The cat visitor wrote to report that Watson got himself shut in the box-room and Isobel, of all people, came to the front door to fetch her to the library to release him. I guess they’ve finally mended the rift in their lute.

I spotted the tabby interloper who started this series of fracas. He sauntered up to the patio door, meowed loudly to attract Isobel’s attention, then swatted the glass of the door to set her off in a tirade of hissing, spitting and lashing her bottle-brush tail. Then he walked away with a smirk on his face, the lout.

The visit to the cousins went very well despite many hours on the road with both The Brothers packed into my small car. Dai gets to ride shotgun because his legs are ridiculously long — the man wears a 36-inch inseam. Andrew politely took the back, with his knees under his chin like a passenger flying steerage on RyanAir. I think he could have used a skyhook to extract himself.

Our aunt is quite frail now and deaf enough to avoid situations in which more than one person will talk at any given time, but her eyesight is excellent after cataract surgery and her mind as sharp as ever. She lives with a daughter (she has three, and four sons) in a madly cluttered house in a tiny village on the bushy bank of Lac Brôme, and spends her days sitting beside a huge window knitting, reading, listening to the CBC, and riding herd on Otis the cat. Her hearing aids don’t process music well, which irritates her no end, but she can do without them in the quiet house.

The cousins are repopulating the earth, and the family Thanksgiving dinner was a mob scene of three generations guzzling wine and talking over each other. The youngest — four kids under five — helled around under everyone else’s feet. Many photos were taken, especially to showcase the “family sweaters” — garish Icelandic-style creations by my aunt, who is their mother, grandmother, or great-grandmother. I, too, have a family sweater that is so warm that I can wear it only in deepest winter, so I didn’t bring it and therefore missed out on that photo op.

Back in Ottawa, I am putzing around until the high-school reunion on the weekend. The weather is generally glorious.