The weather continues warm, but the dryness isn’t what it was. In fact, sometimes the dryness is wet – as yesterday, when after having our hair cut we stayed indoors most of the day and moped, especially after Norwich City FC, replete with new stars, managed to lose 1-0 to Hull after Hull had been reduced to ten men for two-thirds of the match. Nevertheless, we have tickets for Tuesday’s game against Bury, captained by Dot’s cousin Gareth. Adrian and Clarissa are coming over.

It had poured during Friday night, and it even rained a bit when we took Anna on Thursday to Houghton Hall Revisited: a major Norfolk event of the year, running for several months. The idea is to show off pictures sold by Britain’s first prime minister and Houghton Hall owner Sir Robert Walpole to Catherine the Great in the 18th century – now lent back to the hall by Russia and replaced (mainly) where they originally hung.

Houghton Hall is a beautiful building in a stunning setting, but while some of the pictures were impressive, many of them weren’t. However, we really enjoyed the visit – a brief account of which can be found here.

Dot had spent the day in London on Wednesday, accompanied by her friend Anne. They travelled first class and ate in two rather nice restaurants. Dot also bought a hat for an upcoming family wedding. Meanwhile I frittered away much of the time but did manage to get some work done, largely my sermon for today.

On Friday, after Dot had managed to get an appointment at the doctor’s for a few routine matters, we eventually entertained Joe and Birgit to lunch. They both seemed on good form, with Birgit looking much better than recent reports had suggested. She looked very good indeed, in fact, and we had a lovely evening – some of it out in the garden.