Apologies for last night’s absence, and probably more apologies for tonight’s absence, because I am not going to write very much tonight either.
We have stopped by my parents’ house on the way back, and we are parked in their driveway.
It is the darkest hour of the night, whatever time that is, I have lost track a bit since the tiresome clocks changed and suddenly you are late for work the whole time because it doesn’t feel like almost six o’clock already. Anyway, it is dark and the rain is battering on the roof of the camper van in torrents, and I am in bed. Oliver is in bed as well, and Mark is in the shower, washing away the strains of the day.
The camper van does not smell very nice because the tiresome visiting dog had an accident in it, and despite us having a special expensive enzyme spray with which to clear it, it hasn’t, quite. It had the accident when I beat it up again, which I did when it bit me. I felt sad that it was the only dog not sharing chocolate buttons with us, Rosie was practically hoovering them up off the table, which she most certainly is not allowed to do. The visiting dog hates everybody, so it was not sharing the chocolate buttons and was hiding in its basket, growling at the world. I felt sad for its lonely isolation, so I took it a chocolate button and stroked it, and it did not want the chocolate button and bit me in revenge.
It is in lonely isolation again now.
We have been in Bath all day, having ploughed down the motorway in the dark hours of last night, and slept in a lay-by somewhere on some rural bypass, where we awoke to clods of heavy reddish soil and the magnolia blossoms out everywhere, which they definitely aren’t at home. We have still got snowdrops in the Lake District.
Bath is nice, all warm golden stone and everybody pretending to have read Jane Austen. At the end of Persuasion Anne Elliot discovers that the Ibbetsons are in Bath as well so clearly it is a long-established pattern. Did you notice I wrote the book title in italics? I learned to do that in Cambridge, the tutors write scathing remarks on your work if you don’t, although for the life of me I don’t see why they should care, it isn’t like not knowing where to put an apostrophe, and none of them know that properly. I have asked them all about the Master’s’s’ degree and they all frown and look thoughtful and say that it is an Interesting Question, which is another way of saying that you haven’t got a clue, ask anyone in Government.
Did I mention that I am doing a Master’s’s’ degree in Cambridge? Well, I am.
Anyway, Oliver likes Norland College, and we sat outside it whilst he visited, watching the nannies coming and going, tidily polished and smart in their lovely brown uniforms. I approve very much. I would be pleased if he gets a place and wears sensible brown shoes and gloves, even though it will all cost yet another small fortune.
We will have to see how he gets on. He has got another year to go yet.
I am going to sleep. It has been a very long couple of days.
