Hellos and Goodbyes

Hello to the traditional half term cold. Not a horrid, horrid cold, but one that is going to cause minor irritation. It happens to teachers. Stress keeps germs at bay. The moment you let down your guard, the germs take hold. Generally in the mucus membranes.

Hello to a private tutoring student - A level grammar - which I like because when one is being a private tutor, one can teach how one jolly well likes and no-one is going to lean over one's shoulder and tell one one's doing it all wrong. As long as the paying customer is happy, all is well. One's audience is captive and usually enjoys their hour, which, I must add, goes a darn sight quicker than the hour one spends in front of, oh, bottom set Year 10, for example. (Apologies for talking like the Queen - momentary delusion of grandeur.)

In fact, if I could make a living being a private tutor, that is what I would do all the time.

Hello to Andy who is on holiday this week, too. He spent most of the morning at the allotment dismantling the fruit cage and the polytunnel in preparation for saying good-bye to our plot. He brought back some carrots and the last of the tomatoes which I've been nibbling at all day because they are DELICIOUS!!

Hello to Mrs Pumphrey's new feathers. She did this last year - moulted and regrew her plummage with amazing speed. Where other hens go hunched and moody when they moult, Mrs Pumphrey remains perky and bright and loud and bossy. I've been feeding her some corn to keep up her strength, but not too much because we don't want aggressive hens on our hands, do we?

Goodbye to more tat from the cupboards. We had a bit of a crisis in my writing room yesterday, whereby there was a fight between a sofa and a book case and a built-in cupboard. But Andy and I took them in hand, they all know their places now and the opportunity was taken for an Autumn clean and turf out.

Hello to a bathroom re-do. We've taken the plunge and secured the services of a plumber to renovate the upstairs shower-room. He's due to start work in three weeks. As always with any home improvements, I am ridiculously excited.

Almost goodbye to our oven. It's making funny noises. It's becoming awkward to light except the big gas burner which still behaves like a flame thrower. Bits are dropping off it. I'm not surprised. It was cheap, it gets worked hard, and it has probably been picking up on my feelings of loathing pretty much since the day it arrived. I have my eye on a double oven range-style number in cream. In fact, I can almost feel it wending its way towards us, ready to take on the Christmas goose. It's going to be a very full house at the Manor this Christmas. A double oven will be most welcome.