The village hall committee wants a new entrance because the present one is, according to the minutes, unwelcoming. I went round to look. There is a perfectly adequate door concealed behind a noticeboard, two bins and a shrub of considerable ambition. I keep sketching expensive alternatives in my head, then returning to the shrub. Perhaps people genuinely want a new entrance; perhaps they want to spend the grant before someone else gets it. I have been asked for an informal opinion, which generally means a free drawing. For now my proposal consists of moving three things and pruning the fourth.

Low cloud; damp without actual rain. Purlin found a stick sufficiently large to obstruct the entire footpath, so our walk involved repeated stops while he negotiated gateways. These suited my hip rather well. Standing is tolerable; it is the first step after standing that requires discussion. By the time we reached the lower gate I had a reasonable stride, and for perhaps fifty yards walked without accounting for the joint at all. Then the dog reversed direction with his timber. I came home muddy to one knee, although I had not fallen. An important distinction.

Mother asked whether I still did the little drawings for that young man in Bishop's Castle. I had taken her shopping, carried everything in, and was putting the frozen peas away when she said it. I explained, rather sharply, that they were my drawings and that I was an architect. She said she knew perfectly well what I was. This ought to have settled it. Instead I was cross all the way home, and cross again while unpacking my own shopping. I am sixty-three. It is an absurd age to be waiting for a particular sentence from one's mother, but apparently still within the permissible range.