Category: Uncategorized

Taking my time

I walked to Singing for Pleasure today for the exercise and the thinking time. Since retiring, it’s still a novelty to have time without lists or ‘must-dos’. I don’t even mind waking in the night anymore as it gives me time to think about the day and is a good time to process whatever is going on.

After Singing, I wandered along to the central city, ending up in the rarified and calming atmosphere of Ballantynes, where I ran into a friend and a friend of a friend.

In need of sustenance before walking home, I stopped in at She Chocolaterie for a raspberry and rose hot chocolate. The new mural/wallpaper reminded me of Portugal, but I guess it’s likely to be Latin America as that is their theme. I worked out that I have treated myself to three hot chocolates here since I retired over 3 years ago – one a year isn’t bad! This time, I felt the need to counteract the richness with a thin slice of toasted sourdough when I got home.

On the way, I stopped in Victoria Square (formerly Market Square) to read an extract from a Fiona Farrell poem, look at the autumn colours and, further on, to admire a large toadstool by the Southern Cross hospital.

amanita muscaria

In the market square

they trade leaves

for a song,

solid ground

for a fistful

of water

Fiona Farrell, ‘The Deal’, 2015.

Soggy Start

While nothing like the deluge in Auckland, the steady rain here this morning led to my guttering overflowing. This signalled a blockage, so donning an old raincoat, red band gumboots and rubber gloves, I climbed the ladder to check it out. The combination of autumn leaves and rain is not the best, but it looked as if I hadn’t cleared the gutters for a while. There was grass, moss and even a little tree growing up there. Surely it hadn’t been that long?! I filled a bucket with the sludge and tipped it on the garden.

While it was still raining and I had my wet weather gear on, I kicked leaves out of the gutters on the street to clear the drains.

It was all quite enjoyable somehow, even as the knees of my trousers became soggy and water ran up my sleeves. It doesn’t look as if Felix likes the rain much, though.

Pumpkin Pie

A friend with a very productive garden gave us some pumpkin this afternoon as we left her house after playing cards. I was intending to make an apricot dessert that evening, but one of our card players suggested pumpkin pie.

I found a recipe in my ancient Edmonds Cookbook, but used the short pastry recipe from another book. I had more pumpkin than I needed and used it all by doubling the recipe for the filling. I used half yoghurt and half milk, and golden syrup instead of treacle. After I’d boiled the pumpkin until it was just soft, I realised the recipe said to bake the pumpkin. That would have taken too long, but would have produced a drier pumpkin with more intense taste, I imagine.

An ancient Edmonds Cookbook
Pumpkin Pie ready for the oven – the apricots are looked forward to for another day
There were a lot of dishes afterwards!
Forty minutes later it came out of the oven
Cream on top for Mum and yoghurt for me

It tastes very nice; spicy with cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger. The pastry was a little hard to cut through with a spoon, perhaps because I used a recipe with one cup of flour instead of the two cups suggested in the Edmonds book, but I prefer a thinner crust. The pie will last us for several days. Yum!

This will do

Interrupting my bed-making this morning, Felix is happy to settle down on Mum’s warm sheets. Perhaps he approves of the cats. There’s a look on his face which might say, “This is fine. Don’t try to move me.” I’m okay with that.

Bloomin’ marvellous

…as John Campbell would say about anything at all.

In this case, it’s my expression of surprise at my fairy rose. Characterised as a healthy heritage rose, it is still producing flowers despite the frosts we’ve had so far this winter. I went into my garden looking for flowers for the bathroom and found this: at least 22 flowers on a single stem.

Lives of women

This hugely enjoyable and resonant movie has had dour reviews from some reviewers – and my brief survey reveals they are male. Perhaps they lack the perspective of a woman viewer who doesn’t need to be told the backstory of the women in the movie; we know it in our bones or have learned about the horrific Magdalene laundries, the long struggle for the vote, the oppression of women by religion, the ‘glass ceiling’, the manipulative undermining, and all the injustices for women in a patriarchal society. It is, apparently, not even respectable for a woman to play the guitar! In addition, the movie is set in the shadow of the recent World War, women’s war work is no longer valued, they often live in basic, dark, cheek-by-jowl housing with shared privies, they are bound by societal rules of propriety, and under the thumb of the male of the house. Something has to give. This, it seems to me, is what this movie is about.

Neatly staged groups of three show the progression of the movie. First the woman police officer with her self-satisfied and patronising colleagues backed up by the architecture of the establishment, then the friendships of the women, and finally, Woman Police Officer Moss (centre) in civvies, takes matters into her own hands (with back-up). The downed tools in the background suggest the men aren’t up to the job, while the three police officers, full of self-importance, are subtly undermined by the hens.

Mid-afternoon boost

Sometimes at about 3 o’clock in the afternoon on these cooler days I enjoy a hot chocolate which is a bit more substantial than a cup of tea and, unlike coffee, won’t keep you awake at night. Microwaving might be a quick way to heat the milk, but I often burn my mouth, and watch nervously to make sure it doesn’t boil over. I tried a caste iron saucepan, but spent ages cleaning it afterwards. So I’ve bought a small milk pan with a pouring lip on each side.

With this marvellous piece of kitchen equipment, making hot chocolate has assumed the significance of a ritual. I heat the milk slowly, use a wooden spoon to stir in a square of dark chocolate, check it is hot enough (not boiling), then froth it (for a touch of luxury – and you need less milk) before pouring it into a warmed mug. Lovely. It goes well with an oaty biscuit!

The melted chocolate and milk
Frothing the hot chocolate
Notice the milk hasn’t stuck to the pan so it’s easy to clean (due to the gentle heating and stirring).

A cup of tea and a hobnob

In December 2005 and May 2015, Mum and I enjoyed house sitting in London. We became enamoured with McVitie’s Hobnobs – plain oat biscuits. We liked to listen to BBC Radio 4: The Woman’s Hour and The Archers – along with a cup of tea and a Hobnob or two.

I was delighted to find them on the shelf in a supermarket here last weekend. They were the chocolate-coated version, but lovely all the same. Then I spotted them in my local supermarket and bought a packet – only to find I’d mistakenly bought digestives, not Hobnobs.

It’s nice to re-visit the past, but perhaps I won’t go on a hunt for more. After all, they’re imported from the UK and, as Mum pointed out, our homemade Anzac biscuits (also made with oats) are our favourites just now. It was a nice bit of nostalgia though, and has been before when, in May 2021, I took a photo of this delightful Sharon Murdoch Munro (the cat) cartoon in The Press.

Chilled garden

The leaves are falling off the grape vine, revealing many bunches of grapes some of which are beginning to rot. There are too many for the birds it seems, and certainly too many for us, although it’s lovely to pick a bowlful to eat and to share.

The grapes seem to have survived the -6.3C frost overnight. Perhaps they don’t mind being chilled. The water in the bucket – with grape leaves – is frozen solid. The kale and broad beans looked rather limp two hours ago, as did the daisies in the front garden. They are recovering quickly in the sun.

Fortunately I’d thrown frost cloths over the late tomatoes. The plants are bent by the weight of fruit, but they seem to have survived the frost. Perhaps it’s time to pick and ripen inside.

This shoot was outside the frost cloth. It’s too late in the year for the flowers to produce fruit, sadly.