A neighbour asked us to a birthday party for her two-year-old son.  Two years is considered a critical age stage here, and parties for this event are common.  This one was to be held in the Girl Scouts building in town, a mile from our house.  Four o'clock was the stated time, and Rose, who was already in town for other purposes, went there.  As one might have expected, there was no-one there.  Social events usually start about one hour after the scheduled time, and I must admit this irritates me, having been brought up in England by a methodical father. To me, this habit of un-punctuality is an instance of Filipinos being unable to do what they say they are going to do, and this attitude is largely responsible for Filipinos not being taken seriously by the rest of the world.

Rose called me to warn me not to come yet, so I had time to wash at leisure, feed the dogs and cat and scan the internet for any Forex trading opportunities: I didn't find any besides the trade that I had already closed a hour before (at a profit of $7.32.)  Claude, who was fast asleep, having spent the entire previous night awake playing with his cousins at a vigil for a dead relative, was obviously not going to come, so at about 4:45 I locked up the house and cycled off to the town, having first accomplished the tricky task of getting my bike out of the gate without letting one of the dogs out as well - our young male dog is an unruly creature and wily with it.

Arriving at the party, there were a great many people there that I did not know and a few that I did.  I took some of the food offered and sat outside on a concrete slab in the big open space to eat it.  I watched the sunlight shifting gradually on the buildings around and breathed in the cool evening air under a cloudless sky. Our hostess was trying to get me to sit in a more honourable place but I preferred the fresh air and some distance from the monotonous loud music.  Rosie wasn't there yet, having gone to the shops to get a birthday gift for the little boy.

When she arrived, Rosie got food and sat with me while I wondered to myself how to get her back to working the housework schedule I instituted about a year ago and which she gradually abandoned without my doing anything about it. I really dislike telling people to do what they already know they should be doing. The men in the blogs I read, who seem to be all take-charge types, don't have this problem!