I am going to have an early night and so might, regrettably, cut you a little short.
It has been a busy day.
We have been sweeping the chimney.
Actually Mark has been sweeping the chimney. I have been fussing around trying to clear up bits of soot and chimney dust.
It was messy.
I have called the day Chimney so that I can find it easily. If we accidentally set our house on fire again and the fire brigade accuse us of never sweeping the chimney I can dash upstairs and check these pages for Incontrovertible Evidence that we jolly well do, complete with date and time.
It was about 2:15 this afternoon. The date is at the top. Just for reference purposes.
In the end I retreated out to work, leaving him in the yard trying to manufacture some new stove bits out of what looked like a flat tin can. Some of the bits inside the fire basket have melted, which is surprising, since I do not think our house has ever been that warm. Certainly without the fire recently it has been barely warm enough to melt chocolate, the summer seems to have fled south.
I noticed this again at work later. The trees are changing colour fast now. We will be eating mists and mellow fruitfulness before we know where we are, indeed, our neighbours have already donated a large tub of fruitfulness from their Yorkshire orchard. I am supposed to make it into jam but so far have been too idle, maybe tomorrow.
I did not stay at work very late at all. Mark rang just before sunset, and we squandered the last of the daylight having a walk along the edge of the lake.
This was rather splendid. The dogs belted about excitedly, barking at southbound geese, which stopped abruptly when Roger Poopy accidentally fell in. I would have liked to paddle, but unlacing my boots was just too complicated to bother, so I didn’t, but I very much admired a white-haired old chap who courageously strode into the water and was having a swim. It turned out to be a brief swim, but I was very impressed.
We were supposed to be going back to work afterwards, but we didn’t, because there were a hundred unemployed taxis on the taxi rank. Instead we came home and ate an enormous late dinner.
Afterwards we had a glass of wine, just in case we might feel tempted to go back to work.
I was not at all tempted to go back to work. In fact I was thoroughly tempted to go to bed early, which is, I think, what I will probably do next.
Have a picture of a cloudy sunset walk.
