Elemental

Lovely thick mist this morning. I'm very grateful for this as I'd thought if it were sunny I 'ought' to get up early and bustle about so I could enjoy a leisurely sit by the sea before acupuncture...Does anyone else suffer from pleasure 'oughts'...how silly are they, eh? I ought to do this, that and the other before I have fun is bad enough but I ought to be enjoying myself is downright perverse!

I've been feeling 'reet poorly' the last few days and have to watch out for cancer paranoia which, of course, you can get even if you've never had the disease but adds a creeping horror to all manner of bodily awareness if you have! Yesterday, before tea, I made myself do a small section of painting with some extra thick paint kindly donated by John and Jo last year. This was a cunning plan as a) yes, I wanted the extra horrible stretch wall I'd revealed covered up while waiting for lining paper...but also b) because I then had to sleep on the sofa and could start mid evening with the TV chuntering away keeping me company as I drifted off. Sometimes when you're not well you want to be alone but sometimes it does you good to have a bit of company. I would like the universe to be aware that curmudgeonly old recluse as I may seem, I am open to more warm interaction with select members of the human race! In the meantime I give great thanks for the element of Baldrick in my genetic code...and a little virtual chitter chatter now and then...

I'm grateful for the news via Environmental Health that 'a contractor has fixed the problem of the leaking boiler' upstairs as this sounds as potentially promising development not least as it suggests there was actually a problem which has always been strenuously denied before...and for an Essex wallpaper company agreeing to send one roll of textured border by post instead of by courier.