Was it happenstance? Or was it synchronicity? Whichever the case, we decided to Polish everything off. Let me explain.

The other day, the Pony Express guy delivered a box full of different kinds of kielbasa - Rzeszowska, Mysliwska, Krakowska, Tuchowska, and so on, from a friend in Poland. The Northern Lites Courier had brought us some Sonnenblumenbrot, Pumpernickel and Knäckebrot breads from a German pen-friend of the Missus, and the Runabout Courier had trudged up the garden path with a humungous box of French cheese from Them; Brie (of course); Camembert; Chabichou du Poitou; Chaource; Chèvre; Crottin de Chavignol; Epoisses; Gruyère de Comté; Roquefort; and Saint Nectaire.

The students of the Missus from The Natural International Traditional Practical Contemporary Gourmand Cookery School were still here, so... we had an impromptu party. How was I to know that it would be my Farewell Party too, as it turned out, as well as the spur-of-the-moment anticipated birthday party of Sunil, who is Hindu and wasn’t going to celebrate the 25th as Christmas anyway?

So it’s a good thing we each made a phone call to someone with a “come as you are” invitation. There was a lot, and I mean a lot, of food – and soon we had something approaching a street party going. I was surprised to feel a humungous lump in my throat – but I had to admit I had come to love these kids as individuals, surrogate kids, even.

I know that in Maltese you call radishes “rafanell”. In Mexican, they are called Rabanos, and December 23 is the day of the Radish Festival; amongst the highlights one finds grotto scenes and dancer figurines carved out... from radishes. Their radishes are not puny round bulbs. These are 20-pounders that lend themselves perfectly to this practice. These people can sculpt a human figure from one vegetable, with the skin shaved paper-thin and then perforated with fine tools to resemble lace, for clothes.

Jonathan, our “pocket genius”, is an avid collector of trivia. He is the only one who never bothered to take notes during he lectures and hands-on demonstrations because he has a photographic memory.

Sure enough; no sooner had he bitten into the plumpest radish in the dish that he began reciting a list of people who were born on Christmas day... Pope Pius VI; Humphrey Bogart; Muhammad Anwar Al Sadat; Sissy Spacek; and Dido Florian Cloud de Bounevialle Armstrong [Dido]; Isaac Newton; Clara Barton...
Just when he was about to start on the list of people who had died on Christmas Day, I stopped him – this was supposed to be a happy occasion.

I realised it was not going to remain so when I saw one of Them at the door. He held out the package he had in his hand, and I knew instinctively what it was. The title might as well have been The End – but it was Unseen Academicals¸ the latest Terry Pratchett's Discworld series novel. Mustrum Ridcully (he of the hat) finally gets around to setting up the Unseen University football team, with the Librarian as goalie.

The said Librarian is an ape - an orangutan who may or may not have been Dr. Horace Worblehat before the “accident” happened. Just as his large hand and wide reach make him an excellent piano player, and his lower limbs enable him to reach the higher shelves of the library without using a ladder and both were instrumental in getting him a part0time job as one of the ‘Specials’ (the Ankh-Morpork City Militia), so his career on the pitch is bound to be a success.

But I digress. Just inside the front cover was an envelope which contained a cheque for a hefty amount of (Canadian) Dollars, and a note to the effect that Nicholas Wenceslas Stephen Claus was now pronounced free of H1N1, and could be reinstated in his position pronto.

I was flabbergasted, stunned, dismayed, aghast, appalled, and upset. I had known it was a temporary position, but still – I had enjoyed meeting my public. The role had grown on me.

And now, as usual, all the credit will go to the fat man in the suit.