Explosions and jam

Such excitement last night, when I turned the kitchen light on at about eleven o'clock. The light, one of those long-lasting, compact fluorescent ones, flickered on and off before fizzing and smoking. That's never a good sign, is it? Happily, it all ended well, in that the problem was with the bulb rather than the wiring. The only problem was the acrid smell that hung about all night, even after the smoke dissipated, but with all the doors and windows open today, that's long gone now too.

Yesterday, too, for the first time ever, I managed to beat the blackbirds to the ripe fruit on the cherry plum tree, and I'm feeling ridiculously pleased about that. They're all but inedible on their own (the cherry plums, not the blackbirds), but they make good jam; three jars of it, to be swapped with John for actually edible plums off his tree.