Spruce Up

Three days ago we were clearing away Xmas decorations from this room. It is a little shocking how rapidly the veneer of order and taste can be stripped away and we are left with rock and soil. Four burly young men with beards, a cheerful approach to their work and power tools made quick work of removing old plaster, bagging it, removing it and taking it off site. That was the morning and evening of the first day

Most of this stone has not seen daylight for 60 years; by the end of tomorrow it should be covered again, using the plaster that has already been mixed in the blue tub in the centre, applied by employing the mortar-boards (the real thing, not the metaphorically-named sort that I once wore on my head) that are piled up in the tub to the right

An entertaining talk in the village about dyscalculia - i.e. like dyslexia but with numbers. The most thought-provoking part was setting us simple maths problems and then examining the different ways in which different people reached the correct solution. Some people are 'inch-worms', breaking a problem down into small, easy steps and taking each one with care. Some people are 'grasshoppers', leaping as far as possible in a single bound, then applying a few reality-checks to ensure the answer seems right. Different minds learn in different ways. The same principle probably applies to plastering