently have loved to have seen. This photo was taken after dinner, showing the restaurant from the water garden area at the back.

Tomorrow is a half day at school because of the Grand Prix, so Immy will be able to spend the afternoon with her friend Kate and then on Monday morning, she plans to go in to school at break time to catch up with the rest of her friends before we head back to NZ on Monday night. Once we're back there, I think it will have to be a severe diet and lots of exercise for me to make up for the past few weeks of 'holiday eating'!

• Canon EOS 60D:
• f/3.5:
• 0.4":
• 18.0mm:
• ISO 1600

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