Stirred

Mistress Putin rose early but this Yorkshire Putin rolled over and went back to sleep. Soon I entered a bad dream. I was in a school that was composed of elements of all the schools I have ever been in. I needed to get to the other side of the sprawling institution for my first lesson of the afternoon.

But people kept distracting me. I was very aware of the time ticking away yet try as I might I never got there. I thought of the little sixth form group I was meant to have been teaching and what they might have done in my absence. Feeling downhearted and almost ashamed of myself, I made it back to the school hall and for some reason I do not quite understand I prepared to settle down on a camp bed.

Keys jangled in the dark corridors as two caretakers entered the hall. They were of similar appearance. Stocky fellows with shaven heads and gold rimmed spectacles. They didn't seem too concerned that a member of the teaching staff was planning to stay the night on a camp bed...

And that's when the telephone rang. Brrr-brrr...Brrr-brrr...Brr-brr. Clearly Mistress Putin was not going to pick up downstairs so like a sea-lion easing itself from a Hebridean shore, I rolled out of our prince-size bed and grabbed the phone.

It was our Ian in London. He was riding home on a Boris bike having just spent two hours at the gym. The lad was buzzing with things he wanted to share with his old man. My bad dream started to dissolve like an alka seltzer tablet in a glass. In its place there was Hurricane Ian.

There have been preliminary meetings about a TV show and it really could happen. In fact, it sounds as though - in the course of time - it will happen. They have something that is a little bit different to present to the world.

Meantime he has had a second date with a vegan lady who can speak six languages. Meantime there's the second leg of an old friend's stag do to contend with - the first leg having been in Ibiza. Meantime he and Henry have agreed a second "Bosh!" book with their publisher and they have been working up potential recipes while planning the work process. Meantime he's planning to go wild swimming in the River Thames. Meantime, maybe he will try writing a children's book just like David Walliams.

Phew! That's quite a lot of stuff to digest after being stirred from a bad education-based dream. I didn't even get to ask about the old photographs I scanned for him. He plans to use a couple in the Bosh! Instagram page. It's so good to hear him buzzing with life and the pleasures of living. Examples of those scanned pictures accompany this post.

To visit the Bosh! Instagram site go here.