Keeping Busy

So what have I been doing with the time that I should have been posting over the last week and a half? Let’s see…

We got our new washing machine last Friday and have been blissfully laundering since. Matthew had several days off so he has done more than I have, but I’m trying to catch up.

Last Saturday we went over to my friend Virginia’s for lunch and got back at 2am. Hampstead Heath, hippies and Spanish people figured in our adventures, more on which later. My niece's birthday party was on Saturday, too. Judging from the photos, there were 4 grandparents and at least one federal judge present, so it had to be fun!

This was supposed to be my last week at work, but they like me so much they want me to come back! I was originally contracted to work for four weeks at an architectural practice in Central London to cover one receptionist being in the Czech Republic for a week and the other receptionist being in South Africa for three weeks. Near the end of the fourth week, we heard from the second girl that she’d developed a blood clot in her leg on the way back from South Africa and so couldn’t come back to work just yet. However, she’d been hospitalized in France and her doctor’s note was in French, so there was a bit of confusion about what exactly was going on. She’s coming back on Monday so I was prepared for this to be my last week, but on Tuesday, they asked me if I’d like to come back to do another role, which involves entering all their project contacts into a data base for use on the intranet they are setting up. Should be pretty boring, but not difficult. I really like the people there, the location is great and the office is very laid back and friendly. Also, this project should last for several weeks, which will take me almost right up to the beginning of the school term. So yay for me! To celebrate, we had a slap-up meal of George Foreman-grilled steaks, broccoli and thick-cut pan-fried potatoes. So tasty it made me wish I got a new job every day…

Also on Tuesday, I found a book club I’m going to try out. I was aimlessly googling and found a group that meets in Central London and is accepting new members. The list of books they’ve read in the past sounded good – I’ve at least heard of most of them – so I am going to their next meeting this coming Tuesday. To that end, I’ve been reading John Fowles’s 600 page novel The Magus, desperately trying to finish by Tuesday. I know I can do it, but I’m just so busy these days, ya know? Also, I’m not finding myself really engaged in the book in a way that would force me to sit down and read for 4 hours at a stretch. So, we’ll see.

On Wednesday, I took homemade kiwi bread to work and received general adulation. There are no photos of the kiwi bread because it mysteriously disappears every time I make it. In fact, all that’s left of the loaf I kept at home is a very small sliver that I’ve saved for Matthew. It’s not a very generous serving, but should be enough to keep him from accusing me of eating it all while he was at work. Anyway, I got one request for the recipe and many, many requests for more bread. I will have do it again in a couple of weeks, if only because the kiwis are “liberated” from the fruit bowl at work so I feel I owe it to the company to give them back, value-added. Some of them, anyway; lots of them end up in my cereal in the mornings.

Also on Wednesday, I went to my new yoga class. It’s my third week and I still feel the next day as if I’ve been beaten up.

On Thursday evening, we joined Virginia and some friends of hers for a picnic on Hampstead Heath. We sat on blankets in the long grass and ate cold sausages, potato salad, olives, pate on crusty bread, and lots of other yummy things while dogs came over to say hello, families rambled by and a boot camp style exercise class kept running past being shouted at, I mean, encouraged by their instructor. It was windy and got very cold but we had a good time and plan to do it again next week. We took the overground train home, which I’d never done before, so that was interesting too. It’s like the underground, except you can actually see things out the windows.

Friday was extremely busy at work. The practice hosted an awards ceremony for architectural students doing sustainable building projects and I had about 30 minutes in the afternoon to set up the “drinks and nibbles” area for about 50 people. It was hard work, but the most annoying thing was that I kept setting out trays of beers, only to have people keep drinking them! Actually what annoyed me was that they kept leaving the bottle caps all over the tables, making them appear very messy, even though I’d set out a little cup for the caps and even “seeded” it with one so they’d see what it was for. Honestly… Anyway, I fell asleep on the sofa as soon as I got home. When I woke up I whined a little bit about making dinner and we eventually ordered Chinese food and watched several episodes of the American Office. Pretty much a perfect Friday night…

Yesterday I did some shopping (to celebrate the Summer Solstice, perhaps?) and today I went to a crafts fair. It was fun and I bought lots of things, but I will have to wait to write about it, since I mainly bought presents for my sister’s birthday (next weekend) and don’t want ruin her surprises!

Happy Birthday, Mattie!

Today is my niece Mattie's first birthday. She is sweet, pretty, utterly charming and now a whole, entire year old! We won't get to attend her party this weekend, but I've sent a little package and, if the past year is any indication, I'm sure there will be LOTS of photos.

On this festive day, we tried to go to a taping of QI, one of our favourite TV shows, but they were overbooked. We actually made it through two cuts (were literally the last two people in line after the second), but in the end there was no room at the inn. Instead, we were guaranteed seats at a taping of Never Mind the Buzzcocks in August. Instead we had a nice walk, over the Thames toward Fleet Street, then came home and had an excellent meal of stuffed mushrooms, mashed potatoes, broccoli and salmon croquettes. So we've had a lovely Mattie's birthday even without Mattie herself.

Happy birthday, sweet girl.

Oh, and...

We're getting a new washing machine. Yesterday, I had a load of towels going when I heard a loud bang followed by loud thudding. When I got downstairs, I saw water streaming out of the machine. The drum had come off one of the springs that hold it in place. The machine is old and a bit rusty, so we decided to get a newer, better, more energy efficient one. We'd done some research on new washing machines last year before we moved in, so we ordered this year's model of our favorite from John Lewis today and it arrives on Friday. I am absurdly excited about this.

Weirdly, the new machine, with delivery and disposal of the old washer, costs £308. This is exactly how much I earned last week. Huh.

Baby Velvet

Two weekends ago, I went to a baby shower for our friend Mia. (Matthew went to Nashville last year with her husband Paul to co-produce his album. He described it as the best holiday of his life and returned with a Western shirt, a cowboy hat and a mustache. He'd obviously had a good time.) Anyway, for Mia's tea party shower, I made scones and customised a set of onesies (or baby-grows, as they are called here).

I made one batch of strawberry scones and one strawberry and kiwi. They were well received and two people asked me for the recipe – just the sort of reaction I like.

Strawberry Yogurt Scones

2 C flour
3 T sugar
2 tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
¼ tsp baking soda
4 T butter, cold, cut into ½ cubes
¾ C chopped strawberries
¾ C plain yogurt

Preheat oven to 425F/220C. Stir together dry ingredients. With a pastry cutter or two knives (or, if you can’t quite coordinate two knives, a potato masher) cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Stir in strawberries. Stir in enough yogurt to form dough into a ball (up to ¾ C, but I used less). Turn dough onto a floured surface and with floured hands knead a few times. Press into a 9 inch round, cut into 8 triangles. Place onto cookie sheet lined with parchment. Bake until golden, about 12 - 15 minutes. Remove to rack to cool.

Note: For the strawberry-kiwi scones, I used just under a half cup of each fruit and added an additional tablespoon of sugar. The dough is very sticky and was hard to deal with when I used all the yogurt; it was much easier when drier.

The onesies elicited oohs and ahhs, especially the one with Paul’s album cover. That one was Matthew’s idea and it was genuinely adorable. The images on the shirts were straighter than it looks in the photos, by the way.

Mia looked like she was ready to pop the day of the shower, but she didn’t actually have the baby until last week. She is a very pretty little girl named…Velvet Giselle. Well, they are rock-n-rollers.

Plant Hospital

Yesterday I rescued a bloomless orchid from the office where I've been working. It had been on the desk for about 4 months and finally lost its final, withered flower that morning. We got a new one at Marks and Spencer and to keep it from going in the bin (and having heard that they will eventually bloom again), I took the old one home. Lots of people seemed interested in this and offered advice. One girl said she has one that is finally starting to bloom after a year. She keeps it in the bathroom because they like the humidity. Another girl said that if you give an orchid a contraceptive pill, it will bloom continually. I said, "Do you crush the pill and put it in the water?" She said she just sticks it in the soil. Then someone else asked if she has lots of extra contraceptive pills laying around. She said it only takes one. I don't know what her boyfriend thinks about this, but I didn't think it was my place to ask.

When I left in the evening, I got several comments:

Comment 1: Is it your last day? Are you taking your little plant?

Comment 2: Are you stealing that? (When I explained I was taking it home as it'd lost its flowers) Oh, are you good with orchids?

Comment 3: What is that? (I explained) Hmmm. (This was from the founding partner of the firm, when I ran into him on the tube platform. I couldn’t really read his “Hmmm.” It didn’t sound particularly enthusiastic.)

I don't have a picture of the plant in question. I'll try to take one tomorrow, even though right now the orchid is just five droopy leaves and some creepy-looking roots snaking out of the holes in the bottom of the pot. I'm not sure it was worth the effort of getting it home (in the cold and rain), but if it does bloom next year, I'll be thrilled that I got a £14.99 plant for free. Woo, and indeed, hoo.

Battle of the Bins

We live in a terrace house divided into three flats. We own and live in Flat A, which is the ground floor, the basement and back garden. Flat B, on the first floor (2nd floor to readers in the US), is vacant. Flat C, on the 2nd and 3rd floors, is rented by three girls. We have never formally met them, but in the past few months they have become an increasing part of our lives. Some of the reasons include:

- We have been awakened several nights by loud noises. Specifically, the noises of several people staggering up the front walk, banging the front door open and closed, then slowly making their way up the stairs while shouting drunkenly at each other. This normally happens between 3 and 5 in the morning. It's been a total of 5 times over the past few months and each time I vow that the next time I will get up and yell at them. And next time I very well might.

- Also, they never shut the front gate, which I think makes the front of the house look sloppy.

- Someone keeps throwing cigarette butts from their terrace into our garden. This doesn't happen that often, so I think it must be visitors rather than the girls themselves, but if their friends behave this way, it certainly speaks ill of them.

- They do not recycle. The house has four large recycling bins out front provided by the Council, but we are the only people who use them. This would be a bit of eco-self righteousness except that we find that recycling drastically reduces the amount we throw away, whereas...

- They fill up all the bins so we don't have room for our garbage! The Council provides recycling bins, but not rubbish bins, so residents have to supply their own. When we moved in, there were two bins out front. We thought, two occupied flats, two bins; should be fine. Lately, though, we take our rubbish out to find that both bins are completely full. And not only do they not recycle, they don't even crush their cardboard boxes to take up less space - and I know this because they don't even tie their rubbish bags closed! Honestly, I'm surprised they even bother with bags and don't just toss garbage out the window whenever they empty a milk carton or finish a roll of toilet paper.

To date, I have written them a note, spoken to one when we met on the front walk, and confronted one (with her mother!) as she was actually shoving rubbish indiscriminately in the first bin she could find. I've only raised the bin issue; I decided to concentrate on the biggest problem so they wouldn't think I am a cranky old lady griping all the time. However, now that I keep griping at them everytime I see them, they probably think that anyway. I don't care!

And now, as a cranky old lady, I am going to drink some hot milk and go to bed. (Actually, I'm going to have a 7-Up and watch Dr Who, but it's the same thing, really.)