Ivy and I decided to take a road trip the other week. 'We've got a little sports car,' she told me, 'so perhaps we should use it.'
   Good point, I thought, and over a period of a few days we went to:
   Penrith
   My uncle's, in Ingleby Barwick (look it up!)
   Mansfield, where we were supposed to see an olde university friend, but he had to jet off to Ireland to attend a funeral
   Peterborough, where we met up with two of my old school friends (we had rather a lot to catch up on)
   Mansfield, to draw breath
   Penrith via Sheffield, where we met up with an old colleague of mine, who was also my long-time bridge partner
   Home.
About 550 miles in total. And half of it with the top down... in March in Scotland!

Many of you will know about my collection of 'spooky stories to read aloud', As They Grow Older. It's so titled because I wrote the stories for my first three children as they grew up... so the stories had to grow older too. You can find more about the stories by following the links under Writing over to the right.
   I self-published this collection in two different forms over the years, and sold quite a few back in the day by reading out stories at South Ayrshire primary schools. Well, I am delighted to report that Sparsile Books has decided to publish As They Grow Older later this year, near Halloween. There will be a book launch, probably in Ayr. All will be welcome and no doubt I shall be making follow-up reports about this development as time goes by.

I have to report that my wife (who is Chinese) and I are not the same. This has been confirmed over the years by a number of remarkable additions to the English language she has made. Some are not repeatable,
  But just to confirm that we are different, she has said that we are like cheese and chalk.
   Yes, I think that confirms it.