The lawyer called yesterday to say that the probate certificate has already been granted — a land-speed record even for Perth County. Next comes a consultation with Jeff the Baltic accountant (he has an extensive Lithuanian surname) to figure out how to move Edmund’s Registered Retirement Savings Plan funds into my possession without incurring a shedload of tax liability. The adventure continues, hurrah.

It’s been raining off and on for days and my wonky foot is hurting again, in a new place this time, so I have been out the door only as far as the mailbox, and a daily turn around the property to see how the garden grows. The tarragon seems not to have survived the winter, but mint, oregano, parsley and sage are sprouting eagerly. The hellebores I planted last year look great, but I need more foxgloves. The lavender is doing so well that I shall plant more, a task that will require me to extirpate a leggy dwarf lilac that I never liked much.

Neil-across-the-street allowed as how he could use my rotating composter. I hope I have convinced him to accept it for free, but there’s a good chance that he hasn’t quite given up the compulsion to pay me for it.

It’s time to resume the triage and destruction of office papers. By the end of the summer, I would like to reduce the files to stuff related to taxes and the house. That means chugging through about a dozen archive boxes currently stacked on the floor of the study closet. My first objective is to dispense with the four-drawer filing cabinet looming in one corner of my very small study, and replace it with a two-drawer lateral model that will fit under the window. The cats like to sit in that window to watch birds, and the top of a filing cabinet will be more comfortable than the narrow console table they have now.