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I had visitors today in my flat today. It's true I've had visitors before, but only family members so far. Today I had friends! Aside from the associated happiness that comes from seeing friends - particularly those I see too rarely - it was also a chance to road test the flat a little, and embrace the whole "visitor experience". It may sound a little strange, but the host ethos is still somewhat unfamiliar to me. For most of my life, excepting a few rare anomalies, I've been the visitor rather than the visited and it's odd finding the scenario reversed. Not unpleasant by any means mind you, but it certainly involves a particular set of skills which I've yet to master. The "cup of tea" ritual, for example, so memorably immortalised in that episode of "The Goodies" I'm sure at least some of you will remember. Despite my having prepared for visitors by purchasing a kettle and other such tea and coffee making paraphernalia such as, erm, tea and coffee, I still struggled a bit when it came to transforming all the bits and pieces into a something almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea. Fortunately, one of my guests interceded on my behalf - just after I'd started reading the instructions on the side of the box in which the tea bags came - and since no-one complained, and both cups were emptied, I consider the whole thing a remarkable success. Lest my incompetence around hot beverages seem too unlikely too all you seasoned tea and coffee drinkers out there, you have to take into account that, today's efforts included, the number of cups of tea and coffee I've prepared in my lifetime may have finally reached double digits. I should also point out that the tea and coffee I've purchased essentially constitute a lifetime supply for me, so if you're in the mood for some vague approximation of tea or coffee do feel free to drop by. In short: Visitors welcome.

And as for my guests, well, I'd say more, but I'm trying to tempt one of them to detail the flat experience more thoroughly by opening up a guest slot on my blog. Given that their own blog has suffered from a severe deficit of posts over the last few years, I'm only mildly hopefully that I can coax him into posting something here. Most likely he'll retreat into the relative safety of my comments again, but I'm sure he wants to give me a hard time about my fireplace, and a proper post is definitely the best place for that. Honest :)