It just gets worse and worse on the political front. A plane falls out of the sky over the Ukraine and the Russians are accused of shooting it down (or providing the weapon to do so). Not much attention being given to the eye witness accounts that refer to two planes falling out of the sky at the same time. Or the fact that there is no trail of smoke as the plane goes down, only when it hits the ground. Bit soon to start rattling the sabres IMO, but there you go, the US has been itching for a fight with Russia for some time now, what with the situation in Palestine and so forth. One can but pray that our lads will not be sent over to die in yet another war over who gets to be top dog that has nothing to do with us. (I imagine there is oil involved somewhere). I begin to sound like a conspiracy theorist, I realise.

I had a visitor to brighten my day today - my good friend Barbara came up laden with more food than two people could possibly consume and as a consequence the fridge now contains half a roast chicken. Think I will remove the meat from the bones freeze the lot and make a chicken noodle soup out of it using some of the chicken stock I made up before, as well as any I extract from this carcase.

The beef stock I cooked up last night is presently cooling, having been recooked today. The bones have gone in the fire this time, to avoid further garbage tin raids by the dogs. Lord knows what it will do to the flue, but I suppose it will be all right.

We had a couple of rounds of fairly heavy rain last night (so much so that the dog refused his last run for the night due to inclement conditions). Apparently it continued during the night as the loungeroom floor was saturated (and it was not all Seb's contribution). The tank is now three quarters full, which makes a nice change.

I was asked to go and do the cottages again today but decline as I had quite enough to do to rediscover the top of the kitchen table in anticipation of my guest. It will be waiting for my attention tomorrow so I will deal with it then, and fit in a garbage run at the same time.