FREEZING FRIDAY

Last night our neighbour came around to collect some parcels left earlier in the day by a courier and greeted my with the question! “What times breakfast”! This meant that he would be working from home today and on such occasions it is usual for him to come to us for breakfast.

He is a fantastic neighbour and a friend of long standing and so there is not ceremony between our households. I told him that I would give him a knock when breakfast was ready and off he went.
I slept badly;last not and when finally I managed to drop off I was plagued by dreadful dreams as indeed I have been all week. Last night things got so bad that I was apparently screaming and my son was obliged to wake me for which I was profoundly grateful.

Up betimes I went straight to the kitchen to bake the days bread and as soon as it was ready for the oven our neighbour was called to join us and I made ready to griddle some piklets.
Before I did this I had a bash at making English muffins on the griddle. This can be tricky as they need to be on the griddle for quite a long time each side and if there is too much heat they burn.

I had a little dough left after the loaves were made so I shaped them in to Muffins,rolled them in course semolina and popped them on to a warm griddle. I need not have worried it was really easy and the muffins cooked beautifully and look right too.

These went straight to the table and were enjoyed by the boys and our guest while Made a pile off fruited piklets. We chatted away as we ate our meal, I much prefer breakfast guest to dinner parties. It is so informal, people can arrive when it suits them and I just keep on making the pancakes ,piklets or bacon rolls, what ever we happen to be having. On one memorable day breakfast lasted from ten in the morning to four in the afternoon and we entertained about twenty people .Of course am glad that this does not happen every day but now and then it is fun.

With breakfast over my son and I set out for a meeting of the conservation group committee of which we are both members. My sons input is invaluable as he deals with our IT problems and has set up a web site for us. Meeting often go on for ages and this one was no exception, you see we are all old friend and we had a lot of catching up to do.
We did however accomplish a great deal, finalising et dates of two of this years events and my brilliant son sorted out a major problem .

We are releasing butterflies through out the summer months and thought it would be a nice idea if new could interest people in coming to watch the release and take a look at the conservation work in hand at the moment. Butterflies however will not hatch to order so it was making the whole scheme difficult. Then my son said why not tell people about the event ,give and approximate date and say that if they will let forward their email address they will receive a personal invitation twenty four hours before e the event. Brilliant.

Winding up the meeting on a happy note we returned home to tackle the Friday chores.
Hoovering and steaming is a task which my son and I do between us as I am now unable to manage to whole thing alone. \\We both detest the job and were incline to say “... it”.
With out much enthusiasm we finished the job between us and I was very glad we did as I found a missing twenty pound note while the work was on progress.
Our local garden centre is selling bird boxes at £2,49 each and the twenty pounds will buy quite a few of those.

Last night was so cold that we all ended up with chilly feet which for us hardy northerners us very unusual, I suspect that tonight it will be bedrocks all round ans hot water bottles too.
The problem is that none of us can sleep with the radiators on and that means that by morning the rooms are cold. This does not cause trouble unless any of us has a disturbed night, last night we were all disturbed in one way or another.

My screaming woke my son and the amount of heavy vehicles shunting about in the lane until all hours kept Pa and I awake . Apparently it was a film crew setting up for a wee end shoot, what I do not know but if I could find out where the noisy devil live I should see to it that half a dozen ghetto blasters all with boom boxes were deployed in their street. Three O clock came and went and still the port-o-cabins and caravans kept rolling up . Because the gate is narrow they have to shunt about in order to get through the gates without causing damage each time making a ghastly noise.

When all the work was done we sat down to dinner with a sense of relief and a job well done and with a weekend in prospect. It has been a lovely week in spite of the few glitches and I shall if all goes well another of my sons novels to read next week.
My compost and manure are ordered and my plans for this years vegetables in train so that as soon as the weather is warm enough I shall be able to start work at once. In the mean tie I am hoping for snow, the forecast-is promising so fingers crossed.