Yay! We used the lawn tonight, for the first time this year! People, we've had a lovely evening, not least because it was a Newtonian's birthday today, and we were all able to enjoy the appropriately named 'rocky road' cake ..... Oh boy, could I employ an extended metaphor there!
Thank you so much for the absolutely delicious and epicurean offertoire: it was fantastic! (To use a word that I constantly discourage my English students from using!)

I re-read this morning's bloglog. Pathetic. Not even remotely worth reading - but then, you try writing up a diary when you've only just got up: not easy, you know. Still, it was pretty feeble, so apologies for that - especially when you've probably logged on expecting a witty account of what's been going on here in the past 24 hours. At least you learnt that the lawn was mown. And now you know that the Newtonians have used it, too!

I must tell you of this morning's English lesson with one of my fifth year sets. I was going through a CE trial paper with one of my students and was having a bit of a go at him, as I thought that he should not still be using capital letters in the middle of sentences. (My nephew did that; I never quite knew why.) The dualogue went as follows:

Me: ..... but why do you need to use a capital C to start a word in the middle of a sentence?

Him: But sir, that's not a capital C.

Me: But it is! Even I, with all my ophthalmological problems, can see that that's a capital C! You'd be no good as a sailor you know, if you have problems with Cs! (Seas. Ed.)

Him: I don't have problems with Cs!

Another: I shouldn't worry: Sir has problems with his Is! (Eyes. Ed.)

As quick-wittedness goes, I thought that was brilliant. (To use another word I discourage my lot from using.)

And I'm not going to try to outdo that tonight. So, goodnight all. I must get back to the rocky road. Newton lodgemastering, I mean.

Oh, and btw, I did p-p-p-p-pick up a Penguin - and I did get away with it.

Don't you dare sneak on me.