Chugging on as Spring approaches

It's still the middle of February, of course, but today has been the first on which the onset of Spring has seemed a real possibility. Although not spectacular, the weather is mild and calm whilst also being misty and murky.

I got up in time to make a batch of bread dough with added muesli before breakfast. After we'd eaten and done some pottering about, it was ready for knocking back and shaping into a loaf before we walked round the marina. We called into Still Waters for a couple of tins of tomatoes, the office for an electric card and a chat about planting raspberry canes with Bob, and the Farm Shop for some chicken Kievs for tonight.

Back at the boat, it was time to start the oven heating and then to bake the loaf. More pottering and reading filled in the time whilst it baked and cooled. It was still steaming a bit on being sliced when we had lunch – absolutely scrummy according to my chief critic.

I'd not bothered relighting the Squirrel in the morning, so was able to give the flue a sweep and the firebox a general clean out. This led to the discovery of a spare machine screw lurking amongst the ash and crud, a leftover from the refitting of the chimney collar, I guess. I have checked to ensure that there are none missing from the stove itself...

Once this necessary but messy job was complete, I carried on to check the batteries (minor top up required) and the overall state of the engine space. All seemed to be well. The Hurricane happened to fire up whilst I was doing this, so I could see that it was burning well with a good yellow/white flame.

Since then, we've been relaxing, though I did take the opportunity to forward the critical text messages about cancelling the Elite order to my email account, just in case we need to produce them later on.

Tomorrow is going to be wet, it seems, so we'll be lurking indoors apart from a trip to visit Peter and Katie on Uriah Heep in the afternoon.