Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Odds 'n' Sods

Almost a month has gone by since I wrote my last blog post. That has to be a record. I can assure you that I have not been sitting around on my backside wearing fluffy slippers, smoking fags and reading trashy magazines. I can't even say 'much as I'd like to' because I'm not the fluffy slippers/fags/trashy magazine type.

Here is a (non-toxic variety unlike the stuff made by Monsanto) round-up of recent activities:
  1. Writing. YAY! I've been writing exercises which will make me millions (!) on grammar and punctuation - 130 for each of three levels, with question, right answer, three wrong answers and explanation. Total: 780 inspiring and educational exercises... Plus reading through even more for a figurative language app where I came across a whole bunch of words that I had never heard of before, like anaphora, synecdoche, etc.
  2. Making water kefir. This is a process that requires regular attention what with keeping an eye on the first fermentation process to bottling the kefir ready for the second fermentation, and remembering how long the bottles have been out before they have to go into the fridge. I you want to find out all about making your own kefir water, this is a very thorough description. My kefir grains keep reproducing like bloody rabbits and I now have jars of the grains in sugar water sitting in the fridge waiting for someone to take them off my hands. I keep running out of flip-top bottles too. Must up my beer intake... This is in a vain attempt to give the boys a fizzy drink that's actually good for them. So far, so big failure, but it's a project in progress and I WILL find a version that they like! Preferably before they leave home... Meanwhile, my gut is glowing.
  3. Making sour-dough starter. Another process that requires regular attention! I started making it so I could make sour-dough bread until I realised (after my starter had been going for a week or so) it takes about 20 hours to make a loaf! As I'm not sure how to fit that into full-time work, I've been using the starter to make pizza dough until I work out the logistics of baking sour-dough bread. 
  4. Being part of the local elections as a member of the team opposing the one currently in place. This has involved regular meetings and delivering political tracts in the village. We also meet up in the market on Sunday mornings to show shoppers we're a sizeable team of merry types who have good ideas and are ready to talk about them. We buy goodies from the market vendors - oysters, cheese, charcuterie - which makes us very popular with them, and, funnily enough, after the first Sunday we were there but the others were not, the next week, they turned up too in a different spot. We offer wine from the local winery, they serve the hard stuff. If we win, I'll be on the local council! My DB is hoping I'll make it to Deputé level so we can live in the lap of luxury for evermore... (he's got a hope!).
I don't know how all the women who write the healthy food websites and blogs I follow (list in right-hand column) have the time to do all the stuff they do. I can only assume they do not have full-time jobs, or they have a full-time job but no kids. They seem to have husbands too. I drew myself the short straw being a working single mum AND trying to do all this time-consuming stuff. Wards off Alzheimer's I suppose keeping track of it all...

My mum was without a land-line phone for three weeks over Christmas and New Year. TalkTalk offered her a measly £18.08 off her next bill. I wrote to them and said I was not impressed. My mum is 80 and needs a land line, if nothing else, to contact the emergency services! She incurred £20 on her little-used mobile phone whose number is not known by most of her friends, and she suffered a lot of stress at the extreme inconvenience over the festive period.

TalkTalk wrote back and told me to get stuffed. They had compensation guidelines and as her phone had been out of order for so many days, she gets so many days off her next bill. It was all BT's fault anyway as their idiotic engineers had mis-connected some lines when they were working just down the road. Took three weeks and endless expensive mobile phone calls to get them to move their arse. Telecom companies are all bastards.

After all that I'm in need of a holiday. My DB and I will be off soon on a motorbike ride to Italy to visit Pisa, Florence and surrounding spots. I just hope everything stays alive while I'm away!

24 comments:

  1. Hello again! Best of luck in the elections, I too am on a list, but we don't yet know if there will be a challenging list. It's either all top secret or left hand doesn't know what right hand is doing! Ho hum!

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    1. Is there only one list where you are? That is the usual state of affairs where I live except that the current maire is stepping down. He's been in the seat for 30 yrs and wants to do something else. His replacement is an unknown, so there is a chance that we might win. Best of British for your list! :)

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    2. At the moment we don't know how many lists! The current Maire has been in for 13 yrs and our list includes five members of his council, but even they say he has given no indication as to whether he is standing again. It may just be us or he may have a secret list.

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    3. How exciting! Who would have thought local politics could be so interesting... :)

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  2. I wondered where you'd gone! Standing for election, hey? I will be sitting back with a bowl of popcorn and enjoying the fight here. I stood for election in 2008, was elected and enjoyed it very much until PF decided we were going to move house. Fasten your seatbelt girl, the pouches fly fast and low in the run up to the elections...

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    1. I've heard it gets pretty nasty, but we'll see... I'm quite a way down the list and known mainly to the parents of my boys' friends.

      Did you move within the village or to another place altogether? In which case (if the latter) did you have to give up your place? We only have two lists here. If one gets an outright majority I presume it won't go to the second round? It would be nice to get it over and done with!

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  3. Or should I say, "punches". Ah-hem.

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  4. I have visions of your fridge amusing itself in your absence on holiday by producing kefir bombs while the sourdough reproduces itself into something like kryptonite....when you get back push someone else into the kitchen first.

    Best of luck with the elections...if you get in there will be at least one elu who won't figure in Le Point's feature today 'the more crooked you are the more likely you are to be elected'...

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    1. I too have a vision of an exploding fridge with molten sourdough lava pouring out and taking over the house. Meanwhile, the kefir cannon balls are being fired off preventing access to the buanderie, and I have to call in Special Forces to bring it all under control. Such would be their interest in the situation, that they would develop new secret weapons with my killer kefir.

      It is a sad indictment of today's politics that Le Point's feature is so accurate. I suppose it was ever thus to some extent, but the psychopaths and sociopaths have taken over, with the results we can observe. I'm a political amoeba. :)

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  5. Gosh, after reading all this I can see why you need a holiday, Sarah! Good luck with the elections. I'm all for shaking things up in local politics. Shaking things up in the kitchen with exploding kefir bombs and sourdough bent on taking over the world might be a step too far. :-)

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    1. Oh damn, Perpetua, I was hoping you'd be asking for some of my spare kefir grains! :)
      I've put an ad up in the local organic shop to give them away, but so far, nothing. They'll end up on the compost heap at this rate.

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  6. Yay for your grammar writing. Have always been fascinated by propa gramma but never really learned it at old alma mater Whakatane High (won't repeat the unofficial mantra as is offensive) Did Lyn whasit make loads of money with that Eats, Root and leaves? I read that Chelsea Clinton really wanted to sit next to her at a fancy dinner

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    1. I don't know if the Eats etc was a best-seller to the extent our Lyn can retire on the proceeds, but I think it had a decent run. I bought it, anyway. :)

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  7. O goody! I can't wait to see pictures from your upcoming motorcycle ride. You two always seem to wonder off to exciting places. And might I also add....good luck with your election!

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    1. Thanks, DD. I have to sift through all the piccies I took!

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  8. Writing takes a lot of time indeed. It looks like you have had a lot on your plate, so don't forget to take care of yourself!

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    1. The holiday certainly did me a lot of good. Eating well helps too. :) As does wine... :D

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  9. I can imagine your fridge taking over the world while you're away...we had a great book when my kids were little called The Rascally Cake about a cake that did just that....loved it. And yes, Telecoms companies are all heartless, slef-seeking, slef-serving cheating whatnots - your poor mum.

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    1. My fridge was intact upon my return I'm happy to say. The sourdough starter was becalmed by the cold, as were the kefir grains. Hurrah!

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  10. Am curious about your writing. I completed a proof-reading course some years ago but never did anything with it. I wonder how I would do at your exercises?
    Interested in your dalliance with local politics. Keep us posted.
    I am about to write a letter regarding my elderly aunt's home insurance. Only just realised she had been paying an absolute fortune over recent years. It said her house had 99 bedrooms (it has two). We have managed to massively reduce her costs for the coming year - now to see if we can get some recompense for the past errors.

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    1. Your aunt's story is a familiar one, over here too. Seems some companies can't resist the opportunity of ripping off the elderly and it's only when the family steps in that the easy money dries up. Shocking.

      Proof-reading is becoming very popular what with internet publishing being so huge. The exercises I do are quite challenging in that I have to find interesting things to write, not just 'the boy walked the dog' type of thing. The latest one on etymology is the most challenging as it takes so long to look up each word and find a suitable quote.

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  11. Little wonder you need a holiday. I am exhausted just reading it all. I would vote for you. Go safely, and have lots of fun. Top up your energy level - it sounds as if you're going to need all you can get. :) I wish blogger would accept comments from Wordpress. If you win, could you have a word with them?

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    1. Thanks Susie. :) We'll know the outcome on March 23rd...

      The holiday has done me a lot of good. I came back to a bit of chaos concerning the kids but not enough to undo the good!

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  12. Have fun on your holiday! Sounds like it's well deserved. x

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