I now have all the paperwork assembled for claiming my pension. Now I need to assemble the documents so I can give money to one of my own children. It’s all very vexing. The pension company ws happy to take my money and hang on to it, why do they suddenly need to know who I am? As for the “money laundering” regulations, I’m sure they would all melt away if solicitors were not able to charge for doing then checks. They would suddenly remember that the law relating to gifts isn’t quite clear and may not apply.

To restore some calm to my life I have been cooking. I dismembered a parsnip of considerable size, chopped some carrots, softened an onion, added lentils, garlic, stock cube, water and boiled it up. It is now blended and waiting to be eaten for tea tonight with crusty rolls and mackerel pate (Julia is buying the rolls and I will make the pate later). I think it is quite tasty but it’s difficult to tell because I’m also cooking a curry for tomorrow and I tasted that before the soup. Schoolboy error.

I will try again later when the feeling has returned to my tongue. It’s very difficult getting the right degree of bite when adding chilli in the form of crushed chillis from a jar. It also features onion, sweet potato, chickpeas, tinned tomatoes, garlic and curry powder. And the leftover tomato soup from earlier in the week. In turn, we will add the remains of tonight’s soup to the leftover curry and use it as a base for something else, probably curried vegetable soup.

This the first time in a while that I have felt fit and organised enough to get stuck into some planning and batch cooking, so it’s a good sign.

A bad sign of trouble to come is that my WP screen is acting a little differently at the moment, and I cannot access the comments. They are still there, but in a flickering diaphanous form. Probably a sign of more changes to come.

Red Kites in Wales