Crikey, WK - I hope it wasn't us, and the dog wasn't Harvey ...
It's another grey sort of day - not unpleasant enough to be called "dreich" but not exacty June-ish either. I suppose I'll have to sort the laundry and indulge in some Iron Ing, although perhaps an amble first, before it decides to start raining.
S. made some no-knead bread on Saturday: apparently all you do is mix the ingredients (flour, yeast, water, salt and a little honey) in a bowl, leave it covered for a couple of hours and then divide it and bake it. Not even any need for a machine - and it was absolutely delicious. I think I'll have to have a go - while I loved my bread-machine, if I'm not going to have to buy a new one, then maybe I won't.
We must have all your sun, Piglet. It's lovely here.
I've just had a chat with a friend in the garden. She came round so I could make a birthday recording for her sister whose 40th birthday it is on Friday. We were supposed to go away this last weekend to Newcastle and they were meant to go to Granada a couple of weeks before. Friend 1 is making a composite recording of friends and family wishing her well. Their local ice cream parlour does a click and collect afternoon tea. It all sounds lovely, but I'm sorry we can't do more of it in a group. Am hoping to do some garden clearance to enable it be used for a picnic at some stage. It's on a bit of a slope though, so we will not be able to eat anything round
(It looked to be trying to rain just then, but I'm sat in the garden up against the back wall of my house and it turned out to be a starling having an energetic bath in the drainpipe!)
Yesterday was meat free Monday so we had omelette for lunch (in baguettes for the others in the house) and vegetable coconut curry with smoked tofu and homegrown salad for tea, followed by a tiramisu from the corner shop which was surprisingly good for an off the shelf cake.
Listened to a friend’s podcast from church this morning (the minister is interviewing a wide variety of church members a couple of times a week) and then went for a walk round the village. I saw a couple of dozen people of various ages but mostly mothers and children and I was the only person wearing a mask. Social distancing was good when they saw me in my mask but I suspect lacking at other times.
I need to put some bread on; I think I’ll make focaccia to go with some burgers for tea. Then I have to do some work, mostly related to my studies. There’s a work meeting this evening which is a module de-brief.
the cyclist was alert. no harm done to anyone, other than my daughter having a bit of a panic. Thankfully the pavements were busier than the roads at that time and it was also at a "pinch point" where the traffic has to slow and go single-track to get past.
I did that horrible parent thing (that hopefully other people do, not just me) where the first thing I shouted to (at) her was along the lines of "silly girl, what on earth are you doing" rather than "are you okay"
I did that horrible parent thing (that hopefully other people do, not just me) where the first thing I shouted to (at) her was along the lines of "silly girl, what on earth are you doing" rather than "are you okay"
I certainly did that. It seems to have resulted in no lasting harm to our son, who is now 36 and a father himself.
I saw a couple of dozen people of various ages but mostly mothers and children and I was the only person wearing a mask. Social distancing was good when they saw me in my mask but I suspect lacking at other times.
Interesting comment. I thought the general feeling was that people were more likely to thin, "Oh, they're OK as they're wearing a mask, so keeping a distance from them isn't too important".
Walked to the shops this morning. Three men working at an electronics cabinet by the side of the road very graciously stepped back as I passed. Supermarket very quiet, probably half the customers wearing a mask. Caught the bus home: the driver (behind a screen) and one passenger wore masks, I and the other one didn't - perhaps I should have done (they're not compulsory here).
Something I have learnt today- if you are going to go to the trouble of baking a delicious cake perhaps check you have set the oven to the correct temperature🤣 #epicfail
Interesting comment. I thought the general feeling was that people were more likely to thin, "Oh, they're OK as they're wearing a mask, so keeping a distance from them isn't too important".
My experience is that so few people wear masks in the street that seeing someone with one on reminds them to keep a distance. I suspect they also think I am more vulnerable. It may well be different if everyone wears a mask.
Cambridge suburb (ex-village) so very graduate middle class in the village area, although I live on the council estate. It always surprises me how few wear a mask here, just the occasional elderly person. Waitrose early in the morning (just after the hour set aside for vulnerable people) has about half the people masked though.
It was very foggy here early this morning; it's lifted a bit (I can see the trees across the road now), but it's still not much as you might expect a week or two before Midsummer Day!
Today is likely to be a day for bread-making and job applications (although I've got this interview on Friday, I'm not taking anything for granted).
Supper will be the last Hello Fresh thing - prawn laksa.
Rain is occurring here, with Thunder to add to the fun...
This, of course, started about a nanosecond after I had put out some washing, but never mind - it will stand another rinse! I bought a nice little pot of Lavender yesterday, as part of a Plan to brighten up the deck of the Ark, so that is duly grateful for the water from the sky.
We've had thunder grumbling around but no rain to speak of. My garden and newly growing patch of grass seed would be glad of it.
I've managed to navigate two on-foot outings today without getting wet, including a socially distanced coffee with two girlfriends and the purchase of some new stickers to decorate my journal with. Both things make me happy.
I'm jumping ship to become a landlubber. I suspect some will accuse me of being over-sensitive but I think I'll be happier ashore.
Good luck with the job search @la vie en rouge and @Piglet, I hope you find a pleasant and affordable berth soon and a job with people who value you and your gifts.
Sorry about that.
We had some heavy rain about 6.30. I rang himself, out for a walk, in case he wanted to be picked up, and he didn't realise why I was calling. I went over to the church car park, about half a mile away, where it was not raining, and he was dry when he arrived, just as the water started splatting on the screen. The divisions between wet and dry were very sharp. On th e way back there were very wet puddles, and water sluicing across the road.
Sorry, to see you go TheOrganist but I can understand why you might want to go ashore (I left in the past because I felt I was being challenged about my denomination whenever I mentioned it). Look after yourself. If you are able in future, so pop in to see us in All Saints
Looking out the window we should have walked first thing this morning as the promised thunderstorms are overhead, complete with deluge. Yesterday's walk included sighting of what I suspect was a lesser spotted woodpecker*, swallows, skylarks taking flight and hearing a yellow hammer. We've also seen a peregrine recently.
* It was one of the spotted woodpeckers, out in the open. Both are reasonably likely hereabouts.
Rain here, too, with Blunder and Frightening to go with it...
The new pot of Lavender will be rather over-watered, I fear.
I would like two more pots to keep it company on deck - O Gardener Shipmates, do you have any suggestions? This is a harsh environment (lots of Salt-Laden Wind, and not much in the way of shelter, though at least that means that the Sun Shine can do its stuff!).
We have sparrows, the occasional tit, a pair of resident blackbirds, a robin, the infernal pigeons, and recently at least one pair of magpies. Although there aren't suitable trees or bushes in our garden, both neighbours have potential nesting spots, and immediately behind our row of houses there is a tangle of assorted trees and shrubs in a circa three metre strip between our fence and the school one.
My experience of what does well in a sheltered back garden in Scotland probably not much use. Plus finding a local - or any - supplier for sea buckthorn or whatever the experts say would do well is a problem.
I have been snaffling such bedding plants as have occasionally appeared at local shops, several of which I'm keeping as houseplants. Geraniums, coleus and a compact fuchsia are all having a happier life than their outdoor siblings.
Today I thought I'd try the reverse and bring some excess garden plant indoors. I'm wondering if a bonsai raspberry would be possible.
How about rosemary @Bishops Finger to go with the lavender. I've also often seen scabious growing on cliff edges so it might like your environment too.
We have the rain and a bit of thunder and lightening. It's not very near, unlike the other day when I looked out of the window to get blinded by a bright flash, and if I wasn't already deaf I'd have been deafened too. We were going for a lunch time walk, as my husband is working from home and it's his break. Instead he's gone for an afternoon 'read' and I'm mooching about the internet.
We live on the opposite side of the Thames to you BF, in a similar location - Scabious grows like a weed here, has beautiful flowers and the bees love it. Calendula (pot marigold) grows on the shingle beach above the tide-line and seems indestructible!
no rain of any significance for days - possibly weeks. saving water from the kitchen & shower for watering the containers and putting the hose on the beds once a week. Too hot for me by about 09:30, and I'm indoors from 11.)) until 16:30. Not happy.
Cliff top plants here suitable for pots - calendula, as Diomedes said, and sea thrift. Otherwise a lot of common mallow, which is a bit too tall for growing in a pot.
Very sorry to see you go, @TheOrganist - please know that you're always welcome in AS, and make it au revoir rather than goodbye!
It's a glorious day here: according to BBC Weather, @19°;, sunny intervals and a gentle breeze, which sums it up nicely. I'm just back from a very pleasant amble: if it carries on like this I'll be back into my (borrowed) cropped trousers.
I had an e-mail today from NHS Recruitment to say that due to technical issues, my interview will be by phone rather than Microsoft Team. I think this is a Good Thing - apart from anything else, it means I shan't have to get togged up or put on any slap, and they won't have to look at my (very bad) lockdown locks ...
I also had a phone conversation with the bloke from Into Work, and he was very helpful and encouraging: he reckons my age and experience might not go against me at all.
Hello Fresh sounds really good, I have several friends who subscribe. 🙂
We quite enjoyed some of the dishes, but it definitely has drawbacks. You have to watch the use-by dates and make sure you haven't planned something else when you've got something that needs to be used; once you're beyond the initial freebies it can be quite expensive (which was S's main objection); and sometimes not everything arrives. The prawn laksa yesterday came out really quite nicely, but they'd forgotten to put in the egg noodles, so I used some left-over linguine from a previous recipe where they'd sent us too much. We've also had a couple of things where some of the veggies were a bit scuzzy: I had to cut the end off a carrot the other day, and last week we got some decidedly limp spring onions.
This evening's offering is going to be steak: S. ordered a load of meaty things from a local butcher that she'd seen advertised on TV, and we've got some mushrooms that need using. I'm looking forward to it - I'm a sucker for a nice juicy steak. I hope I make a decent fist of cooking it!
The birds I’ve been spotting most on my daily walk are goldfinches. We don’t have them in the garden anymore since we cut down the goldenrod so it’s good to see them in the scrub beside the nature reserve.
Dyeing is done and I now have various fleeces, locks and nylon fibres in delicious raspberry tones. I have decided my favourite lockdown purchase is a really cheap salad spinner bought last week - it’s great for spinning fleece after washing.
Dinner tonight is baked chicken in mushroom and spinach sauce with rice. I have bought chocolate waffles and chocolate ice cream for pudding
@Sandemaniac that's partly why I said lesser spotted - that, not a lot of red and we saw it in the open - flying between the few trees still standing along a stream.
It looks as if that series of fields have been taken over by another farm, now working the fields, cutting down the overgrown hedgerow along the stream and stripping the fields. I was saddened the first time I walked that path this summer as the last time I walked those fields I was surrounded by swooping swallows collecting insects from the old meadows grazed by cattle and horses. They've now been planted with borage having been stripped bare. One's growing a good crop of groundsel.
It is dark enough here we have all the lights on: the last hour has seen a thunderstorm and some torrential rain. I am very glad to be working from home as I would normally have been commuting in the middle of it. Tonight we are having fresh sardines with samphire and couscous.
Seeing established meadows and orchards ripped up is rather sad.
I shot out and mowed the lawn, did some desultory weeding, then half an hour of my favourite garden activity - staring at stuff.
Nap over, I have just put a pot of lamb with apricots, orange, onion and paprika in the oven. Roasties with rosemary to go with I think. Raspberries and rhubarb fool to follow.
Tonight we are having fresh sardines with samphire and couscous.
Yummy but bony. Hopefully these are the "big" sardines. They are lovely cooked on an open fire on a Portuguese beach, fresh from the sea.
They were already butterflied so only the tiny bones to worry about. The fish were decent size though. I pan-fried them with garlic, fresh herbs and half a preserved lemon.
Unfortunately chez Dragon is landlocked so fish comes via the shop. The samphire was a special extra in the veg box yesterday.
Comments
It's another grey sort of day - not unpleasant enough to be called "dreich" but not exacty June-ish either. I suppose I'll have to sort the laundry and indulge in some Iron Ing, although perhaps an amble first, before it decides to start raining.
S. made some no-knead bread on Saturday: apparently all you do is mix the ingredients (flour, yeast, water, salt and a little honey) in a bowl, leave it covered for a couple of hours and then divide it and bake it. Not even any need for a machine - and it was absolutely delicious. I think I'll have to have a go - while I loved my bread-machine, if I'm not going to have to buy a new one, then maybe I won't.
I've just had a chat with a friend in the garden. She came round so I could make a birthday recording for her sister whose 40th birthday it is on Friday. We were supposed to go away this last weekend to Newcastle and they were meant to go to Granada a couple of weeks before. Friend 1 is making a composite recording of friends and family wishing her well. Their local ice cream parlour does a click and collect afternoon tea. It all sounds lovely, but I'm sorry we can't do more of it in a group. Am hoping to do some garden clearance to enable it be used for a picnic at some stage. It's on a bit of a slope though, so we will not be able to eat anything round
(It looked to be trying to rain just then, but I'm sat in the garden up against the back wall of my house and it turned out to be a starling having an energetic bath in the drainpipe!)
Listened to a friend’s podcast from church this morning (the minister is interviewing a wide variety of church members a couple of times a week) and then went for a walk round the village. I saw a couple of dozen people of various ages but mostly mothers and children and I was the only person wearing a mask. Social distancing was good when they saw me in my mask but I suspect lacking at other times.
I need to put some bread on; I think I’ll make focaccia to go with some burgers for tea. Then I have to do some work, mostly related to my studies. There’s a work meeting this evening which is a module de-brief.
the cyclist was alert. no harm done to anyone, other than my daughter having a bit of a panic. Thankfully the pavements were busier than the roads at that time and it was also at a "pinch point" where the traffic has to slow and go single-track to get past.
I did that horrible parent thing (that hopefully other people do, not just me) where the first thing I shouted to (at) her was along the lines of "silly girl, what on earth are you doing" rather than "are you okay"
Walked to the shops this morning. Three men working at an electronics cabinet by the side of the road very graciously stepped back as I passed. Supermarket very quiet, probably half the customers wearing a mask. Caught the bus home: the driver (behind a screen) and one passenger wore masks, I and the other one didn't - perhaps I should have done (they're not compulsory here).
Today is likely to be a day for bread-making and job applications (although I've got this interview on Friday, I'm not taking anything for granted).
Supper will be the last Hello Fresh thing - prawn laksa.
This, of course, started about a nanosecond after I had put out some washing, but never mind - it will stand another rinse! I bought a nice little pot of Lavender yesterday, as part of a Plan to brighten up the deck of the Ark, so that is duly grateful for the water from the sky.
I've managed to navigate two on-foot outings today without getting wet, including a socially distanced coffee with two girlfriends and the purchase of some new stickers to decorate my journal with. Both things make me happy.
Good luck with the job search @la vie en rouge and @Piglet, I hope you find a pleasant and affordable berth soon and a job with people who value you and your gifts.
Toodle-pip! The Organist
MMM
Bon (un)voyage.
We had some heavy rain about 6.30. I rang himself, out for a walk, in case he wanted to be picked up, and he didn't realise why I was calling. I went over to the church car park, about half a mile away, where it was not raining, and he was dry when he arrived, just as the water started splatting on the screen. The divisions between wet and dry were very sharp. On th e way back there were very wet puddles, and water sluicing across the road.
Yes; this.
I shall miss you
Good idea.
Looking out the window we should have walked first thing this morning as the promised thunderstorms are overhead, complete with deluge. Yesterday's walk included sighting of what I suspect was a lesser spotted woodpecker*, swallows, skylarks taking flight and hearing a yellow hammer. We've also seen a peregrine recently.
* It was one of the spotted woodpeckers, out in the open. Both are reasonably likely hereabouts.
The new pot of Lavender will be rather over-watered, I fear.
I would like two more pots to keep it company on deck - O Gardener Shipmates, do you have any suggestions? This is a harsh environment (lots of Salt-Laden Wind, and not much in the way of shelter, though at least that means that the Sun Shine can do its stuff!).
I have been snaffling such bedding plants as have occasionally appeared at local shops, several of which I'm keeping as houseplants. Geraniums, coleus and a compact fuchsia are all having a happier life than their outdoor siblings.
Today I thought I'd try the reverse and bring some excess garden plant indoors. I'm wondering if a bonsai raspberry would be possible.
We have the rain and a bit of thunder and lightening. It's not very near, unlike the other day when I looked out of the window to get blinded by a bright flash, and if I wasn't already deaf I'd have been deafened too. We were going for a lunch time walk, as my husband is working from home and it's his break. Instead he's gone for an afternoon 'read' and I'm mooching about the internet.
I might sort and dye some fleece.
Cliff top plants here suitable for pots - calendula, as Diomedes said, and sea thrift. Otherwise a lot of common mallow, which is a bit too tall for growing in a pot.
I had vaguely thought of Rosemary, but not the others.
It's a glorious day here: according to BBC Weather, @19°;, sunny intervals and a gentle breeze, which sums it up nicely. I'm just back from a very pleasant amble: if it carries on like this I'll be back into my (borrowed) cropped trousers.
I had an e-mail today from NHS Recruitment to say that due to technical issues, my interview will be by phone rather than Microsoft Team. I think this is a Good Thing - apart from anything else, it means I shan't have to get togged up or put on any slap, and they won't have to look at my (very bad) lockdown locks ...
I also had a phone conversation with the bloke from Into Work, and he was very helpful and encouraging: he reckons my age and experience might not go against me at all.
We quite enjoyed some of the dishes, but it definitely has drawbacks. You have to watch the use-by dates and make sure you haven't planned something else when you've got something that needs to be used; once you're beyond the initial freebies it can be quite expensive (which was S's main objection); and sometimes not everything arrives. The prawn laksa yesterday came out really quite nicely, but they'd forgotten to put in the egg noodles, so I used some left-over linguine from a previous recipe where they'd sent us too much. We've also had a couple of things where some of the veggies were a bit scuzzy: I had to cut the end off a carrot the other day, and last week we got some decidedly limp spring onions.
This evening's offering is going to be steak: S. ordered a load of meaty things from a local butcher that she'd seen advertised on TV, and we've got some mushrooms that need using. I'm looking forward to it - I'm a sucker for a nice juicy steak. I hope I make a decent fist of cooking it!
Possibly a nice glass of red WINE to go with it?
Lesser spotted aren't much bigger than a sparrow, if that helps any?
AG
Dyeing is done and I now have various fleeces, locks and nylon fibres in delicious raspberry tones. I have decided my favourite lockdown purchase is a really cheap salad spinner bought last week - it’s great for spinning fleece after washing.
Dinner tonight is baked chicken in mushroom and spinach sauce with rice. I have bought chocolate waffles and chocolate ice cream for pudding
Indeed.
It looks as if that series of fields have been taken over by another farm, now working the fields, cutting down the overgrown hedgerow along the stream and stripping the fields. I was saddened the first time I walked that path this summer as the last time I walked those fields I was surrounded by swooping swallows collecting insects from the old meadows grazed by cattle and horses. They've now been planted with borage having been stripped bare. One's growing a good crop of groundsel.
Seeing established meadows and orchards ripped up is rather sad.
I shot out and mowed the lawn, did some desultory weeding, then half an hour of my favourite garden activity - staring at stuff.
Nap over, I have just put a pot of lamb with apricots, orange, onion and paprika in the oven. Roasties with rosemary to go with I think. Raspberries and rhubarb fool to follow.
There is an even better fish stall in Cardiff Indoor Market, but of course it's been "off limits" since March.
They were already butterflied so only the tiny bones to worry about. The fish were decent size though. I pan-fried them with garlic, fresh herbs and half a preserved lemon.
Unfortunately chez Dragon is landlocked so fish comes via the shop. The samphire was a special extra in the veg box yesterday.