anyresemblance

Loaves and fishes

The zopf was delicious but add some fishes and I have enough to feed the multitude. Tonight I had to eject one of our cats and his mouse from the house three times. The last time he refused to budge and growled at me. Miss S had to pick him up and bodily place him outside complaining "ewwh, you've got mouse breath, Misty". We couldn't get the cat flap to lock so we barricaded it with the washing basket until we were sure he had got rid of it (probably in his very fat stomach). Two weeks ago, my babysitter rescued a mouse she found swimming in the toilet that had escaped the same cat. She took it outside and left it in the bushes, worrying if she should have wrapped it in a blanket (???). I told her it would follow her home thinking she was Friend To All Creatures. The workshop was hard work and despite going slightly off the rails at lunchtime I got what I wanted by the end of today but 8 hours in a room with 15 other people is only slight less painful than a contract negotiation. Actually, it might be worse because at least with contracts it's ok to acknowledge that the other side have a different agenda to you. In this session, we were supposed to be all on the same side but it was obvious that there were many internicine battles being waged. Poof, corporate politics is so wearing. I am considering selling my piano. I don't play but my daughter does but not often and she can play a much better baby grand at her father's. We plan to put the money towards a holiday in late September. The children want to go to San Francisco. I have a feeling that Charmed has influenced this desire. We can fly there with Hawaiin airlines way cheaper than Qantas but I think we have to stop over in Hawaii. I need to do some research but it's exciting to have a trip to plan. I am tired and plan to do not much all weekend.

On balance

I am not going to a conference in Prague in May like some of my colleagues BUT I was happy that I made the point about the lack of visibility of his selection process to my boss and he was then forced to ask me to provide feedback on his management style for a leadership course he is doing. I was frank. My daughter mistook the container with the beef and anchovy stew for her lunch box and it all spilled in her school bag BUT it was washable and her nice teacher lent her money to buy lunch. I have a potentially stressful workshop that I am running tomorrow BUT I made good preparations today and am happy that I have the risks covered off. I paid out $50 in babysitting last night BUT my kids got to spend time with their old babysitter who was so happy to see them AND I got to have dinner with 10 women colleagues from work and we had the best time. As a result of last night, I am organising an event with our women customers. It's an antidote to golf days. We're going to a private viewing and dinner at the National Gallery. I had a good talk with a headhunter yesterday. I don't know who the company is and it's kind of hard for me to feel enthusiasm for a nameless entity. They won't tell me till they short list but I asked her, do you think I'm a good fit? She said, oh yes, but it's quite a blokey environment, how do you think you'd feel about working in that. I told her when i went to teach in Libya, Col Gadaffi was trying to encourage more girls to enter the university and my recruitment was part of a conscious drive to have women teachers (ha, the practicality was something else) so I didn't think it was too much of an ask. Then today, I was talking to my friend M and we were discussing how would it be to work in an environment surrounded by people who wanted to help you get the work done without scoring points, understood your life and shared your interests and wanted to have fun while they were working. Is that too much to ask? I am trying to make zopf at the moment. It doesn't seem to be rising as much as I would anticipate but I'm telling myself it's because it's such a rich dough but I'm not sure how late I want to stay up...

Rough puff

Friday night I ate not particularly good Indian food with my step-son and his girlfriend. It rained which was a gift after months of nothing but dry. Manuka was packed with a very dreary crowd. My step-son was waxing at great length about eco diesel and a get rich scheme but though it all sounded plausible, experience has demonstrated that he is strong on ideas and weak on execution. It's a continuing financial sore that I am still, via my marital obligations, funding his education at 23. He's a nice young man but this drives me nuts. Saturday morning I was up early to drive down to collect my children. I bought a flat white and an almond croissant in Silo and hit the road. The temperature dropped and the sky got more leaden the closer I got to the high country. I began to worry that my fleece was not going to be enough warmth for standing in a paddock watching a mini-horse trial. As I cut across country outside Cooma I could see traces of snow on the mountains. Fortunately, the horse people had decided to exempt us from pony parade. I was so happy to see my children. They were predictably tired and grubby but full of horse gossip. It's a great environment with lots of emphasis on safety, respect for others and personal responsibility. The winter activity of the horse people is in breaking in brumbies from Kosciuszko. Both of my girls want to ride in the Jindabyne gymkhana in two weeks so I agreed they could do it since the horse people will lend them horses. By the time we got back home it was still only around 12C so we lit the fire and moved the tv into the sitting room and snuggled up and watched movies all the rest of the afternoon. On Anzac Day I knitted a scarf for Miss S in a yarn I bought at Kingston market. It's shades of pink and flame and a twisted mohair. I spent the afternoon knitting a cobwebby sort of affair. I half hoped she'd reject it so I could keep it but alas she likes it. She had been to her friend's and brought home the most divine fudge choc chip cookies they had made. Today was a cooking day. We made a beef, thyme and anchovy stew adapted from nigella lawson but with mushrooms instead of celery; a bolognaise sauce to see us through those evenings when anything more arduous than grating cheese will induce a fit of the vapours; lemon biscuits from the Stephanie Alexander and Maggie Beer Tuscan cookbook. I also made a wholemeal loaf from Sophie Grigson's recipe - you add a crushed vit c tablet and although I don't know the chemistry for this it really seems to lighten the loaf. I am still in pursuit of the flour to make wheaten bread the way I tasted it in Ireland. I have, in the past, brought the flour back with me. I recall it having yellow flecks in it and wonder if it's cornmeal. I tried mixing polenta with my flour but have never really managed to reproduce it. We also made risotto again for dinner. I've worked out that the ritual of ladling in the stock is one my older daughter likes. In fact, she loves the predictable all round. We made this one with lemon again but this time added some sauteed zucchini. Pretty damn good. Of course, the glass of Cloudy Bay sauvignon blanc tossed in at the beginning may have added to the overall deliciousness. Kitschenette had a supplementary food blog. She asked me about my formula for rough puff pastry and I failed to post this. This won't make mille feuille but it's good for sausage rolls and pies. 500g plain flour 250g butter (it needs to be very cold, you can put it in the freezer to do this) iced water Put the flour in a bowl and grate the butter into it - keep dipping the butter in the flour if it starts to stick on your grater. You need to use one with large holes. Using a flat bladed knife, stir in enough cold water to make a dough. Turn out onto a flour board and roll into a rectangle. Fold in the bottom third and then top third. Give it a quarter turn, roll out gently again and repeat. I do this about 10 times. In classic pastry making, I think you are supposed to let it rest every 3 turns but give me a break. Let it rest in the fridge for 30 mins then use. Easy peasy. Note 1: I think my mother used half butter, half lard but I can never find lard in my supermarket. Note 2: lest anyone think I am too precious, I once went to a cookery demonstration by Sophie Grigson who was asked about how she made her puff pastry. She looked incredulous, "I buy it in Sainsbury's, like any sane person" she replied.

Green with envy

I may have mentioned before that on 31 October 2003, in the great Yarralumla heist, I was relieved of all my jewellery. This ranged from the fabulous diamond earrings I received in the wake of an infidelity to the macaroni necklace my daughter made me when she was 4. My wedding ring, engagement ring and eternity ring were among the stolen items. As was my daughter's charm bracelet with a cute lobster in a lobster pot I brought her from Boston and a minature replica of the Mary Rose from Portsmouth. And my mother's gold watch bought for her by my father in Glasgow in 1973. And the amber and silver ring I bought her for her birthday from Liberty's; she chose it herself and I kept it after she died. And the charming necklace that I bought for myself in Liberty's with coloured glass and enamel hearts that every child wanted to play with whenever I wore it. And the sapphire and diamond earrings I bought in the gold souk in Tripoli; they were so heavy they hurt my ears but I would wear them every Christmas. The vile insurance company has finally settled. It's very odd to be spending your way through a large amount of money like this. There was no option to take cash and do something useful like pay a lump off my mortgage. So I've been spending it with a tinge of guilt. My engagement and eternity rings were diamonds and emeralds. I loved them. When I split up from my husband, a jeweller asked me if I'd like them remade into something else but I said no since I didn't want to erase the past and thought that one day I'd give them to my daughters. So I was sad that they were stolen. And I really love emeralds. Today I bought a new diamond and emerald ring. So this ring acknowledges the past but it was chosen all by me, and worn by me for me. All the women in my office have admired it greatly. I can't describe how beautiful it looks - and I do not have beautiful hands or a flawless manicure (or any manicure for that matter). My friend, P, said "oh my, that's a MegaCorp women exec ring" since we have a non-scientific survey going of senior women in our company and the size of the diamonds they wear. Except I have a stunning emerald ring. Nah, nah, nah. I didn't have to struggle up the corporate ladder to get this one. I was robbed.

Desert (Island) Books

I found a box of papers on the weekend that I handed over to the children's father as I thought they were all his. He brought back a few files which were mine. I didn't even know I still had them nor that I had transported them through three countries and eight house moves. One was full of letters from friends in Libya, a stack of the postcards I wrote about last month (including some snippets I had forgotten like No democracy without popular congresses and Partners not wage workers ) and a stamped form authorising me to remove personal property from the country on departure.

List of Educational Books, personal property of anyresemblance, English Dept, Faculty of Education, Al-Fatah University, to be taken out of Libya on exit, July 1984. Madhur Jaffrey, Eastern Vegetarian Cookery George Orwell, Decline of the English Murder Jane Austen, Persuasion Claudia Roden, A Book of Middle Eastern Food Anthony Hutt, Islamic Architecture ed. Elizabeth Hardwick, A Susan Sontag Reader Clifford Quick, Cystitis Greil Marcus, Mystery Train Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions John Buchan, Greenmantle

Susan Sontag! What was I thinking? I think I knew I would have limited reading material and I would be forced to read this but I don't think I got past the introduction. In fact, the first four were what sustained me, along with Agatha Christie mysteries from the British Council library - before it closed and I was forced to read censored copies of the Economist or Good Housekeeping. I read very quickly (yesterday, for example, I read Jenny Siler's Flashback and Nick Hornsby's 31 Songs - neither of which are hard going but are about 300 pages). But I do re-read a lot of my books. With the benefit of hindsight, this would be my revised desert island reading list. I'm assuming the rule that Shakespeare and the Bible (or spiritual text of your choice is already there). I'm also assuming rescue at some stage; I can't imagine a life where there are no new writers or books to discover. Jane Austen, Persuasion Alexander McCall Smith, The Number 1 Ladies Detective Agency Elizabeth David, An omlette and a glass of wine PG Wodehouse, all the jeeves and wooster series Dorothy L Sayers, The Nine Tailors John Buchan, The 39 Steps Arthur Ransome, Pigeon Post Sebastian Faulks, Birdsong Charles Dickens, Hard Times Philip Pullman, His Dark Materials I'm not saying these are my favourite books in the whole world, but they are books which I read for a sense of the familiar. Now, what strikes me about this list is how very English it all is, and a kind of golden age Englishness, even Mma Ramotswe, rooted as she is in Botswana is resonant of those women sleuths of the 30s. Which is just what I want to sustain me on a desert island. Or when I'm stuck at home ill.

I am sore afflicted with an ague

I have benign positional vertigo. It's so nice to be able to affix an impressive label to one's ailments. Yesterday I left work in the afternoon since I thought I was going to throw up from the thumping migraine that I had. I came home and slept, then slept some more though I woke up every hour through the night. This morning, the headache was gone but I fell out of bed. I went to the dr and she said she thought the dizziness was probably precipitated by a viral infection and made worse by migraine. She gave me some medication and a medical certificate until Friday. Let me confess now, I have never had a sick day in the 7 years I have worked in this company, but given my current state of mind and the legitimacy of my ailments I am taking the time. I talked to my secretary and we rescheduled the most important things. I've turned off my phone and unplugged my work computer and I am going to take some time for myself.

Baked in a pie

My weekend with my children was good. Friday night we ate takeaway thai food - chicken satay, tom yum ga, stir fried beef with chili and basil and coconut rice. It was very yummy and my oldest daughter loves chili. Saturday we went out to the kitchen shop to buy some individual pie dishes. We got oval white porcelain and they were only $3 each. After horse riding, we went home, ate lunch and my younger daughter and I made pastry. I learned to make pastry watching my mother and though she did some things which never made sense (like putting a pinch of baking powder in it) she was a terrific baker so I follow her example. We made a sort of rough puff pastry by grating the fat into the flour. Then Miss I did the gentle rolling and folding 10 times. My mother never let pastry rest but I find if I don't then the bloody thing always shrinks and I have leaking filling on my oven floor. We made leek and chicken filling for Miss I and me, and a sort of ratatouille with olives for Miss S. They looked terrific but since I left my $%#@ camera at the beach I am unable to show off my culinary prowess. On Saturday night we watched Gilmore Girls, another secret vice, and had an early night. Sunday morning I was up early finishing packing their bags for horse camp - this consists of scruffy t-shirts, jodphurs and old track pants since this is a no-frills adventure. Their father wanted to drive down with us and since he is going to China on business and won't see them for a couple of weeks I felt compelled to agree. But I have to say sitting in the car with him for 5 hours has left my shoulders in a knot of tension. We stopped en route to see farming friends. Although they are also friends of his, it was an awkward visit and despite an extra cute new kelpie puppy to play with we didn't stay long. We dropped the girls at the farm and settled them into their rooms. Miss S headed off to the horses immediately and I left Miss I cuddling a ginger kitten on the bench outside the kitchen door. I avoided conversation on the drive home by listening to this. It's very well read with the author narrating and the dialogue with actors. I woke up this morning with stiff shoulders and a dread for the working week. At least, I am going to Pilates tonight. Over here, Alan has an excellent piece on the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza (Bantuising Gaza - links don't seem to be working). It encapsulated the what's wrong with this picture discomfort I was feeling.

Dashing away with the smoothing iron

There have been some comments on ironing. One of my earliest childhood memories is of playing on the kitchen floor while my mother was ironing. She never let laundry sit around in the ironing basket. Things were ironed the day they were washed and then into the airing cupboard. (She also had a contraption predating tumble dryers, called a flatley - a heated box with hanging rails.) The smell of hot, slightly damp cotton is the smell of my childhood. On Sunday evenings my father would press his suit with a hot iron and a damp cloth. I never saw him iron anything else until my mother became ill. Now we tease him for ironing socks. "Didn't your mother iron socks?", he asks us. His shirts were to be folded. I loathed trying to fold them so they were all the same size in a drawer. I only learnt the easiest order to iron shirts in from a friend a few years ago - collar, yoke, sleeves, body. I loathed ironing when I was married. I gave up wearing linen and cotton and bought clothes that didn't need to be ironed. I think ironing, like many other domestic tasks, was laden with resentment of all the things I was doing and he was not. Now I enjoy many household tasks as I'm doing them for myself. And I love the feel of ironed cotton pillowcases.

The root of all evil

Phew, this going to work is hard stuff. The girls are on school holidays so the blessed Mary came to look after them yesterday while I ran from one meeting to another. On my friend's recommendation, I watched the L Word last night. I love it but I have to learn to program my video since it's on way too late for me (ie, after 10pm). I never watch Letterman because a) it's on at midnight and b) the tv guides never tell you who is going to be on and if it's worth staying up for. I got a letter at work today.

Happy Easter. Dear Mummy. I love you. Do you love me. I will miss you lots and lots and lots when I got to camp. Love you! Miss I

On Tuesday, after we had a falling out, I found the following on my pillow:

Dear Mrs Green. I hate you. Goodbye for ever. I'm never coming back to this life again. I hope you have the baddest holiday. Bad luck. Miss I.

Today they are at a workshop on Creative Candleabra. Teff, the teacher, lives close by and runs their really cool art workshops from her house. She's an inspiring teacher and the girls are really looking forward to spending the day at her house. Next week the kids are off to a horse riding camp near Cooma. This time they are both going since Miss I had decided she likes horses again. I had my hair cut this morning which was an enormously rewarding time out from the office. Then I got taken to lunch and given a bottle of Moet champagne for signing a contract last week. The bottle had a card that said "with thanks, from mgt". Who are these mgt, I ask myself. Still, I didn't pass up the free lunch at ArtEspresso and had barramundi with a salsa of tomato and pickled lemon. It was yummy. Mgt, of course, like talking about themselves a lot but I tuned out. Now I'm home waiting for the plumber to arrive to run the electric eel through my sewage pipes. I have tree roots which grow into them but faced with choice between $10,000 to replace all my old pipes and $100 a pop to unblock them I am going for the cheaper option. Did I mention it is 30 today? It's the middle of autumn and it's still hot. And no bloody rain. Frost forecast for the weekend, though.

Just stuff

The father of my children called tonight to talk to them. He asks, what did you do today. Just stuff, I hear my daughters reply. Here's the stuff we did. Alas, we have head lice again. This time I got them too so the day started with getting rid of them and patient combing. Then I laundered all the sheets and towels and hair ties and hung them all out in the sunshine. I took down the netting over the fig tree. I had only just put it away in the shed and gone back to the tree and there was already a magpie in the tree. I chased it off to get the last of the fruit off the tree. Then I swept up two wheelbarrows of leaves. The I made the beds up with clean sheets. Miss S's friend came over and they played a Harry Potter cd-rom. Then they printed off medieval recipes. They are reading the Redwall books at the moment and seem obsessed with mead and the like. They wanted to make crystallised rose petals so they gathered stuff off one of my bushes. They made a sugar syrup while I looked on in fear of burnt skin but they were safe and sensible. Unfortunately, my sugar thermoter got dropped towards the end of the proceedings. As it was covered in syrup it stuck to the floor which was a challenge to clear up. Miss S's friend said the rose petals tasted like artichokes. I don't think this was high praise. Since the big girls were cooking, Miss I made a marble cake with lurid application of food colouring. It tastes pretty good though. Then I ironed sheets and pillow cases and we all watched Pride and Prejudice. I was surprised at how attentive my 8 year old was. They watched about an hour of it which was good going. Then they played outside on the trampoline while I hoovered and tidied up. Miss I walked down to the newsagent by herself and came back with a restaurant pad which cost her $1.50. She is delighted with it and has enjoyed taking our orders for various meals all day. The bit she likes best is the carbon paper between the sheets. I share her love of stationery and find it charming that she is fascinated by carbon paper. It is a struggle for me letting her test her independence but I try to balance my fear of the unlikely with the need for her to expand the boundaries of her world safely. I am heartened that I live in a safe suburb in a safe town and that if I stand on the edge of my tiny upstairs balcony I can see to the local shops. When I was her age I walked a couple of miles to school but it seems almost unthinkable to let her do that. Tonight we made risotto for dinner with lemon and black olives. This is a nice soothing thing to do when you have helpers to ladle in stock and stir and grate parmesan cheese. It was perfect comfort food for a cool autumnal evening. We have some left over and I plan to attempt those arancini balls tomorrow. Tomorrow I have to emerge from my cocoon of domesticity into the work world again. sigh.