Sunday, February 10

This morning we leaped up bright and early, and watched the snow all slide off the back roof of the house behind us. Then we heard it all slide off our back roof.

Irma went out to check. It had all slid off in one go, and now lay in a huge pile outside the back windows, on top of the huge pile that already lay there.

Irma disappeared and then came back to report that the snowplough had piled a huge pile of solid snow into our front drive. I went outside to look, wrapping up first because I still felt as though my flu might return any second. Sure enough: the snowplough had piled a huge mound of rock-solid snow up to our hedge and the stopped.

I assumed that the driver had got the angle wrong and realised that, if he continued, he would rip all our bushes up, and so had stopped dead with no way to undo what he had already begun. We have just enough room to get the car out in the gap still available to us.

I spent the afternoon ironing while Irma cooked the meal that we never ate yesterday.

At 18:00 we go to see Marja in the hospice where she has moved. I take her the Aku Ankka book and she looks at me slyly and then her mouth widens into a big grin. “Yes, I would like it”, she says, and then promises she will read it and tell me if she wants another one.

We sit talking and then go into the big room where Irma and I get given hot chocolate and buns, and Marja goes through a large smoothie. She seems in admirably good spirits, and good humour. We move into the indoor orangerie and I notice a plastic squirrel peeping through the leaves. I manage to photograph it.

I will watch various people coming in and emptying bottles of wine, or replacing empty bottles with new ones. Other people will arrive with flowers and, in one case, a big cheese.

I will leave impressed with everything I have seen.