Thursday, 23-07-26

Good morning, everyone!  Welcome to my Thursday blog.  The weather seems to have settled into a pattern - dull cloudy start, then the sun breaks through and it's lovely and warm, cooler evenings and a lovely cool night, perfect for good sleep!  The only thing that would make it better is rain - but only through the night, please.  :-)

After going out to pick some tomatoes, I took a few photos:

These are sitting on my kitchen window ledge but they're not all today's picking.  Some of the tomatoes on the left are ones that fell off so I brought them in to ripen.

It's a mix of sungold, honeycomb, Rapunzel, sweet millions and a few gardener's delight.  The only tomato not yet showing some colour is the Shirley, and they usually ripen a bit later.  Even the Alicante is blushing a bit.

As for the Roma, I may be making some sort of pasta thingy with them by the weekend.

Visually, I am quite missing some yellow and a bit of the variegated ones but I decided to go sensible this year so it's my own choice.

Lunch with Chris was great.  We went to The Hare which used to be good, then went really downhill, was taken over (I believe) and reports were that it was picking up again so we though we would give it a try.  Yes, it is definitely better - service was friendly, prompt and helpful and the food we had was plentiful - and they did doggy bags so it did my dinner too.  I will definitely go back there.
The only thing - they no longer do the small plates which is a shame and we mentioned that to our server.  Hopefully, she will report back.

I watched the recording of the new Sewing Bee programme.  I do love Sewing Bee.  Is anyone else watching it - what do you think so far?

Now, the car . . .

The garage lad (he looked so, so young), Kasey, turned up promptly to pick up the car and take it for its service and MOT.  By mid afternoon, she was back again and the news was good.

First of all, the tyres are still legal and fine although he said to pop in later in the year and he will check them for me again, to make sure.  That was good!
The air con is now running smoothly and without pong.

The cracked fog light cover has been replaced.

The only thing he queried was the cambelt because they should be replaced every ten years or roughly 100,000 miles, which ever comes first.  I had to check the previous paperwork but that was done by the previous garage at the ten year check so all good there too.
And there's no reason why it shouldn't do me for at least another year.  Yay!!

And the bill was far less than I was dreading - no new tyres (yet) of course.  So, all in all, a huge relief.  That's the last unknown bill for this month; I know how much else I need to pay now.

That being so, I sat down, did the maths (what's in the bank, take off next month's income, already in, take off the last two payments, allow a bit for food, etc,) and then worked out how much I needed to transfer over to pay for the hearing aids next Wednesday.  That amount is now winging its was over from short term savings and all is well.
By the middle of September, I should have replaced that in my savings, barring any unexpected disasters ( 😄 ).

And last night, after all that, I slept like a log.  In bed soon after eight, asleep almost immediately and I didn't wake until after five.  I must have really needed that sleep.

Chris can't make our coffee and chat today and there is absolutely nothing whatsoever in the diary.  I'm going to stay at home and potter - bit of sorting, bit of decluttering, bit of gardening, that sort of stuff.  More productive than it sounds.

Well, I must love you and leave you, as dear Diane Epps used to say.  I still miss her.
Have a lovely day and stay safe and well.  xx