Row the boat

A weekend of regattas for us then as we met friends to celebrate a 30th birthday in Marlow. The bad weather just about held off, and our canny friends had had the foresight to nab a picnic spot under a large tree in any case. The most amusing spectacle was observing the boys in blue gleefully confiscating booze from underage lads and pouring it away onto the grass in front of them... ah fond memories of misspent youth! Most people seemed to have had less trouble accessing the fruits of the vine, however, and it looked as though it was only going to get messier as the evening wore on.

We had the opportunity for a bit of vicarious excitement as Ed's cousin, who lives in Bisham, had been to England football captain John Terry's wedding on Friday. We heard all about it and saw the menu cards and order of service - it all sounded very romantic.

Church this morning was enlivened somewhat by the entrance, just before communion, of a rather interesting gentleman,who immediately started kissing a young chap who had come to our church for the first time. On being dissuaded from this, he then made a beeline for poor Marion, who had to endure his close (and I do mean close) attention for the rest of the service. Luckily Marion bore the situation very stoicly and managed to wrest the chalice from the chap's grasp as I was serving it. It's not the first time that we've been joined by some of Reading's less fortunate citizens - a couple of homeless chaps joined for the communion and th tea afterwards a few months ago - but it's always a tricky one. Christian duty means that of course we should welcome all through the doors of the church, and with a congregation as small as ours we need all the support we can get, but I don't think it really extends to allowing people to come in a nd snog us! Anyway, in the end the chap had his cup of tea and talk with the vicar, and then headed off, leaving a rather relieved Marion slightly higher on the ladder to sainthood!!

At lunchtime we took a trip down the Thames on the Caversham Princess to check out our future Thames-side mansion. There was a regatta on here too and we had a good view of the rowers coming down the course.

Got that Sunday feeling now, work again tomorrow. I'll be spending the next couple of weeks trying to garner interest in a major press conference that we are holding on the environment, with a little recreation in the form of a trip to Ascot with the lovely chaps at Reading FC on Wednesday.