Things I Did Yesterday 15/02/10

It's the sweet'n'low version. The in-laws are inbound for breakfast! Luckily yesterday I only:

- Went to church. Yes, yes, I hear you snickering, Bruce. I've no problem with being dragged along to church every once in a while, mainly as an act of politeness. Most modern church services, especially the likes of Presbyterian or COE, are all about tolerance and so on anyway. At least the ones I've been to are. So it's fine, and I always find the differing ceremonial aspects of the different churches quite interesting. Plus it was my chance to meet James, the family minister who I've heard a lot about over the years and who we nearly flew in to marry us. The service was all about love (of course), and the need for the church to embrace the idea of romantic love. Not to be so tied up in the idea of rules governing who can love who and so on. Anyway, it was a nice history lesson in the church's attitude to love, from claiming a pagan ritual for St Valentine (who had virtually no connection to love, but was martyred on the desired day) to the downgrading of Valentine's sainthood status as the church distanced itself from the day and gave it over to the marketing boys (who have long since stripped any reference to Sainthood out of the picture). Pretty interesting stuff, as it goes.

- Had prep time for a big party being held in the evening. Honestly, the most event-free day of the trip so far, and that was just fine. Just to have enough time through the day to do my blog and catch up on the some reading was very nice indeed. The party certainly required a good deal of work, shifting furniture around getting glasses washed and so on. The Browns don't do these things by halves, that much is for sure. Didn't leave the house all day!

- Had a party. Really, it was an excuse for a lot of family and friends to meet me for the first time, so it wasn't exactly a relaxing affair. Certainly my standard party strategy of finding a spot and setting myself up there for the evening wasn't going to wash. But I had plenty of drinks, good food (great chilli con carne) and everyone was very nice.

- Carried on after most people had left until midnight-ish, then hit the sack, leaving my wife and Barbs (an inveterate party animal) drinking on the deck. I really must call it a stoep, to give it its local name.