the structures of familiarity

I don't remember this ever being quite as distorted-looking as this despite quite probably being an agent of introduction of some of the distortion. I don't think I fitted into it for too long after we moved into this house but it was occasionally stood upon for various purposes and otherwise used for purposes other than the storage of worn clothes prior to their laundering. It appears to have been displaced from its natural home of the bathroom by the increasing application of modern wicker-incompatible furnishings but appears to have outlived a more modern competitor which resembled a shopping trolley.

The journey down was evidently successful but had been indefinite almost until we left, depending on the weather. Although the last hour is statistically by far the most dangerous bit (Lincolnshire welcomes careful drivers, but only so that it can discreetly kill them by barring into them at high speed to keep the number of road traffic fatalities high) the little bit from the hoise to the end of the road was still a bit slippy and the A1 from just outside the bypass to just past Morpeth was anything from lightly car-squidged fresh snow to severely compressed rusted ice on the roundabout just before Berwick, at which some operatives with fluorescent jackets and shovels were digging out a gritter. Apart from when we has to step out of the tyre tracks to let an ambulance pass which required a little push to get us back on the road and a bit where we'd have skidded merrily off had I not issued a potential frost pocket warning there were no incidents in the nine hours the journey eventually took.