The day wears on. I am having lunch now. A soft pretzel (I shouldn't, I know) and a cup of creamy mushroom, heavy on the garlic, but everything seems to be in the cafeteria. My space heater is still humming and my feet, out of my clogs, are right up against it. Brrrrrrrrr. Still very cold in here. Whenever the weather gets as cold as it is right now (bone chilling, static-clinging-skin burning) I like to immerse myself in a novel that feels a lot the weather outside. What better than something by a Bronte? Actually, not a novel, just a weird little biography of the Bronte family written in 1969 by Phyllis Bentley, a woman given to arch and prosaic sentences which sound like she might have been living side by side with the strange, but brilliant family. Here is how she describes the Bronte's:

Thus the Brontes world ws formed by a decidely unusual comination of elemtns. Their heredity was Celtic---a character ususally eloquent, expressive , extravert. Their environment was Yorkshire-----amongst a people realistic , practical, reserved, greatly disliking any too great revelation of feeling.

So, warm and fuzzy they weren't. This seems universally known and accepted. I'll persist with the book, with the flowery and dramatic scenes and the evocation of sadness, blight and death. It makes everything else, in comparison, look just peachy!