Just spent a weekend in Brighton. It was absolutely wonderful. The weather was kind, sunny and windy, and it was perfect. ED and his GF have just bought a beach hut, which is where we sat drinking tea and eating various foodstuffs, with family and friends.

I spent some time looking for smooth and/or round stones with the youngest child there (nearly 7). He was directing quite a complicated game but I just followed instructions, and found – a fossil! in fact two, in one stone! I’m so excited about it. Apparently there is an Echinoid (sea urchin) and potentially a bivalve or a brachiopod. I have a friend who’s very, very knowledgeable and clever, and that’s what she says. I’m going to show her the fossil on Saturday.

In the evening there were further celebrations and I met some very interesting people. I was talking to one young woman, who, Réjane & Yves, comes from Cholet! she was as surprised as I was that I actually knew it! She’s called Sylvenne and designs and makes jewellery. What a coincidence. She said that nobody else had ever heard of it. But of course Solihull and Cholet are twinned, so I had heard of it anyway. Fancy that. It was lovely to be able to talk French for a while.

The hotel, however, where we have stayed twice before, was very disappointing this time. Overpriced and understaffed. We have written a long email listing our complaints before reviewing on TripAdvisor. We shall see. Their website assured me that every room had a hairdryer. When this turned out not to be so, I asked to borrow one at Reception and was asked for a £5 deposit. That’s all fine, but I had to then ask for the deposit to be returned. We also had to ask, twice, for our final bill to be recalculated, as it was just wrong, and too much. Not good.

And I’ve left Facebook. I had a very difficult discussion with friends of a friend about the refugee situation. In one of the conversations I used the word “underclass”. I really did not intend to offend anybody, and I think if I am offended by the use of a word, I just say “I find that offensive”, but I was subjected to a tirade of very personal insults. When I apologised for using that word, the rant was simply deleted. In the other conversation, I was accused of “trolling” and not wanting anybody else to have a different opinion. Not true, just not true. I should clearly, in hindsight, not have engaged in these conversations. I felt assaulted, and although I am missing Facebook a little (I belonged to a knitting group, and had “liked” various pages such as The Poke, Bill Bryson and Bill Maher), I’m not sure I’ll go back. It’s actually quite fun in the “real world” but the contact with friends is less of course. More time for knitting, though (and blogging)!