Blogstipation

After the ecoli infection comes blogstipation. Know the feeling? You sit down at the computer wanting to post something but nothing much springs to mind. Maybe it's the time of year. While bloggers in New Zealand witness springtime bursting out all over, those of us who inhabit the northern hemisphere are beginning to look into the dark and oft-times miserable abyss that is winter. In England rain keeps falling after the least sunny August on record.

September. Toadstools sprouting in our lawn. By the old apple trees, the earth is sodden. I pick what brambles I can find to make a pie for dessert after tomorrow's Sunday dinner. Back in the house, I spend half an hour trawling through "You Tube" to find something that's funny - for visitors' titillation but nothing grabs me. I consider the clip showing electronic bollards in a city street. They sink for a service bus and rise immediately after it has passed as dumb car drivers attempt to take shortcuts - only to have their undercarriages wrecked by the rising bollards. I smirk but it's not a belly laugh.

The new school building is just about ready for our students on Monday. It really does have a "wow" factor. There are carpets, sensor-operated lights, sturdy tables without graffiti or lumps of dried chewing gum. There are clean toilets with soap dispensers full of liquid soap and all over the place computers and interactive whiteboards, brightly coloured walls, doubled glazed windows. Compared with what I have known - this is the dream school and my team of enthusiastic, driven English teachers are close by in our suite of modern rooms, ready for the challenges ahead.

Shirley is upstairs stripping the paper from Frances's bedroom walls while England make hard work of beating Andorra in the first World Cup group match. Perhaps we'll saunter down the pub in an hour or so - gotta do something to rid myself of this blogstipation.