Month: June 2020

Bit Twisted TWTW # 83

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Cooking, Life, The Week That Was

Hello again! This week started with a lot of promise of getting stuff done, and then on Wednesday morning I twisted my ankle and getting stuff done was restricted to what I could do sitting on my bum with my foot up. I don’t think I’ve done any serious damage, a bit of swelling is all I really have to show for it and painkillers keep most of the discomfort at bay. It has meant though that dog walks have been shorter or limited to the garden and I wasn’t able to drive for a few days.

It also meant that I spent one afternoon playing around with some watercolours. I doubt that I’m going to be a famous artist any time soon, but I did find it very relaxing and with no pressure or expectations it was nice to experiment.

I’ve continued with AudioMo throughout this month, some of the posts are just short snippets, others are longer recordings. Those that I haven’t listed in a previous post are linked below if you’re interested.

AudioMo will be over in just a couple of days and I’ve really enjoyed this years. The discipline of making myself record something everyday and discovering new voices and acquaintances along the way has been fun, and thought provoking.

AudioMo Day 15 – Currently Reading, Day 16 – A Lockdown Problem, Day 17 – To The Woods, Day 18 – Online Voting, Day 19 – Buffering, Day 20 – Buffering, Day 21 Harvesting After The Rain and Allotment Audio Tour,  Day 22 – Woodland Ramblings, Day 23 – Lockdown Reading, Day 24 – A Touch of the Ouchies, Day 25 – Not at the #1984symposium, Day 26 – Reimagining Ansel Adams, Day 27 – Reflecting on AudioMo 2020, Day 28 – The Week Ahead

Work has been very quiet this week, which in some ways has been a blessing. I’ve been able to do some sorting of my Mum’s stuff and then being laid up with a twisted ankle hasn’t had the impact it might otherwise have done.

The Committee on Climate Change produced it’s annual report to government this week, it has recommendations for every government department. If you want to read the whole thing you can find it here or this Guardian piece is a good summary. I’ve been working my way through it slowly but my fear is that government will do little or nothing about it.

I read another Brother Cadfael this week – Dead Man’s Ransom, although these have kind of become my fall back when I don’t feel like reading anything else I found this one a little bit disappointing. Won’t stop me reading the next one though.

My friend David also published some poetry recently, it’s really good and you can read it here.

One thing that I didn’t do this week was visit the grave of George Orwell on his birthday (25th June). I’ve done this a few times but this year with coronavirus and a twisted ankle it wasn’t to be. These events are “organised” by my friend @documentally, and he wrote about it in his newsletter this week. If you don’t already subscribe to his newsletter you should, it’s free every other week or for the cost of a cup of coffee each month you can pay for the full weekly experience.

Lockdown seems to be completely over now, although we’re still broadly avoiding anything other than essential stuff here. Half-a-million beachgoers in Bournemouth had other ideas.

I haven’t been able to get much done on the allotment this week either, fortunately despite us having the hottest day of the year, we also had some rain so I didn’t have to worry about trying to get any watering done.

One of my minor successes this week was cooking a feta and spinach puff pastry roll. I’ve made this a few times and it’s really straightforward. You’ll need: a sheet of ready made puff pastry, a packet of feta cheese, a big handful of spinach, a bunch of parsley, some dried oregano, 2 eggs, some extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper to taste.

  1. Take the pastry out of the fridge and allow to come up to room temperature to make it easier to handle.
  2. Preheat the oven to gas 6 or equivalent.
  3.  Get a baking sheet big enough to accomodate the puff pastry sheet and grease or line with baking paper to prevent the puff pastry sticking (baking paper also helps with one of the later actions, and is my preferred method)
  4. Wash, drain and dry the parsley and spinach and then roughly chop and place in a mixing bowl.
  5. Chop the feta into cubes and add to the spinach and parsley.
  6. Sprinkle oregano over the top (about 1 to 2 teaspoons) and salt and pepper (don’t be too heavy handed with the salt as feta is already quite salty).
  7. Add one of the eggs and about a tablespoon of olive oil, and mix everything together to combine.
  8. Next place the puff pastry on the greased / papered baking tray.
  9. Lengthways down the centre of the pastry place the spinach / feta mix. You don’t want to overload the pastry or you won’t be able to seal the roll but make sure it is evenly spread.
  10. Beat the other egg to combine the white and yolk.
  11. If you are using baking paper now lift the bottom edge of paper to make the bottom part of the pastry sheet fold over the spinach mix. Brush the egg mix of the exposed pastry atop the spinach mix and the exposed pastry above the mix. Then use the top part of the baking paper to fold the pastry down to cover the mix and overlap the pastry. Press down gently to seal, and seal the ends by pinching with your fingertips.
  12. Carefully cut three or four slices in the pastry to allow the mix to breath in the oven, and brush the whole thing with the remaining egg.
  13. Cook in the oven for around 30 minutes or until the pastry is golden brown.

Serves 4 to 6. Works well with veg or salad or baked beans and chips if you want a trashy tea. Will keep in the fridge once cool if you can’t manage the whole thing in one sitting. Reheat in the oven at the same temperature / time; but cover with foil to prevent the pastry burning.

That’s it for this week – ankle permitting I’m going to be doing some more sorting of things for Mum in the week ahead but otherwise I don’t have any specific plans.

Stay safe!

Emotionally Draining TWTW # 82

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was3 Comments

Hello! If you’re one of the new subscribers who have joined this week, welcome. This is my weekly post (The Week That Was), which is a review of what I’ve been up to in the previous week, or at least as much of it as I can remember.

This last week ranks as probably one of the most emotionally draining weeks of my life. I write the intro to these posts last and this weeks is a little bit shorter than normal because of what’s been going on – details below.

On Tuesday of this week my Mum went into a care home. She has Alzheimer’s Disease and for some time now it has been progressing to the point where we cannot provide the care that she needs by keeping her in her own home or that she would be safe to be there by herself. It’s a home that she has lived in for over 50 years, but no longer recognises as her home and constantly asked to be taken “home”. Her short term memory is failing and confusion and distress are not uncommon. She no longer recognises me all of the time, frequently confusing me with other people.

We know that this move is the right thing to do for her but it is possibly the hardest decision I’ve ever had to make.

We can already see though that it is the right thing. She has been much brighter in the few days that she’s been there and although there is still a period of adjustment, hopefully as she settles down and becomes familiar with her new surroundings some of the other memory issues that Mum has will be less of a burden for her.

There is also a period of adjustment for us to. Many of my routines were built around making sure that Mum was okay, and doing things for her that she could no longer manage. There will of course be new routines in time but it’s barely been a week, so it’s early days.

Speaking of new routines, I almost always go to the allotment on a Saturday morning. This week it was absolutely slinging it down with rain and so I did some other things and went on Sunday morning. I harvested a lot of loganberries and gooseberries as well as some potatoes and lettuce. The weeds love the rain and so there are plenty of those but also the other plants are looking good. With everything that’s been going on this year the plot isn’t looking quite how I’d like it to be and there are a lot of plants that I just haven’t had time for this year.

I finished reading David Sedaris’ Calypso and still have Valentine Warner’s Consolation of Food on the go. I’ve also been reading C S Forester’s The Good Shepherd which is being made into the movie Greyhound. I can see that depending on how they do the transfer to the big screen, if they keep to the story then either it will be an amazing film or a bit of a flop. I’d recomend reading the book whether or not you intend to see the film.

 

Making It Up As They Go Along TWTW # 81

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was1 Comment

It’s been a busy week. I’ve mostly been working on personal projects and doing family things.

It seems to be as though social distancing has gone by the wayside however as the lockdown has been relaxed people seem to be making their own rules rather than following the government’s advice. Possibly they are acting on their instincts like Dominic Cummings did all those weeks ago. I don’t know, but it certainly feels like the government has lost control of the response to this crisis and is making it up as it goes along. This thread on twitter makes for an interesting read, it’s pretty much a shambles.

Mask wearing also seems to be pretty much non-existent, and I predict all sorts of complaints from idiots on Monday when the rules change and we all must wear them on public transport. I can see a lot of people going nowhere fast.

I am attempting to participate in AudioMo again this year. The principal is simple, post a piece of audio everyday during the month of June and share a link via Twitter with the hashtag #audiomo. You can find all of mine via Twitter (@tontowilliams), or click on the links below.

Day 1 – A Day of Firsts, Day 2 – Bin Day, Day 3 – The Rain, Day 4 – Some Thoughts on Social Distancing, Day 5 – Thinking Carbon Emissions and Atmospheric Carbon, Day 6 – Some Thoughts on June 6th 1944 and Current Events, Day 7 – Thinking Time on the Allotment, Day 8 – Work & Coronavirus, Day 9 – Don’t Break The Chain, Day 10 – Things That Go Bump In The Night, Day 11 – Nobody Told The People In My Dreams About Social Distancing, Day 12 – I Think I’ve Broken The Weather, Day 13 – What’s Your New EDC?, Day 14 – Are You Ready To Go Shopping?

Also one of the field recordings that I made at the allotment was featured on the podcast Field Recordings

Work has been very quiet this week. I think I’ve probably reached that point where the amount of current work is declining faster than new work is coming in.

The allotment has been relishing in the rain that we’ve had over the last few days. It’s looking much healthier for rainfall rather than what I am able to provide with watering cans. It has of course also benefited the weeds, so I spent a good proportion of Saturday weeding. We did also have our first new potatoes and some gooseberries and loganberries. (I must remember to put the bowl of the ice cream maker in the freezer and order some double cream on our next grocery order, so that we can have gooseberry ice cream!)

Sadly we’ve also had some thefts from the site. This is a more common occurrence than you might think, and in the past we’ve had spates of people’s sheds being broken into and tools and other things being stolen. The current crimewave however seems to focus on food. Persons unknown are stealing fruit and veg from people’s plots. As far as I know, nothing has been taken from my plot but I do know of a few who have had things taken. I wonder whether the thefts are motivated by people not being able to afford to buy food from the shops or whether there is some other driver.

I read Helen MacInnes Above Suspicion this week and now am flipping between Valentine Warner’s The Consolation of Food and David Sedaris’ Calypso.

Above Suspicion was a great read, I’m pretty sure that I read it as a teenager around the same time I was reading Alistair Maclean’s stories. I’d like to read her other novels but at the moment I have so many books to read I don’t really want to add anymore to the long list and that’s probably why I’m flipping between two at the moment. I’d recommend reading Valentine Warner’s book in particular. If you don’t know he’s a chef but this isn’t really a cookbook. There are recipes in there but this is more of a book of stories with the odd recipe thrown in. If you want a taster you can go to his Instagram. He recorded a few of the stories there during lockdown to help publicise the book. I already had a copy but it encouraged me to bring it to the top of the pile.

Okay I think that’s about all I have this week. Have a good coming week yourself and stay safe!

https://twitter.com/cmcollins_hort/status/1270985925259034624

Book Review: “Into The Tangled Bank” by Lev Parikian

On By TontowilliamsIn Book Review

Into The Tangled Bank – In which our author ventures outdoors to consider the British in nature by Lev Parikian

My Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Lev Parikian takes us on a nature tour from lying on the pavement outside his house looking at a common blue butterfly to ringing birds on Skokholm island. As he points out “Nature means different things to different people”, and he covers all sorts of perspectives including his own and those of famous naturalists such as Charles Darwin, Gilbert White, Gavin Maxwell and John Clare along the way.

This is a well drawn tale of what nature means, it doesn’t go into a lot of heavy detail or tales of mass destruction and loss of species and habitats but nor is it a lightweight view either. It is well observed of nature, of naturalists and those that wouldn’t call themselves naturalists but are exposed to it everyday.

If you like your natural history with a little humour then you will enjoy this, what Bill Bryson did for the travel tale and the secrets of the universe, Lev Parikian might well do for the natural world. Learning how to catch Manx Shearwaters for ringing or the multi-modal uses of the average back garden all take the reader to see the more humourous side of nature.

I do have one gripe about this book however – the use of footnotes. They were heavily overused in the text and ultimately became quite distracting, constantly nipping to the bottom of the page to see what the little asterisks, cross or other reference point means. In my opinion many of these footnotes should have been incorporated into the main body of the text. They were relevant and would have added more there rather than being relegated to the bottom of the page, sometimes with three or four others, and with some pages that were more footnote that main text.

About the Author.

Lev Parikian is a birdwatcher, conductor and author of Why Do Birds Suddenly Disappear? He lives in West Longon with his family who are getting used to his increasing enthusiasm for nautre. As a birdwatcher, his most prized sightings are a golden oriole in the Alpujarras and a black redstart at Dungeness Power Station.

Into the Tangled Bank – In which our author ventures outdoors to consider the British in Nature is published on 9th July 2020 by Elliott & Thompson at £14.99.

[Disclaimer: The publishers very kindly sent me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I have received no payment for this review, and the thoughts are my own.]

 

Black Lives Matter TWTW # 80

On By TontowilliamsIn The Week That Was

Catalysed by the murder by a police officer of George Floyd, there have been numerous protests around the world and in some cases violence. Some of this violence has been perpetuated by law enforcement, seemingly emboldened in America by a President who seeks to divide the country. But this is not an issue solely limited to America, my own country is not innocent.

The racism has to stop. I write those five words as a privileged white person who in many ways can’t begin to understand what has been considered “normal” by many a coloured person. Their version of “normal” has to cease. Equity needs to be the normal. If you don’t know what I am writing about then please go and educate yourself. There is a lot of information out there that shouldn’t be too hard to find, but I will point you towards this newsletter by my friend Documentally which contains a lot of links to useful information and things that you can do.

 

Suspicious Puddles TWTW # 79

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Fork To Fork, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was, work4 Comments

Hello and welcome to the sunny south coast of the UK where that strange orange orb in the sky has been slowly roasting me all week.

I’ve mostly been at home – but things have been pretty quiet, although there are a couple of high spots to share and things to talk about. How’s your week been?

I received my developed film back from the processors, both this photo and the one above are from that roll. I opted for negatives and a transfer to USB stick (that I supplied) as this seemed like the cheapest option, and I didn’t want to waste a lot of paper on potentially poorly taken photos when I could print the best ones at home anyway. This was probably a good choice, as it would seem I have (or the camera has) a slight tendency to underexpose frames – I’m going with operator error until I have any other evidence to the contrary – and in most cases I can tweak these things afterwards if I need to.

A little bit like I have with this image.

I’m already part way through my second roll and for the most part I’ve enjoyed this little return to “analogue” photography and will probably keep going.

I think in some ways I prefer the immediacy of a digital camera and the ability to take many frames of the same thing with little worry as to the cost, until you get the image you were looking for. That said the challenge of having a limited number of exposures and thinking much more about the image you want before you press the shutter release is also a bit of a thrill. There will be more film in my immediate future.

I finished reading Maigret’s Pickpocket and also read The Sanctuary Sparrow by Ellis Peter’s (a Brother Cadfael mystery). The Maigret was excellent, one of the better ones and although I enjoyed the Brother Cadfael it wasn’t one of the best. I’ve yet to settle into anything else.

Don’t Worry I Live With All These Books

I spent a bit of time doing the conversion from winter mode to summer mode in the potting shed this week. This essentially means moving out the remaining tender plants into the garden, taking down the bench they were on and setting up for tomatoes and other things. This year I have some tomatoes but also some lettuce and beetroot in tubs. These are doing exceedingly well and we have had our first harvest of beetroot leaves and lettuce alongside some broad bean and coriander pesto on pasta. We’ve been eating broad beans pretty much continuously for a couple of weeks now, and the main crop are coming to an end, but we have some “spare” plants that I put in tubs in the garden that will also give us a second crop in another couple of weeks.

The tale of Ollie and Dollie, a pair of pigeons that befriended a family on lockdown

The water leak on the car has also now been fixed. The garage got the part and fitted me in on Thursday morning and the bill was less than they thought it was going to be. I’ve hardly driven the car anywhere since but it seems to be okay – no suspicious puddles on the floor of the garage – but I haven’t given up carrying the big bottle of water in the boot quite yet.

Work has been very quiet this week. I’ve had a couple of things to do, but jobs that only really take a half-hour or so to do. I need to be mindful about where this leaves me. The government says that I am not eligible for the self-employed income support scheme, although I’ve asked them to explain exactly why because I’m not clear on their reasoning. So I’ll be needing to find some income of some kind if my existing work doesn’t pick back up. All of my talks for this year have now been cancelled – quite rightly – either by me or the organisers as clearly they can’t go ahead under current conditions. Some of the talk formats will also need to be reconsidered – those that involve produce tasting for example – as they are also no longer practical in their current method of delivery. At the moment I’m not sure it is worth spending a lot of effort on as things could change so much before the next talk that I have provisionally booked in January 2021, but it will be slowly burning away in the back of my mind in the meantime.

Well that’s about all from me for this week. It’s looking like it’s going to be another quiet one in ongoing sunshine. Stay safe wherever you are.