Today, I am back at the Old Rectory. It is cold. I have the heating on for the first time since summer.

Yesterday, the concert and tea for older people was a success. No mishaps. We had enough food for everyone. As we rely on donations of cakes, it is always a stab in the dark. We don’t know how many people will turn up.

I once took an elderly friend, and she broke her hip when she rushed to speak to the performer. She had been a ballerina when she was younger. The classical music, I know, reminded her of her performances, when her body was in its prime. She managed to recover after a gruelling rehabilitation, and she even swum in the sea near her house in Spain the following summer.

When she was fit again, I took her to the next concert and tea. We got talking about her ballet days on the way home. I had never seen photos of her dance around the world, sometimes with Nureyev. When I was helping her out of the car, she invited me upstairs to look at her photo albums. I said that I would next time. I was tired after helping at the tea.

She died soon after, and I never saw the photos. I so regret not saying yes to her.

At her memorial, there was an amazing photo of her as a young woman, with one leg almost touching her back and her arms elegantly outstretched, one behind and one in front. It was posed, not on a stage, but on a rock, looking out to sea. It was one of the most moving photos I have ever seen. It was breathtaking. I had only seen her walking with a stick.

I must try to get Lania, the daughter of my Aussie friends, Jen and Glen Atkins, to replicate that pose, at the sea, in Sydney. She is currently training with the Dutch National Ballet. Every time I see a photo of her, I catch my breath.  Her star is on the rise.

Today, I am going to the Rogate Art Fair at the church. Then Domino and I will head to the Downs for a long walk. He can run freely, at speed, up there.

Today, it is colder, and autumn has properly pushed summer off the map.

I have a concert and tea for older people later today, at St Paul’s, Onslow Square. We are expecting close to four hundred guests. The event is free and volunteer led. It is an impressive achievement.

Yesterday, I mentioned a disturbing dream about a tsunami, the underlying theme pointing to my desire to protect the children, when they were young, from all harm; parents obviously can’t, as they cannot eliminate random risks. I still have the same instincts. Nothing has changed, but they are no longer in my care 24/7.

Inevitably there were accidents and mishaps that happened to them growing up, despite my overly protective instincts. Anna has a scar on her forehead, and Hugo has one on his lip to prove the point.

Anna was, always, easily spooked when she was young. She watched White Fang, with a young Ethan Hawke. Mild fare, but in one scene there was a dead body under a frozen river. The sight of this motionless old man’s face, triggered a bout of nightmares for Anna – ending up as a nightmare for Geoff and me. We were up and down to her bedroom, in the wee, dark, still hours for about six weeks.

On another occasion, we were staying in Scotland at a houseparty – a fully fledged pheasant and stag event. There was tartan and velvet, at dinner, as far as the eye could see – miles of it.

While we were having a jolly good time at dinner, the children were being entertained elsewhere. Mine were five and three years at the time. The group watched Rowan Atkinson’s hilarious, but cringeworthy, movie, Bean Movie, in which he stains and tries to clean Whistler’s Mother’s face. The scene should be called Face Off. 

First, he sneezes all over her face, then he uses a handkerchief to clean off the snot – disastrously the handkerchief has blue ink on it from a leaking pen in his pocket, then he tries to remove the ink with chemicals; initially, he is successful, but then the chemicals completely obliterate her face so there is only the canvas left.

Somehow the disappearance of the mother’s face traumatised Anna. She couldn’t sleep for weeks. She woke us up, repeatedly, every night. I think she wanted to check our faces were still in place.

I had a good look at the painting at the Musee d’Orsay, while I was in Paris, a couple of weekends ago. The mother is in profile, and her expression is vacant. Did she suffer from dementia? Some of the older people at our concert do! It is heartbreaking.

It is clear blue sky this morning. The sun is holding on to its hat.

I was glad to wake up this morning. I had a vivid dream last night that made me restless.

We were driving past a beach in Britain. Geoff stopped the car to take in the view. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the waves were breaking, and they were crystal clear. I ran away from the car, even though Geoff was calling me to come back. I just couldn’t resist those Australian-like waves. He remained in the car with Anna and Hugo.

All of a sudden, the sea started to recede very quickly and for a long way. Eureka. I remembered that this is what happens in tsunamis. The water was now rushing in like a wall. I couldn’t make it back to the car, so I ran to a building nearby as fast as I could and climbed six flights of stairs to the top floor.

Very conveniently when I opened a rear door on the top floor, there was safe, dry land, on a hill. There were parents everywhere gripping their children.

I had that desperate, sinking feeling that Geoff had not been able to drive the children to safety.

Anguish engulfed me for a few minutes, and then I saw the car appear. Geoff was there with Hugo. But I could not see Anna. Had I lost one child? But then she slowly emerged from the car. She had hurt her leg, but she was alive and well.

Relief washed over me like a warm blanket. And then I woke up.

In the summer before Hugo went to boarding school in 2009, we decided to use our Singapore Airlines airmiles, about to expire, and go to Phuket and to a small island resort, on Koh Racha, that some friends had raved about. Instead of the usual Mediterranean holiday, we headed much further east. It was the rainy season, but it was guaranteed to be warm. It had been hit badly by the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami.

It was the time of the bird flu epidemic. I didn’t feel well on the flight, and when I arrived I had a temperature. Would I be quarantined? They had heat sensors in Singapore. Luckily, I made it through. It took five days and strong medication to get back to normal.

The Racha resort was stellar. Modern, sleek Asian decor. The children had the time of their lives. There were not many guests so the staff spoilt them rotten, supplying them with endless virgin cocktails in the pool. I had to stay in the room for the first couple of days as I was ill.

When we went for the second week to Phuket mainland, Geoff picked up a newspaper and gasped. Whilst we had been on the island there had been a murder. One of the male staff had become insanely jealous when his female lover went off with another man, and he promptly stabbed her to death. We worked out that this had taken place while I lay eating chicken broth in a remote villa, while Geoff and the children were at dinner on the sea front. There had been a high speed sea chase and police had combed the island on foot to track down the killer. They hadn’t caught him. He had jumped from a cliff to his death.

What if on this wild chase, he had seen my light on and knocked on the door? The island was tiny. The only inhabitants were associated with the resort: guests and staff.

I was quite glad to get home to Chelsea!

Today, I have lunch in Sloane Square with Mrs Springbok. She can tell me about the sun and sea she’s just left in Plettenberg Bay, on the Garden Route in South Africa.

 

 

 

Another lovely day; I can’t believe that the sun has still got its hat on. And hasn’t run away completely now that it is autumn.

Yesterday, I had a reunion with a few Sussex House (Hugo’g prep school) mothers at a Palestinian restaurant in Beswick Street, Piccadilly. Tabun Kitchen: completely down to earth, completely stylish and completely delicious. And the service is impeccable.

The owner is from Jerusalem: her father was from Bethlehem (I know of another descendant from there!!!), and her mother was from Jerusalem.

I wondered, sitting there in the West End, if Chelsea inhabitants stray much from the area, as it is a marvellous place to live? I was the only one who had jumped ship to Fulham; the rest continue to be loyal Chelsea residents. And they are all foreign: part of the EU (European Union, which Britain has left).

There was a Belgian (Chocolate); a German (Mercedes); an Italian (Ferrari/Pepperoni) and Spanish (Flamenco). And me, a bouncy kangaroo. They are beautiful, sophisticated, cultured and stylish: peacocks.

It was a fantastic afternoon. Time just went on for a bit. It slowed down, and we just stayed and had a good chin wag.

I just wish that there were more of these moments; where you can take life down a notch and just enjoy the connections. One main connection was our boys. No longer pre-teen, but men. We all gazed at photos of them in wonder. The transformation was extreme.

Today, I am back in my tennis shoes. Then I have an Hon. coming for lunch. Then a great pheasant for tea. Then another couple of pheasants for drinks.

At the end of the day, whether you are foreign, or a pheasant, the main thing is that you are a good egg.

A good friend, a trustworthy friend, a good person, a trustworthy person. Trust and kindness is what I hope for in a friend.

Everyone at the Palestinian restaurant yesterday fitted that description.

But there have been many more for me; in Australia, there were a few kind kangaroos who bounced with me, and in Britain many a pheasant has reached out.

I thank you all.

 

Today, Monday, is lovely: crisp, cool, calm, sunny weather. We are in October now, and autumn is promising to be dry and warm. A gift for me.

On Friday, I had no idea what the weather was like as I was head down. I was bouncing around like a startled kangaroo. I had so much to do for the weekend houseparty at the Old Rectory. The Spanish were coming like a slow but steady tango. Shopping, cooking, flowers in bedrooms and bathrooms, setting the tables, beds made, towels positioned. It would be worth it, as they extended great hospitality to us on a tour of Andalucia, a few years back now.

They are from hot climes. They may be dark haired and olive skinned, but they are kindred spirits.

I wanted everything to be perfect as Flamenco, the first friend I made at Hugo’s prep school, Sussex House, is legendary for her faultless hospitality. And Flamenco and her husband, a Brit, introduced us to another Spanish couple, who sent their sons to Harrow at roughly the same time as Hugo, our boy. They are from Vigo, Galicia, the largest exporter of fish in Europe.

I had the bright idea, last minute, of serving English wines, which are made in Hampshire and West Sussex, to go with each course. So Geoff and I bounced over to the Exceptional English Wine Company, at Cowdray Park in Midhurst, and sorted it before they arrived on Saturday. The gentleman from Vigo is a member of a renowned European Wine Club, so I thought he would appreciate it. He did. Some were better than others.

Harrow School – it was where I had to hand over my son to an institution; at the age of thirteen. It was heartbreaking for us, but probably a bit of relief for him. I had always tried to keep him firmly tied to my apron strings.

Hugo was again, for me, a very difficult pregnancy. Again, I almost lost him, as I almost lost Anna, in the first trimester. I wanted to keep him very badly, as I had wanted to keep Anna, very badly. On 11th December he was born, and I was grateful to get him to full term. He was perfect, and I could see that he would be handsome one day. He is.

When it came time for him to leave Sussex House and go to the equivalent of High School in Australia, I wanted him to go to either St Paul’s or Westminster, local to where we lived. He wanted to go to Harrow, to The Park house, part of a boarding school just north of London. I took him on the rounds, but he set his heart on going there. It is where Winston Churchill went. Eight British prime ministers boarded there.

Why? He often went to The Park from infancy, as his Uncle Rob was the resident housemaster. At Christmas, he sat amongst the Wilmots in The Park hall, off and on (we went to Oz too), and that is where he desired to be.

I don’t think I shall ever forget the day, the moment, when I left him to that great institution.

He was extremely happy there. But I clearly remember the moment when the Housemaster turned to the sixteen couples who had just deposited their sons into his care, and he said, “Could parents now say goodbye to their boys and leave.” Or words to that effect.

I felt like I’d been hit in the chest by a bullet. It was a living nightmare for me; countercultural. I had so desired to be a mother. Was this what you had to do in the land of pheasants and stags? I kissed him goodbye and sobbed in the car. He was thirteen and would sleep at Harrow most nights. That was the thing that got me: he would not be under my roof at night.

Maybe, whatever the age, you feel the loss. But it was sooner than I’d expected. But Harrow suited Hugo. I missed him terribly. But he was very happy. Sometimes, I would have a nap in his bedroom, just to smell him.

 

 

 

 

It is bright and sunny this morning at the Old Rectory, but there is a distinct chill in the air.

The light though is crisp and sharp, reminding me of our time in Provence, in the first year of our marriage. I had in my mind’s eye Monet’s The Luncheon (seen at the Musee d’Orsay last weekend) as I passed by the empty garden table by the meadow, now mown. If only life was so elegant nowadays.

 

In 2010, when we took the children to Paris, we also took the high speed train to St Remy afterwards.

This was the same trip when Madame Secretary pronounced “NON”, that it was simply “impossible” to allow us to use the facilities at the Cercle de l’Union Interalliee members’ club, despite having an introductory letter from the Hurlingham Club.

On the day of departure it was pouring with rain. When we arrived at the train station, the passengers were barred from going onto the platform, until the last minute. The surge of bodies when the barrier was lowered was like the first day of the Harrods Sale; survival of the fittest. Who cared if you trampled over your fellow man or woman to reach your seat?
We asked a railway official on the platform whether we were at the correct carriage for our pre-booked tickets. “NON, you are on the wrong platform. This is not your train.” We set off at pace to reach the next platform, to be told, “NON,” you need to go to the next platform.” He was pointing to the platform we had originally been on.

We legged it back to the spot on the platform where we had first set off. The whistles were blowing, the doors were about to close, everyone was now on the train. I just yelled, “Get on.” So we threw our bags on and followed with our bodies. We landed in a wet, messy heap.

We were, ‘surprise surprise’, in the correct carriage!

St Remy was beautiful. People talk about the light in Provence. It is where many of the Impressionists and post-Impressionists headed to paint: including Vincent Van Gogh. After he had an attempt at cutting off his ear, he went to stay at the Saint-Paul Asylum. He was very ill when he went there, but he still managed to paint some exquisite art, including Starry Night over the Rhone. I was enthralled by a similar one at the Musee d’Orsay in Paris. When I stumbled on the painting, the words to an old Don McLean song flooded back, “Starry, starry night. Paint your palette blue and grey, Look out on a summer’s day, With eyes that know the darkness of my soul.” He suffered so. Is there sometimes a link between brilliance and depression?

 

Our little hotel, very basic, happened to be across the road from Saint-Paul. We went to see Van Gogh’s room, where he stayed most of the time. It too was basic, and it was unlike the cheerful painting of it displayed at the Musee d’Orsay. The grounds were beautiful, and although nature is said to heal, it did not heal him. They failed to still the desperate ruminations of his mind.

We did very little in St Remy other than swim in the pool, play cards and board games, and eat delicious food.

And at night, we looked at the same stars that Vincent Van Gogh, a genius, gazed at from his small, lonely room.

Today is sun and rain. But it is warm, and it is expected to be a warm October.

I have a lot of cooking to do today. Not my favourite activity. I am no Nigella.  I am certainly not a Domestic Goddess.

Hugo became firm friends with Nigella’s son, Bruno, when he was at Sussex House, over a decade ago now.

I once asked him what Nigella had cooked for dinner. He said that she didn’t cook all the time, as that was her profession.

Once, when I went to collect him from tea, I walked into the hall to see a weird looking woman with a baby in a pram down the corridor. I said hello, but she rudely ignored me. I said in the car to Hugo, “Gosh, that woman in the corridor with the baby was rude. She didn’t answer when I said hello.” Hugo replied, with some degree of exasperation, “Mum that is a wax work.” I was amazed.

Another time I went on a Sunday morning to collect him from a sleepover. I rang the doorbell. Charles Saatchi answered the intercom. For some unaccountable reason I said it was Sandra, but I said my name with an Aussie hard ‘a’, and not a soft ‘a’. He buzzed me in, just as I heard him yell, “Hugo your nanny is here to collect you.”

Hugo did not appear. He was obviously sound asleep. What could I do? I couldn’t very well go upstairs and look for him. So I sat down on the bench in the hall. This time, I was sitting next to a wax older gentleman. He was so life like it was unnerving. He had crepey skin on his arms and neck. He was hunched over, holding a paper bag. He looked exhausted. I marvelled at his realism.

After 45 minutes, I saw Hugo run across the landing to the loo (toilet) presumably. I yelled out, “Hugo, please come right now.” It was my only chance to retrieve him, and I was not going to squander it.

When Hugo was turning 13, I asked where he would like to go for his birthday. Without batting an eyelid, he said, “China Tang at the Dorchester.” He’d been there with them. And other good restaurants. He ate a lot of good food in their company.

When Bruno came to stay with us, I once asked him what he’d like for breakfast. He asked for pancakes with blueberries. I actually make a pretty good pancake. I was taught by my grandmother, Vera, my mother’s mother. I could woof down at least ten of hers as a child. No wonder I was a pudgy teenager.

As he ate away, contentedly, Bruno asked, “I am a bit confused. Are you Hugo’s mother or the nanny.” He obviously had met a few Aussie nannies. I wasn’t cross. I just laughed.

Bruno loved to talk about the sea and surf. He wanted to be a surfer. He often talked about Italy, where they holidayed, as Nigella is partly Italian. (Geoff was delighted to be standing behind Antonio Carluccio, another Italian chef on television, in Waitrose recently.)

I was happy to talk to Bruno about one of my favourite subjects, the sea, and I knew a lot of surfers growing up. He was enthralled as I told him about my brother Shaun’s fearless pursuit of the perfect wave, often at the expense of his face. He once came home having split his forehead on a reef. He still has a small scar between his eyes.

So, I better put a shopping list together soon.

 

Warm and sunny today. It was like that on Saturday in Paris. 25 degrees, and it is almost October.

I spent the morning walking around the first arrondissement on Saturday in Paris.

On that walk, I went to see the newly refurbished Ritz. I, of course, had to get past the bodyguard on the door. No easy task.

“Hello,” I said. “Could I possibly look around the renovations?” The bodyguard looked uncertain. “Yes,” he said. “As long as you do not take any photos.”

In I went. Perfection unfolded before me.

What a tour de force. It was faultless.

However, sometimes, life is stranger than fiction. I was gazing at the newly panelled corridor.

And then I turned to my left. On two seats. A man in a pink jacket. Beside him in a pink quilted carrier bag, a poodle with pearls around its neck. Only in the Ritz.

But sometimes dreams really come true. Like when I turned 41 and I was there in Paris with Anna. She was a girl then, a woman now. I wish that I could bottle that moment in front of the Eiffel Tower. It was joyous. Joy is so wonderful. It is bubbly and effervescent.

I then went on to the Musee d’Orsay to see the Impressionists and the post- Impressionists. What a setting for great art. Through the transparent clock window, as the building was once a train station, and you must make sure the trains are on time, you could see Sacre Coeur in the distance – white pillars of serenity over the city.

I wish that for Paris. I wish that for us all. Peace and good will to all men!

If only that we could live that out daily.

Today, I have more tennis. And that will be a tonic. Radio 4 have conducted a survey of 18,000 people as to their main forms of rest, ‘the rest test’, which leads to well being. Games is one of them. As that stops you thinking about problems and what people think of you. Maybe that is why I am often in tennis shoes.

 

Today, I awoke to rain.

Yesterday, I caught up on life post-Paris. Jobs to do; that meant saying NO to a lot of things I would have preferred to do. I would have loved to have had a swim. Wash away the cobwebs of travel. It was not to be.

A few years back, Geoff was on a conference in Paris, in the Opera quarter. It was a hop and a skip from the Cercle de l’Union Interalliee, the club I visited in Paris this past weekend. We had the children with us, then in their teens. Off we set, excitedly, to enjoy its reciprocal hospitality, which the Hurlingham offers to their members, when they are in London.

In we walked, through the enormous gates to a majestic building, right next to the President’s palace.

Geoff speaks pretty good French. He studied it along with German at Durham Uni. He explained that we had a letter of introduction from the Hurlingham Club in London, and we would like to have lunch and a swim. The concierge looked downcast. As if Geoff had slapped him across the face or insulted him.

He gravely said, “I cannot let you in without the secretary’s permission.”

Geoff said, “That is fine. We can speak to the secretary.”

He said, with a very stern face, “She is not here until tomorrow.”

Fine, we thought; we will come back tomorrow, and go to the Marais region today; the Place des Voges and Notre Dame.

Off we went, a bit irritated, but there was always tomorrow.

Fast forward to the next day; tomorrow had arrived.

We were shown into the secretary’s office. We showed her the letter of introduction from the Hurlingham Club. Madame Secretary acted as if we had committed a heinous crime, that warranted an imminent beheading at the Place de la Concorde.

She was a large woman, shall we say, with enormous bosoms, which she rested her crossed arms upon, like a shelf.

Geoff started again: “We are from the Hurlingham Club, and we would like to take the children for a swim in the pool and have some lunch.”

Her considered answer: “NON.” Finito. No. Final. Forget it.

Geoff, ever the gentleman, politely asked: “So when can we come and use the club.”

Her considered answer: “You could have used the pool yesterday (when we had originally come) and on Thursday.”

We were leaving on Wednesday. I had steam coming out of my ears.

Fast forward a few years later to our next visit to Paris. It is now May 2013. I am determined to swim in that pool and to eat at the Interalliee at all costs.

Reverse back to when we had returned from our unsuccessful attempt to visit the Interalliee. I immediately checked with the Hurlingham Club membership office, and we had been entitled to used the club any day of the week. Mrs Madame Secretary obviously didn’t like Anglais bodies, plus one Aussie, in their over-chlorinated pool.

I was determined on the next trip to use that pool and eat their food. Fast forward back to May 2013 to the next trip to Paris. We are this time, given access to the Interalliee.

So Geoff and I have a nice bite to eat, and then it is time for our dip, just before we have to catch the Eurostar back to London. I lock my suitcase and passport etc in a locker and head for some laps. When I go to unlock the locker after the swim, I have, moronically, forgotten which locker my possessions are in.

Just remember, at this point I am dripping wet, and Geoff by now is waiting anxiously in the reception of the club for me. I see a woman in a nice black dress and black court shoes.

I ask her, “Can you help me? Do you work here?” She looked at me with disgust and uttered, “Do I look like I work here!” as she pointed to her svelte body. She marched away without a second glance at the desperate, drenched, dripping woman, who did not speak French.

I ran and found the lifeguard. She is paid to help. She explained to me that we had two chances to put my code into the correct locker, and after that, the they all locked for ten minutes. She is obviously thinking to herself, “What a plonker.” In French, of course.

I entered my code into the first locker. I am unsuccessful. I try the next locker. I am unsuccessful. We wait it out another ten minutes, until I can try two more times. I get it on the third. I change at speed. Forget the blow dry.

I find Geoff pacing in one of the salons. I don’t explain. We have to dash for our train. I look like a drowned rat. The Parisian women on Rue Fabourg, the equivalent of Mayfair, look at me in horror as we run to find a taxi.

Today, I can go and enjoy the Hurlingham Club and play some tennis. If I hear a French voice, well, I shall just smile. No need to be rude!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Summer was like a flakey friend. She left while I was away in Paris. Couldn’t be bothered to wait to say goodbye!

It is distinctly more autumnal this morning. This seasonal shift was confirmed when I arrived last night at the Old Rectory, having returned from Paris, to see that the Sweet Pea Lady, down the road, sadly, had taken down her summer time teepees. Each year she lays out rows of wicker teepees in her front garden, and when the blooms appear, she cuts them and puts them in jam jars, on a wooden trolley, outside her front gate; they are £1 per bunch. They make our house full of sweet scent.

Hugo has moved into ‘digs’ near Warwick Uni; I shall miss him. Another disappearance!

The days are getting shorter. Instead of nudging 10pm, at sundown, at the height of the summer, it was pitch black by 8pm last night.

Paris was warm and balmy, on Friday night, on arrival around 5pm. It was still summer.

The hotel was just off the Tuilleries Gardens in the 1st arrondissement, midway, near the Place de la Concorde. The sight of greenery in the park enticed me to walk to the end of the street. I could see the roof of the Grand Palais to the right and the Eiffel Tower further afield.

That is Paris for you. Everything that matters is compacted into the heart of it, like a treasure chest, so that all your eye beholds is beauty, and it feels at the end of your fingertips. As if you could stretch and stroke it. As I stood there, I felt that I could reach for the Louvre to the left, a bit further to Notre Dame Cathedral on its little island, the Musee D’Orsay straight over the Seine on the other side of the Tuilleries, the Arc de Triomphe to the right up the avenue and the Opera behind me over my left shoulder; a bit further afield on a tall hill, if I really stretched, the Taj Mahal-like Sacre-Coeur Basilica, watching over the city.

The city is neatly and precisely designed and formed; it is meticulous, mechanical, an equation that adds up to perfection. Unlike London, which is an ad hoc splattering of satellite gems. It is spare like Coco Chanel’s original creations.

All around me, the sound of French voices. What is it with the French language? The language of love? It is so beautiful when articulated. Even if the telephone book was being read, it would sound like Proust to my untrained ear.

Travel is tiring. I was early to bed. I had a score to settle in the morning. I needed to muster my strength. As a member of the Hurlingham Club, I am entitled to the reciprocal hospitality of a number of clubs around the world. They can come to the Hurlingham, and we can go to them. One of these clubs is the Cercle de L’Union Interalliee, on the smartest street in Paris, the rue du Faubourg saint-Honore, parallel to the Champs Elysees  and next to the Prime Minister’s residence.

Some years ago, I heard the same word all day from a number of quarters in Paris. “NON.” But none more than at the Cercle de l’Union! They obviously did not like my Aussie accent. I shall tell you about that tomorrow. It was a stuffy establishment. And very formal. The menu for the men had prices. The women’s did not!

Today, I will try to recover from miles of walking in Paris. And too many carbs. Who can resist the pastries and bread in Paris? I could not!