Well, we are back on the road. Nil desperandum, and all that.
Mark’s taxi did not get fixed but it seems to be working again, so that is all right.
My car has got a new alternator, courtesy of Penrith Scrap Yard. Also it is Monday and despite the quite astonishing wetness of the Lake District at the moment, I have even managed to wash the sheets. I hung them in the yard, optimistically, this morning, but they didn’t stay there for very long, just long enough for a passing pigeon to have an accident on a pillowcase and also for them to get an extra rinse, in the rain.
I brought them in after that, and we had the dreadful wet-washday thing of sheets hanging about all over the house, limp and dispiriting, like seaweed brought home from Blackpool in a toddler’s bucket, and dumped, forgotten, in a pile on the lawn.
It is too warm to light the fire. I hastened the process along a bit by lighting the oven and cooking some ham and sausages, so they will probably have a faint culinary jauntiness by the time I get them on the bed.
They are not dry yet but I am nil desperanduming about that as well. They will be all right by the time we have finished work.
It is very, very wet. I have no words for yesterday’s advanced wetness, and today’s, although less dramatic, frankly is not much of an improvement. Worse, I am now on the taxi rank and trying to be patient with idiots who pipe up, cheerily, Good for you lot, this weather, isn’t it.
Absolutely. We love to see our drain covers floating off down the road. Absolutely marvellous.
Still it is nice to be back at work, rather to my surprise. I think I told you last night that a small part of me was outraged at being obliged to remain at home, like a teenager after a shockingly bad school report, instead of sloping off into the darkness to be around whilst the most interesting part of the day was happening.
I never understood the fashion of obliging teenagers to remain at home by means of a penalty for their misdemeanours, actually, not least because I was always relieved when mine buzzed off out, and never wanted too discourage them. In any case as soon as you introduce compulsion, any self-respecting teenager will disappear at the earliest possible opportunity, like a rat under a compost heap.
I like my house when it is not compulsory, but I am still pleased to be out and being a part of the night again. It is dark at a sensible time now, and the feeling of autumn is creeping up on us, the air is heavy with the acid scents of soil and the slowly-darkening leaves. A bat flew into the house last night and flapped around anxiously for some time before Mark managed to usher it out of Lucy’s bedroom window again.
I was bitten by a bat once. They have sharp teeth. I did not get rabies and die so do not believe everything you read on the mighty Internet.
In other news, Lucy telephoned. She seems to be getting along nicely with her house purchasing, although bemoaning the quite astonishing amount of forms that need to be filled in. She is used to filling in forms, because of being in the police, but not used to being the Accused, which appears to be the way the building society are considering her.
Number One Daughter telephoned. She is in Jordan. She is doing something educational with the Army, although it seems to be of a friendly nature, we are not yet at war with Jordan, so do not worry. At least, if we are at war, Number One Daughter is not getting bombed. She sent me a picture of her being very bronzed and lying on a sun-lounger.
Number Two Daughter telephoned. She is in Canada. She is having a minor domestic crisis because their house has an infestation of dreadful creatures called Carpenter Ants. These are the sort of carpenters that trash everything, leave sawdust all over the place, take all your money and run off, not the sort that leave you with a gleaming new staircase and polished oak floor. They have killed two doors-full so far and think they might have managed to poison any others. Somebody is going to look tomorrow.
Oliver telephoned. He has lost his shoe polish.
It is very, very quiet on the taxi rank. There is nobody here. The weekend was the end of the summer.
Nil desperandum.
