I’ve been busy this week trying to catch up with all the things around the house and garden which are neglected during the school holidays. So I’ve been hard at it cutting back a lot of growth in the garden which is mainly the result of the amount of rain which we’ve had recently. This time last year I ended up with a frozen shoulder because I overdid it in the garden and by Christmastime I could hardly move my arm at all, so I’ve stuck to using the pruners and steered well clear of the saws.

I didn’t even get around to reading The Guardian so this morning I did some catching up. We always buy The Guardian but you can get most of it on-line I think. Unfortunately they don’t put the cryptic crossword on the site and we both love doing the crossword, it’s a bit of an addiction really.

There was an interesting article about biofuel. They are experimenting with by-products of the whisky making industry at Edinburgh Napier University. Apparently it can be used in cars without having to adapt their engines. Sounds good. I’m wondering what it smells like. It would be fine if it smells like the finished product, but some of the smells created by distilling whisky aren’t so good.

I was brought up in a distillery town where they made Ballantines, J&B and many more, but the smell could be pretty nasty at times.

I’ve heard that if you adapt your car to run on old cooking oil from fish and chip shops then the exhaust fumes have that distinctive chippy aroma. Very confusing if you’re in need of a fish supper and you don’t know where your nearest chippy is. You used to be able to rely on your nose to sniff one out!