When the game eventually starts, I find it is being televised, so relax in front of a huge TV and watch the players struggle with the cold and damp. Cubs’ pitcher, Ted Lilly, takes a no-hitter into the seventh and the Cubs win 4-0 – good stuff.

After a sandwich, I go in search of a post office, and take a little look at downtown Escondido. Following which nothing remains but to sit on the porch, writing postcards and identifying the birds using the feeders. I get a ruby-throated humming bird, different kinds of goldfinch, house finches, purple finches and pine siskins. Hiding peanuts elsewhere in the garden is a pair of western scrub-jays, and overhead flies a heron, although exactly which type I’m not sure.

Evening approaches, Rod arrives home, and we are joined by the neighbour, Ted. He is an Englishman in his eighties, born in Deptford, and if I close my eyes I can hear my wife’s uncle Jack. Ted has brought microbrewed beer with him, Pete’s Wicked Ale, and is great fun, talking about his life, sport and beer. But every now and then something clicks in his brain and we get a lecture on the evils of immigration, the benefits of selective breeding and the death penalty. When he was a boy in wartime London, he learnt German – just in case!!

We dine royally on lamb kebabs, with tomatoes, rice and salad, Ted is rolled gently down the hill to bed, and we spend a few moments dissecting his political analysis of the world before retiring ourselves. It’s all part of life’s rich pattern!