Everywhere in Bowness is so desperate for staff that yesterday Lucy found herself manager of the downstairs half of the restaurant.
The restaurant was feet-achingly busy, as you might expect in a Lake District town centre restaurant on a bank holiday weekend, and in a gesture which I suspect reflected the manager’s desperation rather than Lucy’s natural customer service abilities, Lucy was put in charge.
As well as all the normal bits of her job, her new job description meant she had to answer the phone and take bookings. On such a busy weekend this meant keeping an eye on all of the tables on all floors of the restaurant, and judging how long it would be until one might become empty. On top of this interesting activity, she was taking takeaway orders over the phone, and relaying instructions to the kitchen and to the other floors of the restaurant.
She had an assistant in this labour, an awkward looking Eastern European youth who had been hastily promoted from kitchen porter, and who worked very hard but did not speak a great deal of English. This did not stop him explaining hopefully at the end of the evening that he would very much like to kiss her, which offer she declined. This made Mark scowl when he heard about it later.
She came home thinking that going back to school might not be so bad after all. All she has to do at school is study for her GCSEs.
She does not have to run up and down the stairs with piles of plates, or try and guess what sort of takeaway slurry drunk people are ordering on the telephone, or apologise to people who are fed up of waiting for a table because somebody else has decided to sit there and order another couple of bottles of wine instead of buzzing off: and there are no amorous Romanians to be fought off in the kitchen.
School, perhaps has got something to be said for it.
The rest of the household grown-ups finally crawled into bed at some time after six o’ clock this morning, feeling wearily pleased with the night’s efforts and yawning until our jaws ached.
Number Two Daughter got up again some hours later to go to the gym. Number One Daughter has persuaded her to allow herself to be entered into some sort of dreadful fitness endurance competition in October, and she is taking it very seriously, and even though she has a very pleasingly comfortable bed, she staggered out of it after hardly any time at all in order to make herself into a finer person.
I must observe that Mark and I did not leap out of bed in order to engage in self-improvement.
We sat in bed for absolutely ages, looking happily at the sunshine and drinking coffee, and speculating about life and feeling pleased that we could pay the mortgage this month.
After that we took the dogs to be emptied around the Library Gardens. We have started taking a couple of poopies with us, even though it takes twice as long when we do. This is not because of the poopies who are fine and will walk beautifully to heel for a Good Dog Sausage: but because of everybody in the Library Gardens who would like to stop and stroke a cute poopy.
This means the walk takes absolutely ages, especially on a holiday day. Today the gardens were full of people enjoying the gorgeous clean sunshine. There were families eating picnics on the lawns, and old people sitting contentedly on the sunny benches, and mothers trying to persuade wandering toddlers to hurry up a bit: and every one of them had a warm smile and a pat for a fluffy poopy.
In the end we were longing for what Number Two Daughter calls our first second coffee before we managed to escape and replace the poopies among their excited siblings. All of the poopies feel differently about going-out notoriety. Fat White loves any sort of attention, and will bounce up to everybody to be petted, odd ears flopping. Roger hides behind my ankles.
We washed up and tidied up and hugged the children and went to work.
Today is the last day of the holiday rush, it is very nearly over.
It has been splendid, sunshine and visitors and everybody strolling around in the sun feeling glad to be in the world: but I am still looking forward to the end of it.
The picture is Fat White and Tonka, having their morning snooze. It is the loveliest thing in the world having a house full of poopies.
Except for the pooping.
