Norwich City are playing the final match of the season as I write, having won promotion on Monday amid incredible scenes at Poringland, where we were completing a bank holiday with the Robinsons. After an unlikely 0-3 loss by Cardiff to Middlesbrough, the Canaries needed to beat Portsmouth away to make sure of promotion, and they did just enough: 0-1 (Jackson). So today’s match is a formality, and there is more than a suspicion that the City players have not been putting everything into training. Still, it’s 0-0 as we approach half-time, and Dot is having her hair cut in the kitchen, courtesy of Linda, with the radio on. (Final score 2-2)
Monday was a good day. We started with tea at the Robinsons, plus a tour of their extension-in-progress. Then Philip drove us to Ingham, near Stalham, for lunch at the Swan, which was very pleasant. I then navigated us to East Ruston, where we stumbled on the Old Vicarage Gardens which, coincidentally, we were looking for. I wasn’t optimistic about these, but after an entrance that seemed like a glorified garden centre, they turned out to be most unusual, more than making up for the biting wind, and with hedges that occasional blunted it. Some brilliant planning, with views through holes in the hedges picking our churches and the nearby Happisburgh lighthouse.
After a pause for tea we returned to Poringland, where we looked at about half the Robinsons’ pictures from their recent world tour before switching our attention to the vital match. The tension was so high that Philip had to leave the house, leaving three of us on the edges of our seats – well, two of us, with Anne mildly interested.
A busy week followed for Dot, with several school visits and an inspection at Elveden on Thursday. She has written most of her report already. On Wednesday I went to see Hilary Mellon about a journalism workshop she wants me to do for her Bridges group. I was a bit doubtful at first, but I think it sounds OK. Gave her a lift to a Bridges meeting at St Mary Magdalen afterwards, which gave me an opportunity to spy out the ground. In the evening I was over at Paston for a trustees’ meeting, at which we decided to continue with our plans for the church in the hope that a new clergyperson who will be PCC secretary will bring order out of chaos. We shall see. Nice homemade ginger biscuits, though. Dot meanwhile was visiting Carrie.
Yesterday, with the weather having settled itself at something very pleasant (no wind at last), my iPhone went on the blink, with the battery not recharging. I took it up to the Apple store, having made an appointment on David’s advice, and they thought initially it was a connection problem. But after I left it with them to charge, it became evident that the battery was faulty, or had reached the end of its life. So when I returned from doing a bit of extra shopping, I was supplied with a new battery, which comes in the form of a new phone, but at battery price (£55). Altogether a good result, especially as I had remembered to cancel the papers for our upcoming holiday, and the new phone recovered its apps and everything else.
This evening we head for Morston Hall, again with the Robinsons, which should be very good indeed. The weather is still excellent, though rain is predicted for tomorrow, when I am preaching at St Augustine’s.