Driving

The drive back from Norwich seemed interminable. In a way it was. We left at 11.30 and arrived in Pompey at almost 20.00.

We did make a side trip however. We were meeting some friends of Kevin's for lunch. We were first to arrive at the pub.
'I just need to warn you,' said a well-upholstered woman with a Norfolk accent - or Suffolk, who knows, I think we were in Suffolk by then, 'we've only been here for two weeks, we haven't got our card system set up, you can only pay by cash or cheque,'
'But.....nowhere else takes cheques,' said Kevin, 'we've been seeing signs all over the place saying they no longer take cheques...'
'I know,' she said, 'but we've only been here two weeks.'

At the other end of the meal, the person who had invited us wanted to pay and claim it on expenses. When the bill/receipt came, it was handwritten on a piece of torn out filing paper.
'Er...do you have any headed notepaper?' asked our friend,
'We've only been here two weeks,'
'Huh....a stamp with the business address and VAT no.?'
'We haven't got our VAT number set up yet, we've only been here two weeks...'
'Huh...'
Eventually, the fortnight-old landlord was prevailed upon to come over and sign the piece of paper and write the address of the inn on it.

Today we went round to see Simmi et alia to say goodbye. Fun but sad.
Saying goodnight to the children when they went up to their baths and thence to bed, was sad.
We need to be up at 5 ish to make sure we're on the road by 6. That'll be a damn long day too.