I do not think I will finish this before we arrive, but I am very pleased to tell you that we are almost home.
The threatened fuel-pump disaster has not materialised so far. The problem is that after a little while the engine thinks that it has run out of fuel. Mark said that as long as we keep the tank fairly full and did not go up hills, we should be all right, and so far he has turned out to be right. Obviously we could not avoid the hills, especially whilst crossing the Highlands, the clue is in the name, but we are almost at Shap Fell now on our way back, and so far, so good.
This can’t possibly be an exciting diary entry unless something dreadful happens in the next short distance, which I hope very much that it won’t. It can only be very dull indeed, because of course we have spent the entire day, from the very first thing this morning until now, travelling.
We woke up rather earlier than we had hoped, because tomorrow we have got to look after Elspeth’s dog for a little while. Elspeth is off investigating the one-eyed yellow idol and the grave of Mad Carew, and tomorrow her son goes back to university and we are going to look after their dog until they get home again. Her son has accepted his part of the arrangement with the utmost seriousness, and has been getting terribly worried about whether or not the dog will be lonely in the four or five hours in between him leaving it in the morning, and Mark picking it up after work.
Whilst I am impressed by his dutiful thoughtfulness, and indeed rather touched and charmed by the earnest determination to fulfil such a serious responsibility, I was perhaps not the right audience, especially not after about five hours sleep. I told him to shove it in the shed with a blanket and some dog food and it would be fine.
He disagreed and has occasionally been chirping dog-related worries ever since. Somebody else is going to look after it and nurture it through its anxieties until we arrive and spirit it away to fight it out with our dogs for a while.
I think it is going to have a traumatic sort of week.
I reassured him as well as I could, which was not very well at all, and we decided that probably we should get up. At this end of the day I am very glad that we did, it is lovely to be almost home and it is not midnight yet.
We took Oliver back to school, and we have no children any more.
We were there by lunchtime, and then there was all of the unpacking to do.
This was not just the stuff that we had brought with us, but all of the stuff that he had stored away in the trunk room at the end of last term.
He is very, very organised. I mean really organised, and very tidy. We spent quite some time making sure that everything was carefully folded and neatly placed in all the right drawers.
He keeps it like this as well, we know this because the housemaster has told us. I am very impressed. His sisters are all very tidy as well, but they had to grow into it later.
It is very quiet now. We do not have the soundtrack to the Book Of Mormon blasting cheerfully in the background to our lives. I imagine he will continue with this at school, he can explain Hasa Diga Ebowai* to the housemaster by himself.
LATER NOTE: We have made it. We are home. Mark says that he will order another valve for the fuel pump and so we do not need to worry about it any more.
It is wonderful to be home. We had closed the flue tight on the stove, and so the fire had stayed lit all of the time we were away. Everywhere is warm. We have fresh sheets on our bed, and everything feels clean and quiet and perfect. The adventures are all over and the world is a tranquil place again.
It is midnight and I am going to bed.
I am feeling very calm and peaceful.
*It is a song in the show, and it means something dreadfully rude in African.
