Wake up and reach for the coffee.

Deal with the dead (almost mummified) mouse corpse behind the fireplace. So much for the cat sitter not finding any rodents.

Discover the very lively mouse cowering at the back of the grate, and with the help of two out of three cats, corner it and trap it in a glass. It looks like we’re back to the days of our mouse “catch and release” programme.

Have a couple of conversations with the neighbours whilst re-locating the mouse including the guys with the bruiser who terrorises my babies. Managed to keep it civil. His fat cat has been put on a diet, which might explain some of it’s grumpy menace.

Elsewhere agreed to visit my very elderly next-door neighbour to ostensibly to chat about her garden, but basically to schedule some time to chat see how she’s getting on. Wondering vaguely whether there will be people around to take an interest in us when we’re in our 90s or whether it will even be considered normal or acceptable to show an interest in your elderly neighbours. Obviously I am also hugely interested in her lovely garden as well, not least because it’s always great to crib ideas.

Lunch.

Had a tennis lesson and got things together for tonight’s mini-tournament of mixed doubles.

Looked through the garden now that the weather has broken to a more manageable 25C to determine what has survived and what has not. There are lots of gaps up on the gravel roof after 6 weeks of no rain and 30C and some surprising survivals. One of the perennial wallflowers has died but there’s another in a pot to replace it. All of the roses and iris have survived (some judicious watering while we were away).

Engaged in a few political conversations on-line to absolutely no obvious effect, but at least I’ve tried. I find the current political climate entirely without rhyme or reason.

Sorted through some more of the photos from Iceland – still difficult to believe that it was so grey and gloomy – and finding it odd that it’s such a difficult country to photograph well. Maybe the landscapes are just too big to capture easily.  Certainly the details are much more easily captured with endless decent pictures of cute puffins.

& now I’m off to taxi the kids around. Surely by now they should be driving themselves, even in London?