William's Run for Fairbridge: Diary of a Novice: Sunday 26 July

Essay crisis: have promised to write the first draft of the chairman's piece for the annual review by the end of the weekend. It has been going around in my head, but I haven't actually put any words down. Yesterday I got up really early (er, quite early) and warmed up the laptop, settling ino the task. Rearranged the desk a few times. Made a cup of tea. Answered a few emails. Wrote the blog, it had got seriously behind, etc.

Today was different, thanks largely to Michelle who provided helpful encouragement ("my sympathy is fast disappearing" "just get on with it" "you'll just have to do it another time"). By the end of the morning it was done. Pinged it off to my Fairbridge editors, but not before a lesson in tropes (incl. the synecdoche) and enclitics (?!) from Michelle, Francis and their brainy friends Roxy and Urban. Ask them (orWiki), I'm not even going to start.

After that badly needed some fresh air. So we went to Arthur's Seat, or nearby, and walked above Edinburgh admiring the city, Holyrood, the bargain-built Scottish Parliament, a huge gathering of the clans complete with kilts, rugs, knees, swaying figures, cable-tossing etc.