Her tiny hands are freezing

It is so cold even the bronze nymph is wearing a long scarf draped over her private bits. This is the nymph who appeared billowing water as a fountain in the front of someone's garden a few years ago. She is the first thing people see in the village when they enter it from the east and is occasionally dressed in a tutu, a Santa hat and anything else that takes the fancy of passers-by. She was also used as an initiation ceremony for Mr Loggins 12 months ago. One cold December night, wearing only shorts and wellington boots, his task was to go into the garden, fondle the nymph and have his photo taken. The things that nymph gets up to.

The ice on the road has taken the local council by surprise. For two days, relatively major roads (for us, at least) were not gritted. As a consequence, accidents have been happening all over the place. Last week a cattle lorry was in a head-on collision with, guess what? A gritter truck. This week, a mother and child had to be taken by air ambulance to hospital after their car left the icy road just before 10am. A rumour spread quickly around the village that it was a fatality but, thank God, it was not. Police report no serious injuries.

It is cold now but not icy. There is lots of mud and slushy grass but that's about it.

Mr Grigg is going off log licking this weekend. He meant to write 'picking' in an email but he is so obsessed with logs I think 'licking' is quite appropriate. He is the village's male version of the Log Lady from Twin Peaks. Oh how I miss that programme.

I refuse to let the credit crunch and the advent of computer technology stop me sending Christmas cards. They brighten up a home.

That's about it
Maddie x