I do not possess a torque-wrench. I have never possessed a torque-wrench. It is one of the many ways in which I have failed to express that particular masculine ideal which involves a tool for every job and an intimate knowledge of how it should be deployed. Now, clearly, being conversant with tools is but …
For a long time now, I have hoarded toothpaste. By this, I don’t mean that in these straitened times I have panic-bought huge stocks hoping to make a killing on the dental hygiene black market. Rather, I have kept my own tube of toothpaste hidden away in the bathroom cupboard, so I don’t have to …
So, last week water started dripping through a light fitting in my kitchen ceiling. Now let me be clear: this was not flooding. Flooding is a whole other universe of properly terrible. This was just an annoyance. But it was very, very annoying indeed. Naturally, therefore, I behaved as any rational person would, faced with …
It’s always strange on a Friday to be surrounded by famous names. In our house, everyone has a name that is peculiarly and particularly not famous. My eldest, Miriam, is Huncs. Huncs is a contraction of Hunca Munca, who is one of the Bad Mice in Beatrix Potter’s ‘Tale of Two Bad Mice’, and Miriam …
It’s Friday and they think it’s all over. Time to Pause for Thought – except no one wants to Pause. I don’t. I just want to get to the end of the day, the end of the week and have two blessed mornings not riding the bus to Oxford. So spare a thought, ladies and …
So it's the weekend. What a relief. But here’s how the weekend is with me: it’s full of things that I have to do because I haven’t gotten them done when I should. The fact is I’m a little disorganised. I have a diary but not an up-to-date diary. I have good intentions but not …
One of the pleasures of returning to work at the museum last week (and there have to be pleasures in returning to work otherwise we’ll all go crazy) was to be surrounded again by its many treasures: pictures, sculptures, textiles shimmering with gold and silver thread, ceramics of miraculous delicacy. It is a daily treat …
When I was small, I didn’t like the dark. It wasn’t that I thought there were monsters lurking; it was a physical thing. I didn’t like the darkness of it, the thickness, the feeling of it closing around me. I didn’t like the unknown silence of it, the quietness into which my own heartbeat might …
Last Friday, I got up in the dark at 4.30 as I usually do. I wasn’t happy. I don’t like getting up in the dark. But as I rooted around for socks (I know my socks by touch) I felt the socks I most love: cashmere, grey with blue toes and heels and soft as …