My dear Followers, I'm pleased to say that I'm still here (atm) and have not been abducted by, well, whomsoever. Nor am I working for the other side now. Honest. I must confess that looking at the stats page of this blog has become something of an obsession now, as I can see instantly how many people have had a squint at my writings (!) and where in the world they come from. It's fascinating, and the realisation that one is broadcasting to a global audience is quite something! Incidentally, if you are the (which I just typed rather aptly as thj) followers in the Netherlands, I didn't mean it. It's just that I do find your country a little, erm, flat, and I've never been a huge fan of the holes in the cheese. I did love the herons on the banks of the waterways, though: that was very special. And it was your country, my dear friends, that facilitated the opportunity for me to play the organ for a concert in the cathedral with the longest nave in Europe: the Cathedral of St Jan, in Gouda. H'm. I think I might have been a little unjust with my remarks. My apologies.

Here in Newtonianland, all is well, and we've had another in our shoe-cleaning series. Six lucky winners tonight, but I fear that they didn't exactly feel euphoric at their achievement as the prizers were small packets of Haribo, which none of the victors (although none was named such tonight) particularly liked said confectionery! Not our greatest moment, sadly. Still, we did try to find appropriate substitutes.

We're all preparing for our Ofsted boarding inspection next week. Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday might be a bit edgy for Mrs C and yours truly, so if you don't hear much, you'll know why. You can have very little idea of just how many policies have to written, implemented and submitted .... ! There has to be a policy for almost everything - and I do mean everything - which has meant copious (as in thesis copious) amounts of writing, updating, re-working, re-wording, re-this and re-that. Still, as long as the policies and procedures are all in order - and I think they are - we should be OK.

So, if after Wednesday you hear nothing more from me, you know that the policy on face flannels (FF58467/876DD/890/agsh/flan) wasn't up to the mark and either we'll have been guilty of a load of flannel ourselves, or I've been 'invited' to work elsewhere.

Bonne nuit.