Middle class problems

The piano tuner came today, and there's nothing more calculated to drive me from my desk than the noise of a piano being tuned in the room immediately below my study. I thought about going out for a walk, but I'm a bit below par at the moment, so instead I shut myself in the kitchen and made some dulce de membrillo.

The preparation, boiling of the quinces, slow draining in a jelly bag, grinding of the fruit through a food mill, and cooking up of the paste, has taken much of the day - though for quite long periods things were meandering along by themselves, leaving me free to do something else. It was nearly 9pm by the time the first period of baking was finished, and I've left the tin containing what I hope is now well-set paste sitting in the cold oven overnight; tomorrow I'll turn it out and decide if it needs another period of cooking. On one very disappointing occasion I hadn't boiled the paste for long enough, and it didn't set at all - but I was quite careful today, and I'm hoping for a better result this time.

Today was the day of SarumStroller's funeral. I had hoped to go, but in the end I didn't feel well enough for a long drive; I was thinking of him a lot during the day. If you haven't yet seen it, AH14 has posted a very nice account of the service, which sounds to have been a lovely memorial.