Dirty weather

As I said yesterday, I copped out of the tree planting this morning; I felt a bit guilty about it, but trying to do sapling planting in the grotty conditions we had (bitterly cold wind with snow flurries) without a decent hot meal inside me would have been a seriously bad idea. Hopefully my gut will be better soon and I'll be able to take part again.

Sheila went off at half ten for her trip round the marina with the Wetland Bird Survey people. That was done at a better pace than usual, not surprisingly, and there weren't as many birds about. Partly this will be because they too would be undercover and partly because we're getting to the stage when it's harder to spot the breeding pairs as they snuggle down in their nests.

Nonetheless, the usual suspects were seen and both the Great Crested Grebe and the Oyster Catchers who have turned up since last month were formally recorded.

In the meantime, I turned to and cleaned the inside of the boat, sweeping and dusting and giving the bathroom fittings a good seeing to, even cleaning out the base of the rubbish bin, which tends to get clagged up with muck on the base below where we hang a carrier bag to take the contents.

After lunch, we had another brisk walk round the marina. The snow largely held off but the wind persisted. I think it was the first time we've walked right round without stopping to chat.  We nipped into Midland Chandlers to see if they had another pack of Ecofire briquettes but they were sold out. More are due in tomorrow. I've found that they burn a bit hot and fast for regular use but are excellent for quick heat if the fire has burnt down and it's chilly in the boat.

Once we were back in the warm we settled down and watched another episode of Inspector Alleyn this afternoon before getting on with the routine stuff; writing this blog, doing the washing up and so on. Roast pork tonight, I think. I've got a joint from Ocado – it's good stuff, Packington pork, but a rather odd shape.