The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2525 by Angharad Copyright© 2014 Angharad

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David came back to the house a little after I did, he looked a bit pasty but he was smiling. I was relieved, partly because he’s a much better cook than I am, partly because I’d have had to cover his absence and mostly because I was fond of him, he was pretty well one of the family.

I surrendered the kitchen to him and took my mug of tea into the study. I had survey stuff to do—I always have survey stuff to do. An email from Dan told me they completed the building of the study centre—we had a delay when the first contractor went bust—and a second was difficult to recruit. Apparently they were now doing interior fitments and decorating. It would open in the spring and word had it that Henry had managed to convince HRH, The Prince of Wales to show his green credentials. The fact that he seems to be building on half of Dorset, doesn’t appear too credible to me, but I’ll try and be available if he does come.

Drinking my tea, I pondered on our murder mystery. Was it a locked room mystery? Yes and no. The door was locked but any one of a couple of dozen people could have the combination to open it. Okay, they have to get into the building first and that requires a smart card. So the police will have lists of the people using the building on the day before. Perhaps I should avail myself of one? I know I shouldn’t interfere but it was my department.

It’s so easy to imagine, probably in error, what happened. My favourites were he was surprised by someone who was burgling the place or he’s was doing something illegal and fell out with another ne’er do well, who killed him. I had no evidence for any of them, other than he was killed by a bash on the bonce.

If I’d thought about it. I should have touched him—I might have seen who hit him. Anyway, it’s up to the police to sort out, if they get stuck and tell them to contact Trish. She watched some TV programme about Quantum biology and reckons she might want to do that after she’s solved the problem of nuclear fusion, designed a spacecraft to travel to Mars or even further, and finished her Christmas shopping. Just as well she has another two weeks of holiday to do all that.

She was trying to explain how European robins who spend summer in the far north migrate to Spain for the winter. “It’s all quantum, Mummy.”

“I thought they flew.”

“They do.”

“Well then—problem solved.”

“No, silly Mummy, how do they navigate?”

“Sat nav?” I suggested.

“No, it’s quantum, they have red and green balls whizzing round their heads an’ it’s to do with their eyes.”

“Well yes, it would be. If you blindfold them they would fly into things.”

“No, these balls connect faster than light.”

“I didn’t think anything was faster than light.”

“A robin’s balls are, Mummy.” I’d have to think about that.

“An’ tadpoles are quantum too, their college gum dissolves and their tails grow into legs.” So how come we don’t have five legged frogs?

“You don’t perchance mean collagen?”

“I might, what about photo-something or other, that leaves do.”

“Photosynthesis?”

“Could be, anyway in the leaves there’s corn plasters and the light hits them and they send waves of energy everywhere at the same time.” Corn plasters? I wonder if she means chloroplasts?

“Then there’s proton tunnelling, these balls go through like walls.”

“What was that related to?”

“I can’t remember, but it was good oh an’ smells make your nose vibrate.”

“That must be what Daddy is doing when he sleeps, he must be smelling things.”

“I thought he was snoring?”

“Ah but is it quantum snoring?”

“It’s all to do with enzymes.”

“What is?”

“The quantum stuff. I got it a bit mixed up, Mummy, but it was very good.”

“I’m sure it was, who did it, Professor Cox?”

“No, some baldy bloke called Professor Jim something or other.”

“Jim, Al khalili?”

“Yeah, how come you know him?”

“I’m a professor, too, Trish, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

“You know him?”

“I met him once at a universities conference thing, he does stuff on physics and maths on telly and radio.”

“I know that, Mummy, I watched him.”

I looked up the programme on the BBC iPlayer and saw it was available until Christmas, I told her if I had time we could watch it together and I’d try and help her understand it, assuming I understood it first. It’s only quantum physics—no pressure then. Perhaps I should have asked Si to watch it with her, though he doesn’t do biology, except to practice procreation at every opportunity.

I sent him a text asking him if he could get a cheap laptop for David for Christmas. He sent me one back saying they had some spare ones in IT, he’d have Sammi, check one out for David. Apparently her latest love has disappeared so she’d be home for Christmas sometime after lunch on Christmas Eve.

I assumed she’d be back anyway but no one had said anything for several days. She’s been staying at Simon’s flat in town, he comes home most nights, I suspect to give her some space. She desperately wants to find a man and settle down, but it’s a bit like Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, the more certain she tries to make it, the less chance she has—one of Trish’s parrot boxes. Pity, because she’s a lovely kid, very beautiful with a figure to die for, but I suspect she frightens the boys away, she’s too intense and possibly too full on.

Julie seems to have given up the idea of boyfriends for the moment. It doesn’t seem that long ago she declared she was lesbian, then proceeded to have a few boyfriends and flirt with every man she met—very lesbian, not. Anyway that’s up to them.

Sammi was looking at flats or houses to buy, but has since decided to buy herself a flash car—a BMW Z4 or something, she called it a roadster, so she might drive down on Christmas Eve, or get Simon to do it for her. I think I would, roads will be ridiculous.

This year, I get a distinct impression that no one will be safe on the roads, so many old folk still driving and doing so very slowly—their eyesight and reactions slow with age. But youngsters drive too quickly and despite quick reactions, they have no experience and some very few brain cells. So perhaps I’ll try and persuade Simon to abort the road trip. I can always see her car in the new year.

Damn, I told David I’d get Trish to start him on Facebook, I’d better go and ask her—Is this ordinary FB or quantum FB? Life in the fast lane I yawned—nah.