I woke up with a headache caused by drinking cheap wine.
It was cheap as well, so cheap that the box just said: Red Wine, not even Merlot or Shiraz or Cabernet Sauvignon, and it was very bad indeed.
Mark said that we ought to use it in cooking and not be so mean with our cash next time. Now that we are not leaving the EU for a while there is still time to dash over there and stock up properly before the gates are forever slammed and barred against us, if only we had some cash, which we haven’t. All the same it would be worth it, the thing I miss about France more than anything else is the wine, not least that you can buy it in two gallon boxes.
Fortunately the headaches woke us up a bit early, because we had a busy morning. Number Two Daughter rang whilst we were having coffee. She is flying back to the UK today, is in the air even as I write, and had worked herself up into a flap.
That was an intentional dreadful pun, just so you know. I hope you are all chortling into your cornflakes.
She was in a flap because she has sprained her ankle. It is swollen and purple.
She rang her sister, being Number One Daughter and the expert on all things physiotherapeutic, to ask how she should look after it on the flight.
Number One Daughter helpfully explained that she ought keep it propped up and occasionally walk around a bit. She added, ghoulishly, that the cousin of somebody she knew had died from going on an aeroplane with a sprained ankle.
Number Two Daughter was upset about this. She did not want to die.
I observed that if mortality were a likely consequence of travelling with a bruise then probably airlines would mention it on their check-in websites.
Number Two Daughter conceded this, and cheered up a bit.
They are not even travelling business class on this trip, because it is ridiculously expensive. They are in pauper class with the rest of the thrombosis candidates. It is probably being horrible even as I write, although probably you need not worry because by the time you read this she will probably be here, arrived and safe and well, and wandering around the airport trying to find Number One Daughter, who is going to meet her.
Mark cut some wood up before he went to work. We have been having some firewood difficulties lately. The chainsaw is not working at the moment, which is not helping. Mark has had it for thirty years and it has kept our fires going all that time, but it is now in need of dismantling and its component bits distributing around the shed for a few weeks. At the end of this he will either have fixed it or lost half of it.
We needed the wood. The day was ice-sharp, cold and bright and clear. Oliver and I hung the washing outside and took the dogs up the fell. I shall miss his company when he goes back to school, he talks about interesting things. Roger Poopy has almost finished eating his ball now, Oliver is having to throw a mis-shapen fragment. It seems to make him just as happy, he bounds after it with just as much joyful excitement, even though it no longer bounces, merely lands with a miserable splat.
Mark and Oliver had packaged up Oliver’s new bike for the courier last night. We left it on the doorstep when we went up the fell, and when we came back it had gone. It is on the way up to school, another To Do box ticked. He has some new school uniform, properly labelled, and his train tickets and his taxi are booked. All that is left to do now is give him some cash and refill his tuck box.
I am not looking forward to it.
