My penultimate Saturday free before we reopen the pub: carrot cake with a view of cows grazing underneath horse chestnut trees; mini schnauzer puppies, one hiccuping in my lap and casting the most world-weary of gazes at me; my friend's solo art exhibition, aromatic with the scent of a herbarium pegged on the wall; a walk in the shadowy woods, huge fungal saucers gleaming in the understory; hangman with my niece after stew and red wine. I finish and email my essay, replete and a little buzzed.




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