Thurs 4 July - long day for Rita, more CIF, shopping, Loki, Kyrgios

Today was a long day for Rita, with a student social function after a long day of classes. But she enjoys this catch-up with class-mates, so she won't be home from Dijon till about 10pm. Apart from blogging, I had little else to do (it was still too breezy for the tarp removal), so I did a did more CIFing on the stern of the boat covering the area when the name and port are displayed. These names are done with plastic decals, and are not holding up too bad after 8 years. They are starting to crack around the edges a little (like above the "m" in Kanumbra), but from a distance they still look good. I took some care with the cleaning and the overall result was not too bad.

I then did a bit of shopping (I'm now getting quite proficient at supermarket shopping in France, smiling when people talk to me and generally understanding the gist of what is being said). I then came home to more blog catch-up. While I was doing this I heard a noise at the wheelhouse door, and looked down to see a little basset/beagle hound. He started up our steps but decided that was too hard, so he jumped on the yellow boat next door, and proceeded to explore it. However, when he had finished exploring, he had a little problem in that he didn't know how to jump back down to the pontoon deck.

So little Loki walked round and round the deck looking for a way off, without going downwards. Finding no way, he climbed up to the rear deck (he was quite good at going UP) and then up to the upper steering position. At this stage, he must have realised he was in trouble, so he just sat there with his head through the railings, whimpering. Eventually, his owner, who was doing some work on a nearby boat, heard the whimpering and came to rescue him. But even she could not coax him to come down, so she went to the top deck and carried him down. Everyone was relieved.

In the evening, while waiting for Rita, I followed the Wimbledon match between Nadal and Krygios. It sounded like a high quality game (in terms of shots) but with Krygios up to his usual tricks. But this time, instead of just being a dickhead, he seemed to be deliberately trying to get under Nadal's skin, which he successfully did on several occasions. I was waiting for him to knock over Nadal's carefully aligned water bottles during a change of ends, but he refrained from doing so (would that be ruled as unsportsmanlike conduct?). However, he did make an interesting point to the umpire as to why Nadal is allowed to get away with exhorbitant delays between serves when he is serving, and is never ready to proceed when not serving. Good point!