No it's not an April Fool. Chinese markets will be closed Monday/Tuesday as the nation celebrates the Quingming Festival, also known as the tomb sweeping holiday. Basically it's a celebration that spring has arrived and you go and clean up your dead ancestors grave, take them their favourite food (probably sausages) and some wine to sacrifice to them along with some paper resembling money. This is all burned in the hope that the deceased are not lacking food and money. Well they will be now that you just burnt the stuff won't they you soft bugger. Kites are also a feature of Quingming. You still think I'm joking don't you? I bet you can't resist Googling it though can you? Pooh count: one babies arm and a couple of small ones.

Who'd have them, well not me obviously as they got me "done" last year, the tight bastards. The eldest one, what's she called? You know the one with an iPod stuck to her right hand. Nah, it's gone, anyway she's been making a fuss about wanting an alarm clock so she can get up at 6.30am for Christ's sake. Even I don't get up at that time. Not even for sausages. Why does she want to get up then, I mean there's nobody to Facebook at that time is there? The answer is so that she's got time to straighten her hair before she goes to school! And she's not even curly! I despair of the youth of today, I really do. Pooh count: a very convivial treble.

Walkies round Ripley Castle this morning, very grey and damp, steady rain without it actually lashing it down. Me Dad says the crops need it and me Mum says the garden needs it, so at least two thirds of us are getting what we want. It was so miserable that even the two resident blackbirds, Serena and Venus, seem to have disappeared. Got let off my lead unexpectedly though, which was a bit of a result. Breakfast was dog shit tartare, with a lightly poached quails egg and some grass, which was nice. Wonder what's for tea, I do hope it's sausages. Pooh count 3 1/2 (don't ask!)

Had a lovely walk this morning down by the river, it was me Dad's birthday yesterday so he'd gone out on the lash, meaning that we had a 4 mile walk into town to pick up the car. All went well until we got there only to find that there was a bloody stupid scooter rally on. Who are these saddo's? Old gits stuck in a pathetic 60's time warp. They've either got sweatshirts on that say Preston Posse or Whitby Wheelers or something like that, or ex-Army issue overcoats. Like they think that makes them look like they are Steve McQueen in The Great Escape. Except they're not, they are a fat old bloke on a scooter. A scooter with an engine smaller than that of the average Kenwood Chef that barely has enough oomph to support their ample frame. A scooter that is kicking out so many shitty exhaust fumes that it must surely be contravening emission rules. Not to mention the noise. Christ these things make more racket than an epileptic in a bowling alley. They want to round ...