Saturday 24th April 1943

I've often asked to be given a job here where I could use my brain a bit, so that it would work again normally. Now I've been given a job in the reception office, at the reception and discharge desk. It is a very untidy desk, which I long to put in order, but unfortunately I'm only the assistant so must let the confusion remain. A very busy day... I redirected nearly a dozen letters! And took a bundle of papers to one of the wards which had received a new patient! Absolutely rushed off my feet!

I am reading a book, and it's a subtle, humorous, and “human” story, not just a “thriller.” It is “Nightingale Wood” by Stella Gibbons. This is the second SG book I've read, and it's as attractive as the first, which was “Cold Comfort Farm.” Both these stories seem quaint and merry and somehow “different”. Both show good knowledge of human nature, and sketch human character very neatly, in an exaggerated, caricaturist sort of way.