Photo diary: week 42, project 365

It's Sunday, and I'm feeling rotten. I woke up with a terrible headache and blocked nose. Thank you, my dear child, for sharing your cold with me. Haven't been out all day, and by the looks of it, it's best to stay at home for now.

This week was the last in the first half-term. Eddie seems to have settled in his new school, and Sash enjoys going to his college. I just wish he had more days on offer there.

We were eagerly awaiting Locke & Key 2 on Netflix, and started watching the new series on Friday. We're rationing it, one episode per day. It is quite dark and surreal. 

Last Sunday we walked in town, past Eddie's old school. The bird on top looked as a sentinel, guarding the premises.

Teddy Bears of Witney always make themed displays for all holidays and special occasions. This Hallowe'en cat looks rather sinister, not sure I'd want to have it in my bedroom, if I were a child (actually, I wouldn't want it in my bedroom now either). It looks like one of those stuffed dead animals.

David Cornwall, aka John le Carrė would have been 90 last Tuesday. David and his wife Jane are missed so much. I have many photos of our visits to their house in Cornwall (and London too). 

I first met them both when I was newly married. They knew my husband already, from working on the novel Our Game. We have a beautiful wedding gift from them, an antique china bowl, woven like a basket with flowers. 

Our son Sasha used to love watching the sea from the big airy conservatory in their house. When we visited, we locked the doors from the conservatory, so that he wouldn't escape outside, and checked on him often while we talked in the kitchen. On one of our checks, I found him missing. We knew he was in the house, but he was still very young and I was still anxious to find him. We found him in the master bedroom, looking very comfortable on the big bed with his ipad. Our hosts only laughed at that, they were so kind to Sasha, caring and understanding of his special needs.

We visited them almost every summer, whenever we stayed in Cornwall. On a couple of occasions they visited us in "our" cottage in Perranuthnoe. There are so many lovely photos but they are a personal collection and too private to share. This is the photo taken in 2012, of their house from a distance. 

It's so sad we'll never see David and Jane again, listen to their stories, have tea in their beautiful kitchen, with the most delicious sausage rolls and spectacular cakes, baked by their house-keeper.

And there will be no more books... I bought Silverview, which has just been published posthumously. And holding it in my hands, it feels so final... 

The weather has been so meh in the past week, that only warming dishes will do. I drink endless cups of tea, and cook comfort food.

One of the meals cooked this week was tuna potato stew in tomato sauce. I added a good pinch of paprika in there as well. 

Eddie started feeling unwell on Wednesday, but he did go to school the next day. He came home from school, looking worse than in the morning, and feeling even more rough by the evening. I decided against sending him to school on Friday. 

He spent the evening in bed, reading the latest book from his favourite Tom Gates series, which has just been published.

I love time travel books. Last year I read Million Eyes by C.R.Berry, and was delighted to be asked to review the sequel - Million Eyes II: The Unraveller. If you enjoy time travel and government conspiracy theories, this is an imaginative, entertaining story, involving the Princes in the Tower, dinosaurs, James I and the Gunpowder Plot, Jesus and Joseph of Arimathea, and many other historical figures. The plot is utterly Byzantine. Full review will appear on my blog on the 28th as part of the blog tour.

Charity book shops are an irresistible magnet to me. I love browsing the shelves and finding books I would like to read. On Saturday I bought a couple of paperbacks - Holy Island by L J Ross and Robert van Gulik's The Chinese Murders, which I read over twenty years ago, when we lived in the States. I used to frequent the Sterling Memorial library, and have read all van Gulik's novels. 

There was a big stash of vintage and antique books in the charity shop, clearly someone's collection, lots of Dumas, Haggard, etc. I picked up a copy of Nada the Lily, which I haven't read. I suspect Haggard's books will be considered pretty dated now, and rather colonial. I used to love King Solomon's Mines as a child, but I'm afraid that re-reading it now will spoil it for me. 

I found a vintage post card inside the book, dated 26/11/15. That is 1915. It says, Dear Jenny, thanks for letter received Friday. I might be able to get down Saturday, if so, will arrive about 6.15, so please finish early. Hope you are much better now. Yours in haste, love, Harvey. P.S. If I do not come will write fully.

I wonder if Harvey and Jenny met as planned, and why was he so particular about her finishing early.

How did your week go?

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