You don't know what you got till you start using it again....or something like that

It was my birthday yesterday and we decided to fill the house up with people and invited Anna and William, Ann and Graham and Anne for lunch, amazing that it may seem but nearly all my mates are called Ann,  Peter and Sarah are in the UK so couldn't come. We drove Dana on Friday to a lady called Lynda who is Dana's normal minder, this lady has a business looking after other peoples dogs in her home and they run riot along with her own dogs. We stopped for coffee and chatted about both our lives here in France, which all expats do, and then we left her to her doggie chaos and took the slow road home via leclerc to get my shopping in for my birthday  bash.
Yesterday was full of fun, face book lit up like a Christmas tree with all the best wishes coming through and I got phone calls and e-mails and even had the luck to see Debs online and chatted on skype. We keep missing Georgie on line but will find her later today but sadly no contact from Chris.
My guests arrived at one o'clock and we sat down to eat, but we didn't get up again until seven in the evening, so much to talk about and so much to laugh about, I have no idea how much wine I drank but I was ready for bed as soon as we said our goodbyes but Mike forbade such an early night and I battled on till ten o'clock which was much more acceptable.
Since our trip to the UK in September I have been using the dish washer. It has been sitting there idle for three years because I was playing at little farm housewife and poo pooed the advantages of such fangled machinery and anyway we both needed to have our hands in water several times a day to wash the garden grime out but after experiencing the clean and organised kitchens at John and Linda's and Chris and Sam's homes I decided to plug in and go.  I have not regretted it one bit. A good clean and a program with one of those flush out your dishwasher products and I was back in business and what a difference it has made, the kitchen is clutter free and as I only have to wash the big stuff I wipe up straight away, and put away straight away, it is great, it only goes to prove that you don't know what you got till you start using it again....or something like that