The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1888 by Angharad Copyright © 2012 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

The next day, after dropping the children into school and Phoebe into college, I went and did some Christmas shopping, buying small gifts for the kids to put under the tree and one or two main presents. Daddy is the easiest adult to buy for, a case of single malt and he’s happy as a sand boy.

I got Sammi, Jacqui, Julie and Phoebe vouchers from Topshop and Next, plus each got a soft toy and some tights and panties. Livvie, Trish and Mima got a new dress each, some tights and panties plus book tokens. To unwrap, they each had a small electronic game. Danny got book tokens, tokens for a sports shop and pair of gloves to unwrap, as well as socks and boxer shorts.

The little ones got clothes and a couple of toys each. For Stella I bought a new hairdryer and a subscription to a magazine she likes. David got a new electric shaver and some boxer shorts. The cat got a couple of toys stuffed with catnip and Kiki got a postman’s leg — a long bone cooked and filled with fat or something else the dogs enjoy trying to extract.

That left Simon, I got him an upgrade on his sat nav, it’s a Garmin–you know Dave Millar and all that. So I saw it more as sponsoring a cycling team than buying a present for my husband.

I did get small presents for Pippa and her boys. They’re still riding their bikes so I got them new cycling gloves and bike cleaning kit by Muckoff–it’s good stuff which I use regularly–or do when I’m riding.

I also got stuff for Henry and Monica. They were coming for Christmas dinner as their housekeeper/cook was going to stay with her brother for Christmas. Pippa and her family weren’t coming this year as they were going to her mum’s.

David and I had discussed the menu and he was busy filing up cupboards and freezers with all sorts of goodies, either stuff he’d bought or where possible had made himself. He’d made two Christmas cakes and two puddings which the kids had helped him with, each having a stir for luck. In the old days they used to add silver three-penny pieces, but that would now be considered unhygienic, even though we could sterilise them in the lab. It was lucky to get one in your piece of pudding, assuming it didn’t destroy your teeth while you chewed it, or worse you swallowed it and had to wait for it to pass through. It would be like panning for silver, I suppose checking to see if it had come through.

I got home spent out and exhausted, leaving some of the stuff in the car until I could hide it in the garages. I had a cuppa and piece of the sponge cake David had made. The rest had had lunch, I was no longer hungry, and besides, the cake was enough, especially as I could do with losing the odd inch around my waistline. As I headed towards my thirties I was aware I should really be training harder and eating less to maintain a buff body–I think that’s the phrase they use, not quite sure what it means, but as no one heard my thoughts, it doesn’t matter.

The cake was delicious and I thanked David for his genius and keeping me a slice before Stella ate it all. I changed into my working clothes and did some bed stripping and laundry. The problem with so many inhabitants was that one bed needed stripping each and every day more or less. I didn’t do one on New Year’s Day or Good Friday because my mum had always been superstitious about those days, when if you do wash you’re suppose to wash away someone’s life with the dirty laundry water.

I suspect it goes back more to giving the poor women a day off, in days gone by, they’d have worked huge hours, but then so did the men. I remember someone telling me that their hours were reduced to fifty hours per week. Do that to lots of today’s manpower and they’d be sick after a fortnight, unable to keep up the pace or the hours. Unless you’re a teacher or lecturer, then you might have to work sixty or seventy hours to get all your prep and marking done.

My conversation with Tom had been brief. He confirmed I’d be regarded as a reader, which is equivalent to a deputy or assistant professor in a US university. It also meant a significant salary rise, part of which was funded by the bank. I did suggest that could cause problems, a bit of incest or family favouritism unless the posts had been advertised. He assured me they’d remained within the policies of both the university and government guidelines.

I’d told Simon I’d have a go, but not until the centres had been built and I’d had some influence on their design. He told me they weren’t starting until next April at the earliest, perhaps later. He also suggested they’d take at least a year to construct, more if I kept interfering in the design. I asked to see one of the plans but he fumbled with it and I never did see it. Mind you he hadn’t seen a 1:25,000 of the area proposed for development.

This business with the ash trees was a bit worrying as we had some of them dotted about the site It seemed to be making itself appear in new places almost daily. I asked if there was a protocol for that and was told to write one. I contacted someone from the Forestry Commission for some advice and he agreed to do a quick survey through the woodland in Hampshire. He was going to do that the next day and I agreed to accompany him on the survey–well, if he showed me what he was looking for, I could do the same the next day and so on.

When Stella went up to her apartment I sneaked in half the presents and stuck them in my capacious wardrobe. I then ran down and brought up the second lot.

The idea of the survey was quite interesting. If we did have much of the Ash Dieback Disease, then I’d get a team in to fell the damaged ones and burn them. I hated the idea of taking down trees but it seemed the only way. I hoped we could replant and thus repopulate at some point in the future so was going to grow oodles of ash trees in the hope they missed the disease.

I dunno, a forester’s work is never done.