9.00 am: At Holy Trinity Church, I conducted a sound check of the organ and PA system in readiness for a funeral, which will be held here tomorrow afternoon:

9.30 am: This was my day for second- and third-year painting tutorials:

If you don’t think that you have a blind spot … you have a blind spot. A teapot made out of paint. You must enjoy the paint as much as you do the thing that you’re painting. The painting is the bi-product of your interrogation. Think of a painting as though it were a building site: messy to begin, requiring excavation, demolition, clearance, filling, building, and, finally, tidying. Don’t get prissy, therefore. John Bratby: painting like swearing — rough edged, gnarled, earthy, offensive, and confrontational. A photograph of the object you’re painting is but its ‘ghost’. ‘What am I not seeing?’ (BA painting tutorials, from ‘The Black Notebook’ (March 16, 2017) 234–5).

Elli’s swatches:

Myfi’s grey-dappled palette:

The analogy and reciprocity between the title and the image. ‘Is it wrong, or a different type of right?’ Teachers set traps. It’s how you work your way out them that proves your metal. The painting doesn’t always have to work, but you always have to learn. It’s easier climb a craggy rock-face than a smooth one. The more difficult approach is often the most enabling. ‘The problem is complex; it requires more of you than you’ve the capacity to give, presently; but by engaging with the challenge, you’ll grow in stature, assurance, and competence’ (BA painting tutorials, from ‘The Black Notebook’ (March 16, 2017) 235).

4.30 pm: A wind up of the week’s teaching and preparation for the next.

Throughout the morning I’d battled with an outrageous administrative demand from on high, that (with some muscle from other departments) was rescinded. These, relatively minor, irritants crop-up now and again. But they threaten to draw my mind from the task at hand — teaching. And that’s not fair on my tutees. I’ve always had a flare for mentally partitioning my affairs. That skill was rigorously exercised today.

7.30 pm: Socks paired, I dug in for an evening (and early morning) of tasks, all of which had been begun and needed completing over the next few days. My intercessions for this Sunday’s morning service was first on the roll, followed by further work on a PowerPoint for a workshop that Dr Forster and I will hold next week on the topic of our respective undergraduate studies.

The delights of Japanese confectionary and packaging. This will never be opened: