I just made some green tomato chutney, using a recipe from the BBC food site.
I don’t know whether the chutney will be good or bad, only time will tell. What threw the spanner in the works for me (and made me miss the first half of the rugby semi finals) was the fact that the prep took an hour, and I needed to sterilize 3 extra jars (in addition to the 500ml parfait and 4 normal sized jars I already had). Why did I not anticipate the timing and quantities? See below.
So approx 4 jars = 8 jars (one of which is huge)
Written by exmonkey on October 13th, 2007 with 1 comment.
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I didn’t find any mushrooms, although Milo and I had a lovely walk. He’s exceptionally good company for walks.
Not sure what these where, but Milo didn’t like the taste, so we didn’t bring any home.
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Radiohead’s new album is still good.
Written by exmonkey on October 13th, 2007 with no comments.
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We have been out looking for mushrooms several times now, and have yet to find anything too exciting.
I have a basket full of Common Puffballs. They are edible, but none of my books think they are worth the bother - so I’d be interested to hear opinions on this.
The collection we got last week went in the compost bin, as I wasn’t 100% confident that they were edible. Plus the books (yet again) said that Suillus bovinus (Cow bolete) are not really worth eating.
Hey-ho. We’re going off again tomorrow to have another hunt. Rumor has it that there are chantrelle and ceps in the woods near Cranbrook. This is according to a BHB (Big Hairy Biker) I met, who was also hunting mushrooms. Unfortunately he didn’t want to tell me exactly where they are because he wanted them. Maybe if I’d have had more tattoos he’d have confided in me.
Radiohead
In other news, I paid one pound to download the new Radiohead album (here) and now I wish I’d paid more. It’s a really great album. Like all the best albums, it takes a couple of listens to get it - but there are some really fabulous tracks on it. My favorite (currently) is: Faust Art (track 6).
I recommend getting it if you have a soul (in the strictly non immortal hokus-pokus sense)
Written by exmonkey on October 13th, 2007 with 2 comments.
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Two things occurred to me on the train this morning… I will try and put them here before they evaporate - apologies in advance for the stream of consciousness.
1 - Interesting things happen all the time. I was telling Giles last night in the pub about a couple of the things that happened to me in Columbia a few years ago, and this morning chatting to a friend on the train I mentioned the time I found a GPS device lying in the middle of the road.
This got me thinking… Sometimes one (or I) can fool myself into thinking that little has happened in my life recently, and I am always talking to people who think that nothing interesting ever happens to them, and that the party always seems to be going on next door and they are never invited. The truth is, however, EVERYONE thinks this. Everybody else’s life always seems more interesting, especially if you are to busy watching other people’s lives to notice all the mazing stuff going on in your own.
Last night, in the pub toilet, a bizarre non-organic noise (think tortured metal twisting just prior to reaching breaking point) briefly made everyone lined up against the porcelain laugh and we shared a moment of humorous solidarity in contravention of the normal ’stare straight ahead, do not engage anyone in conversation’ rules that normally prevail. That’s quite interesting.
2 - I was talking on the train about our reliance on electronic devices. R referred to this as ‘outboard brain’ theory.
This made me think about my ultimate goal of saying goodbye to all technology and living a simple life surrounded by a few acres of smallholding, and how much I envy people who already have achieved this more simple existence. Which is fine, but then many people who I look at as having achieved this ambition have done so by being successful in some field (sic) or another and accrued enough wealth to enable them to opt out. Which is weird, because the world is quite literally filled with people who live a ’simple’ life and would sell their soul for a chance to live in the modern, technologically replete world I inhabit. All of which makes me feel like a bit of a white-middle-class-arse. None of which makes me want to change my goals by the way. I guess it’s all about choice, and recognizing the fact that I am lucky enough to have been born into a society and period in time that enjoys health and prosperity. Maybe not exercising that choice is worse than feeling guilty about those who don’t have the choice in the first place.
Maybe I’m just getting old.
Written by exmonkey on October 4th, 2007 with 1 comment.
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I can’t remember what their breed is - begins with a ‘b’ - answers on a postcard. They’re quite stroppy though, compared to the brown originals.
Written by exmonkey on August 28th, 2007 with 13 comments.
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We’ve just come back form a nice trip to the seaside. The drive was quite nice, lots of pastoral scenes of idyllic Sussex life.
A couple of signs caught my eye however, which reminded me of something I have never quite understood. “Home cooked food” said one. “Home grown potatoes”, said another.
Now, I grow potatoes and I cook food. Hence I could, if I wished to brag, put a sign outside my house telling people what I’ve been up to. Neighbours would no doubt be relieved that I am doing something constructive with my time. They may even knock on my door asking for either food or potatoes. At this point they would be disappointed, because I would have to explain that the home cooked food and home grown potatoes are for my home, not for passers by - sorry for any confusion the signs might have caused.
The sign I saw for “home grown potatoes” was on a farm. Surely, if you own a farm and you grow vegetables, they are “Farm Grown Potatoes” or to give them their correct title - “Potatoes”. What gives?
The “Home cooked food” sign was on a pub. When I was a child I used to vaguely think that home cooked food in a pub meant that one of the bar maids was cooking the food at home and bringing it to work with her - a bit like Betty Turpin making hot-pots for the Rovers Return. I was wrong.
“Home Cooked food” means, “shit food”. Or, to be more precise, cheap roasts marinated in gloopy gravy and served with soggy veg. Home cooked food simply means that their chef is not in any way skilled in the art of cooking.
I’m surprised these lies continue to be told on pub signs and farm gates across the nation. What ever happened to the ‘trading standards’ people that everyone always cites in these situations. I bet they don’t even exist. Just one of those made up urban myth government departments - like DEFRA. In fact, Trading Standards should be reported to…. Oops, almost entered a loop.
And don’t even get me started on our local ‘Farm Shop’ that is nowhere near a farm and sells apples from Chile.
Written by exmonkey on August 26th, 2007 with 4 comments.
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Eat jam.
Written by exmonkey on August 5th, 2007 with 7 comments.
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Every doorway in Maidstone was packed with shoppers waiting for the rain to ease up so that they could go and buy more summer clothing.
Written by exmonkey on July 23rd, 2007 with 4 comments.
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I have just seen the first signs of blight on the potato crop. I am trying to halt it’s progress by removing infected foliage - but I don’t hold out much hope for it.
Giles had given me some young tomato plants which I will try and grow in the second greenhouse, which I intend to keep much drier.
Written by exmonkey on June 30th, 2007 with 2 comments.
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I must prefix this by saying - I do have friends, a family and proper real world interests.
That said - I have been exploring Second Life for a couple of days (my new MacBook runs the software so much better than my old Vaio) - and among some other interesting things I read about this: Second life at wimbledon on a blog kept by one of the IBM staffers.
I chatted to him (in Second Life - or SL) this evening (if you follow the above link he is in the picture on the left and looks like a Predator in SL). He describes himself as a metaverse evangelist, and I believe that is actually his job title at IBM (I kid you not). He also turned out to be a really nice guy who was only to happy to spend time talking to an idiot who was having trouble grasping the concept of what they were doing - despite the fact that he is basically a Predator.
Basically they have linked up Hawkeye (not the bloke from MASH, but the camera/software system that follows the trajectory of the ball) to a simulation in Second Life.
It doesn’t actually work brilliantly (not when I’ve been there anyway) - but it does work sometimes, and they are constantly developing it. You can even see a screen (in SL) displaying the control room in IBM where they are controlling the tennis/SL feed and their avatars in SL. It is, to put it mildly - a head fuck.
Below is a picture of my avatar hovering above the IBM Second Life representation of Wimbledon center court.
Written by exmonkey on June 29th, 2007 with 7 comments.
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