So here we go again, then! By all accounts, Long Leave was both happy and successful on all counts - as was ours. I was delighted to overhear a goodly number of Newtonians enquiring of their peers whether they had had a good time, before clobbering said peers with pillows.

I must say that I wish I had returned to school to be greeted with fruit, Chunky Kit-Kat bars and a tin of the most wonderful cookies from a generous donor! I seem to recall that my own greeting was that rendered by a terrifying history beak, whose eagle gaze I endeavoured to avert while I smuggled in my illegal contraband! (I always managed it, and I'm jolly glad I did, because the penalty was pretty severe!) Goodness! What am I saying? Here I am, as a terrifying (well, only sometimes) English beak, admitting to the contravention of prep school rules! Oh well. And I wouldn't have given Mr Burton (or 'Blighter' Burton, as we called him, but not to his face) any unsolicited hugs, either, such as the three that I received tonight!

Nor would I have been able to watch Mr Bean on the telly, either, unlike our residents tonight! I did not confess to my ownership of a Mini 1000 in the 1970s, as I considered that this would have engendered too many suggested thoughts that Mr B and I were not entirely dissimilar in our ways .......

H'm. What a difference half a century makes. Still, I loved my prep school days, for all Blighter B's attempts at making it a frightening experience. (Although he could be quite entertaining at times, not least when he gave us a full-blown demonstration of how King Canute would have beaten the waves into submission, complete with omnipresent gym shoe.) I do hope our Newtonians love their days, too: they certainly appear to. It's good to have them back.