1. There are venison steaks to look forward to at lunch.
2. We are very brave and together try a bit of stand-up comedy training. The session is so fully of silly games and so much like play that we almost forget our fear.
3. It's a clear night, well supplied with cold and distant stars.
1. At coffee time there are gingerbread chocolate digestives, which are surprisingly good.
2. My eldest has been off sick for a few days. I have to shake and pull him awake at teatime: his friend has called round with a bag of Doritos to cheer him up and is waiting awkwardly on the sofa, all puffy coat and long legs.
3. I open the jar of steeped apricots that I made a few weeks back with Anna. It's like a glass of winter sunshine -- very sweet and cheering and bracing. It's a Nigel Slater recipe and in the preamble, he talks about making a welcoming drink for oneself, not just for guests, and it seems like a good self-care approach.
1. I'm very glad to be out as it's such a fine morning. The storm has stripped the trees and soaked the grounds. It looks and feels like winter.
2. Ticking off the last item on my checklist and sending the final email.
3. I took a risk; it didn't work out. But it's only Monopoly, and another £200 will be along in a minute.
1. To hear the wind striking the house broadside but I know I am safe within these walls.
2. Opening the jar of saffron -- the new shoes scent.
3. Raspberry puree drips through a sieve. I can wait: supper is a long way off.
1. Bettany's bag of handwarmers has a satisfying heft to it on this cold, cold morning. I offer her an extra for the way home.
2. While we are drinking coffee, the winter's first snow starts to fall. There's nothing to it, really, and it leaves us without settling.
3. I don't think we knew that's what we wanted when we set out in search of wedding anniversary lunch -- but when we're offered sparkling wine, it seems exactly right.
1. At one point, in the early hours, I have both children in bed with me. I warm my back on whatever it is they came looking for in the cooling dark.
2. Two heavy parcels arrive for the children: a godfather has sent advent biscuits.
3. When I open the door to put boxes out, I find the front garden is blanketed with drifts of lemon-yellow fallen stars, and I can see the cold sky stars through the acer's bare branches.
1. Showing Bettany how French children have petit dej -- a piece of yesterday's baguette with chocolate spread dipped in a bowl of cocoa.
2. Seeing a familiar name on the list of editors for a project I'm joining.
3. I hear Nick open and close the laundry bin before remarking that there isn't much in it. This is because I've kept on top of the washing while he was away.
1. After a long time asleep, I wake up.
2. Geraniums, impossible blue, bloom deep into November.
3. I find myself alone in the woods counting seconds, listening to leaves falling and the calling of birds.
1. We are both walking back the same way.
2. I kiss Nick and see him and his case through the barriers at the station. The small farewell reminds me of when we first met and could hardly bear to be apart.
3. She puts on her shoes and darts down the hill to see the launch of our town's Christmas shopping events. Later, we watch fireworks (and other people watching fireworks) from our front door.
1. I spot some pale flower buds on the cyclamen by the front door -- tight furled promises.
2. In the sunny park, I catch a few startling crimson leaves on almost bare branches. I've been reading O. Henry's The Last Leaf.
3. I really like handing out brand new shiny black and red pencils from my stationery stash.
1. I am tired this morning and so feel completely justified in standing and staring at lichen.
2. Little birds in black and palest brown scuffle and scutter in a thorn tree like boys on the way to school.
3. I have re-wrapped the parkin, swept the crumbs from the table and put our coffee mugs in the sink. A message arrives from Anna to say that she, too, has had a piece with her elevenses.
1. A plant in the front garden has thrown out rosettes of dark red leaves with aerial rootlets. I snip them off and bed them hopefully here and there.
2. Anna and I meet up to plant up her Christmas paperwhite bulbs and observe some seasonal joys as we remember Elspeth Thompson.
1. A pair of cherry cakes cooling on the worktop.
2. In the course of our clear-out, I find a box and realise I can tip the entire contents straight into the bin.
3. We have an empty shelf, which I'm sure will get filled soon -- but for now, there is nothing on it.
1. To pin my poppy on to my winter coat and step out into the cold. I feel like we've crossed the winter line.
2. My eldest comes to find me with the new and beautiful copy of Dune that he has just bought, all matte covers and clear type on thick, smooth pages. It's a bit of a contrast with my copy, which I threw out because its badly printed yellow wood pulp pages were falling off its broken spine.
3. The crunching of a silver ball among the icing on a fairy cake.
1. Google Assistant starts to tell me the news, and then the feed stops for a technical reason, and there's no clear way to re-start it.
2. It's quiet out today -- most of the people seem to be far away in the mist, out of reach.
3. Nick declares that we're having bacon sandwiches for lunch.
1. I catch up with some correspondence and get a flurry of replies; and also some original messages, including one from Anna enquiring about our plans for planting up bulbs of paperwhite narcissus. It feels like I gave the comms channel a poke and unclogged it somewhere upstream.
2. We have the last of the wine with our supper -- one glass each, Sauvignon blanc, very cold.
3. She brings me a few nanotape creatures she has made -- sticky bubble beasts.
1. He slides into his pocket a notebook and pencil.
2. We unwrap a new French cheese. It proves to be exactly ripe and tastes like it might be triple cream.
3. While are settling down for the evening, a very large and spindly spider strolls over the bed. We catch him and put him safe among the books, hoping he will stay around and do his duty against the moths that occasionally try to move in.
1. 'Pizzas are here!'
2. We are both holding our breath at this episode, and find ourselves holding each other against the tension of knowing what the protagonists don't.
3. One of the children has sketched a heart in the bacon fat left in the frying pan.
1. My invoices fly out and the month's money comes flying in. But like a weary air traffic controller, I divert quite a lot of it out again into the joint account.
2. Plaiting extensions into her hair for her Wednesday Addams costume.
3. Aunty Katie appears at the door for trick or treat and soon we're drinking vodka with the blood-coloured Dracola we bought for the children's Halloween supper.