I feel they’re out to get me: a) there’s a picture in today’s Times taken inside our house, admittedly some years before we moved into it; and b) the BBC Radio Four news bulletin at 6 p.m., just now, announced the death of a Glasgow University classmate of mine. Three years younger than I am.

Otherwise, a pretty uneventful day. I have finished knitting the garter stitch block on the front of the baby sweater, and have embarked on the short rows at the top. They won’t take long. And I have read furiously on, on “Daniel Deronda”, determined to polish him off so that I can wallow in the television adaptation. I’m getting there. It's a peculiar book.

Mary Lou, I’ve got a DVD player attached to the television but I’ve never really struck up a relationship with it. My main difficulty was that if I pause a disk for any reason, the machine won't remember my place but will go back to the beginning, Fine for disks that begin with a menu. It’s pretty old, too. Maybe I should investigate the current field.

Anon, thank you for your thoughtful message about my appt with the geriatric specialist tomorrow. My own suspicion is that current weakness is the aftermath of the pulmonary embolism I had four years (or so) ago. He should have the details on his computer. I think I feel roughly as I felt in the months during which I was slowly recovering from pneumonia, when I was in my 50’s. But it’s better to try to think through everything, as you suggest, and not prejudge my case.

Helen and her family seem to be having a good time in Strathardle, and the weather has been kind. Here are some of the daffodils for which our house is famous. Helen says that a huge rabbit is living in that brae, perhaps somebody’s former pet.

Here are some of the curry dumplings outside the back door. They flourish especially just at the point (here in the foreground) where the drain pipe leaves the bathroom and begins its course under the house towards the septic tank. Sometimes I wonder if we have a slow leak.