It was not a pleasant journey overall, though at least the English leg of it was smooth – that they had to hang around at Paddington (which keeps going all night, apparently, so they sensibly made part of the journey then) before catching an early train from Liverpool Street wasn’t anyone’s fault. I haven’t quite gathered what the problem was at Atlanta – weather or plane related – but they finally landed after 10.30pm, which didn’t give time for them to catch the last bus to Norwich, which left Heathrow at 11.30.

Having suggested the 6.30 train, I set an alarm for 7 o’clock. But they caught the 6.00, so I had to hurry. They’d only just got off the train when I arrived at the station – I’d have been in time for it to arrive if I hadn’t stopped to feed the cats, I admitted. I brought them home for breakfast and then they went to bed for a few hours. I met Wink at Ro’s house and took her to the hospital. She said, she’d had a phone call on the way which, when she pulled into a lay-by and checked, was from the hospital. She phoned back, no reply. When we arrived, it transpired that there had been a systems failure in the morning, they couldn’t do the scan she was going for and her appointment was cancelled. She fairly gently asked why a voicemail message couldn’t have been left or a text sent, but the receptionist only fields these points and can’t answer them.

Now 10.30am and R&V are still in bed, for which I don’t blame them in the least. I’ll see what they want to do when they get up. We’ve got today and tomorrow for the local things they need to do, so there’s no hurry.

I expect I’ve mentioned that I became a churchwarden again last year, reluctantly. I’ve been refusing for a long time, but a moment of compassion took over. The churchwarden is in her late 70s and has been soldiering on alone for several years. She just needed a little backup, as it turns out and I don’t have much extra to do. However, now she has broken her hip – a silly accident, her husband wanted her to fetch something (she says, he could have got it himself but he’s used to her doing everything) and she didn’t see the lead from his oxygen cylinder and tripped over it. She was due to have an operation yesterday and will be in hospital a week or so. Recuperation may take a while, it was quite a bad break, it seems.