I worked assiduously this morning. Not on what I’d intended to, as the Sage plonked a valuation on my desk to type up, but anytime I do work as soon as it is given to me feels like great efficiency.

I am chilly. The room is next to the Aga-warmed kitchen but it is, at present, unheated. Having become chillier during the morning, I have just lit two candles and fetched a blanket to go over my knees. It is not that cold really, it is just me.

I have realised that tomorrow I am going to spend the day in Norwich, until 4, and then have to be back there by 6.30. Norwich is half an hour’s drive away. I wonder if it is worth coming home. Probably not and I might as well go to a café for a couple of hours. Or shop. I only really care to start Christmas shopping in December, but it is a busy month. I also have a not-shopping-in-Norwich-in-December policy, which I instituted some years ago when parking and, indeed, moving, became impossible. I tried parking and riding, which is fine if you are after a jolly or business, but is hopeless for real shopping as you need to decant parcels every so often. Shopping is not done in half measures.

I wonder if the second lunchtime glass of wine was not a good idea. It cheered me for a while, but now I’m gloomy again. Chocolate hasn’t helped. Nor has music. Damn.

The Archers has just started. Wisely, I listened to it online last night as high drama was promised – the night when daggy Ruth was to embark on her dirty midweek with her cowman. Wise, as there was a fully descriptive review in the paper this morning. Why is Ruth such a deeply unappealing character? David is rather too perfect, albeit a tad dull, and her voice is truly dreadful – and don’t tell me that, after nearly 20 years away from the North East, her accent would not have softened to some small degree – but surely that’s not enough?

I’m not depressed. Just pissed off. Damn. If I’m not over it by tonight, champagne will be needed.

The good news is that I got a bank statement and I have whole lots more money than I thought, I don’t know why.

I make a crap chairman. I even took my gavel to a meeting, but it seemed rude to use it. Very bossy, banging a gavel.

Do you know, sometimes I really feel I’ll be glad when I can quit. I devised a five-year plan to come off all committees. Within a few weeks, I had agreed to join another one as the secretary was moving away from the area and they really needed someone at once.

This happened five years ago last June. Last July, I left one committee. I still have a five year plan.

I suppose it would be useful to have a proper job at which I was visibly busy every day, so that people wouldn’t think I have plenty of time to spare. I know I appear capable, confident, articulate, but not domineering. I explain that I am also lazy, disorganised and casual, although efficient. This is absolutely true, but saying so is sometimes mistaken for modesty.

I will feel less grumpy in the morning.

But I will still rather want to quit.

This morning, being a dutiful governor at the High School. Sat in a history lesson as an observer and then went to talk to the folks in the Learning Support Department. And remembered to make an appointment for my next visit, as good intentions are not enough and it’s easy to find that half a term has gone by and I haven’t done a thing.

Dilly rang up. Squiffany would really love to go for a walk, but Pugsley had just gone to sleep on her. Well, it just so happened that, not only would I enjoy a walk too, but I had some things to deliver in the village. We took Tilly -unfortunately, forgot a plastic bag. Fortunately, had some tissues wrapped in plastic. Unfortunately, then had to carry steaming handful. Fortunately, only for 100 yards or so, as the village is well equipped with bins designed for the purpose of depositing doggy deposits.

Squiffany has, over the last week or so, started to use short sentences. Previously, they were a succession of one word comments, but now she will say things like “my nice juice”‘ and “where my nice hat please?” You will see the generally cheerful nature of these remarks, I don’t think she has a ‘cross’ vocabulary yet. When upset or tired, she just cries. Not today, I’m glad to say, when she started to rub her eyes she lay on the sofa for a couple of minutes but then got up again, so I asked her if she would like to go for a ride in the car, to send her to sleep. She thought this was a good idea and so it was.

Time to cook. Then, time to work as I haven’t done my desktop duties today. Three phone calls and an email do not constitute a day’s work.

PS … 7.36pm … I eye the inch of wine in the bottle worriedly. I really hope it is not I who have drunk all that, as I don’t remember having done so. Dinner will be ready in five minutes or so, frightfully Englishly it is roast loin of pork, local leeks and sprouts, roast potatoes…the pork has crackling of course, which is the point of pork. Why do some countries cut the rind off pork?*

I’m sure that someone else has drunk some of the wine. It wasn’t I; for one thing my grammar is not desperately astray and nor is my spelling, and for another there have been no typos to correct. But the thought of two hours work later (minimum) is not a happy one.

*Not countries as such; the butchers or cooks in said countries.

He dreamed of cheese, toasted mostly, if my memory deceives me not. I had a yearning too, and promptly gave in to it, with toasted cheese, soup and a glass of sherry for lunch.

I didn’t get down to the pub today. It was after 1 o’clock when I left the church. We had spent some time searching for the silk poppies that assist the flower arrangements for Remembrance Sunday. After clambering awkwardly through the hatch into the attic, looking in the bier shed and all cupboards, I finally spotted them. In a vase, on a windowsill, behind a drawn curtain. Oh.

I arrived home to find a note from the Sage. He is out, making business calls. A self-employed person is never off duty, even for Sunday lunchtime. So, a snack lunch and a look in the paper to see what is on television. Oh. I glanced through the satellite channels, to make sure that I was not missing anything by not subscribing to them. I am not.

So, the Sunday papers and some music it will be, then. Mozart (and Süssmeyer)s’ Requiem, to start with, to soothe and uplift. Not that I vastly need it, but I hate that sodding loft ladder.

No, I will not think of it again. Requiem eternam, instead.

…I feel nostalgic.

I wish I were in India.

I’m glad to say that the Bishop was awfully nice and gave a good sermon (and not too long into the bargain). There were, disconcertingly, more clergy in one country church than I’ve ever seen before. Whole piles of them. No one was wearing their most elaborately embroidered vestments; the Bishop himself was in a tasteful shade of maroon, topped with black, then white – all this would not be for me as I’m far too vain and that many layers would make me look Fat. When shaking his hand for the second time, I was holding my stave which is about 7 foot long and since I am little (heightwise, at any rate) it wavered and nearly came to blows with his Crook (I guess there is a proper name for it but if I ever knew it I’ve forgotten. Unless it’s a crosier. Which it could well be). He looked momentarily alarmed, as well he might.

I redeemed myself later, when he arrived at the village school where food and drink were on offer. No one else hurried to meet him so I bobbed up greetingly and offered to get him a drink. He brightened considerably as he noticed the glass in my hand and asked for red wine; I used the opportunity to get a refill.

We had a list of guests for whom we had reserved seats as they had to say a Few Words, so each of us looked out for the ones we would recognise. I had the pleasure, after my lamentations the other day about an inability to remember faces or names, of greeting several people by name, who looked startled because they didn’t know who I was until I told them. This included our local Member of Parliament, but I spared him by saying “we have met, but you won’t remember me, I was the governor who showed you round *my village* school a couple of years ago.” Mind you, decent bloke though he is, he has a little way to go yet to match our last MP John M@cGregor, who remembered everyone to a disconcerting degree. Once – he was Secret@ry of St@te for Educ@tion at the time – he quizzed me about my opinions and then, rather gratifyingly, used them in his next House of Commons speech. I’m not sure what they were, it was a long time ago.

By the end of it all my legs were not working very well, as I wore entirely impractical shoes and stood in them for rather over five hours. The first two times trolling up and down the aisle were not too absurd, but self-consciousness kicked in on the third occasion and I felt entirely foolish.

Today, I remembered – with more than a week to go, yay! – to ask a suitable person to read the Roll of Honour at the Remembrance Sunday service tomorrow week. And check that someone has ordered a poppy wreath.*

A bonfire party tonight. We’ll have a few fireworks tomorrow I expect. And make a guy. The Sage’s father’s name was Guy – we always celebrated his birthday on Bonfire Night, though after his death we found his birth certificate and found that wasn’t his birthday after all, it was the day before!

*Pride goeth before destruction and an haughty spirit before a fall. I checked around to see if there was anything else I should do. “Bugler?” asked Sue. I know no bugler. I hope someone does – or has a CD. I just don’t think the Last Post will sound the same on a clarinet. Or a saxophone.

I pottered around for a while this morning. Tidied up, read and answered emails, wrote letter and readied it for the post. It was not until twenty to ten that I thought about breakfast. For the first time this autumn, my mind went hungrily to porridge.

The Sage and I often have porridge for breakfast in the winter. But rarely do we cook and eat it together. Apart from the fact that, today, he had breakfasted and gone out long ago, this is for several reasons.

I cook it quickly, boiled fast so that the grains don’t break down and there is still some texture as I eat.
He likes to simmer it gently for a long time, so that it is smooth and – is there a non-oily word that gives the same effect as unctuous? Without me actually mentioning wallpaper paste?

I add a pinch of salt before cooking.
He, virtuously, does not.

I make it with half milk, half water, as little as possible so that it is not too sloppy.
He makes it with half milk, half water, but plenty of it so that it is not too dry.

I add a few grains of dark brown Muscovado sugar, for flavour more than sweetness.
He adds a spoonful of white sugar for sweetness.

I add a few extra drops of milk, just enough that it doesn’t actually set.
He adds plenty of milk.

It would be just too poncy to stand stirring two pans of porridge at the same time, but really, neither of us likes the way the other cooks it. Though we will be polite and eat it of course, if it has been, kindly, made.

Better to breakfast alone really.

However, if you do make porridge, maybe best not to take it back to the computer and idly read a few blogs as you eat. Not JonnyB, at any rate. A sudden laugh catching you unawares can eject a mouthful. Porridge is not easy to remove from a keyboard and must be done at once. Otherwise it sets, with properties not dissimilar from concrete.

Random bits tonight, as I have spent a long time wrestling with a post that won’t be ready for a day or two.

Have I mentioned the new Rector? She will be Instituted and Inducted tomorrow night, by the Bishop of Norwich no less, in a church not far from here (not my village, but the same group). We had a practice the other night. The churchwardens (of whom I am one) have to shift themselves up and down that sodding aisle no fewer than three times. I suspect we will look total idiots. We will be carrying Staves. At one point, my lovely fellow-churchwarden and another male CW will have to shift the Bishop’s chair, as he won’t need it any more. So I’ll have to carry two staves and will, undoubtedly*, trip over one or both of them.

Do you know anything about this? Honestly, it brings out the worst in the Church of England: the love of ceremony.

First they dress up like Total Twats. Sorry. But they do. All church dignitaries are actors manqués and love dressing up. They prance up and down aisles as if anyone is looking at them. Well, we are, but in disbelief. I’m not saying this is not a meaningful ceremony; of course it is, but surely less can be more. It’s like weddings. Often, the more elaborate the wedding, the shorter the marriage (I can say this as I have been married for ages and ages and had three guests, two of whom were witnesses, at my civil ceremony)….you will appreciate that I generalise for effect and am not wishing to cast aspersions on anyone who has had a Dream Fairytale Wedding, but I have known a few where the wedding was the be all and the marriage was the end all.

Then they have too much meaningful stuff. The Rector to be has to be introduced to the door of the church, the bells, the font (and handed the Water), the episcopal seal, the chair, the altar, the oil, the bible, the bread and wine – really, it’s like Alice in Wonderland, or an Australian tale I read as a child called the Magic Pudding.

The good thing is that, at the end, we all disembark to the village school where there is food and wine (and coffee, pfft) laid on.

In preparation, this evening, I had said I’d take forty chairs from our church room to the church in question. I borrowed Al’s van – it’s a little Postman Pat van – and took it to the church. I thought, rather dismally, that I would be spending a couple of rather hard-working hours alone….but then, out of the woodwork, appeared three helpful men who let me marvel at their muscularity as they dealt with most of the work. They were marvellous. The whole thing was done in 45 minutes.

What else? I’ve done a couple of simple but tedious tasks that I have been pretending not to have time to do for a couple of weeks.

Ah yes. A breakthrough yesterday. Squiffany asked, for the first time, to use the potty. “Daddy, poo. Potty.**” He took her into her room and she started to play and to inveigle him into playing too. He thought she was taking the, um, poo, and went back to the highly important job of plumbing in the new washing machine. But a few minutes later, she called him again and this time, she followed through. Much praise and ceremony. I have a feeling that so many children are still in nappies now because disposables are so comfortable. I know a few three-year-olds, and one child of nearly five – mind you, his house-husband father is hopeless, though sweet – still in nappies. It may be no coincidence that Squiffany is in proper washable nappies and doesn’t really like them wet or dirty.

Um. I’ve probably delighted you long enough.***

*I was affronted, yesterday morning, to hear on the Today prog on Radio 4, some government chappie say, clearly and inaccurately, “undoubtably.” Really me.

**Endlessly interesting, the English language. Poo is what is done, pooh is the aroma. Pooh, of course, is the bear.

***I do trust that you all follow my literary allusions.

I went to the hairdresser today. I generally look fairly unkempt in a reasonably tidy sort of way, so it might be hard to believe that I have my hair cut every five weeks, but so it is. At least I look okay for one day in thirty-five.

The person before me had been held up and was late for her appointment, so I had time to sit and contemplate Life in general, and the conversations going on in particular. What I like about my hairdressers is that the chat tends to be general, you might exchange a few words with your own coiffeuse, but if the subject is a good one it gets spread throughout the room and can be very entertaining.

As one person left, she called out “Goodbye Ginnie!” And one of the hairdressers turned and waved. This puzzled me as I had always thought her name was Nicki. But sure enough, not long afterwards, someone called her Virginia.*

I pondered my inability to remember names. Many people find it hard to put names to faces. Others find it hard to put faces to names. I cannot, without great difficulty, remember either.

Not long ago, there was an article in the paper about *the latest syndrome*, which demonstrated that some people, however hard they try, simply haven’t got the mental equipment to recognise people easily. There is, apparently, a test you can take. At one point, they bring on a series of pictures of people whose pictures have been doctored to eliminate the hair. The journalist taking the test – and her mother and her daughter – reacted with laughter. Impossibly to tell them apart. This reaction, it appears, is in itself a vitual diagnosis that you can’t recognise people by their features alone.

I don’t think I’m that bad, but I am not very good. Unfortunately, I’m awful with names too. I do try, very hard, and I have vastly improved over the years. When I moved to this house, twenty years ago, I had to make a whole new circle of friends and I really didn’t want anyone to think I didn’t care enough to know their name. I joined the WI and I used to spend meetings looking round the circle (we don’t sit in rows), putting names to faces. I became secretary of various committees, so that I would have names in front of me that I could use as aides memoires.

What I do usually remember are facts. If you were to be introduced to me, I would be listening to what you say. I might, therefore, not know your name or your face, but if you told me the names of your children, your opinion about an issue of the day, that you loved eggs Benedict but were allergic to nuts, that your dog was born on Christmas Day 2001, I’d know all that about you forever. Just not, unfortunately, who you are. Or what you look like.

I am not good about asking personal questions. If you don’t tell me your name – and why not? Why not, for goodness’ sake? I tell you my name, and I’ll remind you of it the next time we meet** and how we last met furthermore, because it’s embarrassing to be looked at blankly, but just how many people return this favour? Not enough. Really, not enough.

Funnily enough, contemplating writing about this, I read a few blogs and came upon today’s from Stitchwort. Who is finding much the same as me, but as a more recent phenomenon. Though I suspect it is because, at present, she has too much else to think about as she remembers facts etc. as usual.

However, I have always wondered what would happen if I ever were to develop Alzheimers. How would anyone ever know? What difference would there be to notice?

*Actually, afterwards I realised that another hairdresser is called Nicki. I just had them a bit mixed up. Look, I always told you I was disorganised.

**This is, of course, assuming that I know who the hell you are

I woke up this morning, it was 5.22
I woke up this morning, it was five twenty-two.
It was already light and I felt blue because at 5.22 this afternoon it will be dark and that is really absurd.

Stuff GMT, I want British Summer Time all year round.