Sushi For Breakfast

Ten years ago today I followed many of my friends on the Devoted to Hugh messageboards and set up my LiveJournal. The first post was short and sweet. I don't post very often these days but I'm glad I still come back occasionally, sometimes a longer post is required and it's nice to have somewhere quieter to retreat to.

So, 2016: the Road to Rio 2016 is already well-worn yet there's some distance still to go. Hoping for a decent defence of gold medals won at the Home Games, even though many have retired and many more will no doubt do so after Rio. It's likely to be a closer call in terms of the GB-Australia rivalry though.

Space: I notice Tim Peake looks well settled in on the ISS, his somersaults and flips are more controlled, which is a good indication he's used to moving around in microgravity. A crew swap in March will see the ending of the Year Long Mission, and the end of 2016 will see the launch of Thomas Pesquet, the last of the ESA Class of 2009 to go into space.

Work: Don't want to think about it. There's a reason we eat lots of cake and biscuits in our industry. One work-related highlight expected is a workfriend is to become a first-time Dad in the spring.

Home: I discovered this Christmas how much I prefer my own home-made versions of goodies to the shop-bought stuff. So in order to get them right for next Christmas I need to practice during the year. A friend gave me an afternoon tea recipe calendar for Christmas so I might try some things from that if I'm in the mood to make something new. Also, I am hoping I can actually grow some flowers this year instead of crabgrass.

Screen stuff: Certain articles are hinting that Peter Capaldi is about to give notice on his tenure as the Doctor. I think he's right not to stay too long but he's the best Doctor ever and I don't want him to go.

It's only Tuesday but I seem to have done quite well so far at spending money this week. It's stuff I need (really), and I've done OK in terms of bargain-hunting etc. The only negative in this was my trip to Hobbycraft and subsequent search online for card blanks for the cross-stitch cards I currently have in progress - I was hoping for red or green card blanks with large round apertures but have only been able to find white ones, and they're only just big enough. The tricky part will come when I have to wash & iron them without anyone noticing me taking over the kitchen for a big seekrit cunning plan.

So, the successes yesterday & today have been:

• New trainers (even though they have pink trim), which means the old worn ones are now in the bin


• A new watch strap


• Pizza bases! Just scoffed the first home-made pizza, with rocket, mushrooms, sweet peppers, tomatoes, and two types of cheese. Way better than the ones they make up instore


• Three pairs of little flower clips for my hair (black roses, cream roses, sunflowers) for an office-friendly trombone-less Elizabeth Lea look


• Jellybeans, naturally


• Hotel Chocolat selectors, including rose & lime creams


• Marks & Spencer yummy food, including Macarons, which I've never had before


• Two pairs of jeans - I have to go to M&S for jeans as only they & Next (sometimes) do them short & wide enough. Not a fan of the current trend towards lightweight denim & engineering though, when I first saw them in Sainsburys I thought they were just cheapo supermarket ones but it seems they're all like that now :(

Tomorrow we're picking Jessica up from nursery - she's now in the top age group, as it's the start of her final year at nursery. She now also goes to pre-school one morning a week at a nearby church hall - this is to give the kids more of an idea about what school will be like, and she's also there alongside other neighbourhood children, so when she starts school there will be children there she already knows. So I guess for now I'm making the most of these opportunities.

( May Day Weekend, and future weekends )
Hopefully I will report back again after tomorrow's outing, with photos. And possibly a short review of Hugh's episode of Perspectives.

( Hen nights, birthday plans, and Sherlocking )
So tomorrow it's back to work, then next week it's the baking of my bake-off cake - I hope it all gets sold because I'm rather caked out of it for now, nice though it is.

I bought a new TV today, a little LED HD-ready widescreen TV to replace the one I bought in 1998. This is a little cheap & cheerful one I picked up from Sainsburys. It's a really good picture, especially now I've figured out how I can change the aspect ratio settings on my DVD player, my combi and my cable box. I wish I'd known about the cable box settings before, I could've recorded stuff in widescreen but now I'm stuck with everything in 4:3 and everyone has a fat arse when I watch this stuff on my new TV.

The issue with the TV is that despite the instruction booklet insisting there's a Power On/Off switch, it's nowhere to be found and isn't even pointed out in the diagrams illustrating what all the buttons and slots are on. Trying to turn the TV off, I came downstairs to see if there was anything on the illustrated outer box about the switch, and when Dad asked what I was doing I told him, and of course he had to come and see for himself and fiddle with everything. Which meant the signal was lost and it took ages to figure out how to get it back, and even worse he blamed me for buying a cheap TV when it was him who was fiddling with switches and lost the signal. When it came back he carried on ranting about how no-one listens to him and why didn't I get one from the Co-Op, ie the place which is only open office hours and has no nearby parking, so you have to take a day off work to choose a TV and then another day off work to have it delivered.

Yes, I know it's my fault for telling him the truth rather than lying and saying I was looking for a barcode or something. He nearly broke my first Ladyshave because he was playing with it and pressed on the foil - ie the Ladyshave he & Mum had just bought me for my birthday. Perhaps this TV is like the cable box, in that there's still a little light on even when it's switched off, and perhaps it's not an issue to the same degree as my previous TV as it has power-saving things my old TV didn't have. If we hadn't got plans in place to upgrade our cable package - to a cheaper package that comes with HD channels - I wouldn't have been even considering a new television, the old one worked perfectly fine except for one of the latches on the remote control battery cover.

But so far I've watched Gavin & Stacey on TV, Last Shuttle on my combi, and an episode of House (Half-Wit) on my old DVD player, which took a bit of fiddling to get the aspect ratio set properly as the instructions for it are long filed away safely. However, I'm pleased with the picture, the episode of House in particular looked very good but then maybe that's Hugh and Jesse looking delish. The space shuttle looked amazing too, the picture quality is reminiscent of watching NASA TV HD online. This might be a cheap TV (£100) but I'm sticking with it for now. Even if I'd got a more expensive brand it's no guarantee Dad wouldn't find fault anyway.

I am on leave all week this week, and have had the good fortune to pick the week with incredibly unseasonal weather - high summer weather, cloudless blue skies.

( The week so far )
Tomorrow is my birthday. There are two cakes waiting, a giant French Fancy cake for friends and family, and a large Madeira cake with Haribo sweeties on it to share at work next week. I will try and get pics to share before they are eaten.

I have the week off work, and yesterday was spent with a visit from my sister and Bean, who is now fully walking (except when she crawls for speed). I read one of her books to her - That's Not My Dragon - and she was dancing to the sounds on her Chuggington book.

Today I had thought of going to Birmingham, but I have thought since 'What for?' The highlights of a visit to Birmingham tend to be buying JellyBeans, buying something from Hotel Chocolat, and a jacket potato for lunch. Not a lot for a minimum 60 minute bus-and-train journey, especially when the first two aren't totally healthy.

One idea behind having this week off was that I could start Christmas shopping, which might have been underway if my local branch of Dunelm hadn't burned down. I know a few shops have started getting in gift stuff in store, but it's generally not the stuff I'd planned to get. I have quite a few ideas now about what to get people, mostly my cousins & their kids, hence the original plans to go to Dunelm for double-sized throws. They have an online store but I might wait to see if M&S or somewhere similar has anything good in stock.

So apart from catching up on House, not sure what I'm doing today. It's nice not to be under the treadmill of work so I'm taking advantage by not getting up early. I've thought of walking to the big Tescos for some exercise and some sushi, I'll see what the weather forecast looks like. Or maybe staying in will push me to get out just for the change of it. I'll see after breakfast.

I have a rotten cold in advanced development. I woke up to it yesterday, it was caught from my mother. It's one of those colds which can't decide whether it's going to have coughing, nasal "fun", a sore throat or aching ribs as its main feature. Whatever it is, I hope it's over & done with pretty sharpish because I don't want it spoiling my enjoyment of Friday night. And I want it to let me get a decent night's sleep across the week.

Day 1 of my five-day weekend began with a lie-in, of course, followed by a two-course breakfast - my usual cereal (with a cup of filter coffee), and a mushroom & spring onion omelette. Perhaps a bit too heavy on the mushrooms in relation to the onions, but spring onions (known to some as salad onions) are excellent in an omelette. Got the amount of butter right I think this time, and also remembered to season it first. It cooked well, I like them well done, perhaps will try a cheese & onion omelette over the weekend. Another good thing about omelettes is that the washing-up isn't too onerous.

In the afternoon we went to see my sister and Bean. Bean was happy and smiling as usual, she got a bit grumpy when she had her fingernails trimmed, but that's fine cos I was a bit grumpy at her attempt to gouge a piece of flesh out of my cheek with her sharp claws. She was also playing in her bouncy chair, which she absolutely loves, and with the Winnie-The-Pooh spinning top I bought her for Christmas.

I have also had a major sortout, one of the drawers in my chest of drawers collapsed, followed by another teetering on the edge, so in an effort to lighten their loads I have sorted out some clothes and other stuff (scented oil burners, candle-related items) to go to the charity shop. I also threw away loads of stuff, and discovered the real size of my toiletries bounty. This is the stock of toiletries I have built up by only buying stuff when it's on offer and so on, and was revealed to include four deodorant sticks, seven toothbrushes, five bottles of shampoo (plus a two-in-one), two tubes of handcream, and a collection of miniature things I'd swiped from the hotel we stayed at for that awful staff conference. Anyway, the drawers have had running repairs, which will become full repairs once some parts arrive, and I've now got a full large drawer free - but with items earmarked to be transferred there so as not to overload the others.

Have also heard that Discovery has had another extra day's extension, meaning she will have accumumated exactly 1 year in space overall by her retirement. Landing is due late next Wednesday afternoon my time, so I should be watching that online at work followed by a dash home through rush-hour traffic in time for Zumba. If there's a one-orbit waveoff I should know in time to leave work at the usual time, but no Zumba cos I'll be watching the landing.

Day 360 Following yesterday's present haul, I'm not short of DVDs to watch:



Although for now, I'm quite happy enjoying the silence while spending hours at a time on Wikipedia reading about EastEnders characters from the 1980s or whatever. Also my sleep schedule is totally wrecked, because it's so cold at night my sore throat is irritated further and I'm up most of the night coughing, so sleep happens mostly between 5am and 11am, with odd hours before or after if I'm lucky. So long as I can shift this cold I should be fine about getting back on schedule, I'm not in work until 4th January, and I'm past the stage in my cold where I need an extra snooze in the afternoon.

We don't really have any leftovers apart from the turkey and half a jar of good quality cranberry sauce. Because we had Christmas dinner late in the afternoon we didn't have a buffet-type meal during the day, so we never bought the accompaniments usual for this (eg dips, breadsticks, cheese straws, etc) that are so yummy when eaten as leftovers. We do have the stilton of course, plus some strong cheddar, various relishes, and the box of biscuits for cheese, which I made a start on as part of breakfast. I was thinking it was a shame we didn't have the dips, but then they're so predictable, everywhere sells the same quartet, it's no longer a novelty and no-one ever wants much of the thousand island dip. But I still plan to make sushi at some point next week.