We have been watching bits of the Royal Wedding on and off all day.
We haven’t seen very much of it, because of not having television, but we think that we will try and find it on YouTube and watch it at quiet moments on the taxi rank.
What we have seen so far looks as though it was a brilliant day, the lady who Harry has chosen smiled all the way through, which must have been so hard. When I got married to Mark nobody was watching except our families and some of our friends, and when I looked at the photographs afterwards I had been so frightened that I had a grim expression with my teeth clenched as if I was having a sigmoidoscopy.
The sun shone gloriously on them, and the chapel was beautiful, and the guests looked wonderful, smart and groomed and happy.
We looked at them and thought that they both had kindly eyes, and hoped they would be gentle and good to one another.
All in all it was a nice thing to see. Jolly good luck to them both.
We were too busy sleeping and organising our lives to see much more than the BBC’s collection of highlights. We are still sleeping in the living room, of course, which is lovely in the middle of the day. We are right in the middle of the huge fuss and bustle that is Windermere, but like two dormice in a hole, nobody knows that we are there. We left the french windows open and the sunshine streamed in, along with the scent of the bluebells in the garden, and exotic cooking smells from all of the restaurants in the village.
We were just trying to encourage ourselves to get up when Number One Daughter rang, feeling disgruntled with her world.
She explained miserably that she had not done as well as she would have liked to do in her European competition so far.
She was cross with herself and feeling as though she had let us all down.
I was entirely surprised about this, because of course we do not mind in the least if she is not the fittest person in the world, and I said so. She might not be the fittest person in the whole world, but she is a very great deal fitter than me, or indeed than anybody else I know.
This did not help at all. When you are cross with yourself for not doing as well as you know that you might have done, nothing really makes it feel any better.
She has got one more competition day left. I explained that if she was not going to win then she might as well just try and enjoy it, because of having nothing to lose.
That did not help either.
I felt terribly sad on her behalf. It is not easy to have children who are disappointed in themselves, and I wished that she could feel as impressed with herself as I feel with her. It is the very difficult thing about comparing yourself to the people who are the very best in the whole world. If you are reading this, Number One Daughter, which I know you do if you have got nothing else to do, we all think you are doing just splendidly. You have worked your socks off. Nobody minds if you are first or a hundred and first, or even if you make a rude hand signal at the judges and flash your bottom at the television camera. In fact actually it might be very funny, I double dare you.
Shortly after I had finished worrying about that Number Two Daughter rang.
She is coming home.
She will be here on the thirty first of this month, along with her nice girlfriend.
We are quite certain of this because there was some cash flow difficulty, the nature of which I did not quite understand, and so we had got to book the tickets on Mark’s credit card.
It will be lovely to see them.
LATER NOTE:
Everything stopped there, because we got very busy indeed, and now it is daylight, and we have just got home. We have not even had time to watch any more of Prince Harry getting married. We did not even finish our flask of tea.
I was asked one of the stupidest questions I have ever had in the taxi. I collect these. This one was: “Do we have to tell you where we’re going?” This is right up there with: “What do you do for a living?” and “Surely people don’t get drunk in this lovely place.”
Sometimes I do not think the human race deserves to consider that it has evolved beyond the apes.
I am going to bed.
