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2008 — 21 August: Thursday

So much to write; so little time. It's 22:12 (on the Thursday) and I've just finished adding 469 miles to my incrementing mileage total, via Sutton Coldfield (and the cousins) last night, followed by dear Mama and a sadly not-much-longer-for-this-world Aunty Peg in Wombourne and Penn, capped by a chum of Bro's down in not very sunny Swindon. At this rate, I shall need to buy a chauffeur's cap. While digesting my thoughts and emotions let's have another soothing picture of Christa, shall we?

Christa in our living room, 199?

I'd carbon date this to the 1990-somethings as the large, dark-brown things are video cassette storage cases, and all the VHS and SVHS tapes are now long since landfill. The unit with shelves in (we nicknamed it the "tic-tac" unit for obvious reasons) has also moved laterally by a couple of metres in the time since I took the shot. Come to think of it, the sofa has been replaced, too.

Bro is downstairs as I type, gloating over his acquisition, earlier today, of a series of exquisite little die-cast models of various aircraft. It was some form of barter deal; I don't ask. But he still has to get them over to NZ, of course. And, curiously, we are both slightly richer after today's visit to dear Mama. Turns out, she let slip to John (while I was out of earshot filling the car) that "Christa was a beautiful girl"! Too little, too late, I fear. It leaves me stone cold sober (unlike Bro, who can drink as I'm doing all the driving). It's an interesting life in this strange family of mine.

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