I was at church this morning - it was the reserve team as I think that the exchange group have headed off to Germany. So, we had a hymn-fest, with six on the list today.
Being at church meant that I missed the football trip, as it was an away game today. Maybe I should miss games more often, as Jake and his team had a good game. Jake was captain, played the whole 60 minutes, secured a "most improved" trophy again, and his team came away with a 3-3 draw. Good stuff.
I finished off The Last Bus To Woodstock earlier on today. It is the first of the Morse novels (published in 1975) and I'm not sure if I had read that one before. I certainly didn't remember it. Obviously for me, as for so many, Morse = John Thaw (I'm not old enough to get confused about Thaw being some tough guy copper from a 70s series - was it The Sweeney?) and so many of Morse's character traits are there for all to see from the start - the unorthodox approach, the obvious intelligence, the feeling of loneliness and melancholy, his ability to fall for precisely the wrong person, the love of words and in particular crosswords, the love of Wagner - it's all there. We start to see the relationship between Morse and Lewis develop - this being the first time that they have worked together. We even get a reminder at the end of the book that we have got through the whole story without discovering Morse's first name - something that will take a good while longer.
The reason for picking up the first Morse is that I decided that I would like to read the whole series from start to finish. I bought a hardback copy of The Remorseful Day as soon as it came out (must be well over ten years ago by now?) but, knowing how it ends, I have never been able to bring myself to read it. So, I thought that if I started at the beginning, I would commit to sticking with it and seeing it through to the end!
Back to work tomorrow. Our plans for my week off didn't really come to much - we were going to be sorting out the loft, the music room and who knows what else during the last week, but managed precisely none of it. Still, Nicky has done a great job of painting the garden fence - I can't claim to have picked up a brush at any point!
Whilst it is back to work tomorrow, I can take comfort that whilst the week coming is a full five days, after this week I will only have one more five day week until early June, thanks to a collection of bank holidays, plus a carefully placed long weekend in Paris.
As for a year ago today, we arrived in Santa Barbara, a beautiful town and one we would very much like to go back to and spend a little longer, as we only had a day there. Amusingly, given what I am currently watching, we had lunch at a diner called Joe's, and I remember that the Masters was showing on the TV's at the bar.
