Monday 22nd December 2008

I think if we are going to have a tree in a pot outside the front door, we need to move to somewhere less windy. The idea is that after Christmas we plant it and then I can give it an official Christening ceremony. However, the way things are going the poor tree isn’t going to survive long enough to be planted.

I’ve been wondering whether chimneysweeps get a lot of phone calls from small children at this time of year, asking if they can come and make sure the chimney isn’t block so that Santa can come down it easily. It’s an important consideration. In many new houses children may have to call builders in to add a chimney to the house first. It’s a bit hard to clean something that isn’t there.

The good news is that today is the shortest day. Of course that is only good in the sense that the days don’t get any shorter now and will start to get longer again. I wonder what would happen if one year that didn’t happen and instead the days got shorter and shorter until they disappeared altogether. I suppose it wouldn’t feel so dark if it was snowy at the same time, but if it was just wet and muddy, it wouldn’t be very nice and we’d probably need one or two more streetlamps to make things a bit easier. Obviously, if you already live somewhere with streetlamps, you probably don’t need any more but round here it helps to carry a torch.

I’m anxious about meeting my cousin Jack today. It’s very important that I get on with him, otherwise I risk being left out of some of the Christmas celebrations. My Mistress isn’t feeling very confident as I had another run in with a dog yesterday. It wasn’t exactly a run in, but it would have been if my Mistress had let go of my lead.