The best laid plans

I had a list for today, I am wondering if that was the problem. If writing a to do list guarantees that the day will turn into a shambles and so far it has been, a shambles that is.

Lets go back in slightly in time, The Christmas break and whole whole of January were pretty much of a washout the aftereffects of flu sapped me, not only of energy but of interest. Everything seemed like a chore, so essential jobs were about all that got done. I told myself that my year would start on the first of Feb., and indeed I was beginning to feel much better. The weather however has been awful, meaning that every time I started a job in the garden it got  rained off. I had two or three crochet projects that I seemed to have lost interest in. Do you ever look at something and wonder why you ever thought that it was a good idea? We have started moving furniture so that we can get on with the next house project, only to find the the electrician is on a big job elsewhere and can´t be here for another month, better for Steve as two of his winter teaching students will have almost finished for the summer pilgrim season, giving him more time. Leaving me feeling as though I am swishing around aimlessly. Hence the list.

The reason for this mornings panic/ shambles is that I had lost the instructions for my thermometer. yesterday in my new spirit of organisation and enthusiasm I started to make some marmalade( Being strictly honest it is orange jelly not marmalade). the oranges had been boiled and left in the jelly bag over night.

 I was already to go with the first job on my list which was "finish marmalade" when I realized that my thermometer was on the timer setting and I couldn't remember how to change it.
For those of you feeling puzzled with the words "how complicated can thermometer be" at the for front of your mind I had better explain.

 A year or two ago I was in Lakeland ltd the British kitchenware shop. A shop that draws me like a magnet, I am not as a rule a natural shopper but Lakeland sells things, things that home cooks dream about, things that you didn't know that you wanted till they are there, looking beguiling, in front of you. Things you never before (or sadly after) knew that you needed.  Instead of the jam thermometer that I went in for I saw the thermometer to beat all others: Not only could it tell the temperature of everything. Meat, cakes, sugar, jam but it tells the time and has a timer and who knows what else. Of course I bought it, and of course I should n`t have. not because it doesn't work but because the thing is so complicated you need an engineering degree to operate it.

Anyway after two hours of banging around and failing to find the instructions and repeatedly pressing buttons I was running behind trying to do more than one job at once and thoroughly disgruntled. I did make the marmalade though I fear it may not set well. Still a tray of jars of sparkling orange jelly marmalade on a tray ready for the pantry did make me feel better.

The strange thing is that despite everything I have completed all but two Items on my list of jobs, and since Steve is at work till nine I have some chance at least  of completing everything.  So I think I will have a list tomorrow after all, maybe this new regime will work wonders.