hallucinating!

Thanks to everybody who sent such kind and thoughtful messages about poor old Jiminey; we miss her but at least we've got past the stage where every time the (new)boiler switches itself we think we can hear Jimbles coming in through the cat flap: the two sounds were so alike.

I've been rather busy since my last post: learning the ropes at my new job (I love it!); teaching modular knitting to a wonderful bunch of spinners, weavers and dyers; making more brooches and scarves for the Country Market stall (though my sales have ground to a halt, so I'm doubly relieved to have a "proper" job again, albeit just for a few weeks).

Now I've gone down with some lurgy or other. I took myself off to the spare room last night, in the hope that at least Graham would get a good night's sleep. Somewhere in the small hours I was woken by somebody talking to me. Nobody was there, but I heard thumps and bumps coming from the garage. I realised it must be burglars and (very bravely, I thought) locked the door that connects the garage to the hallway, then went upstairs to wake Graham and ask him to confront the burglars (note how limited my bravery reserves are). He felt my forehead, rolled his eyes and then, gamely, came downstairs with me, and we proceeeded to check not just the garage, but every possible hidey hole in the entire house. No burglars. We both headed back to our respective beds. An hour or so later: thump! I screamed. "Get out burglars, go away." (Why can I never find any swear words when they might be appropriate?) This time the "burglars" groaned and "they" turned out to be poor old Graham, in the kitchen making himself hot chocolate, as he (unlike me) had been unable to get back to sleep after the first batch of burglars. (OOps).

Back to sleep. Except now there was a motorbike crunching all over the gravel outside the front of our house. I opened the window of my room and croaked "go away", very crossly. But neither the man with the motorbike, nor the two men who were banging the garage door would go away. I'd had enough at this point, and thought I'd better call the police. Decided it didn't merit a 999 call, so went off to find the 'phone directory. To my horror, though, even though I'd gone to the study to fetch the thing, I was suddenly back in my bed. And then I'd realised that I'd woken up, this time had just been a nightmare: oh, the relief.

Next time I woke up was about 8am, so the burglars had obviously gone home. Today I just feel like a puppet that has had all its strings cut but at least yesterday's awful hot and cold, shivering and sweating has gone. I've cancelled all engagements for today and tomorrow, and am hoping to have a burglar-free night.