Germaine Greer on Jane Austen

Female self-worth could have been invented by Jane Austen. No wonder we still value her.

Clearing up.

We continue to clear up after the party. The dining table is still in the kitchen, where it takes up too much space, and the kitchen is still in the dining room and covered with crumbs, but now not much else. Tomorrow I will hoover, and then turn the tables (as it were).

We still have a number of unidentified serving dishes: desperance, is the blue loaf tin yours? (But it can't be, it's blue!)

A tray of wine glasses has been returned to Tesco's in Durham, and two trays of champagne glasses will go back to the Chester-le-Street store tomorrow after we've been swimming: ( it's a long story )

No glasses were broken in the making of this party, although one mug was: can we really have reached an age where the rowdies at our parties are the tea-drinkers? (samarcand, you needn't answer that!)

There is cake with every meal; but we have reduced the stock of open bottles of wine to one.

Tonight we set the alarm clock; tomorrow morning we get up early and go swimming. That must mean we're back to normal.