Grand miroir de mon désespoir

I am having a large mirror fitted to the study wall, so that Arianrhod can practice her haka moves ahead of the Berkshire Under-Fives Rugby Union trials. I can also keep an eye on No Good Boyo's attempts to open pickle jars in the kitchen.

The various morlocks hired to fit it managed to remove the mounted wolf head with Szekler arms akimbo that my grandfather Boykopolk bequeathed to us - the result of one of his least successful crossbreeding experiments.

They failed, however, to bring the boar-tusk brackets I had specified. So the mirror is resting on a pile of Boyo's parking tickets for now.

Boyo thinks the mirror is a bauble of my vanity. Three years together, and he still hasn't noticed that I cast no reflection.

On an Overgrown Path

Dear readers,

Q: What do the following towns - Wallingford, Tamworth, Stafford and Newcastle-under-Lyme - have in common?

A: You will not pass through them en route from our house to No Good Boyo's ancestral tree-trunk in Mid Wales, as they are far far away.

Unless you are No Good Boyo, of course.