First things first

The steering conrod on the ancient John Deere ride-on was pushed out of joint when in a senior moment I backed it and the trailer into some garden furniture. Of course chaos ensued, when do I do things by halves? A trusty hammer manipulated with skill and determination recovered the situation, but for how long, I ask myself?

I fixed a shear in the plastic pipe of our central vacuum cleaner system. Being an asthmatic, it pays to keep the place as dust-free as possible.

Rain got into the electrics and the earth-reference-circuit-breaker did an earth reference and broke the circuit. This was not a great help to the pumps used by my home-built hydroponics system which is supposed to be busy growing cucumbers, tomatoes and courgettes, plus a trial potato plant. When in doubt, panic, and all will be well. I did, it wasn't. Much drying and fussing later, and it was. The 15 cucumbers remaining on the first plant gave the system a vote of confidence.

All this, plus the current daily chore of runner-bean gathering diverted my attention from the task I had half-decided to begin, namely SETTING THE WORLD TO RIGHTS, deciding what else to do with the Czar plums now ripening, and making sure the lunch-time medicinal dose of Tio Pepe on the rocks was consumed in peace and harmony. Guess which third of those chores was managed!

I now propose to ponder the problems of the universe and what must be done about them, on the morrow.