My cat Oscar is quite fat and probably could do with eating a little less but he looks quite thin compared to this really overweight cat. Sooty weighs almost two stone and is three times the size of a normal cat. He has now been put on a diet after getting stuck in the cat flap. His owner says that although she feeds Sooty normal sized portions of food Sooty has also been getting extra snacks from well meaning neighbours. Sooty is now on a strict low calorie diet of biscuits and is not allowed any meat.

As Rory and I have been together for nine years now we tend not to make extravagant gestures on Valentines’ Day preferring instead to go out at other times such as anniversaries and birthdays. We did however have a nice meal of lobster, dressed crab and large prawns with a nice bottle of Bollinger. Rory also brought me a lovely gift of flowers in a nice vase which was a surprise.

After dinner Rory went back to his new project which is learning about bookkeeping.

Cheshire Council managed to spend £60,000 relocating four newts. Great Crested Newts are currently a protected species and by law have to be relocated if they are found on a proposed building site. When they are found on a proposed development site they are usually caught by specialists using pit traps and then relocated in safe areas. In this case the council had to create a new habitat for the newts which they say resulted in the huge cost to relocate them. I am all for saving wildlife but I do wonder how much money it costs to send someone out with a bucket to catch a few newts.

My phone comes with a GPS system but what I find slightly irritating is it is like most systems geared towards drivers. I have used it on several occasions to try and find my way when I have been walking somewhere and although it does usually get me there it doesn’t always chose the best route when you are on foot. I read with interest this article that Nokia are introducing a digital map system for its phones that gives real time walking directions. The system will be available on its Series 60 and Series 40 phones and according to Nokia is the first pedestrian navigation system on a mobile phone. It will be interesting to see how popular it proves to be and whether other companies will start providing a similar service.

The Scottish government has drafted a document that instructs people on how to care for their cats. The aim is that the document will provide basic information for people who are responsible for caring for cats. The document is 37 pages long and includes information such as what to feed cats and what sort of environment to keep them in. Much of the information contained in the document seems to me to be basic common sense. It does make me wonder how much time and money was spent preparing this welfare code and whether it could have been used more effectively elsewhere.

I found this recipe the other day for chicken with mozzarella. Basically all you do is open the chicken breasts out. Beat them until they are an even thickness. Then stuff them with a mix of parmesan cheese and mozzarella. Then you wrap a slice of ham around each. The recipe uses Parma ham but I used normal ham because that’s all I had in the fridge. Next you seal the chicken in a really hot pan. This makes sure that the ham sticks to the chicken. Then bake them in the oven for about 15 minutes. You can see the result below.

At the risk of blogging about nothing but chicken, I came across this story about how Tesco has now managed to produce a chicken that costs only £1.99. Previously their cheapest chicken which cost £3.30 had been criticised for the poor conditions in which the birds were reared. I wonder what corners have been cut to produce this cheaper £1.99 chicken. Although Tesco have also increased orders for free range birds by 30% they have been criticised for this latest cut in costs. A spokesman for the National Farmers Union has said that Tesco are “devaluing the product and doing it at a time when, overall, the market is strengthening and chicken prices are rising”. He also said that unless Tesco were going to subsidise the cheap chickens that it was not a sustainable price. Tesco say that the price cut does not mean that welfare standards have been lowered and that its birds are “raised in the highest welfare environment”. The £1.99 chicken fared worse in a recent taste test carried out by The Daily Mail.

The blue Smartie was dropped by Nestle about three years due to concerns about artificial ingredients. At the time Nestle were able to reformulate the other coloured Smarties to get rid of the artificial ingredients and colours. However, they could find no way of recreating the distinctive blue Smartie. It appeared that Smarties have now found the answer and can create the blue sweet using a colouring from seaweed.

We made pancakes last week. As always the first pancake was slightly disappointing but all the rest were perfect. Rory has even perfected the art of tossing the pancake without dropping it on the floor or on his foot as he has done in the past.