Sunday, September 23

The woods, 11:50
We got up late this morning after almost fourteen hours in bed. I went for a walk with Sparks’ album Hippopotamus in my ears. I decided that I liked it more than most of their recent albums. It may prove one of their best.
As I complete a large circle I photograph the autumnal colours and shadows in the woods. I can never catch them properly: I need a better digital darkroom.
After brunch I will spend some time vacuuming and cleaning the door frames which have not received any attention for years.
Irma will mow and I will move fallen acorns, apples and leaves and sweep. We will both then deal with a huge white all-electric fake tree that Irma bought in Mikrokulma in the summer, and which must now find a place to pretend to grow. We find it somewhere temporary.
At 15:00 Naa will arrive followed shortly by Mummi who turns up in a taxi. Naa celebrated her 23rd birthday yesterday and today we will have a birthday tea where we will pile her with presents. She will get a Tommy Hilfiger jumper, a bright red winter jacket, and some Ted Baker creams and sprays, as well as some Body Shop lotion.
Irma will take them both home in the early evening, after Sunshine has decided to come in for the final time today.
When she returns we will eat the fishcakes we bought in Pellinge yesterday, followed by the soup that Irma made.
It will feel so autumnal that we will go to bed early again, although not as early as yesterday. It will feel like the kind of evening where you should draw the blankets or duvet around you, and so I shall.