Apart from a landmark birthday, I simply do not know what the New Year will bring. Never previously have I been so unsure.

Apart from a landmark birthday, I simply do not know what the New Year will bring. Never previously have I been so unsure.

There’s a dog on my bed and I want to stop blogging and go to sleep. This is going to take some careful negotiation…

I finished the lecture ten minutes early. I had said all that needed to be said.

That dreaded term again. Come out and be counted, you cowards, hiding behind each other and afraid ever to be held responsible for individual beliefs or actions.

“I am a keen follower of your blog! Amazing. Such a wonderful example of ‘clean time doesn’t equal recovery’.”

In the early morning mist the highland cattle look absolutely magnificent with their long horns and shaggy coats. I hope they feel sufficiently at home in east Kent rather than in the north of Scotland.

There is one thing I just can’t work with. Come to think of it, I can’t work with incompetence either. Or dishonesty. Or cowardice. Gosh, maybe I am more intolerant than I thought. On the other hand, in the private sector I can pick and chose my staff so I don’t see why I should ever settle for second best.

“I’m a committed Christian. I don’t tell lies.”

His family refer to them by another term.

“That’s all I drink in any day. I’m not an alcoholic. My family forced me here.”

What the family – all of them – told us is that he is drunk by lunchtime every day and that he is a dreadful embarrassment if they ever go out. Each one of them has written him a letter of concern – but you would never know that from what he says to us even now.