The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1886 by Angharad Copyright © 2012 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

I sat down and tried to list the queries I had about this venture that everybody but me knew about. That really irked me for some reason, and not because I don’t like surprises. I do, but it’s about the scale and perspective of them. If Simon came in and said I’ve just bought you this book or a new watch, something fairly small, I’d be surprised and enjoy his generosity and the gift. If he came home and said he’d just bought us a new house, I’d be horrified. He might not, but we’re different, he might cope with major change, I don’t–least I don’t at the present.

Thinking back about his acceptance of me, he was shocked although I had warned him it was something quite fundamental. He went off and came back a few hours later–he actually coped really well, though it did take him a while to adjust completely, which is quicker than I am, and I’ve known about myself since I was about three.

As for the career move–is it? If it’s linked into the university, then I can still function from the university unless it became more convenient for me to move to the centre, or even the one in Scotland. I suppose I’d have to pop and see it a few times a year, much of the rest can be done over the net or by phone. Having said that, flights from Southampton to Edinburgh or Glasgow are easy enough to get. I reckoned it would take two or three years to build these places and lay down vehicle access, especially if we’re talking about schools visiting–that would mean a bus or coach.

Assuming I could make some choices, like colour of curtains–seriously, if I had a choice of venues and management methods, I think I could do it–or at least give it a go.

The doorbell rang some way off in the house–I was busy with my thoughts and wasn’t really interested. Jacquie arrived with a small package. I wasn’t expecting anything, but it was addressed to Dr Cathy Watts. I eventually succeeded in getting into the paper and plastic wrapping on the outside and managed to extract a small box from the centre of said wrapping. I opened the box and inside were hundreds of business cards, stating:

It also gave the university phone number and my email address there. I assumed the culprit was Simon, though Tom could have been involved–nah, if he’d organised it through the university, we’d be waiting for six months, it had to be Simon.

While I was debating this Catherine toddled in by herself and I picked her up and cuddled her. She was trying to suckle from me–which she hadn’t done for a couple of days and I wondered if I still had milk–I did and she sucked me drier than a piece of blotting paper.

I showed her one of my new cards and she tried to eat it, squealing with temper when I stopped her. Then to make my day, she bounced up and down on my lap and was promptly sick all over my desk, my diary, my laptop and my new cards were covered in it.

I felt like bursting into tears, instead, I put her down after wiping her mouth and ran up to the kitchen for a bucket and a cloth. The cards were all ruined, my diary was badly smudged in places but it’s a Filofax so I could get a new insert. My lappie was kaput. I called Peter Green a free lance computer buff and asked him to bring me a new one and to see if he could rescue the data off the old one and/or repair it. He promised to come after lunch with a new Samsung he had on offer and his firewire set to try and load the data off the old one straight on to the new one. I was tempted to ask him for a MacIntosh, but stuck with the laptop for now.

We’d used him at the university for a couple of years, especially when the so called IT department couldn’t repair or supply things, and as I’d been the person who suggested him, purely because Simon had bought a computer from him, I’d got his personal attention from the start. I also bought half a dozen laptops for the kids, so I suspect I deserved his immediate attention.

David does the most amazing omelettes. They are like cotton wool they’re so fluffy, yet they fill you up. For lunch he did mushroom and bacon with a side salad. It was absolutely delicious, the man is a genius–I don’t tell him, because Henry would poach him, (not in milk or boiling water), for the hotel. Talking of which, they’ve now got one on Hayling Island, even bigger than the Southsea one. I sometimes get the impression that Henry is a frustrated Monopoly player.

Peter arrived at half past one as agreed and he winced when he saw my computer. I had tried to wipe it clean but common sense suggested that washing it with water would make things worse. At least he agreed with me. I left him to it after he showed me the Samsung, it looked okay–I mean, it’s a computer–you know, all grey plastic and keyboards–right? Wrong, this was royal blue shiny plastic and beautiful. It had so many gigabytes of this and terabytes of that and my eyes glazed over. It’s a computer–full stop.

Somehow he ran all the data off the one onto the other, even though they were different operating systems XP on the oldie and Windows 7 on the new one. He was there two hours and left me a bill with the new computer. He took off the old one to see if he could clean it up and reprogram it. Now I had a new shiny one that did all of the things the old one did, I didn’t care. Well, not quite true, I was hoping to keep the old one for a spare, and he was supplying a new battery as well, so it should be much better. I plugged it into the external hard drive and it was compatible with that as well. I was really pleased with it. So was Trish, who suggested I should buy a waterproof one–seriously they exist–as used by garages and engineering works, or where water is a potential threat–wonder if they do a baby-proof one? Apparently, they also make washable keyboards for desktops–weird or what?

I was five hundred quid worse off, with a bill outstanding for the work Peter Green had done and was going to do in recovering the old computer. My fault, I should have pointed her out the window–or just thrown her out the window–I am on the ground floor. Oh well, it’s only money.