15January1996

My dear folks,

The days fly by. At least, the off-days fly by. Blink and they’re gone, I hardly know where. They’re starting earlier than planned. I’m finding it a bugger to shake off the 0400 waking habit I developed with the day-shifts I worked last week. This morning I took half a tab & crashed again until 0900. A shower restored me to a semblance of consciousness & I cycled off across London to give Penny Mason a computer lesson. Maybe that’s a little formally expressed for the lesson involved much trial & error on both sides. We set about creating a database that would serve as an address book & would also enable Penny to print off mailing labels. We had a creative two hours.

It’s a good 30 minute cycle ride each way - useful exercise as long as one refrains from breathing the exhaust fumes that pass for air. There’s certainly nothing fresh about it. Over lunch, Jones & dipped into the humous & taramasalata we had served dinner guests last night, a former NBC colleague & his new wife. He is giving up his luxury London flat & removing his furniture to her luxury farm house near Toronto. If it doesn’t all fit there, it might find a place in one of her other residences. Jane Austen would have approved. We had an excellent supper, a Jones special that won honest compliments on all sides, served with copious amounts of various & delightful red wines.

It was our second celebration of the day. Penny & Richard had joined us for a Bucks Fizz brunch, bringing with them a duvet they donated to the Quintassential. Afterwards, they walked home to Islington along the canal - as they reported later - a two hour jaunt that we have yet to match. The sun came out for the occasion. It showed its face again today, a visitation we celebrated with a walk down to Queensway to do a little banking on behalf of one of my contacts.

On the way out we bumped into our neighbour, Steffania, and found ourselves taking her bitch, Jessica, along with us. Jessica hails from the Italian countryside and finds the big city slightly daunting. Even so, she enjoyed the walk, as we did ourselves. Afterwards, we sat down for half an hour with Stef to drink herbal tea and discuss the publication of a brochure for a friend of ours in Portugal. Stef has just bought herself an Apple Mac & a desk-top publishing programme with which she hopes to earn a living. I confess that although I have a similar (much simpler) programme on my own computer, I haven’t even begun to use it. Time’s what I need. Where on earth can one obtain it?

There was a 45 minute programme on BBC 2 tonight on the man who solved Fermat’s last theorem, a British mathematician teaching at Princeton who devoted seven years of his life to it. I knew it was an amazing programme even though it was interrupted by the plumber once and I fell asleep twice. The mathematician was lost for words when he tried to describe his emotions at the moment of revelation. I haven’t had any revelations myself but I understood just how he felt - that instant when all becomes clear!

Thank you Ann for your two page fax which I read once to myself and once to Jones. We are both thrilled that the spectre of TB has been vanquished, even if you are still having to cope with the discomfort. And we rejoice in the continuing recovery of Mum. Thank you for all your hard work there. Kevin, Cathy said something to me about the discounted Canadian Airlines family tickets becoming available again in March. Can you confirm? And if such a ticket were available and if I could get a week’s leave in March or April, would you be able to put me up? I should not be much trouble! I had a brief word with Bren at the weekend. He has bought Micaela a new horse. She is pleased.