It's going to be a long night. My neighbours (the one with too many animals and not enough brains) has decided tonight is the ideal time to burn out a stump. The 'stump' is five foot high, about four feet around, has its head embedded in a live banksia, sits a foot from the fence (paling fence) and seven metres from the side of my house. It is old, dry pine. There is another, taller stump (around 15 feet high) a couple of feet away from the one they are burning. In the other direction they have a stand of mature pines that will burn nicely if they get going.

The wind, which is gusting strongly, is toward my house and the fence. So far so good. I have moved the ute, but the gas bottle may be at risk. The dogs are currently wearing their leashes and the cats will get thrown outside if there is insufficient time to box them, should things go awry.

I have also texted someone to see if they have the number for the local brigade (it's not listed on the Tas Fire website). It will become a 000 matter if I get to see flames above the fence.

When we discussed his plans for the stumps he assured me he would a) let me know in advance of his intention to light, b) remove panels of the fence to reduce risk and c) cut the stump down to ground level so all he was doing would be to burn out the roots. Guess he knows what he should be doing, just chooses not to.

I am assured it will probably go out if it starts snowing - not really all the comforting.

Meanwhile, I have been cooking madly today and now have some pork hung shao, and a beef and barley stew with lots of root veges in it. The pork is melt-in-your-mouth tender and served with Hokkien noodles is delicious (I had it for lunch). The beef is still stewing away, but I will need to turn it off soon as it will run out juices soon, the barley having consumed most of it.

We had a flurry of snow about half an hour ago, but it has stopped once more, and though they forecast falls tonight I will not be holding my breath (though, clearly will witness them if they happen since going to bed while that fire is alight is not an option).

ETA: The fire is out now. The captain of the local fire brigade came and explained the error of his ways.

Last temperate day for a few days now. Tomorrow we will be aiming for six degrees, which should not be hard to achieve as it will be four overnight. Unlike tomorrow night which will be minus three.

I laid in a supply of firewood (and foodstuffs) in anticipation of the snow to 300 metres which may or may not eventuate during the next two days, and there is a large saucepan of cabbage and bean soup simmering on the top of the woodstove, and shoulder of pork thawing in the kitchen and a recipe book beside me for the Hung Shao pork that it will be converted into. It will be a variation on the recipe as it is supposed to be pork belly, but I have better things to do with pork belly I am afraid.

The dogs are sprawled in front of the fire (funny how they soon realise there is nothing worth getting excited about once the fire is lit), and the cats are hunkered down also.

Yesterday in the Garden we did heaps of work - cleared the dead leaves and stems from the rhubarb patch and mulched it with more chicken litter; dug some mushroom compost and sheep manure into the beds in the polytunnel (which reminds me, I should tell the gardeners they can start planting). I planted two rows each of carrots and a sort of pointy-topped cabbage in the polytunnel - seeds, as I suppose the warmer environment will allow them to emerge despite the chillier weather.

Fortunately my book rummaging of some weeks ago has found me some good books to keep myself amused with during the enforced indoor existence (not to mention the counted cross stitch), and I am well set to endure it all.

For a day that was supposed to be rainy there has not been much wet stuff about. Though as I type a further shower has started to land on the roof.

I decided to have another go at Boston Baked Beans - this time using my newly acquired molasses, as this is one of the recipes that actually calls for it. It is simmering away in the slow-cooker at present, and will hopefully be done in time for dinner. Also on the bean theme I am soaking some more beans in anticipation of making some bean and cabbage soup, to use up the last of the brassicas from the Community Garden. I will not be fit for polite company for some time, methinks, lol.

I finally picked up some chain bar lube and cut a small barrow of wood, since it really hasn't been necessary to light the fire during the day (well, not till around two-ish) lately. Since tomorrow will be busy, and Saturday will be showers and the four days after that in single figures, I may have been a little optimistic, but will cope.

Had planned to get some more sewing done today but Sebastian was being a little needy so eventually I gave up and took him for a longer than usual walk. Luckily the rain held off while we were doing that as it was too warm to wear the rain jacket.

A nice relaxing day at sewing today. The machine would not work for me, so I took it home and collected the counted cross stitch, on which I made some progress. The problem with a 16 gauge aida cloth, of course, is that you can put a lot of stitches in without getting much coverage, so I am still well short of the 2 square centimetres I have gridded so far.

The weather is somewhat warmer but a little overcast - so much so I had to put the lights on in the ute when I popped home for the sewing. But apart from a little mizzle there was no real rain.

The new bottle shop has opened in the Main Street, so I went to inspect their wares (leaving them all on the shelf) and was pleased to see they carry a rather broader variety of wines than did either of the local bottle shops associated with the pubs. The situation has, until recently been that one could (if one could hunt out a staff member) get a bit of grog from one of the pubs, if they were open, and if it suited their convenience, and from the other pub you could walk into the bar, through the passage past the men's toilet and wander around in a concrete bunker trying to find something potable, so the new shop is a welcome addition for those of us who still have a palate. It is a little vast and echoing, but will presumably fill up as the business grows, which in the this town, should not take too long. I am in two minds about the social impacts from such a development, but from a personal perspective am quite thrilled (though they don't stock Glenfiddich!!)

Some of my vision problems were sorted out today when I dropped into spec savers and had them check whether my frame had been knocked out of shape during my recent altercation - seems it had, and i now can see rather more clearly. Damn graduated lenses!!

Shadow obviously found a lease of life today and was found sound asleep on my bed when I got home from town - he hasn't managed to get up there for a couple of years now, so something must have been exciting enough to warrant getting high enough to see out the front window. No idea what.

I found that haricot beans are not standard stock in any of the major supermarkets i visited, so went to a health food store instead. There I also found some molasses - something I have sought on numerous occasions for recipes, but not found. So I now have a jar in the pantry since it doesn't go off at all.

The cord on the vacuum cleaner at the Bank has become very very twisted, despite my best efforts to keep it straight (it was twisted when I first started), so I took it down with me and dropped it in to them to sort out for me while i was shopping.

My last stop was for the pet food, and i found that Animal Tuckerbox stocks chook food with an 18% protein content, which is ideal for fattening chooks. So a bag of that came home with me to finish off the roosters. They also scored another bag of kitchen scraps from my friend who dropped them in this morning before I left home.

Tonight's dinner is a sachet of Mure's prawn bisque which was on sale at the Roxy - not sure if I can follow the instructions accurately (finely chopped onion, sauteed with white wine till the wine burns off) as the only white wine i have in the fridge was opened some considerable time ago. I will give it a sniff before I pour it in.

Another frost, but rather lighter than yesterday's.  Having cut some wood and lit the fire I settled down to do some counted cross stitch. I was just drawing another length of thread when I realised I was using the wrong colour (doh), so instead spent my time carefully cutting away the offending threads, hoping in the mean time that my stash of several hundred threads contains on in the right shade of tan. Since it only requires one short (50cm) allocation in that colour I suspect it is for detailing backstitches and so a close match should do the trick nicely. Meanwhile all that concentrated work made my left shoulder sore and my eyes a bit dry, so no more of that today, thank you very much.

In half an hour I sally forth to clean the bank and will then return to sit and read, since sewing is clearly not going to be a option, sigh.

Bit of  a chilly one last night - minus degrees from three am, and minus 2.7 at 8:30 this morning - brrr. A good layer of frost to make our morning walk crunchy and the ice on the chooks' water supply was so thick I had to knock it out with the top of a star picket!

Three loads of washing went on the line, but it is all now festooning the loungeroom as it never quite got warm enough to dry it. I have given up and there are now flannelette sheets on the bed. The flannel shirts are hung in a row and I am rotating the back ones to the front so they pocket flaps can dry out before putting them in the bedroom, and the bath mat will presumably be soggy underfoot tomorrow as it is still very damp indeed.

Spurred on by the temperatures I cut a load of wood to supplement what remains and am presently very snug indeed as the various barriers of damp clothing are blocking any drafts that might remind me how cold it is outdoors! I will need to cut a bigger load tomorrow but since i have run out of chain bar lube (except what is currently in the machine) it will presumably be smaller stuff, using the drop saw.