Thursday

Happy Birthday Mouse!!!! 86 and not out - and she's not finished yet. Was our wait person just being kind to the Birthday Girl this afternoon - or was he truly stunned that Mouse is in amazing shape for her age? And she is! As she said "I was 85 yesterday" ... and she was.

High Tea was a lovely thing to do (much better than the third buffet dinner in as many weeks) and will long be remembered as a very special afternoon. This was the first time S and I had been to Versace - we have driven past many times though on the way to the Spit or to SeaWorld or back to Main Beach - and while it is nice from the outside, it is magnificent inside. And who knew they had an artificial beach - or had worked out a way to stop palm fronds crashing to the ground or on to unsuspecting poolsiders?

I arrived early and rather than going straight there, I had a walk around the Marina Mirage, soaking up some atmosphere and checking out the pet pampering shop which is now decorated for Christmas - including statues of dogs wearing almost tasteful reindeer paraphernalia (although they were without antlers). There was a pretty outfit in the window (being modeled by a keen Scotty statue) which would look quite nice on Prince (M and A's dog) except that it (the outfit, not Prince) is pink. It may be good for Mum's dog (Pippa ... a female) too - although we don't want to start stereotyping with the dogs ... especially if they are colour-blind - did I read that somewhere or make it up? Or is that cats?

The big news of the day is that it looks like N is coming back up this way to live. M told us today at High Tea that even though N was initially told she didn't get the position she very much wanted with a major firm, their HR department had made a mistake and offered her position to the wrong applicant - but the error has been discovered and N offered, and accepted, the role. M is one very proud and happy parent. N and the firm are now backwards and forwarding about start dates but N should be set up in Brisbane by as early as next month.

Back at Latimers, M is less than impressed that another plumbing problem has surfaced. When she went to do ablutions this morning, she found there was no water. We are - or were - currently on bore water. For a moment she thought that either the power (and therefore the pump) was off - but no! - or that it has been off and the pump hadn't restarted and needed to be primed again. Not so either - although the problem was evident when she got down to pump-land - a pipe, perhaps a sealing ring. seems to have failed and needs repair. M switched us back over to tank water and the plumber is coming tomorrow and if he can't fix it and if it doesn't rain, she is considering buying a load of water and/or sending us all out for showers!