Mr Neighbour (they were going to be called the Ben10s after the cartoon series the children are particular fond of) and his eldest son met Mr Shallot and I at the Heathrow Airport. They drove us back to their house in Richmond. Unlike us, they had taken a lot of their furniture when they relocated so their place feels quite similar to their Lilyfield residence. The differences being the conservatory area and the boiler that is used to heat the whole house – it would be great to have that in Sydney too.

We were shown to our race car beds (the two boys slept with their parents as there is a full house at the moment) and were told that we would be going for a run shortly. The temperature difference is quite significant compared to HK so we slipped into something long and warm, put on the sandshoes and were set.

Richmond Park is only a few hundred metres away and many families use it for exercising their dogs, playing golf, going for a run, cycle (including mountain biking) or as a path to the pub (that was what we did on Sunday for a traditional roast lunch). The Park is reminiscent of Centennial Park but about four times the size and with deer. It’s rutting season at the moment and it’s the first time that I’ve had to be alert to charging deer when I’ve gone for a run.

Arriving home, we were given 30 minutes to change before it was football time. For the Australians reading this, it’s really soccer. We watched the eldest son play three short games and were quite impressed with the ball skills some of the kids had. They were also quite cute. Some of the parents were a little more enthusiastic than the children which was a bit weird to see given the kids were only six years old. They even did the hand gestures when they scored (the kids and parents).

We then prepared for our walk around the Monopoly Board. We saw most of the landmarks of London, found the Queen was out at the moment, rode in a black taxi cab, kicked through the autumn leaves (I’d forgotten there were other seasons apart from hot and cold), went on the tube and finished at this great Turkish restaurant. For a person ready to sleep, I could hear the cushions and soft furnishing calling me “Mrs Shallot, put your head down here and rest for a moment”… I decided not to give into the temptation and drank some wine instead.

I have no idea what time we arrived back at the house but I could hear the race car bed calling me now “Mrs Shallot, I’m ready to drive you to sleep”. I replied, “Ok”.

* Thanks to Everclear for the title to this post. Not the original song but a good version! We’re on our way to Rome today.