anyresemblance

The Help

It is extremely rainy here today which is both welcome and not that usual.  I have cranked the heating on and all the animals are making themselves cosy though none so as unhelpful as Ned who decided my keyboard was the optimal place to warm himself.

I managed to finish a few more books and am halfway through one so am sort of almost on track for my 75 book goal.  I read Hitch in 2 hours last night at my daughter's recommendation. It's a good thing it has a reasonably happy ending and a good dog as it is otherwise very traumatising and not really what you want to read in the current situation.  In happier content, I am reading The Dictionary of Lost Words which is a little bit pleased with itself (expect to see it on many book club lists) but an enjoyable read just the same and a very clever conceit.

Swings and roundabouts

One of the characteristics of this locked down is the total paralysis I seem to experience every now and then.  Saturday was hugely productive and energetic (18,000 steps!) with the house cleaned and shopping done and a delicious dinner cooked.  Sunday I got up and walked the dog and then went back to bed, almost unheard of for me, and then wasted time on bad telly including Van Der Valk to which I am inexplicably addicted.  Despite it having none of the charm of the original with a terrible script, total cliche of the rag tag posse of iconoclastic detectives and bad acting, I am loving the Amsterdam backdrop.  

Today is fortunately a public holiday for Anzac Day and I have cleaned the oven, fixed the sliding door, tidied out the weird kitchen utensil drawer and listened to 4 episodes of Last Seen, a fascinating podcast about the heist at the Gardner museum in Boston 30 years ago which I had no recollection of.   I can't bear the ghastly performative nature of Anzac Day.  I think my neighbour is miffed with me for failing to get up at dawn to stand at the end of my drive way but I am breezing my way through and he can call me on it if he likes.  The downside of this pandemic is the urge to snoop and tattle tail on your neighbours.

Five years ago I was in Istanbul with ganching.  If this stupid health crisis were not on, I would be preparing for a west coast road trip with her.  It is very annoying not to be able to replan our trip but I am really hoping it will be within got next year.

 

Cognac

I'm obsessed with warm tones for autumn.   My bed linen is the colour of autumn leaves and we've been collecting words for those tones.  I feel for designers trying to find new words to describe their colours.  I saw a velvet cushion on the target web site but it was described as chipmunk coloured.  These Birkenstocks (my winter offering since I am wearing socks and stocks these days) are described as mink.  I am pretty sure a real mink is a much paler colour than these so I dub them cognac.

 

 

Burnt out

This is such a sedate suburb I am really not sure what the story is here with this burnt out car but it's been there a couple of days so Charlie and I did a little detour on our walk this morning so I could inspect it closer.  Anyway, it's probably a metaphor for something.

I have eaten extremely well the last few days:

cauliflower tacos from Molly Yeh

porky delicious from my favourites at Bon Appetit.  I bought pork shoulder and minced it myself as I'm squeamish

 

The price of vanity

I am about 4 weeks overdue for a hair appointment and given I go every 6 weeks anyway and my hair grows fast, that was a fair amount of grey.  I was weathering it ok until a video conference on Friday from a different angle, showed a view which did not match how I wished to project myself.

I had the forethought a few weeks ago to investigate how I could ship some Madison Reed.  I used to go to their salon in NYC and it provided a cheaper option for dealing with my hair than any other NYC hair stylist I could find.  Sadly, they do not ship to Australia but I then signed up for a shipping service.  Suffice to say, what with woeful exchange rate and fedex shipping it cost me well over what a normal salon experience does but at least I now have all the equipment to keep me going for another 6 weeks.  Sadly, I do not have cutting skills (I did cut my hair when I was in my twenties but I have more sense now)

Bucolic

This really is my favourite season.  The days are clear, the sky is bright blue, it's cool in the mornings and evenings and the trees are changing colours.  I have had beautiful walks this weekend.  Last night when I came down the hill there were at least a dozen kangaroos peacefully grazing within ten metres.  Usually, they move away when people, especially those with dogs pass, but these were totally unconcerned with us.  I had Charlie on the lead but he barely seemed to register them either.

Tonight we did more streets and it is delightful to see how many children are playing in the street outside their houses.  There are chalk pictures and home made ramps for bike tricks.  Elderly neighbours are bringing their camping chairs out in late afternoon to drink a glass of wine or cup of tea and share good will with people across the street.  Frankly, I am loving it.  

I had to attend to my roots today.  Of course, I didn't have to, I could have taken the plunge to go grey but I was not feeling it.  It is fiddly and messy doing it at home but I did and it looks fine but golly hairdressers deserve their money.

Day

In the stupid hail storm in January some plastic panels on my garage roof were damaged.  Unfortunately, their repair is taking forever because: insurance company, rain preventing builders and now stupid pandemic.  Even more unfortunately some heavy rain has got into the garage and ruined some cushions stored in there, some old framed art and some suitcases.  The mould is impossible to remove from the cushions so I have dumped them all at the tip but brought everything inside so today has been rearranging the linen cupboard to fit stuff in (suitable washed and dried, I'm not a complete savage.)

I did not sleep well last night and had a dark night of the soul.  I did not want to get out of bed this morning but did lever myself out before 8 and walked the dog and everything felt better.  I then went to Coles for an early shop and was rewarded with a 12 pack of loo roll which is just as well as we were down to our last 3. I should also celebrate the kid got the vacuum cleaner out without any passive aggressive sighing on my part so things are not so bad.

I spent most of the day in domestic pottering but we have made coffee ice cream for our choc tops.  I ended up  just buying waffle cones as I have lost my crepe pan somewhere in the last 3 years and could not be arsed trying to do it in my rubbish frying pan and had no intention of spending $$$ on a new one. I am making steak frites for dinner and even scored some tarragon to make béarnaise so we will be well fed.

We also redid the gallery wall a couple of weeks ago and it pleases me much more.  The airconditioner is ugly in  what is already a room with a low ceiling but the smaller pictures are an improvement.  I also put in a bigger rug which works so much better and changed up the cushions.  I bought the matryoshka years ago on a visit to Warsaw.  The iron curtain had only just come down and my then brother in law had been posted there to open a western bank.  I recall the food was terrible, there were armed guards who came every night to sleep in his basement and we lost our luggage on the way over.  I did buy some beautiful krosno glasses, this matryoshka and a cathedral made entirely of sweet wrappers.

 

In flight

We are planning a cinema night.  I said we had to have home made choc ices but my daughter drew the line at printing tickets and neither of us are big popcorn consumers.  I am now googling how to make waffle cones for the true choc top experience.

I ordered four more books, talked to my sister who got some half dead flowers I ordered (I ordered alive but they came half dead which is irritating), did a LOT of work, ate a home made burger for lunch and washed out the microwave which still smells of burnt sweet potato 5 months after the fact.

The weather is glorious.  Warm but autumnal.  We are lucky we still have short walks in the woods available to us.  In possibly the most on brand thing ever, our local government is about to institute one way walks round the lake.

*I don't really care where I fly to next, I just want to be in an airport with that sense of possibility

Cheering things

1. Videos of owls on twitter
2. My daughter researching how to optimise coffee making in our stove top espresso pot
3. Watching Bon Appetit test kitchen and snooping around the kitchens
4. Rediscovering crinkle cut chips and how nice hot chips are
5. Watching Morning Wars - I did not realise it was so dark but Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon are astonishingly good
6. Charlie - always. 

 

Same old

I know that this blog is really just the daily minutiae but there is so little variation in the days it is hard to find anything to do.

It was delightful to have 5 days off work (I added an extra day as we have been exhorted to take 5 days leave before June so that the whole company does not get hit come December, as if anyone can think that many months ahead).  I used that extra day and the absence of the dog to some social excursion to deep clean the house and felt very lightened by having washed the floor and emptied all the fridge shelves etc.  I also watched Unorthodox which I loved and urge you to watch forthwith.

I managed to read 3 books over the weekend so am creeping back to only 10% behind my target this year.

I listened to a few podcasts and am relieved the High Low is back with its book recommendations.

I made a sad chocolate tart from Ottolenghi.  I mean it was fine but it hardly seemed the effort it involved.  I had a better attempt with some Marcella Hazan tomato sauce and my daughter made beautiful cauliflower cheese last night.

I miss going to the cinema and browsing in the bookshop.  Heck, I even miss airport life and doing the sudoko in the qantas magazine and checking into a hotel room.