Pea and ham soup brewing

The big news of the day is that I ventured out for a (very short) run. This is the first time that I have hit the cycle path in my trainers since the disaster of 13th March last year. After that date, I switched to cycling to allow my limbs to heal so that I would be able to complete the long bike rides on our summer holiday in the Outer Hebrides. I had planned to return to running in the late summer, but was prevented from doing so by the Baker's cyst injury that I acquired in the Uists. Then, just as it seemed that I was almost running-fit again in early November, I turned my knee when hill walking near Comrie. Anyway, I managed today's route and hope that this will be the beginning of a build-up of distance and speed to be able to join Paddy and Caitlin at Saturday morning parkruns in the future.

Also today I brewed pea and ham soup (blipped) and - with about 45 minutes' notice - baked a batch of scones after my middle sister rang to say that she and my brother-in-law had popped up to Edinburgh from Holy Island for the day and would like to call in on us. My sister was more interested in my marble tortoise than the scones, but I was delighted that she knew exactly my reason for buying it - because it is rather like one that belonged to our paternal grandparents.

I was back in the kitchen again later on to prepare supper for the arrival of Paddy and Caitlin and a (late) Burns supper together. This gave me an opportunity to use for the first time the £3 charity shop bowl that I bought on the same day as the tortoise (21st December 2021). It was perfect for our pudding of cranachan (extra). Between the main course and pudding, we played a game of Catan. The world champion won because Caitlin wasn't fast enough to 10 points, I failed to breed any sheep, and Mr hazelh became trapped in a corner of the board, unable to expand.

In between all this I worked on a journal article. I'd really like to get this one off my desk before the official start of our new project to podcast Lorna Lloyd's war diary, but it's unlikely that I will manage this. (By the way, I forgot to say yesterday that I composed and posted some news about the project to my blog: we have recruited another actor for the production.)

Exercise today: 20 minute run.