"Oh Mama!" I expostulated, "surely you cannot mean that I must live with Great Aunt Piddleton in her hovel in Weirdstone!" "I'm afraid you must dear. Your dear Papa lost his all when the business collapsed." "You mean he lost everything Mama!" "No - he lost his awl. And when you are a cobbler you cannot survive without an awl." "But how did the business collapse!" "The roof was too heavy and the walls weren't strong enough. I told him corrugated cardboard wasn't the same as corrugated iron but he wouldn't believe me." "But the people in Weirdstone. They are so...." I hesitated unable to bring to mind the word I sought. "Peculiar?" "No Mama. Not peculiar. Like peculiar but not peculiar." "Strange?" "No." "Odd?" "No" "Bizarre?" "No Mama," poor Mama was running out of synonymic epithets,...