Elder Brother & SIL will arrive around supper-time, and I have a full day of shopping and cleaning to get through first.

I suggested that they might prefer to stay home and not bother with a long hassle-prone drive, but they wanna get outta Dodge (i.e., Ottawa). So yesterday I made up the guest-room bed and ordered a leg of lamb at the butcher’s for Sunday dinner. Today I’ll scrub the toilets and the bath-tub, vacuum the parlour rug, and sweep up the tufts of cat hair from the various corners where they accumulate. Thanks to another of our correspondents on this thread, I now have a word for this procedure — “scurryfunge”.

Apparently, my visitors are looking forward to long walks, access to books they don’t have at home, and sparkling conversation. I can provide all that, plus a thrilling Saturday-morning jaunt to the farmers’ market for fruit ‘n’ veg. The theatre doesn’t appeal; they’ve had enough high culture. Maybe we’ll meet the neighbours’ dog. It’ll be a thrill a minute.

But first — pool class!