Mike's musings

A Jo day

I had a lovely day with Jo today. Moo needed a) some sleep and b) to do some work for an approaching deadline, so in the morning, I took Jo for a walk with Si, D, Morgan and the boys (their dogs, Murphy and Tolly). We walked some footpaths around the Thurlows and did a little over two miles which, with two adults, a toddler who walked a fair amount of the way, and an increasingly heavy baby (who was on my back all the way) isn't bad going. Took approximately an hour and three quarters, and felt like good, honest exercise. I guess that, with the carrying rucksacky thing, I had about 10kg on my back, so not a huge amount, but enough to add a little something to the exercise (in both obvious senses of the word).

After that, I headed off briefly to Sainsbury's, got some food, and the Plants joined us for lunch. That was all great: then the Plants popped back home, grabbed swimming stuff and Jo and I went with them to Sudbury leisure centre (the Kingfisher Leisure Centre). It's got a great slope down into the water, which meant that Jo could paddle a bit, and two slides, including a little one which Morgan was brave enough to try (several times). Jo had a lovely time splashing around, and I enjoyed myself lots, too: I'd not gone swimming with her before (getting her changed back into her clothes afterwards is _not_ an easy job). She also really seemed to enjoy the noise and all the children around (she was the youngest there by a way, but was completely unphased by it). She started to get very tired after a while, and I took her out just as they put the wave machine on (which Morgan seemed to enjoy - and his dad, too, to be honest), and then took her home once Si, D and Morgan came out of the changing rooms.

So, although Moo had a day without Jo - and missed her, particularly after having to read through the Victoria Climbié report - we had a daddy-daughter day which was very special for me. And Moo got some sleep, and did some work, so all very good. Need to do some theological academic work tonight, and I have sermon to preach and service to lead tomorrow, so I need some preparation time, too. However, the goespel reading I'll be using for the sermon is the one for which I prepared a sermon a few weeks ago before realising that I'd picked the wrong Sunday, so I've got a good idea of what it is that I'll be saying.