Mushroom picking is a national obsession in France at this time of year, each person’s favoured location for finding the much loved fungus a closely guarded secret. So imagine my surprise when, on a wander round the garden this morning, I found dozens of delicious looking mushrooms dotting the grass. They look like ordinary field mushrooms to me, but I’ll take a couple of them to the pharmacy tomorrow, just to make sure they are edible. I can’t eat them, but would hate to poison Nick and Kieran by serving up garlic poison toadstools!

Kieran arrived home from his stay in Harrogate this evening, delighted to be back in the warm and the dry, after a very cold, wet motorbike ride through England and northern France. The garage roof has passed his inspection and he’s keen to get moving on the removal of the grange floor, which Nick has put days of work into over the last week, enthusiastically assisted by Hermione. She doesn’t like the noise of the concrete breaker, and gets out of the way as fast as her clipped wings will allow her when that’s in use, but stands as close as possible to Nick all the time he’s digging with a spade; he reckons she’s depth testing the hole he’s dug so far.