Deb's Digest
Debbie Atkinson’s family life column, as featured in the Southport Visiter.

Tuesday 22 May 2007

I've left the ironing for five minutes to come and sit down. This is the trouble - it takes at least two weeks to get everywhere back to normal after a holiday. And that's just with the two of us - how I ever managed when there were five of us I just don't know.

The cruise on The Arcadia was lovely although I could wring the necks of the loutish cruisers who left towels on their well-positioned sunbeds and then disappeared for hours on end. I haven't dared step on the scales yet
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- maybe tomorrow!

Our favourite port of call was Santa Margherita - mainly because it gave access to the beautiful Porto Fino.
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We liked Monte Carlo too and visited the casino.....
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From the boat we saw lots of dolphins and some amazing sunsets.....
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At home we NEVER get dressed up and it felt quite strange doing it on board....
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In Florence and Rome we kept seeing those life-like statues, standing absolutely still for hours on end. At the final port there was a proper bronze statue in the shape of a postman with a sack, sitting on a bench. An elderly fellow cruiser turned to her husband and said: "EE, he's really good in't he?"

The younger son decided he'd drive to Southampton to see us off. I kept this a secret from my husband so secretive texts had to be sent to my son along the journey. At 9am he said he was awaiting our arrival in McDonalds car park. His dad wanted to break the journey and have breakfast en-route. He couldn't understand my insistence on a McDonalds breakfast - something I've never requested in our 33 years of married life. It was worth all the subterfuge however - his face was a picture when, as we parked our son knocked on the driver's window.

But after seeing him, I spent the whole cruise worrying. A week earlier he'd gone to Cambridge for a game of football and the boots had taken all the skin off his little toes - made worse by cricket the following day. He'd been wearing flip flops all week (dirt and germs in the wounds) and when we saw him they were still oozing and bleeding and looked horrendous. I emailed and texted him from the boat and he kept reassuring me that they were healing, but I won't be happy until I see for myself when he's home next weekend (especially since he played cricket again on Sunday and opened the wounds up again.)
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