Just call me Eric: or,

Little by little, I tell you. We will get there yet. (It's kind of the way I write books, actually: one step at a time, one word and then the next and the one after that...)

Malcolm the nice joiner has just been around. The hole in my bathroom floor is now a tad bigger, where he's been poking at it; the hole in my heart is concomitantly smaller. He doesn't think it's as bad as Simon suggested; he thinks once the bath comes out and the floorboards come up, the joists can probably be repaired rather than replaced. Which, if true, is the best news ever. I'm not counting on it, of course, we will wait to see the truth revealed - but it is what I was hoping he would say, and he did say it.

He has gone away and will commune with Simon. I have placed something large and flat and heavy over the hole, on account of it is now that little bit bigger and certain cats of our acquaintance are fairly sure that with a little wriggling they could absolutely get their heads stuck in it; and now I am going to run away and think about ghost stories for a little while. And think about the kitchen all over again, because if the joists above don't have to come out, then the kitchen ceiling doesn't have to come down; but I do need to do something, because it's foul as it stands.

Little by little, I tell you.