Barley House, Nailsworth

Here I am, still in Nailsworth, still enjoying the peace and quiet. I did go back to Stroud today, but it felt like a bit of a holiday: I had my eyebrows waxed at the nail salon, in a separate back room, and tried to get some Euros at Thomas Cook. Might as well have asked for moon rock: they'd had a run on them, and were completely out! I must try again tomorrow.

Quick trip home, to pick up some cards, then off  to a friend's house to watch a DVD: the 1940s Heiress, based on the novel Washington Square by Henry James. We will be reading this for our WEA course. A lively discussion ensued after the film. Friend F. drove me back to the market town of  Nailsworth, and I walked up the hill to the hamlet.

My late evening has been spent watching about the late, great writer Andrea Levy, who died last Friday, of breast cancer. She was only 62. I'm thinking a great deal of my friend Una, who died about this time last year, also of cancer. She was 53. Some of the best die young.