Safely back. Not much knitting done, except that last night I advanced the toe-up sock to the point where I should reach the ribbing today.

We had some astonishingly wonderful weather, day after day from Friday when we drove up until it broke on Monday evening. I can remember summer days like those, not many but some. But it is especially magical to have them in May, with the cuckoo shouting  and everything fresh and sparkling and no midges.

My little vegetables are doing surprisingly well. The three crops which I can rely on – potatoes and mange-tout peas and broad beans – are all moving forward nicely. If one paused for a moment and stood there watching, one could see them grow. The beetroots which I bought as plug plants have also settled in well, and are growing. The climbing beans, also bought as plug plants, have entirely perished, as expected. It was too early and too cold for them. I replaced them with seeds. I planted out the courgettes I started on the windowsill here, and they seem happy.

Life

Sure enough – before we left last Friday, I heard from the contractor that the dining room ceiling will come down on June 13. So Joan Schrouder and I will not meet on the 14^th (because we will be in Strathardle while Alexander deals with things here). A serious sadness, but I’m glad that something at last is happening.

Theo sent this link.

Rachel rang up yesterday to say that her son Joe has got an internship in September with the sports promotion firm Hellie’s boyfriend Matt works for. They also want to interview him – Joe – right now for a job – temporary? -- in connection with an unspecified project.

He has no idea what he wants to do in life. He read politics at Nottingham, and at least knows that he doesn’t want to work for a political party. He is hesitant about plunging into a job when he doesn’t know where he's going.

I tried to encourage him with Theo’s example (see link above). When Theo was a year out of university, as Joe is now, he had no job and no real idea what to do. (He came to the Games that year; I remember.) I don’t know how he found and developed his really very remarkable ability to manage big projects while remaining cucumber-cool. But he certainly offers hope that Joe will find his niche too, if he just keeps moving forward. And in these hard times, a job of any sort is not to be sneezed at.

Meanwhile, Theo says that his wife Jenni has an ante-natal appointment tomorrow from which I will learn on which side to put the buttons when I knit the Tulip jacket.