Well, the day of the jackal is approaching. In other words, the new member of our family is coming to join us for a trial day tomorrow - and, ridiculous as it sounds, I'm almost as nervous as I would be if it were one of our own going for a day at a prep school! I'm sure you will recall the feeling! Sadly, though, I have to go to London for a meeting at 11, so I won't be able to see her for more than a few minutes when she arrives at 8.15, but I will try to make the most of our brief meeting. Her name, by the way, chosen by daughter Alice, is Cheska, which we thought rather nice. I wasn't that keen on the 'h', as the name seemed classier without it, but I was outnumbered my female opinion. I tried for a small 'c' as well, and an apostrophe, viz: 'cesca, but that was considered to be ridiculous. What about cc'esca? Rather like ffortescue. No? Oh well, just a thought. I'll let you know how she gets on.

Monday night meant shoe-cleaning night in Newton, and once again there were three lucky winners, who became Haribo-encompassed as a result of their endeavours. The judge tonight was daughter Hannah, who is taking a(nother) break from writing her dissertation, although she is terribly excited, as she has been appointed to a school for September! Just the degree to go, then. I can't, at this stage, tell you which school it is, but Mrs C and I are v. proud, as you can imagine, especially as she's going to keep the education flag flying, so to speak.

I had a most intriguing conversation this morning about the French pronoun 'on'. My converationalist could not for the life of him understand why it could be translated as 'we', because as far as he was concerned, 'on' is 'one' and 'we' is more than 'one'. He does have a point.

Until Wednesday night, then,

Goodnight.