The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1931 by Angharad Copyright © 2013 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

Danny came home from his bike ride without his friend, who’d gone home. “Good day?” I asked him.

“Yeah, s’okay, I s’pose.”

“Your friend seemed a nice boy.”

“Yeah, he’s okay.”

“Well I thought he was quite polite.”

“Yeah, he liked you too–thought you were sexy–his mum’s about ninety five.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Danny, if he’s the same age as you, the oldest she could be is about fifty and I suspect probably much younger.”

“Compared to you she looks so dowdy and old.”

“I probably have a better clothing allowance.”

“But you still have your hair cut nice and haven’t got as fat as loads of other parents have.”

“Sometimes that’s a matter of luck.”

“Yeah, if you’re lucky you won’t eat so much and become a pig.”

“I don’t like this conversation any longer.”

He simply shrugged and went up to his room.

Sunday, came and went. I watched Brian Cox’s documentary and enjoyed it. He was quite right, life is all about energy potentials and gradients–quite literally. Once they happen they produce the opportunity for the rest to happen–natural selection and evolution do the rest. The superstar geek got to visit umpteen different countries including the Philippines and Borneo. I think it helped to have some idea of chemistry and physics, especially the second law of thermodynamics which is about heat transfer and entropy reaching equilibrium if I recall, it’s a while since I did it. He maintains living organisms/systems take in pure high grade energy and give out heat, which is poor energy, however, we retain enough of the quality energy to replicate our DNA which only makes one mistake every billion characters–DNA being resistant to change under normal circumstances. All good stuff, he also demonstrated evolution by isolation of a lake in the Philippines where the golden jellyfish is found. It’s different to any other jellyfish because it has done away with its stinging tentacles and instead has absorbed algae which it then exposes to sunlight. The symbiotic relationship means the algae is exposed as much as possible to sunshine during the day, the jellyfish track the sun swimming into whatever light is available, and in return the algae produces glucose which the jellyfish needs to fuel it. Darwin would have loved it, I did.

Monday was back to the routine–Simon and Sammi went off to town to work–this after he brought the investment bank to Portsmouth, then gets saddled with running the retail arm. As I mentioned before, Phoebe went off to Neal who called her just before I was due to take her to college. He came and collected her and I called the college to explain why she wouldn’t be in.

She had some misgivings about going, not to the cemetery, rather to staying with Neal, especially now that Glo had a baby.

I got on with organising the dinner. I was doing a huge cottage pie and had half a ton of potatoes boiling, having spent ages peeling them. While they were boiling, I cooked the mince with mushrooms and onions and plenty of garlic, which I adore in savoury food. It’s supposed to have all sorts of medicinal properties but I just like the taste. I don’t drown the food in it, but I doubt the local vampire would want to eat it.

Over the next half an hour I mashed, then creamed the potato, then tipping the mince out into a large baking tin, I spread the potato on top of it, added some sliced tomato and put it in the oven to brown the top. It would have about twenty minutes. Then I’d dish up about twenty portions some of which would go into plastic tubs for the freezer.

I’d feed the kids when Julie came home, but would wait for Simon, Sammi and Tom before I had mine. While the pie was browning, I heated a whole kilo bag of frozen peas. We cook on an industrial scale.

As soon as Julie had arrived and changed, I began dishing up and the stampede to the table began. It was quiet while they ate, but only Julie asked why I wasn’t eating and when I explained, she nodded. “I coulda waited.”

“Don’t worry.”

“Where’s Phoebe?” she asked.

“Gone to Neal’s for a couple of days.”

“She coulda said.”

“I think it was all a bit short notice.”

She looked at me as if I wasn’t telling her everything. I wasn’t.

“What’s she gone for?”

“I told you a couple of days.”

“Why?”

“They were having some sort of headstone put up for their mother.”

“Cor, that’s taken a long time.”

“I believe it does. Anyway, they were driving up to Salisbury with Glo and dedicating the headstone or whatever people do.”

“Okay, mind if I watch some telly.”

Simon and Sammi arrived almost simultaneously with Tom. He’d been in a meeting all afternoon, whereas I’d knocked off in time to collect the girls. I pulled out the plated portions of cottage pie and added peas to them. We’d just settled down to eat when I saw headlights in the drive and a minute later Phoebe came in, she looked upset. I put my meal back in the slow oven.

“Problems?” I asked and we went down to my study.

“Neal is a pig and Gloria and that bloody piglet just got up my nose, so I came home–is that all right?”

“Of course–have you eaten?”

“Um–not since lunch time.”

“C’mon, I’ve got some spare cottage pie if Simon hasn’t eaten it all.” Fortunately he hadn’t, but only because his mobile went off as he finished his first trawl of the food. I rescued my own plate before it dried up after dishing up some for Phoebe.

“Where’s Jacquie?” she asked looking round the table.

“She’s gone off on a course–I finally managed to talk her into going.”

“What’s she doing?”

“She’s doing an intensive access course at Salisbury.”

“I didn’t know they even did them.”

“Yeah, she’ll be tied up for about two weeks if she can stick the pace.”

“I sometimes wonder if I’d have been better off going back and doing my A levels.”

“I did try to persuade you to do just that.”

“I know, it’s too late for this year so I might as well stay where I am–at least I’ll have a fallback position.”

“And you’ll be sure if you do go back that it’s what you really want to do.”

“Yeah, I s’pose. Sometimes I think I’d like to study something completely different like biology.”

“Better get mugged up on the second law of thermodynamics then.”

“I said biology not physics.” She sounded a bit irritated.

“Absolutely–I recorded Brian Cox’s programme last night–I think you’d be advised to watch it, it’s about the building blocks of life.”

“Yeah, what has that to do with thermal dynamos?” The misquote was quite deliberate and designed to provoke me.

“Because it’s how life came to happen here.”

“Oh, even dormice?”

“Even dormice.”

“I’d better go and watch it then,” with that she departed the table and went into the lounge.