O/S Daily Tuesday 6 December 2016

Caterina

Hi Marie sorry about your cousin's loss, so good that she has you and her family around, will be a bit of comfort at least.

I had a nice day altogether, not very adventurous but satisfactory, and the steady mood held all day, no dips.

The meeting this morning went well, this woman and I thrashed out a few menus, then she told me that the church funds for the night shelter stretch to getting a couple of large slow cookers, what an excellent idea, so we don't have to spend all the time cooking, just a bit of prep in the morning and a bit of veg prep in the evening, then we will have more time to spend with our guests.

I had a gas engineer around who came and serviced the boiler. He discovered installation problems and had to cut off a part of the box that enclosed the pipes to access a valve. More proof that the horrid nasty barstewards who did our kitchen set us up for a lot of future trouble when they were "doing the work" which is in reverted commas because they didn't get much right. I am sure it was deliberate. We have had to have more electric and plumbing work and DH had do finish off a lot of what they did not finish, decoration-wise. We paid through the nose for that kitchen and still finding issues that weren't addressed, or badly installed appliances. Unbelievable, the dishonesty of some workmen.

Anyway, this guy wasn't cheap and he also tried to upsell and get us to upgrade to a full system flush but as the system is only 2 years old we stood our ground and said only service, nothing else. He seems to be good though, he was very thorough, gave us the readings and explained a lot of stuff. We will probably have to have the full flush next year but for now we have a serviced boiler, also reset to the correct settings.

The afternoon with the boys was lovely, the young one is 10 tomorrow, I cannot believe it I started with the family when he was a tiny 5 years old and now is a strapping sport-mad big boy! I gave him what he had asked me for gift (some footballer cards) and a birthday card and he gave me a hug - rare with him, he is not very touchy-feely at all. It was very sweet.

Back home, dinner was freezer roulette (veg stew) with brown rice and a bit of hm coleslaw in vinaigrette, since we have no mayo.

Very tired now, so I am off to an early bed.

Hugs and warm wishes to all who need them xx

Good night.