I have painted and painted and painted and painted and now I am sick of painting.
I painted the bathroom door. The side of it that goes in the bathroom was so revolting that it needed three coats. This is because it stands open much of the time and catches the soot from the Lake District fresh air, and also because when we do close it, when we have showers, we light candles.
Penhaligon’s candles smell wonderful but smoke dreadfully, even if you keep the wicks trimmed down. We don’t buy them any more, because if I am going to pay fifteen quid for a divinely scented beautifully presented middle class status symbol I do not want to spend the next week wiping it off the mirrors.
I painted the skirting boards and the door frames and then the bathroom ceiling. This was messy. I should have got changed before I came to work, but I was too idle. Our council has got a dress code policy for taxi drivers. Tonight, from my paint-encrusted t-shirt to my safety-pinned shorts and my Roger-Poopy-chewed flip-flops, I have utterly failed to meet it. I am a sartorial disaster, even by the unexacting standards of taxi drivers.
I shall just have to hope that the Taxi Inspector is not about. He probably isn’t. It is about ten years since his last evening visit.
In between painting I have busied myself with preparations for an approaching adventure.
Tomorrow is going to be an exciting day.
Mark has got the first paper of his GCSE maths exam in the morning. He is despondent about this, because he keeps falling asleep on the taxi rank when he is supposed to be revising in between customers, and he does not think that he knows the things that he is supposed to know.
We are going in the camper van, and think that we will go and camp near the GCSE school tonight, because sometimes in the mornings there are terrible traffic misfortunes, and it can take ages to get anywhere. We do not want him to miss it, and so we are going to set off after work tonight and sleep somewhere in Kendal.
Once the GCSE is finished, we are off to Yorkshire. Oliver finishes school tomorrow, and it is Son Of Oligarch’s party.
We are not going to the party, but when it was first planned, Son Of Oligarch wondered if we would collect Oliver from school, take him to the party lunch and then on to the activity place afterwards.
This left us with some hanging about in York, which would have been tiresome, as York does not allow camper vans to park there.
You might recall that in an inspired moment, I decided to book us lunch at the gorgeous Grand Hotel, where you can park camper vans without abuse.
We do not need to ferry Oliver about now, as Son Of Oligarch’s mother has volunteered for this duty.
We could go straight to the activity play park, or we could go home, or we could do anything. We do not need to go into York at all.
All the same, I have not cancelled the lunch.
Mark wondered this morning if perhaps we should, because I am in terrible need of a haircut, in need of strimming really, perhaps it has been the sunshine. The budget will not stretch to lunch and a haircut as well, and I am getting dreadfully scruffy.
I still did not cancel the lunch.
This is especially wicked, because on the day after we are collecting Lucy and meeting Nan and Grandad for lunch, along with various other visiting family: and that will be two lunches out, one after the other, in the manner of utterly reckless hedonists.
I don’t care. You can die at any time, and I would rather die with happy memories than tidy hair.
I would like tidy hair as well, although not to die with especially. I like life, and will like it even more when I am drinking nice wine in the Grand Hotel.
I took the picture on my run this morning.
It is very hot at the moment.
