Down to earth ... with a bump

So after returning relaxed and lovely on Saturday and having a very pleasant evening catching up with Arty Daughter the dog sitter, Sunday brought us down to earth with a bump. Chav Central, situated somewher beneath the delightful flat we occupy in Urine Towers, was busy all day with young men consuming (actually relatively small) quantities of Stella Artois and feeling only its detrimental effects accompanied by shrieking young women. I can only surmise they were quaffing fruit based drinks a la "The Pub Landlord", probably Bacardi Breezer or something similar. These were having a similarly detrimental effect and very soon even more shrieking ensued and accusations and epithets were being bandied about with vigour. Bottles soon started to be dropped on the ground and we were quickly reminded why we had had such a good time in the middle of the countryside. I thought they had set in for the day but about 2 o'clock it went quiet again. Perhaps they had gone home for a nice Sunday dinner with their respective families I hear you ponder. Well that would be the conclusion any usual person might come to but apparently this wasn't the case; they went somewhere else and got (allegedly) stoned and had a few more Stellas and then decided to go for a Sunday afternoon drive.

So all this seems a very long way away.

But it's not too far away really as we are going down at the end of September. yay!!

We're back!!!

0ur holiday could be described as bright with sunny intervals and intermittent showers and I will report in the fullness of time along with a couple more piccies but for your delight and edification I present Mullion Cove - ta da!

Caravanitis

In my quest for all things "vanny" I stumbled across probably the most fantastic ebay listing I have ever read: ebay add. The sale has now closed so I'm not trying to flog you anything and I have nothing to do with this guy. Although if he had a blog I think I might have to pop in to see him every now and again.

You Gov

Take part in surveys used in the national press and television news and get paid for your time. If you sign up through this link, I get paid too which will help me buy a Carver Cascade water heater for this:

Every woman, every man join the caravan ...

... of love.

As I eluded in the post below, since I last posted we have become the proud and ever-so-slightly mad owners of a caravan.

A 1989 Ace Rallyman to be precise. After weeks of trawling used caravan adds I have now found the very van (well the very model anyway) and can therefore post lots of lovely pictures without actually having to go to ours. That little pleasure will have to wait until the slider in the post below reads 0.


I have, it is true to say become rather obsessive compulsive about it all as we have stayed in this van before two years ago and all our camping gear is actually already in it. The fact that I thought I would never see any of it again may go someway to explaining elation and excitement.

Any how I have 2 weeks in the middle of August booked and am fit to burst. I have never been on a holiday where I have had to pay a deposit before so at the tender age of 38 (on Monday anyway) a grown up holiday is something I am grasping with both hands and wrestling to the ground in that kind of matey play fighting rambunctiousness that teenage boys have about them.

In true anorak"tin-tenters" tradition I will now give you the lowdown on our "outfit".
We have a 2.0 Renault Laguna estate which is of absolutely no use as I don't drive and the Artist is still a bit incapacitated in that respect. In fact we are a bit dubious as to whether it actually works at all. Not to worry we are going on the train.

Our 1989 Ace Rallyman is a 2/3 berth with either 2 single bunks or one extra large double.
It does look somewhat like the one in the picture though ours has the added convenience of having opening curtains!

In the picture above you can just see (on the right) a gas fire and (on the left) a built in three-way fridge and ice box. We also have a table which goes in between the two 'banquettes'.

To the rear of the van is an end kitchen and end/side toilet/shower/washroom.

For some reason blogger doesn't want to upload these pictures but we have a sink, a three borner gas hob and a grill, loads of storage, a shower, wash basin and porta-potti. We also have a large awning which attaches to the side of the caravan complete with large dining table and lots of chairs. This converts to extra bedroom space which is useful given the fact that Surrealo Son is now a bit of a long thing. He was 15 last week and is now about an inch taller than me. (6' 2"?)

As you can probably tell my excitement knows no bounds - wish me a happy one for Monday. I appear to have been given a caravan from an unlikely source.

Happy holidays

So many things have been going on since I last posted and I haven't really got the time to do it just it now so I'll leave you with a tiny smidgeon of information above and keep you guessing until I have time to do the whole subject justice.

Who'd have thunk it?

Thanks to Cheryl, who appears to be back to her normal (?) self, you can now stereotype me by drink.

You Are A Martini

You are the kind of drinker who appreciates a nice hard drink. And for you, only quality alcohol. You don't waste your time on the cheap stuff. Obviously, you're usually found with a martini in your hand. But sometimes you mix it up with a gin and tonic. And you'd never, ever consider one of those flavored martinis. They're hardly a drink!

What Alcoholic Drink Are You?

As you can see, any of you worried that I might be dead this is not the case, I'm just a bit bogged down at work which finishes soon for the summer. Yee hah as they say in my nearest Martini bar.

Oliver's Adventures at LTB's house

This week had to be the one where Lachlan had to look after the class "pet". Oliver came complete with a bag and a book of his adventures at all the other boys and girls houses (all written by other mummies). Just another thing to add to the ever increasing list of things to do. I should probably add that Oliver is a toy cat not a real pet at all.
I have just finished it and I must admit to being quietly pleased, so here for your delight and edification is the story. Are you sitting comfortably? Right, then we'll begin.

OLIVER’S ADVENTURE AT LACHLAN’S HOUSE

Oliver came to stay at my house for the weekend but he didn’t know that he would actually stay a week. On Sunday we went to Mount Edgcumbe. It is a long way away and we had to get a bus and a ferry. It wasn’t very sunny but we had a barbecue anyway and I played football. Oliver sat on the mat and watched. After lunch I didn’t feel very well. Mummy said I had a temperature and we would need to go home. So we got a ferry and a bus back home.
On Monday I still wasn’t very well, my skin was very itchy and I had a headache and I was very hot. Oliver helped mummy to look after me; he kept me company and made me feel better
On Tuesday I was feeling a bit better but still not well enough to come back to school and I did something very silly: I hit my old dog Jack, on the head. It made him very frightened and he bit me. My mouth was bleeding and I had to go to hospital. A nurse looked at my mouth and said the doctor would need to look at it. When the doctor came He got a special face doctor to look at my mouth. She told my mummy I would need to have an operation to mend my lip and that I would need very strong medicine in my arm to make me better. Oliver was very worried about me and he went home with my daddy to wait for me.
In the afternoon a special doctor put me to sleep and when I woke up it was night-time. I was only awake for a little while. Mummy was at the hospital with me and she had to sleep in the playroom! She was very tired.
The next day the mouth doctor came and looked at my lip and said he thought it would get better soon but I needed to have some more strong medicine in my arm. I stayed at the hospital until I had had all my medicine. When I finished having my strong medicine in my arm I was allowed to go home and I went with mummy and daddy on the bus.
On Thursday I went to see my doctor to make my skin better; Oliver stayed at home and did some colouring in. My skin is feeling much better now and mummy says I can come back to school on Monday.
Oliver told me I was very mean to smack my dog and I won’t ever do it again: operations aren’t very nice; I would rather play with Oliver instead.

Friday Picture

Some pictures from the Painter's exhibition on the Barbican, Plymouth last year.

Courtesy of Surrealo Son

I'm probably the last person to find this site but courtesy of Surrealo Son yesterday in a vain attempt to cheer me up he introduced me to this. I haven't tried out the other bits and pieces yet but will do today whilst trying to complete some irksome tasks I have to get out of the way.

LTB in dog bite drama

I've been a bit distracted. At the moment the whole world feels like a very hostile and unkind place and I feel completely overwhelmed. I will be about but there is just so much ruminating going on in my head that there is no other room for words.

Little Jenny Wren

This post was inspired by Doris over at Grans on Bran. Many Happy Returns, Doris.

Your anniversary date is one I share as on 9 June 1986 I left home aged 17 to join the Women's Royal Naval Service as a trainee Wren Radar. The girls I shared a mess (bedroom) with were Sue Thomas, Elaine ____ from Sunderland, Claire Norsworthy from Cardiff and Lesley ______ who's dad had been in the Navy with mine.

I could say that I joined for all the usual reasons given for joining the armed forces but in truth I joined to escape a situation that over the previous six years had eroded my confidence and broken me into tiny fragments of myself. The shards were so shattered that it has taken me the intervening twenty years to try and reassemble them and they are still not all in the right order and some may still be missing in action.

At 17 I found myself close to emotional meltdown and considered a career in the Wrens as a safer option than the complete boundarylessness of the next few years spent at University. In fact it was anything other than safe and in effect just pulverised the shards into smaller fragments than they would otherwise have been.

My memories are therefore bittersweet. I do not blame the Navy; my expectations were flawed. The people I met were not all angels and their motives were sometimes very suspect but on the whole they were good people. I was the ubiquitous square peg and however hard I tried I just didn't fit.

I have felt like that for a lot of my adult life apart from here; I actually feel like I do fit in. What that says about the rest of you, though, I couldn't begin to imagine.

New thingamajig

I'm trying something new while I wrestle with something old. I have a Sheweevil forum which I am trying out: FORUM.

Friday Picture

This one is off down under soon to a lovely patron of the arts and I must admit to it being a favourite. It also currenlty adorns our livingroom wall and so as with any of the Painter's pictures it will, no literally, leave a gap.

In other news the bits and pieces have arrived from cafe press and are so fabulous that the bag I bought for Happy Christmas Fairy is going nowhere fast. Sorry and all that but I just love it too much to part with it. One word of caution though; if any of you decide to buy something and your order exceeds £18 you will be liable to pay UK duty.

I will get you one, Happy, you jst can't have this one and Huffy you just need to tell me which design you like.

Sorry the rest of you, just chat amongst yourselves, it's the only way we three weird sisters communicate with each other. I exaggerate but only slightly. If I can get the battery charger to work I will post a piccie of the true loveliness of the stuff later including perhaps one of the Painter sporting a very attractive strawberry tee-shirt.

In more other news my lovely allotment neighbour Tom has managed to get me a water butt all I have to do is is dig a hole to sit it in so that the kids who live nearby and collect gardening implements to sell at car boots don't kick it over.

That's tomorrow sorted out then: a hole to dig. Strange, that; I'm more used to digging myself out of them than in.

Moses supposes ...

To make up for my lack of posting I thought I would send you all flowers. Well, a flower at any rate. This is the William Morris posted about previously, and as you can see it now is flowering.

It's really appreciating being in a bright and sunny position as opposed to where it was before. It got the best of the sunlight in my old garden but still not really enough to keep it happy.

It was a bit of a shame to dead head it really but the bloom is beginning to fade with intensity of the sunshine and hopefully it will just encourage it to flower some more.

Hugs to all.

Of cabbages and kings ...

So we spent the day yesterday laying the rest of the weed fabric my lovely mum got me for my birthday (which isn't until July but the garden wouldn't wait that long) including some of the paths. I also managed to plant out 10 Sweetcorn plants, a variety called Lark and 15 each of Red Cabbage (Inferno), Brussel Sprouts (Diablo), Cauliflower (Skywalker) and Savoy Cabbage (Famosa). I have planted cornflowers in amongst the sweetcorn and hope that they will help the ground stay freer of weeds and provide some additional support and help in pollinating the corn.

I actually only managed to fit 52 of the brassica plants in the bed I'd put aside for them and have had to dot the spare around in various places to make sure they don't go to waste. I'm planting morre intensively than recommeneded as I only have a half plot veg and a second half plot for fruit. My allotment neighbour, Tom (80 next year) says he doesn't think they are even halves and I should get it remeasured but to be honest I've got about as much as I can cope with at the moment I shall just have to try and give them extra food until I can manure all the beds in the winter. I think I'm going to get them some pelleted chicken manure (called Cluck!)

It was very hot there yesterday and Friday and, according to another allotment neighbour, it was up to 90 degrees on his shed; I did feel somewhat like the witch in the Wizard of Oz: "I'm melting" but survived and the whole place, although not looking massively attractive with the addition of the plastic matting does, at least, look and feel a tad more manageable.

In other news, it's back to work on Monday, so no more halcyon days indulging my shepherdess fantasy.

*Wanders off singing "high on a hill lived a lonely goatherd ...."*

Friday picture

Sadly this is another one that has gone to the place where unwanted paintings (underneath other paintings) go. I love it and had I seen it before it was overpainted would have shouted "Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo" in slow motion. I love it. It helps that green is my favourite coulour. There is an underlying sense of corruption which I adore.

As ever it is by my lovely husband and talent on legs John Morris. We are excitedly awaiting delivery of two tote bags, a t-shirt and packet of greetings cards from here.

The sun has got his hat on ...

Yestreday, after the funeral, I went up to the allotment to do a bit more preparation. I wore the black cotton top that I had worn to the funeral as it's stretchy and comfortable to work in but it has no sleeves. This means it's quite cool, I also had on a pair of baggy dark grey linen trouser and felt comfortable despite the sunshine.
I didn't think "stick on a hat, something long sleeved or at the very least some suncream" and consequently today I am paying the price. If someone could find a method of converting the heat coming from my arms into something useful we could heat a greenhouse or three, quite probably.
Ally asked about the cheese and it is still being quite cheesy. I heated 2 pints of milk to blood temperature and added Vegeren to the amount stated on the bottle (10 drops per pint) and waited for it to set. Once it was thoroughly cooled I strained the curds from the whey using a linen napkin (as I had no muslin to hand) and then later I put a knife through the curds added some salt and pressed the curds into a mold (a 3 inch plat pot that I had) lined with some curtain netting that I had. At this stage it tasted a little like mozarella and was the same kind of consistency but after being pressed over night it now smells cheesy. I have been looking at the recipes here and am hoping that my little bit of cheese will turn into something resembling a brie*.
It may be horrid; I don't know but I have been wanting to try this for quite a while and I am, so far, very pleased with the results. Just the rudimentary equipment I have to hand has meant I have something that resembles cheese. It may be that in a couple of weeks I have something unpleasant that I don't want to touch we'll have to see. I'll keep you posted.
*Note to self: In future do not enter term "brie" into google images unless you want something you hadn't bargained for. Try Camembert instead.

Gardeners delight...

... or mine anyway. As promised I am back, having made 4lbs of lemon curd and some homemade cheese. I'm nothing if not industrious, me.
I have spent most of the last few days (Sunday, Monday and Tuesday) at the allotment. Actually that's not strictly true. We did go on Sunday with LTB in tow but had to abort our visit due to boy/rake issues. Our visit was long enough to discover that some form of arthropod has attacked the tiny sprouts of our Golden Ball onion sets. I discovered also that we have lots of lovely strawberries coming through too.
Yesterday Surrealo Son and I went up and he sheared down the grass and dandelions around the fruit bushes so that I can lay the weed suppressant fabric round and about. I turned over another bed (the one that I had done on Monday) in readiness for our 60 brassica plants that are due any day now, hoed around the strawbs and earthed up our new potatoes, Adora. They're about 5 or 6 inches tall now. They went in a week earlier than the Catriona which are just breaking through.
This morning 10 sweetcorn plants arrived; they will have to wait until Friday now as I have to go to a funeral tomorrow and won't have time. They join the globe artichokes in the things to do list, although I have potted them up and they are sitting on the kitchen windowsill. Did I tell you that already? Am I loosing my mind?
The most exciting thing of all is the tiny pea sized apricots or nectarines on my unidentified fruit trees which even have tiny green bum clefts. There are also a plethora of red/white and black currants although the strimmed goosberry bush seems not to have survived.
Last but not least, I have to report that my Maigold rose is flowering its little heart out and my William Morris is just about to follow suit.
So as they say, somewhere, everything in the garden is lovely.

New and lovely

A repository for my recipes can be found here: http://sheweevilsmoveablefeasts.blogspot.com/.

I will be posting about the allotment a little later.