Busy day.

Exciting day for this woman here. Lunch with the Rotary Club (daughter is now a member) in the nice traditional hotel restaurant up the road followed by the yearly 'flu jab in the Town Hall. The notable features of the first experience were the surprising number of toasts (I haven't been to anything that involves formal stand-up-for toasts for about 100 years) and the veritable sea of male faces all in one room, a very pleasant change, albeit a lot of them where liver-spotted. They seem a jolly enough lot, good at doing fun things to make contributions to charity. Last week there was a horse racing evening with filmed races, only sometimes they do it with human beings dressed up and a big floor mat and furry dice. Chloë looks to be the youngest member and gets made a lot of fuss of, which is as it should be! No leather aprons or rolled trouser-legs or slow-handclapping (I went to a Masonic Ladies Night once and was appalled because a slow hand-clap to me meant disapproval. It had to be explained...) There seems to be a constant need for bucket-shakers at charity events and Chloë has been persuaded to dress in a Pudsy costume sometime soon.She chose that over the bucket-shaking because she feels the cold and everyone assured her it's very warm inside Pudsey!

Notable feature of second experience - the sugared tea and biccies afterwards. I never eat biscuits these days because once I start I can't stop. Ate three shortbreads and then waddled home.