Z did her exercises

I've had a relaxed day, which was good. I read a lot and did my exercises. We had a leisurely breakfast with our guest, whose meeting (where he was doing a presentation) didn't start until 11, so he and the Sage, who had made an appointment in Lowestoft to fit in with giving a lift, left a little after 10 o'clock. I've hardly set foot out of the door today and have been lazy (although I did do my exercises). One of the good things about having someone to stay is that afterwards you don't have any housework for a bit as you've done it all.

We finished the fish pie for dinner, which didn't thrill Ro as he'd taken some of it for lunch today and he felt like a change. He said he'd prepare himself something, but I offered to make him an omelette. I suggested, rather randomly, shallot and cheese in it and then, as he was very hungry, offered croutons too. This somewhat combined two of my favourite omelettes; shallot and chilli, and cheese and croutons. I didn't have any fresh chillies.

The first is particularly fabulous if you've got a cold or feel cold - just chop and fry a shallot or small red onion in butter, then chuck in the green chilli, sliced into rings, then bung in the eggs beaten with salt and pepper. The chilli pieces can be hot enough to bring tears, if you're lucky, but because it's so quickly cooked the hotness doesn't permeate the eggs.

The latter is too fattening and I don't make it any more for myself, but my mum, sister and I used to cheer ourselves up with it sometimes after my father died. Fry some cubes of bread in mixed butter and oil, put on one side, dice some cheese to the same size as the croutons, wipe the pan and put in fresh butter, beat eggs with salt and pepper, tip into the butter when it's stopped sizzling but not started to burn (obv), when the omelette is half cooked add the cheese, then the croutons. Tip onto a plate while still runny in the middle but the cheese has heated enough to start to melt. Fold it over and the middle will continue to cook a bit so that it's not so runny and the cheese, eggs and croutons meld rather deliciously. God knows how many calories - you could do cubes of toast instead of croutons and do just a little cheese which would help but not be quite so gorgeous.

Anyway, I have knitted a bit more of my hat. I went for one with straight needles which is sewn up at the end. Embarrassingly, I discovered that my brain couldn't cope with going straight into ribbing - you know how the first row or two winds itself round the needle? - I got muddled and kept forgetting whether I'd knitted or purled 2 stitches, as I was supposed to, or 1 or 3, and I couldn't tell as it was too early and obviously if I got it wrong it wouldn't work at all. So I pulled it out and am just doing stocking stitch. Amazingly, I remembered how to purl. If it isn't quite right I'll pull the whole lot out again and make my scarf longer - I've taken the precaution of leaving it on the needle rather than casting off. It's a bit lowering to be so rubbish, I must say, but I daresay I'll get better at it. At the knitting, that is, I'm already proficient at being rubbish. But at least I did the exercises.