Sauntering Vaguely Downwards
Bunch of photos taken earlier in the week over two days. I’ve been sidetracked with playing Vampyr (I’m halfway through a review post for that, but it’s probably not going to be done tonight) and have only just gotten around to sorting and posting these now. The Flickr plugin seems to work a treat, so I’m sticking with that. Even more triffids to be found on Flickr should that tickle your fancy. Otherwise, enjoy what’s below.
I had plans for today, but have effectively been a zombie, hence the unimaginative post title. I did manage to take a satisfying amount of photographs, but it took until nearly midnight to get them uploaded and write up this pretty simple blog post. Jake still managed to help (see Instagram for the set of Jake photos), but a full battery and reasonable weather allowed for more photo opportunities. As always, see Flickr for a whole bunch more.
In typical British weather news, it’s raining. That’s fine, we need it. I’m annoyed we didn’t get any storms, could do with one to clear my headache. It’s the type of rain that’s light enough we get drops forming and pooling in leaves, which I always think looks pretty cool. Anyone else also find things just look more real when they’re wet? Wonder why that is. Anyhow, photos of leaves below, more stuff uploaded to Flickr.
This was the photography post I was planning on making today, before Jake decided to steal the limelight. As usual, there are a few more up on Flickr, though not as many as I’d have limed because the battery ran out. Jake videos use up all the juice, he’s decidedly not cute and is very unhelpful (and it’s totally not that the battery was due a charge anyway *cough*).
Anyone not aware (hard to imagine, he gets tweeted about on a regular basis), I live with a fluffy monster by the name of Jake, who has a very floofy Tail. I was doing some Triffid photography, lying on the grass to get up close and personal, when I felt a gentle tug and found Jake had developed an interest in my camera strap. At that point I got completely distracted with taking some photos and video of Jake being adorably ‘helpful’.
Dinner last night was my mum’s cheese pie (possibly a flan, but we always called it pie). Mum used to make it a lot, and it’s dad’s favourite so I made sure I learned how to make it. I thought while I was making it, I should document it here. So here be my mum’s cheese pie recipe for those who enjoy that sort of thing.
Note: Trex is a vegetable fat and Stork is a baking margarine in the UK. Non-Brits will need to find the equivalent, or just use their own trusted pastry recipe.
EDIT: I’ve been informed that mature cheese is a term some outside of the UK are not familiar with. It’s basically aged so it has a stronger/sharper flavour.
Didn’t intend to go this long without a blog post, but last weekend I was enjoying having the house to myself while Dad was in Brighton, and then the past week of work kicked my arse. I spent yesterday in a fog recovering, and I’m not pushing it when my body and brain say it’s too much. So it’s only today I had the energy to do Things, and potter around taking pictures. One advantage of the time gap is that things have moved on again in the garden, so there are different things to take photographs of. There’s a selection of triffids below, and more on Flickr. I’m also on Instagram now, so far posting pictures of Jake, flowers and food. Give me a follow if you want, let me know on Twitter if I know you and it’s not obvious.
Dad’s off to Brighton tomorrow. He’s taking fresh rhubarb. He’s taking Rhubarb’s Marmalade. I’m doing a last ditch attempt to send more rhubarb down in cake form.
As such, this evening I baked up Rhubarb Crumble Cake from Jane’s Patisserie. I’d never been to Jane’s site before, but the recipe randomly showed up on the news/links section of the Chrome homepage on my phone this morning. Probably not that randomly, really, as I’ve been searching ‘OMG, WTF DO I DO WITH ALL THIS RHUBARB, GOOGLE?!’ and lo, Google decided that it would provide. Anyhow, it looked simple and tasty, so I thought ‘who am I to pass on this sign from the gods?’ and I went for it.
Birds hate me taking photographs of them. They make every attempt to scupper pictures. They’ll turn their backs on me at the last second and flash their backsides in a series of continuous shots, then fly off. Or they’ll hide behind the bird feeder. Case in point.
Followers on Twitter will know that my dad has grown some rhubarb. Quite a lot of it. I’ve already stewed some for pudding and made some cordial, but that didn’t make a dent. We’ll be offloading some on my aunt and uncle at the weekend, but that’s also not going to use up a substantial amount. More cooking of the stuff has to happen, so I decided to make jam. Well, marmalade in this case. Actually, it might be jam for all I know, I’m not up on the archaic rules for what makes these things jam or marmalade, but we’ve always called it that for reasons, so we’ll stick with that.