Getting back to normal

Well, what passes for it on Sanity Again ;) It's hard to know what to mention from the weekend and what to leave out. If I wrote a complete account, it would be far too much for one blog post and probably amazingly boring for those who aren't part of the Owners' Group. There's nothing worse than being presented with a load of in-jokes and private references that you're not privy to. So, just some highlights:

Both the set up and take down were blessed with good weather and with a team that co-operated without squabbling about the right way to do things. We saw a lot of folk at the Open Day, both potential customers and those with build slots booked, the "Owners in Waiting". The Boars Head meal, the pot luck supper, the barbecue and the Chinese on Sunday were all successful. The auction was one of the best both for entertainment value and for the amount of money raised for Anthony Nolan and the Leukemia and Lymphoma Trust. I haven't worked out the absolute final figure, but it's going to be over £2,000 all told, including Gift Aid.

We had a good mixture of old hands and new faces and the newbies fitted in very well indeed. The quiz seemed to go down OK, including the experimental Pointless round. We made sure that Peter Mason won the BOG Award for heroic failure, nominating him four times for a variety of mishaps. He took it very well and promptly set himself up for next year by nearly wrecking a carefully worked out boat shuffling scheme on Sunday afternoon, one he'd set up himself.

A moment's forgetfulness meant that he tried to bring one of the boats in build back into the yard off the water point before I'd moved out the boat that was occupying the space it needed to go into.

Those of us who were left went down to the Boars Head last night and had a very pleasant, relaxing and winding down evening. Sheila and I were feeling both pleased with the way things had turned out and completely relaxed for the first time for a couple of weeks. We got to bed reasonably early, anticipating a good night's kip.

So the burglar alarm in the bungalow went off at five to one in the morning. We woke about a foot above the bed as our bedroom is presntly just through the paint shed wall from the alarm box. I popped out with a torch and checked that there was no sign of nefarious activity in the bungalow. Peter and Susan had gone home to Stockton Heath for once and had turned off their mobiles, so there was nothing for it but to sit it out until the alarm silenced itself after 20 minutes.

It took us quite a while to get back off again.

Heigh ho, it's been another good day today, cleaning the brass pole and plank stands and helping with yet more boat shuffling. Most of the owners have now headed off, leaving just the crews of Cala, Ice Breaker and Sir James here. They will all be taking off in the course of this week – I reckon we'll be on our way early next.