"The HotBox"

So it seems that the Icelandic volcanic ash is wreaking havoc on our airways. Many planes have been delayed from taking off here and the other day my husbands parents were in a bit of a state - not knowing whether they were going to be trapped here for some time.

I could understand their mild panic, for although lovely, the thought of being held hostage in a too-hot-at-the-moment country like India right now, was too much to contemplate.

We had spent the first week of their visit pottering about to various beaches and being fairly active, but in the second week, there was palpable relief as they left their glorified beach shack and checked into the only hotel around for miles (aside from the wallet-emptying monolith "The Taj" down the road - where for the price of one nights accommodation you could live quite easily for a month elsewhere).

I thought they would explode with joy when they realised that their room was not only CLEAN, but SAND-FREE and...get this...AIR-CONDITIONED!

To be fair, the lot of us ended up spending many hours in the lusciously cool confines of their air-conditioned hotel room. In fact Dumpie was rather candid in his opinion of the superior digs, by suggesting on the first night that 'Granny and Gramps' move into our house and we move into theirs.

He had a point.

In fact two nights in a row they hosted a sleepover for the boys. Whether it was the giant telly, the air-con or the freshly made up beds, we have no idea, but they loved sleeping there and on the third night the husband and I even managed to unload BOTH boys and have a night to ourselves in the "HotBox" (as our home is now known).

During the second week of their stay we pretty much set our sights on two main activities: swimming in the gorgeous pool - and eating our combined body weight in chips, ketchup and cheese/onion/tomato 'toasties'. Yum...

Being only a small 6 room hotel, our loud, shambolic group pretty much took it over during their stay there, and as the in-laws checked out, we felt as if we were being booted out of a luxurious tropical resort and being re-homed (ever see the brilliant "District 9"?!) in a cramped 2-bed council flat.

Don't get me wrong. We're rather fond of our little "HotBox" but I'm still not sure we've adjusted.

But save a sigh of pity for the husbands parents, who had to endure a 4 plane/37 hour journey back to Toronto, Ontario via Athens and New Jersey. Alas, at least the temperature controlled cabins must have been some relief. Somehow I think their next holiday is going to be within their own timezone...

As for us, we've merely been trying to move as little as possible, slathering on creams and prickly heat powder in an attempt to stave off heat rashes, and are in the process of defining new measures for 'slothfulness'.

Which of course isn't going to help our current quest of undoing some of the damage from last week's "beer, toasties, and chip-a-thon extravaganza" (sigh)...