Drive-by (with a blown tyre) post

It's been a while since I posted here, and really it's just for want of matter. My last few weeks have been a mixture of marking (mostly that, in fact), walks, al fresco meetings with friends, and other pleasant but perhaps not blog-worthy activities. My biggest adventure was probably yesterday, when a tyre blew as I arrived in Cardiff. But that's all fixed now, and I don't have any horror stories to attach to the mishap. AA membership takes the excitement out of life.

Meanwhile, I'm anticipating tomorrow with some trepidation. It will be my first visit to my home town for more than 18 months - for a friend's funeral. Apart from the service itself, which I'll be watching from outside, I'll be meeting a bunch of people whom I've not met since I was in my mid-20s. Will I recognise them, or they me? How will we get on when we repair to the pub afterwards (the main wake being reserved for family) to toast the departed?

I suppose this sort of occasion will become ever more familiar, as time goes on, much as the weddings of contemporaries were some 30 years ago. I wasn't comfortable being the central figure in the proceedings at that time; I'd be much less so in the latest round.