The geese were fighting in the orchard as the sun rose

Yesterday Jeremy walked to the corner of Mill Road to post a letter. Yet again the Royal Mail postbox had vanished. The last time was about 18 months ago. When our postie Jason arrived with our post this morning he told us that he went to empty the box and found that it had disappeared.

I went walking with pal Sammy and her dogs at midday. The postbox was nicked from their village yesterday and several other places too. So if you get offered one on the black market may we please have ours back.

Outside, in the barn, there are “lazy lambs” taking the load off their legs.

A zoom lecture from Fairfield University, Connecticut was taking place at 7.30 eastern time but 12.30 am our time. It was about a subject who has been overlooked for a number of years but, thanks to historian and antiquarian and writer, Irvin Ungar, is regaining the prominence that he deserves in the field of art and illumination. That man is Arthur Szyk who was born in Poland but escaped before the Nazis entered his beloved country. He illustrated books, he drew and painted political cartoons and in 1940, in London, 250 copies of his illuminated Haggadah (the book we read at the Festival of Passover) were printed on vellum and sold for 100 Guineas each. At the time this was the most expensive new edition of a book ever sold anywhere in the world.

Do take a look at his work through Dr Google, Wikipedia or the szyk.com website. It is simply beautiful and also, many pieces, highly political. a modern,inexpensive edition of the Haggadah is available in paperback and hardback. I just ordered one.

I didn’t manage to stay awake until the end of the talk because a hungry lamb needed his early morning bottle and chicks needed feeding and goats opened up. Bless ‘em all!

A common theme in many of our festivals is “they tried to kill us, they failed, let’s eat!” Each festival has its special foods and on Purim we eat Hamantaschen – pockets of pastry filled, usually, with sweet meats. I decided to make some savoury pastries as well as sweet hamantaschen.

Then home in time for Di to feed Lambikin and cuddle one of Toffee’s tiny twins

The tractor has been earning its keep, tilling the patches where, last year, we grew squashes and potatoes. The earth will dry out and then have a second tilling.

The lambs play in the barn at their peril. The risk is a cuddle and a kiss from J and me

Inside the house Nigel is trying to climb on anything and everything. I’ve just put him out for fear that he will jump onto the ceiling light as he did a few weeks ago.

A good run to Stanmore to see mum and back in time to do some gardening (removing brambles) down at the goose pond

Usually mum has difficulty replacing the telephone handset back into its cradle. It’s a bit like watching a toddler trying to build a tower out of cups. She knows it’s a brain “thing” as do I but sometimes it’s painful to watch. Today, with some prompts from me through the window, mum did it and we both whooped in celebration! And then we both laughed at the absurdity of it all. We also talked about holidays we had taken when my brother and I were very young. We were encouraged and expected to eat our meals with our parents and I have vivid memories of meals in french hotels en route to our holiday destinations in Italy and sometimes in Switzerland. Grand hotels “out of season” in Swiss skiing resorts were affordable and glamorous for our family of four driving in an Austin 1100 along autoroutes. A strange choice of holiday given that my brother and I were often “car sick” but also a great way to see foreign cities, towns and villages on a budget.

When I handed the head nurse a box of Ferraro Rocher chocolates, today, for the staff (they are on special offer at Aldi!) * mum and I remembered one of her visits to The Gables when she was still able to accompany me to the shops. We went to Aldi, and filled the trolley with cat food and Aldi’s excellent single malt whisky. A man looked at our shopping quizzically. Mum told him we were holding a party for the cats – and we laughed all day when we thought about his expression! Mum is still great company even if she struggles with the telephone. Who cares?!

*other supermarkets are available