We decided to have an early night last night, and I was in bed by 11 with the Sage not long behind me.  I’d just turned off the light, finished replying to an email and we were just snuggling up to go to sleep when the phone rang.  “That’ll be Daphne,” I said, as she usually phones around 11 pm.  In fact, it was the police – or one of them, anyway, a female police officer.  A cow had been reported out in the lane.

The Sage’s first reaction was polite lack of interest, but we supposed we’d better do something about it.  So I fished my underwear out of the linen basket, put my jeans and jumper back on and we stomped down and into the car.  The cow was out, rather wishing she knew how to get back in with her friends (Big Pinkie and another cow, we haven’t named them this year yet) and wasn’t entirely pleased when I clapped my hands to get her to move to where the Sage had released a section of wire.  I clapped her on the rump, she started to move and then wheeled round resentfully.  I stepped back a bit.

Once she got going, it wasn’t easy to stop her and she vanished over the bridge down the lane – away from the road, fortunately.  I moved the car to help persuade her not to go past it, and it didn’t take long for the Sage and me to drive her back into the field.  We were back in bed by midnight.  All the same, knackered, darlings, we were.

It’s all been a bit busy today and I haven’t got around to writing down directions to get here, so if you’re waiting I apologise and will email you tomorrow.