After a quiet day at home tidying up the spare room for next week's visit from Daniel and Gemma, and a quiet evening in with just Kiloh at night (Apoa was off sleeping over), with a visit from Clemmie, Dug and Nicki squeezed in (with a bit of guilt as I took advantage of their SUV for a quick stock-up on cat food), we had a really fun day today.

First we visited circus school where Apoa took a massive step forward in the battle against vertigo and learned how to turn around on the flying trapeze. Meanwhile Kiloh mastered the 'big star' on the static trapeze and developed her skills on the walking globe and whatever those funny things with two steps and four wheels are called. Then we resisted stopping off at Virgin on the way to the Soho Theatre, where the matinee performance of Private Peaceful was followed with a discussion and question session with Michael Morpurgo (author of the novel), Simon Reade (writer and director of the play) and Paul Chequer (the one actor in the play). I've been to a fair number of these discussions and this was the liveliest and most fun, mainly because Michael Morpurgo is a right laugh and a great performer. When the host said we should be winding up soon, he said 'Why? I don't have anything on this evening, do you?' He capped it all by having his chair collapse under him near the end. His wife instantly leapt onto the stage, whipped out her camera and took a picture. She says it might appear on his Children's laureate website soon.

The play itself was really great. I could mention the few things I would have been tempted to change (there are always some of these) but the main thing to say is that the script and performance were great, totally involving and 'real'.

We followed that with a quick pizza stop on the way home and an almost instant passing-out from both kids when we got home. Maybe not the best prep for a busy week at school, but worth it imho.

B-)