Vegetable Soup of Indeterminate Ingredients

For the last six years I have had Wednesdays off work, because, with us working weekends, Wednesday was the only day we could have off together. Gradually we have done less, and the NHS has demanded more of my time, so it was often a day for medical stuff.

Today, though the first official day of my retirement, featured no work, a blood test and a trip to the jewellers to drink tea and get a watch battery and a new strap. Thus, it was impossible to tell the difference between work and retirement. Tomorrow, I will be in hospital for 8.30 to have a pre-operative assessment. I got quite excited when I got the booking but it seems that they now last six months (they used to do them the week before the operation at one time).

Mushroom Soup with healthy pumpkins seed garnish

That means that I will have to wait until Friday to notice the difference between working and being retired. Even then, as Fridays had been reduced to half a day, it won’t make much difference. It will be Saturday before I really notice and, to be honest, as Julia will be in Toronto, I’m not really going to have much of a day.

I thought that the hardest part of being retired would be striking a balance between the workload (I know a number of people who work harder in retirement than they did when they were at work)  and the inclination to stay in bed all day. In fact, the hardest part so far has been noticing that I’m actually retired. If Julia were here she would doubtless make some barbed comment about me being semi-retired since the 1990s.

She’s only been gone a day and I’m already missing her.

Carrot & Ginger Soup

Today’s illustrations are soup. After two days of cake and Chinese takeaway my digestion is pleading for plain food and my brain is telling me to eat more vegetables. Tomorrow, I think, will be a soup making day. I’m thinking mushroom and sweetcorn. It’s a strange combination but I have surplus mushrooms and half a can of sweetcorn in the fridge. Though I also have tinned tomatoes and a bag of lentils, so that’s a possibility too.