We are sailing

I have a lot to do today. And I've already managed to fold about a 100 years worth of laundry, tidied up my clothes cupboard so that I could fit my newly, not very well ironed clothes in it. I also tidied up the boys clothes cupboard, put on a load of laundry, unpacked the dishwasher, repacked it, washed a few dishes and now I'm ready to start work.

However, my computer is operating so slowly it's almost going in reverse. I think it might be because I have over 7000 items in my deleted items folder and I haven't defragged the machine for a while (mainly because I'm never too sure how one defrags a pc or what the hell it is supposed to do). So I am typing this while intermittently deleting more deleted items.

I've just checked out the weather forecast for tomorrow and it's going to be 19C with sunny spells and a 21 knot westerly wind. The reason this is important is because I am going sailing. In the Solent. On a 45 foot yacht. With no children. Quite frankly, even if the forecast had been galeforce winds and torrential rain coupled with sleet, I'd be ok with it because I am going to be on a boat in the sea with no children anywhere near me. Lovely husband bought me the sailing trip well over a year ago but I've not had the chance to use it. He was meant to be joining me on it, but as he'll be winging his way back from Seattle, I roped in a friend who is just as pleased to escape her children for a full day.

I grew up sailing. It's one of those things I'm sort of proud of. I can't play a musical instrument or speak a foreign language (well not one that counts - Afrikaans and Zulu are hardly going be universally useful are they.) I am athletically challenged in every way. I used to think I could sing, but having heard myself sing in a kareoke bar many years ago, it's apparent that I don't have that talent either. But sailing, I can do.

My husband doesn't like sailing with me. He thinks I become 'shouty'. I do. Particularly if we're racing and someone is going faster than us and my crew tries to impersonate a snail by moving really slowly and doesnt get his sail in fast enough. Or when there's about 30 boats crowded on a start line, sails flapping, waiting for the seconds to countdown before the start gun goes. And your crew - whose job it is to look out for things and warn the very busy skipper - fails to point out a large boat barrelling down on us so that we end up having an almighty collision resulting in a big hole in the side of the boat. Then yes, in those kinds of 'theoretical' situations I can get a bit tetchy.

But tomorrow won't be like that. Because tomorrow we will have a skipper and a crew and we can decide to help them winch in sails if we fancy it, or we can simply swan about and watch them work. We get to have a grown up, girly lunch on the Isle of Wight, and then we get meander back across the Solent again. Fabulous.

I'm very glad that husband will be coming back tomorrow. I'm growing rather weary of this single parent lark. For a start, the kitchen surfaces haven't been buffed since Erika the cleaner was here on Monday and yesterday I had to do the bins all by myself. Bins are a boy job. As is mowing lawns and ours are in serious need of doing. I'm sure he will be thrilled with his to do list upon his return. Then again, he's had a week of eating US sized steaks so he gets no sympathy from me.

I need to go and turn off the washing machine now because it's beeping at me and it's incredibly annoying. So fare thee well. I will return to report back on my adventures at sea.