"Danger, danger, Remus Robinson!"

I am exhausted. But I've had a lovely three days - I want to say weekend, but I'm talking about Thursday - beginning from when I ambled out of the house on Thursday morning and went to Liverpool to pick up amchau, whom I am learning to call Rhiannon.

Whatever we're calling her, she was up north for a brief fannish holiday, and I was playing native tour guide for a couple of days. I observed at the time that you never see the tourist attractions in your own city until you come to take someone else there, which is how we ended up at the Anglican cathedral. There are apparently forty-two Anglican cathedrals in Britain, and this being such an auspicious number has led Rhiannon to the conclusion that she must visit them all in her gap year. The mind boggles. Liverpool's cathedral is number six.

So we did the Anglican cathedral whilst griping at the weather, and then the Roman Catholic one as a sort of supplementary cathedral. Well, they're both on the same street. I took in Liverpool as a tourist for the first time in many years, and enjoyed myself in a distant sort of way; I suppose you can't ever be a stranger where you live, but it's fun to pretend you are.

And at length I dragged Rhiannon home with me, courtesy of Merseyrail, and she seemed somewhat surprised by my house, which leads me to suspect I have never once described where I live in my own journal, and that seems counter-intuitive in the extreme; therefore, for the record, I live in a white house with a lot of open space and far too many lightbulbs, and my room is sort of natural-neutral-beige with red curtains and lamps and things and I'm very fond of it. And we geeked a bit, and my parents did the interrogatory thing which parents generally do, or at least my parents, and my mother suggested pizza and ice-cream and, um, yay.

[At which opportune point we conclude that we are not all amoral barbarians Up North, but the South is still another country.]

Friday was marked by Rhiannon and my mother ganging up on me at eight o'clock in the morning. I told them to go away in no uncertain terms, but was eventually dragged into consciousness and into the shower. I can sleep in the shower. But I chose not to. Instead we ended up having breakfast and watching Velvet Goldmine like civilised people. But we also went to the beach, and that's always fun on a day where the weather's changing every five minutes; the shoreline was its usual vision of panoramic beauty and utterly deserted. Rhiannon took pictures of me, which I objected to as I am not a photogenic person and my ears were filling with windblown sand, but she would insist. I took the digital camera, so perhaps more pics later. But it was fun, and illuminating, as we got to see our own footprints erased swiftly by the wind and shifting dunes and I took the opportunity to deliver a short and sad lecture on succession in an ecological context.

Oh, yes, and we made sandwiches. Cheese, salad and butter for Rhiannon; cheese, salad and mayonnaise for Colleen; and cheese, salad and chilli sauce for me. Said chilli sauce moved into the other sandwiches by osmosis and resulted in much griping at me. I remain cheerfully unrepentant.

So, on a Friday afternoon and well equipped with picnic basket, Jaffa cakes, Tom Baker scarf, tapes (but no iPod as magic gadget has gone boom), the three new_who mods embarked on a Day Trip to the Blackpool Doctor Who Exhibition.

At this point, I should probably just turn you all over to Colleen, whose account of this event is both illustrated and much funnier, but I must put in my own two cents, as they say. We reached Blackpool with no problem at all, with Colleen's driving being absolutely exemplary and my navigation mostly unnecessary. But then we had to make our way along the windy wet seafront trying to find the exhibition, and we were on our way to tourist information when I said, "I can hear music."

[Colleen has an icon that flashes the words "diddle dee dum diddle dee dum ooo eeee ooo". I leave the gentle reader to render that in the comfort of his or her own brain.]

We paid our admission and went in, and it was wonderful. There was an old-skool console to take silly pictures of, and an entrance Dalek, and lots and lots of monsters. The best bit, in my humble opinion, was the bit with the old costumes. They had some of the First Doctor's canes, and parts of Three's costume, and Four's scarf. This may be stating the obvious a little, but it's really long. They actually had the full costumes for all the others up to Seven, and on the other side they had the Gallifreyan High Council costumes, with headdresses.

"Oh-muh-guh," I said. "I want one."

I do. I don't know what I'd do with it.

Eventually, we emerged from the exhibit with a Dalek poster, three of the past adventure books, two Targets ("Definitely your thing," Colleen said) and a TARDIS-and-crop-circle print between us. And proceeded to press-gang a passer-by into taking a picture of the three of us and Bessie. Who has an in-date tax disc, which amused us all far too much. ("How else did they get her here?" I asked.)

Actually, this isn't the real Bessie, this is a replica, but the real one is in the exhibit to be squeed at.

Following which, we went to buy pink seaside rock for Rhiannon's brother, and got home in time for tea.

Which was another adventure. I had been invited out by the chemgeeks for our last dinner together, with Mrs Colvin and Mrs Miller, and I took Rhiannon along. A fact she may have later regretted, as she said, plaintively, "You all talk so much!"

We do and we did, and it was a wonderful night. They were going to take Mrs Colvin ice-skating (when asked why I couldn't come, I said, blandly, that I was going to Blackpool to see the Doctor Who exhibition) but it was closed, so they went bowling instead, which I'm sorry I missed. That said, the meal was lovely. We all gossiped and got caught up and Mrs Colvin delivered some sage advice about boys in Oxford. "String them along," she said, happily. Actually, everyone was happy that night; we've all got where we want to go and the two teachers are no longer our teachers, so they felt able to be indiscreet. They were both delighted to be taken out by us, and the general feeling was that the group of seven was that rare thing, a perfect mix.

Still, it ran quite late. I didn't get to bed until about one, which was ridiculous as I had work the next morning (this morning, that is) and once again Rhiannon dragged me out of bed. She came into the shop a few hours later and got summarily dragged to Homebase by Colleen (I didn't ask for details) while I pottered about the village. Colleen didn't come into Liverpool with us, having had no sleep, so I took Rhiannon to Quiggins and Forbidden Planet, both of which she liked.

And then I had to say goodbye to her, as three days do go quickly. I'm hoping she wasn't too overwhelmed by my life in its lunatic glory, (all the elements were there - fannish, chemgeeks, bookshop, parents, teachers) but I thoroughly enjoyed having her here with me. Still, it's an interesting time for her to come, as this lunatic life will slowly become another sort of lunatic life. Talking of which, Neil Gaiman is doing a signing in Oxford in November. Just as I was wondering who I could drag with me, jacinthsong posted to wonder the same thing. I love LJ.

And after all this, I got back to find two titbits in my inbox - a girl!Doctor drabble from Rhiannon, and a Doctor/Jack limerick from Patrick. Life is good, if exhausting.