Island

I’ll perk up in a bit. I’m due in with a client at 9:00, and decide that by the time I’ve got through the morning routine my condition will have improved, in spite of feeling off-colour on waking. We drop Freya at the island in the fjord where she’s on her sailing course this week, and head into Oslo.

On the motorway, I sit in the passenger seat feeling ill, Liz sits in the driving seat eating her breakfast, and the car drives us in at 90 km/h down the fast lane, with Liz retaking control for the last kilometre to the office.

From the car park the front door of the office is in sight. I know what kind of work lies in store for me today, and I’m really not up to it. I just can’t face it. I contact my client and tell them croakily I’m too sick to be in. Thankfully, this is Norway, not America, so they’re fine with it. Zero hours contract though, so no revenue for me today. Who cares? I’m too sick to do useful work.

Soon Liz, who works nearby, is finished with her morning meeting and collects me from a local coffee joint. She tells me she requested an expensive be robot to be sent over a kilometre underground, no doubt at substantial expense. The robot has wedged, and when they tried to pull it out “some of the wheels fell off”. Now they have a very expensive hole containing bits of expensive robot.