Just made it to the last post of the year. I’ve been in bed for the last three days with a really bad upper respiratory tract infection – my personal vote for hell on earth – but it retreated overnight, and I now have just have a very bad cough, a tight feeling in my chest and general fragility in the upper body area. It arrived late on Sunday, just after David and the children left, and necessitated the cancelling of my eye appointment at hospital yesterday  and the end-of-year celebrations planned for tonight.

I’m overwhelmingly grateful that it didn’t arrive earlier and spoil the Christmas celebrations with our family. They arrived as scheduled on the 21st, and the children loved the new room arrangements, with Oliver in my study and Amy in Dot’s study.

The next few days were busy, but we managed to fit in some games and a couple of quizzes, as well visits to the Maddermarket to see The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (cold theatre, but excellent production) and the Odeon to see the latest Star Wars. The latter was nothing short of superb. David and I both wanted to see it again.

On the Tuesday we also fitted in visits to Rosie, the cemetery, Auntie Sheila (fleeting) and Jessie, who supplied her usual excellent mince pies.

On Christmas Eve we were invited to the Hendersons’ for a buffet supper, which was very pleasant, especially as my god-daughter Holly was present. Also some old acquaintances from Saxlingham and the Butchers from Cringleford. As I was leaving I was introduced to Robin Myerscough, who had some fond memories of my Aunt Dorothea. He had the Philip Butcher role of Chaplain at Norwich School for some time many years ago.

Christmas Day was lovely: Dot provided an excellent Waitrose turkey repast, and the children got advanced gadgets: Amy a laptop and Oliver a Playstation game and a Bluetooth version of Scalextrix that was a considerable improvement on the original. After this it proved increasingly difficult to access the TV, and the only thing Dot and I saw over Christmas was Downton Abbey.

David bought us an Apple wi-fi extension that enables us to hear music from our phones played through our hi-fi set-up – brilliant – and thanks to an extension cable, enables us to access things like iPlayer directly from the TV.

On Boxing Day Kevin, Lisa and Matthew came over for the afternoon: Kevin’s new job seems to be going well. On the Sunday (when we gave the joint service at St Luke’s a miss) Richard came over with Maddy and Darcy and stayed for lunch. On Monday, Norwich beat Aston Villa 2-0; so everything was hunky dory. Hopeful in a day or two I may be feeling hunky dory too.

We missed Jack Earl’s funeral, because no-one told us when it was, and it was much sooner than I expected it to be. It was in fact last Wednesday at Southrepps, while Dot was having lunch with Carrie. Later in the afternoon, oblivious, we had our hair cut and in the evening went to the orchestra Christmas dinner at Cosmo’s, which has replaced Habitat on London Street.

The latter was interesting, because it was a serve-yourself, eat-anything restaurant that tempts you to eat far too much, with food ranging from Chinese to roast beef, and suchi. You are served with drinks,and everything is cleaned away very efficiently so that you can have another shot. I liked it. I sat at the end opposite Yvonne, who plays bass clarinet and comes from Scotland but now lives on Newmarket Road. She was very interested in what Dot does (who isn’t?), and we had an interesting conversation.

The next day, the Higbees came for lunch, but not before Dot and I drove to Hempnall to load up some sugar for the Eagles as part of rather sweet charity event. Then Dot drove with them to Rodham (three cars) while I returned home in her car and cooked some chilli con carne. It all came together when Dot arrived only moments after the Higbees. The lunch was OK, and we had a pleasant afternoon.

They left just before 4pm, and about a quarter of an hour after they went and just as I’d finished getting rid of the dirty dishes, Jude knocked on the door with a card; I invited her in, and she stayed for an hour and a half, drinking sherry. As she’s extremely entertaining, this was a bonus.

On Friday, the hectic activity continued. We both went to the PHS Christmas get-together which – in the absence of Rob and Penny, who were in Kent supervising the birth of their grandchild Enid – was a bit chaotic. Lucy had gone to sleep and was half an hour late; we had to buy our own drinks and mince pies, and the whole thing would probably never have got going if I hadn’t persuaded late arrival Lucy to stand up and introduce it. After she had done so (very effectively), Peter showed some excellent videos, in one of which (not quite so excellent) I read a Paston letter. It was around this point that I asked Lucy when the funeral was going to be, and discovered it had taken place two days earlier.

In the evening Dot and I went for a light meal with the Robinsons, which featured some excellent salmon. Philip is anticipating much medical intervention: a prostate biopsy and a new hip. I felt quite sorry for him: he is booked on a cruise in January and intends to go.

Much of Saturday morning was taken up with last-minute Christmas shopping, during which we had a break in M&S cafe. We managed to get home in time for Dot to hear most of Norwich City’s game at Manchester United, and she was totally over the moon when we won 2-1. A real Christmas present for her. I don’t feel I have to buy her anything now.

Yesterday saw our usual Alternative Carol Service, which I wrote and presented. It went surprisingly well in view of our lack of rehearsal, and we got a very good response from the 24 or so present, who included Vicky and her mum and dad, plus Liz and David Cannon. This was followed by an exceptionally good Christmas meal.

My attempts over the weekend to get in touch with Joe and Birgit fell on straight-to-voicemail ears; I decided at the last minute that taking their present to Hethersett was a waste of time as they had probably left early for Germany. So I left a message on their phone, but I still haven’t had a reply.

This morning Dot and did all the food shopping at Waitrose and got home just before it poured with rain, and not long before we took delivery of a parcel for David. Quite relieved that we were home when it arrived. We are now awaiting the arrival of David, O)liver and Amy, who appear to be on the A11.

Unsurprisingly, much time has been consumed  over the past week with wrapping presents and writing cards, plus quite a bit of furniture rearrangement. After a false dawn on Saturday, Colin eventually came on Monday morning and transferred the shelves upstairs; so Dot and I now have separate studies, and I think both rooms look quite good. Hope the children agree.

It was a very wet weekend. On Saturday I drove to Mundesley for the third of the Paston Heritage Society writing workshops at a the Royal Hotel. I left slightly late because Norwich City were playing Everton on BT Sport. Dot was at the match, but I watched a bit before I left. Norwich City were playing very badly, and I was amazed later to find they had drawn 1-1 and could easily have won. So I was a few minutes late at Mundesley, and only five of us were there (including the tutor). It was quite interesting; I put up a vigorous defence of my use of commas and dashes, which was fun.

Later Dot and I went by bus with Anne and Philip to Jamie’s for a meal. No doubt because of the proximity to Christmas, this was much rowdier than usual, and the meal wasn’t as good as we expected. The free elements (on Dot’s gold card) were by far the best – a taste of pumpkin soup (with amoretto) to start and a mince pie to finish. However, our waitress was excellent. Philip and I waited for a bus back, but the women walked – beating us only because they ran, and Philip can only walk very slowly nowadays. Unsportsmanlike, I call it.

Yesterday seemed an odd day to me, but it started in lively enough fashion with the Archant canteen Christmas lunch. This was a bit heavy (possibly because I opted for the wrong things) but again the starter was very good and the canteen staff very friendly and helpful. Brian and Tricia, Robin and Shelagh and Paul and Maryta were there with quite a goodly number of others.  Afterwards Dot and I went and bought a printer from Ryman’s, and I ran into Richard “Batso” Batson doing a bit of shopping. He has recently “retired” from Archant and is working for a different company in a PR role, which he seems to be enjoying.

Meanwhile Dot was busy buying a white printer to match the decor of the bedroom, and when we got out of the shop there was an unpleasant drizzle in the air which made the walk home unpleasant and seemed to literally put a damper on the day, which gave up the ghost. It was almost dark before 3pm.

At home I installed the printer (resorting to reading the instructions after an initial fail), and it now seems to be OK, though the print is not as clean as it should be. Spent some time trying to work out how to clean the nozzle. Haven’t cracked it yet. On the plus side, it does fit the decor of the room, and it does work wirelessly, though I have a connecting wire in reserve.

Dot has been out and about today and is now at Little Plumstead for a governors’ meeting of some kind. It’s a toss-up whether she gets back before she’s due to have her hair cut. No word from Linda.

Very sad news yesterday: Geoff Saunders has died after a long struggle to recover from his operation and subsequent stroke. He had a couple of falls, breaking his arm and then getting a blood infection. He then had a heart attack while in a nursing home. I had visited him several times when he was in hospital and then at home afterwards, but thought he was recovering.

The newish vicar and our friend Judy came to an evening meal on Friday last week, and it was a pleasant time. He wasn’t feeling on top of the world, and I forgot to mention a couple of things I meant to, but apart from that it was OK.  We showed them a few of our pictures, purely because David (the vicar) had previously asked us when we were going to invite him round to see our pictures. Two can play at that game 🙂

The next day we saw him (and Judy) again when we went carol-singing in Anglia Square. There had been a lot of confusion leading up to this as to prospective musicians; so I didn’t take my guitar, which turned out to be a good decision. We had one guitarist, a guy named Richard from St Luke’s, and with amplification that worked well. There were about 14 of us – an equal number from each church – plus the vicar, who was pretty pro-active with carol sheets and giveaways for watching children. We both enjoyed it, as did most people who came by. About £80 was collected for refugees.

Before we started, Dot ran into Rupert Mallin, and we had a chat. Good to see him.

That evening Joe and Birgit came round for supper. Both of them seemed in good health compared to recent months, and Joe’s business seems to be getting somewhere. They are going to Germany for Christmas. Phil and Joy are going to Southampton to be with Sam, Lucy and Elliott for nearly a fortnight; so I guess they must be feeling better too.

On Sunday I preached and followed it up by assisting Dot in dramatically changing the rooms round to accommodate Oliver’s bed downstairs. We put the big filing cabinet in the hall, where it looks surprisingly  in place, and I used the opportunity (both on Sunday and Monday) to weed out lots of redundant paper from the files. I have now been through the top three drawers and will leave the bottom drawer until the new year and I’ve forgotten how painful the other three drawers were. The bookcase went into the kitchen and then upstairs. I have now contacted Colin (At Your Convenience) to come and move the shelves on Saturday, so that Dot has a study upstairs. I will of course have to buy her a printer, preferably one which uses the same cartridges as mine.

That still leaves the garage to be restored to some sort of order…

Also on Monday I went up to Boots to collect my new glasses, which are rather startling frame-wise, but fortunately Dot is happy with them. My eyes seem reasonably happy too, though they have been watering a lot over recent weeks. I have a hospital appointment on December 30, after having been booked into the wrong clinic by mistake on a different day. No problem with my vision, I’m happy to say.

A couple of frustrating days followed, when I was unable to get to grips with stuff I needed to do for various reasons. But on Tuesday we had a Christmas “meal and compline” at our house, with David, Bridget, Judy and Vicky. We all supplied part of the meal.

Yesterday, while Dot was attending a DSSO meeting at Easton with Paul, I posted a wildlife magazine and letter to Andrew and then bought some flowers for Mum’s grave, as it was her 104th birthday. I took them up to the Rosary in the afternoon while Dot was shopping. I also managed to almost finish my Paston short story and got a reasonable ending out of it.

Meanwhile, sad to say that Jack Earl has died – aged, I believe, 102.

On Monday, we had natural disasters. Dot, Judy and I drove in appalling weather to Holy Trinity to hear a distinguished scientist from the Royal Society talk about whether natural disasters were acts of God. He seemed a very pleasant fellow, and much of what he said was interesting, though hardly original. I would liked to have disputed his view of climate change, but the atmosphere was wrong (see what I did there?). Dot asked a question on whether things were all that different now compared with the past, but he misunderstood it, probably accidentally.

On Tuesday I made it to the Archant coffee morning, but Dot was deflected by the Diocese: she has been extremely busy this week. Quite a pleasant time; spoke to Paul quite a bit afterwards and then went to pay in church cheques at the TSB and buy some Christmas cards at Revelations. I decided to abandon my pedantic objections to having the three kings on Christmas cards because they didn’t come at Christmas. Just another example of one of those myths becoming so widely accepted that it’s futile pointing out that it’s wrong.

On Wednesday I at last managed to obtain my prescription pills – just in time, because I was on my last Perindropril. The chemist had forgotten to put my order through to the surgery last week; so I had to remind them on Monday. They were apologetic. On leaving the chemist I was phoned by Dot, who had been having lunch with Carrie (plus a bit of shopping) and had arrived home without a key. Fortunately I wasn’t too far away…

Earlier I had bought some Christmas stamps at the sorting office and taken a walk through the Rosary – a few weeks since I’d been up there. While there I got the inspiration for a poem. Lost count of how many poems the Rosary has inspired..

Thursday was the maddest of several mad days for Dot. She was supposed to finish with a governors’ meeting at Little Plumstead, but when she arrived home from Catfield at 5.30pm, we realised she had left her phone behind – the realisation coming mainly because the Find Friends app said she was still there. She thought she must have dropped it at the side of the road where she almost fell over, and foolishly I let her go back to look for it, as I was cooking dinner.

Obviously (about five minutes after she left) I realised it would have made a lot more sense for me to have gone with her, or at least have lent her my phone. As it was, we were out of contact. I kept checking to make sure no-one had picked it up, and eventually Dot arrived at Catfield – happily, to find the school open; so she was able to ring me. At first she couldn’t find the phone, but then I enlarged the Find Friends map, which in combination with Google Earth seemed to indicate it was inside the building. I rang back to tell her, but when she answered she said she had just found it – in the toilet. Well, not actually in the toilet, but in the small room housing the toilet.

I had rung Little Plumstead to say she wouldn’t make it to the meeting. This was a Good Thing. I am trying to persuade Dot to stop being a governor, because it’s so time-consuming.

Tonight we are having the vicar and Judy for a meal. We are not trying to pair them off. We have been to Morrisons and Dot is now making a cake, because she knows he is coming (literary reference). There will ensue a mad dash to clean the house. Later I will be cooking a child con carne. Actually that’s a chilli con carne. I rarely cook children. Predictive text can cause all sorts of trouble, particularly as it has no way of knowing it’s being extremely stupid.

Speaking of stupid, we are now bombing Syria, a small country far away of which we know little.