So there we are, then. The end of one of the most difficult terms I can recall since I started in this game in 1973. We've come through snow, and a really nasty, virulent 'bug', and the Newtonians have been great throughout all of it. And tonight they have packed without a problem.

I know you won't mind my offering a special word of thanks and appreciation to Diana, because I know full well that if it weren't for her this place would fall apart. And despite wading through unmentionable piles of, well, unmentionable things, in the small hours of the morning for days on end, clearing it up and sending the projectors back to bed with a reassuring 'goodnight', she seems impervious to anything that might cause her to take to her own bed. As I said in my wedding speech in 1981, never question your wife's judgement: just remember who she married.

Lots of thanks, too, are due to Miss Chloe, who arrived at this strange and idiosyncratic place from the other side of the world, to be greeted by white fields, white houses, white cars and white everything else. She is a great asset - even if, by her own confession, she's 'not a morning person'!

And while I'm expressing thanks, I mustn't forget my colleagues, Mr Bryan, Dr Dean and Mr Porter, who have always been willing to help out, not just on their regular nights, but on other occasions, too.

Have a lovely time with your boys, wherever in the world you may be. I'm off to New York for a week on Saturday, and I can't wait. Thank you all for your support - and for taking the time to log on to the nightly reports. I couldn't write them without you.

Goodnight, one and all.

It's hard to believe that this is the penultimate post of term. It's been a pretty difficult ten or so weeks, though, and there will be quite a number who will be looking forward to the summer term with some alacrity, methinks!

I'm pleased to report that our injured Newtonian is making good progress, and hoping to be back with us for the final assembly of term, and knowing his tenacity, I bet he will be, too.

Tonight, at supper, I was surrounded by a number of Newton residents who were intent on telling me all about their own joke repertoire, and listening, very patiently, to mine. So now, if you want to know what you call a nun with a washing machine on her head, or the story of how the man who was driving along the motorway was apprehended by a mobile forest with a blue lamp on top, you'll only have to ask your offspring. And having heard all about the young girl from Tottenham who had removed parts of her apparel due to the heat (I bet one of you is at this moment smiling knowingly!), I was asked whether I knew any 'grown up' jokes or limericks! I replied that yes, I did - do - but that my audience was not old enough to hear any of them just yet. So if you should wish to know what catastrophe befell the young lady from Brazil (Jill, I think her name was), you'll just have to wait. (You may be amused to learn that I heard that particular little piece of verse from my first headmaster, during my first supper with him and his wife. So shocked was I to hear such lines falling from the lips of such an aristocratic and upright gentleman that I spilt a full glass of expensive claret onto a priceless white tablecloth. "Do you like courgettes?" was the HM's wife's diplomatic enquiry as the wine spread ever further across the table.)

Time to sign off, as the Congrevians are returning from the league feast.

As for the unfortunate nun's nomenclature: Sister Mattick.

Goodnight.

An oxymoronic day today. I was saddened to learn that one of our Newtonians had sustained a nasty injury over at school earlier, and Mrs C and I send our love to him, in the hope that he will not be in too much discomfort.

Tonight, though, as always, we have been off duty, and we have had the pleasure of entertaining our children's director of music, who, purely coincidentally, is examining at St Edward's and a few other schools in the vicinity, and staying on the Banbury Road. It'e been a truly lovely evening, during which we have done no more than reminisce about former times, consume a lovely spag bol and imbibe some very enjoyable liquid accompaniment, I put a notice on the board earlier, which informed the residents that we were entertaining tonight and requested of them that they might not be too noisy.They weren't. Under the excellent direction of Mr Bryan, we wouldn't have known they were anywhere near! So, many thanks are due to all - and I will tell them tomorrow morning how brilliant they were.

Cross country this afternoon, and everyone was terrific. Many Newtonians did extremely well, and I was delighted when so many of them came up to me once they had completed the course, proudly displaying their position number! I worked for a HM some years ago, who always said that he wanted to do away with entry tests, and simply get all prospective pupils (not their parents!) to participate in a cross-country run. In this way, he reckoned, he could tell far more about a boy's character than any academic test ever could. Controversial? Well, maybe - but he had a point. And all of your young were shining examples of what Baden-Powell called 'stickability'.

Until tomorrow.

Good evening all - wherever in the world you may be, and a special greeting to anyone in New Zealand who may be having a squint at this nocturnal blogobabble.

I sent an e-mail to Our Leader this morning about something which I suppose must have had a touch of end-of-termishness about it, as it brought the briefest of responses:

! Only four days to go!

And I tell you that because it has served to remind me that the term will shortly be over and I must thank all of you loyal Followers for your wonderful support, whether tangible, as in those amazing cookies from the best Granny in the world, or other hugely appreciated and gratefully guzzled treats, or simply by logging on to these quinquagenarian ramblings every night.

We all went to the junior play tonight. It was very well performed indeed by the Second Year boys, but it was a little sad at the end, when the principal character actually died. This gave rise t the following dualogue:

"Sir, what did you think of the play?"

"Terrific," I said, "most enjoyable. You?"

"Well, yes, I suppose so - if you like thowing yourself off a warehouse."

Anyway, moving on. I forgot to tell you on Saturday night that we enjoyed listening to the senior boys in aballoon debate. The characters involved were Mohammed al Fayeed, Tim Berners-Lee, Albert Einstein, our own Henry Harman, and some Korean footballer called Kim Jung Il, or something similar. Most enjoyable it was, too, and we were invited to vote for our character of preference at the end.

When I returned to Newton, I was asked who I had voted for. Sorry, for whom I had voted. I replied that as a member of staff I hadn't been able to vote, but had I done so, I would have voted for Henry Davies' impersonation of Henry Harman, as I thought he was amazing, and very funny. I asked my questioner whom he had voted for.

"Oh, easy. I voted for Mohammed al Qaeda.'

So there you are. If the Taliban are surfing the 'net tonight I'll probably have a a fatwah on me by tomorrow morning.

Sleep well.

Those noisy gappers woke me twice last night, as they returned from their nocturnal revelry! And if they're reading this then I hope they will take note! Those of us who are so antiquated that we can't remember a time when we enjoyed such riotous behaviour need our sleep! (Actually, some of you may recall my reference to 'Operation Floribunda', so I'd better not be too vitriolic.)

It's been a good day today: Mr Nicholl organised a mile run for the masses who wished to dress up in fancy dress and run for Sport Relief. I have to admit that I was more than a little concerned by the chosen apparel of one particular Newtonian, and advised him not to come anywhere near me while he was adorned with jogging suit, pink bra and similarly coloured underwear. (Which he chose to wear as overwear.) As the duty master for the afternoon I kept a weather eye open for any boarding inspectors who might have been lurking in the undergrowth, (or overgrowth): they would have had a very poor view of what this place was all about. (Actually, they would probably have had quite a good view, but they would still have been troubled, I think!)

In Chapel, Mr BT spoke about 'Delights' and listed some of his own. Clearly, this message had been taken on board, because one resident opined to me, as I entered the lodge on return from duty that 'you can find good in anything if you look for it.' True enough - and as Newton's lodgemeister, I should know.

One more week to go. (And I bet a pound to a penny that if you were a boarder at your prep school, you'll have the words and the tune of 'that song' in your head now!)

Good night. (And don't let that song irritate you too much tonight.)

I sometimes think that I am too much like an ageing Andrex dog rather than the Rotweiler into which I metamorphosed last night. I tell you that because tonight I was hoist by my own petard (again), as the following dualogue (sic) displays.

Me (to one of last night's culprits): What do you think you're doing? You know that you were told specifically to come over here, get washed and go straight to bed.

C: Yes, sir. I, I .......

Me: No, I'm sorry, I don't want to know. (Slightly lengthy and very boring diatribe about how one should behave, etc., etc, containing all the inevitable lines that many of you will recall from your own schooldays.)

Witness: Sir, I think you ought to .......

Me: Thank you, X, I've heard quite enough from you tonight.

Witness (persisting in the face of adversity): But SIR! He was trying to cheer up Y, who was really upset because of what happened earlier.

Me: Ah. Oh. I see. Thank you, Ge .......

What had happened earlier was that there had been a mega-fall-out between certain parties, as the result of some game of 'It' that had taken place outside, (as it does (did) every night, apparently, and had ended with two residents in tears that their hitherto cordial relations had terminated. I needed to change gear, very swiftly.

Eventually, following much placatory chat and reassuring words about how we were all very tired at the end of a particularly difficult term, all was well again and Newton was a happy place once more.

It wasn't all bad, though. Once we'd all got back on track (pun intended), I found myself going up the stairs in the form of a train, pursued by half a dozen 'carriages'. The whole scene bore more of a resemblance to the conga, although the sound effects were different. I stopped off at 'Heronian station' as it was christened, whereupon the carriages metamorphosed into passengers, who made for the bathroom and thence their beds.

Th culmination of the evening, of course, was being invited to bid goodnight to Roger the Otter, who has become an extension to a light switch. Shocking. I should switch to another topic. Ohm my goodness, how many more puns can I use? Watt? I re-fuse to give up. There must be more in the current series. Dear me, what a bright spark.

That's enough. (No, there wasn't one there.) Wire we still talking about it, then?

'night all.

I think I'm getting old. Tonight, Mrs C and I, enjoying a night off, were practising for our retirement evenings in two years' time by watching 'A Place in the Sun', beset by thumping and banging from above and around. Well, you see, there's only so much of that that one's patience can endure, so, in the end I stormed up the stairs and vented my spleen. It can't have been too bad a performance, as I was applauded by Dr Dean and Miss Chloe when I came downstairs, and I was asked whether I needed a glass of water. I declined such a kind offer, in view of the fact that I had seen enough water in the upstairs bathroom to sink a battleship. (Actually that little bit of fig. lang. almost works, surprisingly.)

Anyway, they're all very quiet now, I can assure you, and I'm sure they will all sleep well. Quite whether they will want to see me in the morning is anyone's guess.

No, they probably won't.

Oh don't worry: they'll get over it.