Frozen

That brave explorer Ranulph Fiennes has had to abandon his attempt to cross the Antarctic in winter because he got frostbite in his fingers. Now, I'm just a wee home body and I think the only thing that should be crossing the Antarctic in winter is a penguin, and then only if it really feels it must, but I admire Fiennes's courage. And I sympathise.

We had a music practice in church this evening. Church is a big grey Victorian building. Heating it costs half the national debt, so it doesn't get warmed up for music practices. I'm not sure if the heating 's working just now anyway, because one of the pipes started leaking - lots - and we've been having services in the lovely warm hall instead. Leaking pipes make the church damp, so it feels even colder. It was five degrees outside and I reckon about minus twenty within. We should have rehearsed in the car park.

I'm one of the lucky ones, I just have to sing a bit and whack a tambourine. The clever people who played things with strings were having a Ranulph Fiennes moment. Georgie turned white, then blue. Victoria's flute froze to the wall and had to be chipped off with an ice axe, and the guy with the violin lost all feeling in his fingers and couldn't tell if he was playing or not. We may have to amputate. No, I told them, I haven't brought castanets, that's my teeth.

It just proves what I've always known. The place to be on a winter evening is by the fire, with a good book.