We do our weekly food shopping together, often conferring over what looks good and would be a pleasant addition to our meals. It's an enjoyable excursion. This week my husband decided he'd skip a trip to the bank for cash. He's habituated to paying for everything with cash, and very seldom uses any of his credit cards. He thought he had enough cash on him to pay for our shopping expedition. I never bother taking any money with me when we're out together.

Two unusual things happened. Every time we shop we bring with one of those disposable plastic bags, since we use large rigid plastic carry-alls to convey the food we buy from the supermarket to the car's trunk, to the house to be unpacked there. The bag is meant to hold the food staples we will deposit in the 'cage' out in the supermarket vestibule for the local Food Bank.

This turned out to be the only week when that cage didn't receive a bag full of tins of baked beans, tuna, soup, flaked chicken and boxes of macaroni and cheese that we usually pack into them for food bank collection. Our shopping was larger than usual. Among items we don't normally buy there was a 10 kg bag of dog kibble meant for the raccoons that visit us daily. And sale items I just couldn't resist stocking up on. We managed to pay for our groceries and hadn't enough to pay for the food bank-designated foodstuffs. We just told ourselves we had to live with the fact that we skipped a week, but it made us feel uneasy; habit does that.

The other thing I missed was that my husband, who often pops odd things into the food cart I don't notice, selected a bag of crumpets, thinking they were English muffins. Had I seen them I would have reminded him that he has mistakenly bought them before and detested them. They are, in my opinion, fairly disgusting. The raccoons and squirrels didn't think so.

But this left my husband without breakfast bread, so I decided to bake a challah, an egg-braid bread. It's simple enough to put together, and I used a milk base, two eggs, and honey in making the dough. It's needful of time, for the dough to rise which takes about an hour, then for it to rise a second time once it's prepared in the baking tin, and another 40 minutes or so to bake. He always protests that it's too much work, and that really makes my eyes roll. My reward is the enjoyment he takes, eating it.

While it was rising yesterday, we went out to the ravine once the morning rain had come to a halt. In some areas of the ravine great swoops of forest floor have been revealed, while in others where the forest is denser and the rays of the sun fail to penetrate, the snow and ice has receded, but not to the extent we'd appreciate. Still, the atmosphere was balmy enough, the wind kinder than usual, and the sun did manage to peek out of the cloud cover briefly from time to time.

We've accustomed ourselves to weaving from side to side on descents and ascents to avoid the rushing rivulets of meltwater and the densely-packed areas of loosening ice. Maintaining balance while slithering downhill has become an automatic feature of our ravine forays these past few weeks. We haven't yet seen any indication that trees or shrubs are beginning to awaken, but the appearance of tiny green/red buds will explode suddenly, as always happens.

As for a walk today, it certainly appears iffy. The rain which began again yesterday afternoon shortly after our return home from our hike in the ravine hasn't stopped since. Rain has been falling, quite heavily at times, washing away what is left of snow and ice in the backyard and the front gardens. And we hope it's doing a credible job in the ravine as well. But opportunity for a ramble through the forest trails some time today looks fairly unlikely.