After a lie-in, I spent the morning padding about the house in my pyjamas and my mother's slippers, mopping the floor and scraping dog hair off the sofa, while Dad mowed the lawn. Such is the pastoral lifestyle. Mum's back in hospital, after being finally strong-armed into calling up her nurse & describing her symptoms - fever & rigors coming & going over a period of 10 days. It appears she's finally reached a regularity of health complaints at which the "normal" bar has been lowered to near-drowning. It was actually a relief when the doctor diagnosed E.