Yesterday I cooked.

A potful of minestrone — black beans, kale, large can of tomatoes and three litres of chicken stock; on a sofrito of bacon lardons, sliced garlic and shallots, diced celery and carrot, and dried thyme and oregano; and flavoured at the end with shredded basil, chopped parsley and a dollop of Worcestershire sauce for umami. I gave half of it to my bubblemates so I would not be still eating it at Christmas.

I also made a Cantonese stirfry of thinly sliced flank steak and tomatoes that provides two servings over brown rice (which no Cantonese person would eat on a bet). That was last night’s supper and will be tonight’s.

And then I filled the Instant Pot with chicken stock ingredients, brought it to pressure, and went to bed.

Slowly but surely, I’m working my way through the contents of the freezer. I have only six raw chicken carcasses left of the case I bought a loooong time ago from the butcher at the farmers’ market, so that’s three more batches of chicken stock. The Cantonese stirfry accounted for one of three remaining pieces of flank steak. The minestrone will be four or five easy meals, and it cleared the veg bins.

Today’s agenda is an hour or two of tunes and a meeting of the choir executive on Zoom. Here’s hoping that I’m still full of tunes-generated endorphins when the meeting convenes.

It’s still hot and humid in Stratford, with rain in the forecast all the way to Friday that dampens Canada Day plans already suppressed by the public health authorities.

Full-page advertisement in the Toronto Star today: “Ontario is the only jurisdiction in North America where indoor dining is still closed.” Placed by a professional association called Restaurants Canada, it goes on to point out that Ontario businesses have collectively lost Cdn$10.3 billion, outstripping the rest of Canada combined. (Incidentally, Ontario’s economy is bigger than that of the rest of Canada combined.) It also says that “we” have hit all the targets set for re-opening.

I can almost hear the eyes rolling at Queen’s Park. Who’s “we”? Have the restaurateurs checked every health district in the province, from Moose Factory to Toronto, Thunder Bay to Cornwall? Methinks not.