The mutton is here, after a tedious day of being-waited-in-for. As soon as the Italian lesson is finished tomorrow, I’ll get cracking on that stew.

Still no knitting, but I mean to go get some done NOW, before knuckling down to my Italian homework.

Shandy – sorry not to have answered your question before. Maureen (when we had lunch on Tuesday) was wearing a wonderful (that goes without saying) Fair Isle vest with a particularly distinguished scoop neck edged with narrow corrugated rib. I mentally congratulated myself for having mastered the rib, at least, in my later years, but I don’t think I’ve ever done a neckline like that one.

Reading

I’ve finished Barchester Towers. Gosh, it’s good. It’s going to be hard to go back to Anne Tyler, although I may do it. But I’ve embarked on Doctor Thorne. I don't see why I shouldn't read my way through Barchester again, skipping TheWarden which I think I remember too well. Perdita sat on my lap again for a while yesterday, and then I went into the kitchen and was joined by Paradox, and for a moment I felt like Bishop Proudie being pals with Mr Slope one moment, and the next with his wife.

Current affairs

Mrs Sakoolas is still much in the news, despite all the many other things going on in the world. Mr Trump says, driving on the wrong side of the road in GB could happen to any of us. Not, I think, a helpful remark.

What does “right-hand drive” mean? That’s what the car had. Is that a car like mine, meant for driving on the left, with the steering wheel on the right? Or the opposite, meant for driving on the right? Greek Helen has a car like that, and has managed to move about for the last few years without killing anyone. She doesn’t think Mrs Sakoolas is likely to have brought an American car along with her.

The accident happened in the late afternoon-early evening, and she was breathalysed. That’s routine. We haven’t been told the result.