Another day, another task

I made the dreadful mistake this morning of snuggling down again for another five minutes after my morning tea, when I should have been leaping forth to face the day ... but it was so dark, and bed was so comfy ... Anyway, I did eventually surface, I put a loaf into the machine for lunch, I washed up after breakfast, I put on a washing. By the time it was finished - on the 20 minute cycle - the day was bright and blowy and I hung it all out and it more or less dried by sunset. We had coffee, then went out on a bunch of small errands that gave us a bit of a walk in the fulfilling of them - the optician for new eye drops; the chemist for prescriptions ( the wrong brand of pills again, with the talc filler in them); meeting an old friend by chance at the door of a bank. Then on along the Milton Burn Park to the excellent shop that most resembles a garden centre without the actual plants (Christmas trees just now) to buy a few small presents and an extra set of (battery-operated) lights to complement the ones I put on the tree yesterday, the ones I found disappointing. Another conversation with a neighbour on the way in, and then it was time for lunch (the new loaf) and a seat for a bit, worn out by our busyness.

As the sun went down behind the hills I marzipanned the cake and put it aside to dry out before I ice it (I know - I'm cutting it fine), then did the delicate thing of threading the new lights up the tree with all its decorations in place without knocking any of them off, by which time I was tired again and ready to sit down to my Italian practice, followed by my physio exercises and a quick-prep dinner of ramen and chicken with spinach. Another episode of The Handmaid's Tale and I was ready for bed, only I'm blipping instead and need a smack. (Discovered they're showing Wolf Hall again on Ch 4 ...)

Blipping a wonderful driftwood eagle in the window of an arty sort of shop; there's also a deer made of roots. My extra is the collection of old dinner knives (my grandmother's, I think), one of which I've sharpened so often it's lethal but now too thin to use safely. There's nothing like an old dinner knife for putting on icing and so on. They have interesting manufacturer's names on them too.