Not quite groundhog day

Today was the second day the grandchildren were flying home to Oslo. Yesterday's attempt (as you may or may not know) was aborted because we left the passports on Erin Mae. So today, having booked new flights yesterday, we tried again.

Mind you, yesterday's flight was at the thoroughly civilised hour of noon, and involved an SAS person looking after them. Today's was at the distinctly uncivilised time of 9 p.m., and my best beloved detailed herself to accompany them. Of course, the children wanted to know what we were going to do today until it was time to leave. I'd planned the week's programme pretty throughly, but it had not entailed an allowance for passport mishaps. So I begin another internet search for things-to-do-in-the-middle-of-Yorkshire. And then the poo-tank light came on. Decision made – we cruise down to Silsden and back to get a pump-out, and fill the water-tank at the same time. That will keep me fresh and balanced while my best beloved is in Norway.

Unlike yesterday, this morning was nice and sunny for the cruise. My best beloved was chiefly concerned that the boys should not mess up their clothes – they were already in the ones thy would use for the flight. But they mostly spent the time creating their own comic strip books at the dining room table, occasionally emerging to steer Erin Mae or push a swing bridge.

We decided to leave early after lunch, to visit the Craven museum again, since Sam was miffed only Elissa had been invited to see the museum's Shakespeare First Folio on the special visit yesterday. That was successful, so was the ice cream that followed and finally, as the rain started again in earnest, we set out for Manchester. Passports safely in my best beloved's keeping. Everything proceeded without further alarums and I assume that, as I write this, they are somewhere over the North Sea.

It was somehow fitting that, as I drove back across country, Classic FM had a live concert from the Edinburgh Festival, with the Oslo Philharmonic playing the Peer Gynt suite.