Sunday 28 August 2016

Sunday - and a special award to . . .

 . . . Specsavers.  Good old Specsavers!

After my glasses broke on Thursday I went into town yesterday, partly to get some things from the market and partly to go to Specsavers to make an appointment to have my eyes tested (long overdue) and to see if my poor glasses could be repaired.

The bad news was that they can't be repaired.  Such a shame because there's nothing wrong with them (apart from the broken bit, of course).  At the moment they are sellotaped up but they don't feel right at all.

The good news is they were able to fit me in for an eye test right away as I got there early.  It turns out that my vision has hardly changed since the last test which is really encouraging after a lifetime of gradually getting worse and worse and everything came out super healthy - great muscle reaction, eye pressure well within the normal range, excellent peripheral vision (well, I have been a teacher most of my life) and so on.  My goodness, the tests are a whole lot more high tech than they were three years ago though.

The test before last, they found something at the back of one of my eyes and sent me post-haste to have it checked out at the eye clinic.  It turned out to be a little mole, nothing dangerous at all.  Today I was told it hasn't changed one little bit so that was also good news.

They do a two for one, of course.  However, given as I don't really need new glasses from the vision point of view, my prescription sunglasses will still be fine so I got two 'normal' pairs, one pair for everyday and one pair for swimming as the chlorine does have an effect on the lenses over time.

And what is also great is that they came out cheaper than three years ago!  OK, so maybe a few 'retired' not-payment things may have clicked in but even so, can't be bad, can it?

So, you see, Specsavers is in my good books right now!

While at the market, I looked at the fruit and veg stall and came back with a bag full of stuff.  Oranges, nectarines, Victoria plums and mushrooms.  I shall make some soup with some of the mushrooms which will be great for lunch today for me, Beth and Alex and  I think I will prep and freeze some of the plums.

On the kitchen front, I made some more vegetable stock paste which is now snugging in the fridge in three jam jars.  It's so good, makes lovely stock for soups and casseroles, etc, and, being home made, is incredibly frugal (and additive free)!

I picked more tomatoes.  Sadly, at least one of the montello plants has blossom end rot which is a right pain.  The fruit isn't totally wasted, you just have to cut off the bottom and discard it so OK for cooking but even so.  Thing is, as they're in pots I can't see how I could have over-watered.  Underwatering is more possible, although I have been careful.  I gather it is basically lack of calcium  which can be caused by either so I've given each pot a handful of slow release pellets and for the next little while I will crunch up egg shells into a powder and pop them on too.  The good thing is that it can be treated and the advice seems to be small waterings three times a day rather than once a day and then it wilts before the next watering.  Anyway, fingers crossed that it works for the currently developing fruit.

For the rest of the day I crafted and generally enjoyed myself in quiet, homey ways.  I did something that made me feel rather silly but I will share that tomorrow as I've waffled on for long enough!

Today I shall make that soup for lunch first of all and then potter.  After all, it is bank holiday weekend.  We will not mention that life is one long holiday now, OK?

Today's food:
B:  natural yogurt, fresh fruit and granola, apple
L:  mushroom soup, lasagne, Karen's frozen pink fluff
D:  gala pie with salad, melon





2 comments:

  1. I worked out with my tom plants that it was over-watering that seemed to do more damage / blossom end rot. The toms are in a greenhouse and would you believe the only other problem has been birds deciding to come in and being unable to get out. Jx

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  2. Really? Poor birds! Do they do a lot of damage panicking around?
    I'm glad you sorted out your tomato problem.
    J x

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