October finishes today, and with it NaBloWriMo.
Despite my failure to post every day during the month, I did manage 47 (48 with this) posts overall, so I'm prepared to concede success to some extent.
It's been an interesting month. I suppose they all are, but this is the first time I've had the opportunity to look back with documentation - which for me at least, has a certain novelty value.
Breaking it down into the relevant bits, here's what we get:
Drama - fairly quiet due to half term, although things are about to hot up again as classes re-start today. The shows all seem in reasonable shape and the gates of nativity hell are about to swing open. That alone will keep me busy until early December. I'll just have to see how the line learning has gone.
Dice - enforced finger hiatus has slowed all my online games, but they're picking up speed again now and I'm enjoying them a lot. Whether the players are is another story. Home gaming saw my first character kill, of which I am slightly proud, although sorry for the character who copped it. Played some entertaining board games as well and there are a few more in the pipeline.
As well, of course, and near and dear to my heart, the evolution of Mikelmerck. This has all the signs of a fun on-going project. When working on this kind of thing, I have a white space approach - i.e. I have no idea what will be where or why until I need it to be there. The general shape is coming along nicely with some small details. In any case, I can see it keeping me amused for a long time to come.
Damsons - for which read general cookery and fruit reduction as well as gardening. Well, gardening did not happen at all. We have some early onions and garlic to plant, but luckily they are reslient and patient and as long as they hit the ground before the heavy frosts, should be fine.
Cake played a fairly major part in the month. Birthday cake for Mr Rev, frankly sublime dark chocolate cake for wedding and "invention" of crumble cake in the last two days. More cake pending as the days draw in even more and the Christmas stockpile starts.
I also need to mention my own birthday cake - which I did not make. This was a majestic creation made by a dear friend and shaped like a black dragon. It was also delicious. As soon as she sends me the pictures, I'll post them because it was quite simply one of the most awesome birthday cakes I've ever seen or eaten.
NaBloWriMo - the first dip into the communal blogging water. A very positive experience. Discovering that despite myself, I do enjoy writing is a great thing. Discovering that I do this much better online is an amazing one. The blogging community is extremely supportive - which is just as well as I suspect most of us are fragile in the confidence department.
Other stuff - the car crisis, the strange bug and the finger fracas all featured. These things count as the roadbumps I think. The unplanned and unplannable events that just happen. Speaking of unplanned and unplannable, I've got a hugely busy month ahead of me and 50,000 words to produce by 30 November 2011. But that's next month's problem.
Goodbye October 2011.
Showing posts with label autumn. Show all posts
Showing posts with label autumn. Show all posts
Monday, 31 October 2011
Monday, 17 October 2011
NaBloWriMo (Recipe)
Write and report on your favorite fall recipe
A subject near and dear to my heart. Food.
I don't really have a favourite recipe. I tend to be seasonal with food if I can - that's one of the points behind getting the garden cleared and starting to grow our own stuff - but it doesn't always work out like that. I get too tired and grumpy to plan more often than not. Once around the fridge and hurl it in a pan has been working for us for years.
Although ... now I come to think about it, I do have a sort of mental point in the year when I feel that hot puddings are essential. About now, in fact, so there you are. Hot puddings. This is partly to do with having a freezer packed with fruit with which things must be done. Since there is no bad about either crumble or danish pastry, both get made a lot. Even easier if (as I do) you make bulk blocks of the danish dough. It's no harder to make lots. Well, it's not hard anyway, just a bit faffy, but it makes me feel vaguely efficient.
I do have a bit of a guilt factor over danish pastry dough (I'm a Catholic Jew, I am really good at guilt). It requires a really scary amount of butter. If I'm going to feel bad about two pats of butter, I might just as well feel bad about four and get it over with.
A subject near and dear to my heart. Food.
I don't really have a favourite recipe. I tend to be seasonal with food if I can - that's one of the points behind getting the garden cleared and starting to grow our own stuff - but it doesn't always work out like that. I get too tired and grumpy to plan more often than not. Once around the fridge and hurl it in a pan has been working for us for years.
Although ... now I come to think about it, I do have a sort of mental point in the year when I feel that hot puddings are essential. About now, in fact, so there you are. Hot puddings. This is partly to do with having a freezer packed with fruit with which things must be done. Since there is no bad about either crumble or danish pastry, both get made a lot. Even easier if (as I do) you make bulk blocks of the danish dough. It's no harder to make lots. Well, it's not hard anyway, just a bit faffy, but it makes me feel vaguely efficient.
I do have a bit of a guilt factor over danish pastry dough (I'm a Catholic Jew, I am really good at guilt). It requires a really scary amount of butter. If I'm going to feel bad about two pats of butter, I might just as well feel bad about four and get it over with.
Monday, 10 October 2011
NaBloWriMo 9 (Autumn or not)
Given that Autumn is busting out all over, which is your favorite
season and why? Alternately, which is your LEAST favorite season and,
of course, why?
Another prompt (a word I cannot feel the same about since Cruella at Giraffeability of Digressions revealed that it means "fart" in Norwegian - yes, I am that shallow), another post.
I do like autumn. I'm not amazing at heat. Or rather, I'm extremely bad at heat. Every year we have at least one day in the UK when the temperature soars to a majestic 80 degrees and all the newspapers get hysterical and print pictures of people panting in fountains. I nod sympathetically. As a basically cold-weather person, autumn heralds my time of year.
It's very beautiful too. Living as we do in the heart of the Yorkshire Dales, when the trees turn red it looks as if the hills are on fire. Plus we have a large copper beech in the garden which goes the most amazing shade of lurid pink just before the leaves fall. It makes me laugh - the colour is so extraordinarily un-tree like.
Secretly, too, I love the closing in of the evenings. It feels as though the world around me is going into quiet hibernation and my brain seems to tick over more. Stuff that needs to surface has time to do so. This is more true of deep winter, but I can feel the process starting in autumn.
One thing I've really noticed since our move north is how distinct the seasons are and I've come to love them all for different reasons. Living in London, as we did for years, the seasons are not as passionate. Here, they have a real impact on how we live and what we do. Our lives move with the rhythm of that and I like it. Spring and summer are both hectic for us. The garden demands a lot of time and you can see the growth rate. It really is a miraculous thing to see the raspberry cane we cut back to the ground in February groaning with fruit in July. The weeds do the same thing too, of course, which is less joyful, but you can't have everything.
Autumn is preparation time. Winter is for me, for the family, for letting the things that never had time to be thought about arrive and be assimilated. That is not always a comfortable thing, but it is just as necessary as the ruthless energy of spring and florid growth of summer.
No favourite then. Just the need for all of them. Greedy?
Another prompt (a word I cannot feel the same about since Cruella at Giraffeability of Digressions revealed that it means "fart" in Norwegian - yes, I am that shallow), another post.
I do like autumn. I'm not amazing at heat. Or rather, I'm extremely bad at heat. Every year we have at least one day in the UK when the temperature soars to a majestic 80 degrees and all the newspapers get hysterical and print pictures of people panting in fountains. I nod sympathetically. As a basically cold-weather person, autumn heralds my time of year.
It's very beautiful too. Living as we do in the heart of the Yorkshire Dales, when the trees turn red it looks as if the hills are on fire. Plus we have a large copper beech in the garden which goes the most amazing shade of lurid pink just before the leaves fall. It makes me laugh - the colour is so extraordinarily un-tree like.
Secretly, too, I love the closing in of the evenings. It feels as though the world around me is going into quiet hibernation and my brain seems to tick over more. Stuff that needs to surface has time to do so. This is more true of deep winter, but I can feel the process starting in autumn.
One thing I've really noticed since our move north is how distinct the seasons are and I've come to love them all for different reasons. Living in London, as we did for years, the seasons are not as passionate. Here, they have a real impact on how we live and what we do. Our lives move with the rhythm of that and I like it. Spring and summer are both hectic for us. The garden demands a lot of time and you can see the growth rate. It really is a miraculous thing to see the raspberry cane we cut back to the ground in February groaning with fruit in July. The weeds do the same thing too, of course, which is less joyful, but you can't have everything.
Autumn is preparation time. Winter is for me, for the family, for letting the things that never had time to be thought about arrive and be assimilated. That is not always a comfortable thing, but it is just as necessary as the ruthless energy of spring and florid growth of summer.
No favourite then. Just the need for all of them. Greedy?
Saturday, 17 September 2011
Domestic drama
Yay.
It rained last night. Not hugely surprising in autumn. Unfortunately, the rain fell the wrong way and leaked in under the door and down the hall. This happens with fair regularity when we have abrupt heavy rain. It's the fault of the house for being 400 years old, built on a slope and having a sort of walled in yard in the middle of it into which every gutter eventually runs. If they all do it at once, in quantity, flooding ensues.
Towels down and it will dry quite fast, but wet feet this morning.
It rained last night. Not hugely surprising in autumn. Unfortunately, the rain fell the wrong way and leaked in under the door and down the hall. This happens with fair regularity when we have abrupt heavy rain. It's the fault of the house for being 400 years old, built on a slope and having a sort of walled in yard in the middle of it into which every gutter eventually runs. If they all do it at once, in quantity, flooding ensues.
Towels down and it will dry quite fast, but wet feet this morning.
Wednesday, 7 September 2011
Damson Massacre
The wind stripped both plum trees last night and quite a few damsons bit the dust as well. I'm not sure whether to be happy about this or not.
Having spent a lot of last weekend with my husband finding innovative ways of using plums I'm not that sorry to have had the plum issue taken out of our hands. The damsons I do feel a little guilty about. They make amazing jam. It tastes like warmly spiced plum all by itself and has an old-fashioned feel to it. Damson jam means autumn and the start of my favourite time of year.
They're a horror to prepare mind you. There is no way to de-stone the blighters. They have to be cooked. The stones rise to the surface and can be skimmed off. So all the books say, and despite my misgivings, the books are right. They do rise and you can skim them off. It's time-consuming and my glasses steam up watching hawk-like for the rising of the stones and wielding a slotted spoon.
Having spent a lot of last weekend with my husband finding innovative ways of using plums I'm not that sorry to have had the plum issue taken out of our hands. The damsons I do feel a little guilty about. They make amazing jam. It tastes like warmly spiced plum all by itself and has an old-fashioned feel to it. Damson jam means autumn and the start of my favourite time of year.
They're a horror to prepare mind you. There is no way to de-stone the blighters. They have to be cooked. The stones rise to the surface and can be skimmed off. So all the books say, and despite my misgivings, the books are right. They do rise and you can skim them off. It's time-consuming and my glasses steam up watching hawk-like for the rising of the stones and wielding a slotted spoon.
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