Boots
I had an interesting email from a guy that writes the blog – Bay Area Kicks. He suggested swapping links as we had a lot in common. I nipped over to his site for a reccy. It’s a blog that focuses on trainers. The ones that you wear on your feet. Years ago I bought my first and only pair of trainers. Had the idea that it might be good to run everyday. As I struggled past the corner shop I heard a snicker. The trainers never ran again. I mulled over this American guy and his penchant for shoes while weeding our veg patch. He had hit...
read moreDieting
(Written mid February 2007 and discovered when considering my waistline and searching for decent soup recipes on the laptop today. Inca poses with a twelve inch pocket tape measure.) Listening to the reports of the London Fashion week and the sizes of models. D and my sizes were not mentioned. I wasn’t surprised as we are drifting fast into the cuddly range that means clothes cling to our bodies rather than drop enticingly from the slimmest of shoulders. Before today, I hadn’t realised there was a size 0. In the UK, this is...
read moreJalopy
Last year we shared Jalopy for a few weeks when Danny’s car was out of action. Living in the country, this could have been a nightmare but Danny became the chauffeur and Jalopy the only executive car in the exclusive Cottage Smallholder Mini Cab Service fleet. I was driven to work and collected in the evenings. I must admit that I hadn’t realised quite how eccentric this old lady looks. She stands out from the crowd of other ancient Volvos. Not just the fact that her paint is now a stylish matt but her back seat and boot are loaded...
read more8 random facts about me
I have been tagged by Karen from the Wiggly Wigglers blog. Wiggly Wigglers is a great mail order site for wonderful gardening and self sufficiency items such as the log maker, yards of blackthorn for your boundaries (and feed your sloe gin habit) and much, much more. The rules: Link to the person who tagged you and post the rules on your blog. Share 8 random or weird things about yourself. Tag 8 people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs. 8 random facts about me I am a collector (Danny says “Magpie”). Objects,...
read moreTwo thousand and eight
Two thousand and eight. These words had a softness. Good rounded syllables. “I hope that this is a good year.” I hovered with a mug of coffee beside Danny’s computer in the Rat Room this morning. Danny leant back in his chair. “All years have their good points.” Not what I expected. I love New Years Eve. At midnight a fresh year arrives like a new puppy, excited and tremulous. As Big Ben chimes my heart lifts. Danny is different. He mourns the passing year. “365 days elapsed and not a lot achieved.” So...
read moreTV
I love watching telly. It’s seductive. We don’t have cable telly or a digi box, so it’s just the five UK terrestrial channels. A year or so ago Danny set up a sideline business and I started writing this blog. How would we create the time to accommodate these ventures? The simple answer was to give up watching telly (August 12th 2006 is engraved on a small invisible gravestone that sits just below the telly in our sitting room). It was worse than giving up coffee. So much light conversation is about telly and I couldn’t...
read moreHappy Christmas cleaning
Christmas and Easter are flagged as reorganisation opportunities here in the cottage. No matter how frenetic our lives and projects are, we always take a few days off. Treasured days. On the run up to the holidays I politely explain to my client that they will not be seeing me for a couple of days before the festivities begin. This is when we Christmas clean or Easter clean the cottage. We seem to miss out on the traditional Spring clean. We discover how much wildlife is coexisting with us in the far outreaches of the cottage rooms. Woodlice,...
read moreMenu for Hope and Food blogging
We all love to eat great food. Most of us have never gone without. We might read a recipe and turn it down because it’s just too expensive to make. Imagine not having the money to buy food. Any food. It’s the last day of Menu for Hope. ?5 buys you a raffle ticket to win a scrumptious prize. Last year $66,000 was raised to fight real hunger. Just now I saw that the total was just $57,000. It would be so good to top last year’s total figure. We have put up a slim hardback winemaking book that has given me superb results –...
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