Friday 26th January 2024

Got up feeling very weary at about 0900. Made tea, then porridged at the computer. Warmed up parsnip soup to take for my lunch, then headed out on inspections in Haringey, before turning southward toward Bow. Broke for lunch in the Tesco car park at Three Mills Island, then headed for the Isle of Dogs, and Poplar, before ending the working day in Leyton. Only managed to get into five units, so still 12 to go! 

Drove home in the gloaming. Caught up with last night's episode of "The Traitors" before we put the instruments in the car and drove up to Helen and Martin's on Fairbridge Road. They had some 10 or 11 guests for their slightly belated Burns Night celebration, including a couple of Japanese lodgers, and a lass from Slovakia. We congregated in the front room, then gravitated to the kitchen/dining-room for cock-a-leekee soup. The haggis had been delivered from a butcher in Hawick...it was excellent. A dairy-free cranachan for dessert. All courses interspersed with whisky and poems, including two of dad's Scottish themed poems, The Laird of Killicrankie, and the Ballad of the Missing Teeth. They went down very well.  We finished the evening with the two Burns songs I'd been rehearsing for a month...Aki joined me on the mandolin. Got home about 2315 and jumped in a hot bath before retiring to bed...