Summing up

We’re finally beginning to relax. The events of the last week have taken their toll on us. We’re absolutely exhausted. We both seem to have become good at pumping adrenalin to get us through the emergency but then pay the price afterwards when we become a pair of limp lettuces.

Mentioning food, with renewed confidence about having power all day long, I’ve just put a joint of brisket in the slow cooker to plop along all day, ready for dinner tonight.

Brisket is one of those joints that seems to have been out of favour for years. Austerity seems to have brought it back to the supermarket shelves. To my mind it is both cheaper & has a superior flavour, to most beef joints. Admittedly it does benefit from slow cooking, a pot roast rather than a hot roast as you would do, say, a rib or sirloin joint.

One thing I’m being struck by is what a good job they did with the drainage when they redesigned the garden last year. Before that, the slightest downpour & a lake would appear. Now, despite all that Storm Desmond dropped on us, it is not flooded. Even now - & it is still raining – there’s only some small puddles along the path edges, but nothing resembling a flood. I’m confident those puddles will disappear the moment it stops raining.

The back door remains lined with rags for absorbing any water coming through the door itself. I do hope the new door arrives soon. It is a nuisance having to move the rags (our answer to sandbags) before opening the door, and replacing them when we come back in. However, the rags do now seem to be keeping the water under control. The holes the people from the double glazing installers drilled into the bottom door do seem to be easing the problem, if not totally curing it.