September 15, 2011
Canning forecast
Round 2 peach canners of the world unite…
During round 1, I canned 4 peaches and it took me three hours, alone.
Round 2 saw the entry to the ring of the small male (as blancher) the productivity rose to a shocking 12 peaches in one and a half hours.
Round 2 was certainly a more disco affair: water, sugar, teatowels, peach skins, pans, spoons everywhere.
Ratio of burns was also down 75 percent.
September 13, 2011
I did not think a kettle could give me as much joy as my new kettle has managed. It has a wonderful disco blue light on it and is made of glass. Thus the water dances about inside, visible to the naked eye. Even the sound of the water boiling (more of a rushing sound) is pleasing. Plus it turns off, I have expired on whistling kettles that summon me to them.
I will say I have always had a very healthy regard for the kettle, but this new sneaking joy, watching and hearing it I have not previously known.
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I have just canned my first round of peaches. I will not admit the numbers as they are embarrassingly small quantity in the length of time some people could build a house. It is a process and the canner is so big I can practically fit inside it, so if all else fails I may just live in it. I am not quite sure why I get so enthused for domestic endeavours I am entirely unsuited to. It might have been more sensible to find a novel which had a woman canning in it and to experience it vicariously.
Oiche maith from Sleepless in Peachland here.
September 13, 2011
Publishers appear to be giving up on fiction and practicing only accountancy, therefore in protest I am joining them by giving up on hairdressers.
I wonder which will become apparent to the greater populous first…. I suspect there will be a negligent impact felt on both scores.
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On the other hand the absence of salt from HP sauce has been noted and vigorously protested by said salt deprived tongues.
Once salt is restored to HP sauce the uptake of literary fiction can be re-examined.
We must be reassured by the HP dilemma that attention is being paid to certain appetites and any attempt to diminish them will not be tolerated.
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I am now a certified peach canner. Certified by helping the peach canning expert Leannej in 500ml jars, without the need to blanche.
September 9, 2011
Earthquake was felt here at mrsokana. The couch jumped and my knitting bag rose. There was also a bang. I immediately thought Earthquake! Turned left to check out the light — sure enough it was swinging.
I happened to be sitting on the couch at the time so was equally elevated.
This has merely confirmed what I thought about this building that any earthquake will undoubtably flatten it. The poor product of 1980’s Vancouver special type leaky throw ups. I must now do the hoovering incase there are aftershocks. All tremors must be met with a clean carpet.
September 9, 2011
Skookum Chuck
I chanced upon Skookum Chuck by Stuart Edward White (he wrote mainly Cowboy adventure novels, naturalist, travel writings and his wife’s channellings…) set in Vancouver and published in 1925. Here is the opening paragraph. Ignore the twee opening and note the final lines of that paragraph they feel so contemporary and relevant. They are also a common reaction that I encounter to the city from people who’ve recently arrived from elsewhere to settle.) Two fascinating things about this book 1) it’s episodic 2) there are some pretty accurate weather descriptions in it, the following is not the best example of them.
On a sunny afternoon in early May a young man strolled along a back street of Vancouver. It might have been supposed that he—or any other human, for that matter—would be savouring the fine weather that marked the break of the long winter rains, or enjoying the sight of glittering snow peaks and the twinkle of waters on two sides of the peninsula on which Vancouver is so fortunate as to be situated. But if so, his appearance strangely belied him. He looked bored. Or perhaps bored is too active a word, implying too positive a mental state. Let us substitute. He looked uninterested, indifferent, vacant.
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Here are the titles of The Episodes in the book:
September 6, 2011
Of all the challenges I might have imagined my raising a teenager would bring, I did not envisage the auditory onslaught of Northern English accents my small Canadian male currently speaks in and medley of quotes from Top Gear and constant demand in said Northern accents “can we go to ASDA and buy some jaffa cakes”, not least because we live in Vancouver, Canada and I, who lived many years in London, can’t ever remember ever going to ASDA.
Even more startling is his invocation of Terry Wogan. Eventually I will have to introduce him to Terry Wogan on youtube. Ironically the biggest stand off between my mother and her offspring was her insistence on listening in the car only to beeping Radio 2 and none other than Mr Wogan. I will never forgive Terry Wogan for standing between me and the possibility of listening to Culture Club.
I did have quite a jaffa cake habit in 1990’s Dublin, so perhaps that sailed down the genetic lineage.
Fortunately my son does not take my haphazard approach to baking and cookery — which will be a blessed relief to his tastebuds. I take my cooking instructions from him these days to better outcomes.
September 5, 2011
First time Tule
I saw my first bout of Tule Fog (thick ground fog) on Saturday morning on Cortes Island.
Quite the beauty she was too.
September 4, 2011
American asylums documented
“For some reason, everyone left their toothbrushes there,”…
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The unclaimed urns and autopsy room are equally stirring. And the general blankness of what is left and what was once.
September 2, 2011
Pickled herring and reading how to build a Canadian Woodframe House book (CMHC) at Refuge Cove, a place only accessible by boat, inside a house built by a woman using mainly hand tools.
On the way back in the boat I lay down in the hull and had jelly-belly bouncing across the waves.
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Oscar Wilde took a dim view on Tuesdays but they were kinda important to the French Revolution. Other than that they remain unremarkable.