Tag: slice of life

A pictorial post

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The beastie was feeling a lot better yesterday (he’d been running a bit of a fever for the past few days) so we were able to go out and about for a while.

We went to Scottsdales to start buying some Christmas decorations. Yes, I know it’s still early, but we’ve made a deal to not put anything up until Guy Fawkes has passed, and the tree can’t go up until December. Besides, it’s fun and the beastie seems to really enjoy garden centre Christmas displays.

Which brings us to this.


Who the hell thought disembodied, shrunken Santa heads would make for good tree ornaments? I mean, wtf?!?? Just look at the eyes of the one in the first picture. Doesn’t it just say “please, kill me! I beseech you, let this torment end?”

Then, there was this.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Meerkats. I think that Aleksandr Orlov and Compare the Meerkats is one of the best publicity campaigns I’ve seen in a very long time. But what the hell do Meerkats have to do with Christmas???

But there is a happy ending.

The beastie, he is getting very excited about Christmas.

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Long overdue status update

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Lost of things have been happening, and not much, at the same time.

We had our new cooker delivered Monday of last week. It’s all shiny and new and works very well (if a bit scarily too-well). I’ll need to adjust my timings for it but at least it has fire in its belly (!) compared to the old one.

We went to Snape Maltings on Tuesday so that I could visit the farm shop that Katy had raved about from her last jaunt with Donna. I have to say that I’m impressed and we could spend a serious chunk of change there :) We bought some tomato chutneys that I can actually eat, mandarin flavoured olive oil (they didn’t have the lemon flavoured that I already have and love) and some flame-grilled artichoke hearts that have already been found quite tasty on pizzas and marginally less so in my pasta sauce. We had pancakes with some really, really, really(!) good bacon for brunch and then we headed back home through a warren of country back roads. It’s a good thing we had the satnav :)

We went to Lakeside on Wednesday to scope out some preliminary ideas for xmas presents and to try and get a Costco membership. Lakeside was ok. We stopped at Cafe Rouge for lunch. I like Cafe Rouge. It’s generally a nice meal that is also fairly safe, allergy-wise. I had a bit of a surprise this time though. I’d ordered a steak-filled baguette and ended up with a steak and fish-flavoured mayo baguette for my troubles. I don’t know what the kitchen staff did, but they managed to get bits of fish (big enough to point out to Katy and a rather flabbergasted waiter) in my sandwich. No wonder the taste was off… Anyway, they were very apologetic and comped my meal, so that wasn’t too bad. The onion soup was nice as usual though. Costco was a big disappointment. Apparently, neither the EBI or Babraham qualify as valid companies for an individual membership :( I’ll see if I can wangle a membership through somebody at work.

We recently celebrated our 5-year meeting-up anniversary on Oct 1st and our 3-year wedding anniversary on Oct 2nd. I wrote Katy a sappy card and she wrote me a cynical one. It pretty much sums us up :) We were in Leicester this weekend. We had a nice meal at San Carlos and Katy was really happy that we could eat off of each other’s plate. It’s a silly thing, when you think about it, but it very rarely can happen because of my allergies. The food was very nice, as usual, and the cocktails at Las Iguanas were also very nice :) They had a continental market in town with lots of interesting foodstuffs but we were full and cashless, so we headed home.

The car decided that wanted a makeover this weekend and had aspirations to become a muscle car. To that effect, it decided that its exhaust system really needed a throaty growl so it reworked itself to bypass the back-box. Sadly, Katy decided that she preferred to have acceleration, gas mileage and full use of her hearing instead of having the only Toyota Corolla that sounded like a supercar and took her car into the garage yesterday. We would have gotten it done in Leicester but nobody had the parts around to do it on short notice.

Today is Katy’s first day back at work and she’s of mixed minds about going back. Scratch that, both of her minds don’t want to, to be honest. If she can handle it for the short term, it’ll give us a bit of a chance to sort out longer-term options.

The beastie is doing well, even though he’s been a bit of a handful in the past few days. He caught a cold – which he will share with us soon enough – and we think that his teeth are giving him some grief. Other than that, we think he’s just on the cusp of being mobile. The cats look worried. I don’t blame them.

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Anna, Good. Florian, Bad.

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We had a BBQ this weekend – one last shindig before Lennart and Leen leave for Belgium. Joe and Matthieu weren’t able to make it, but Juan Antonio, Florian & Anna and Phil and the kiddies were able to come (jeez, his kids have grown!). As usual in these matters, I made waaaay too much food. I had three packs of sausages, burgers and I’d marinated some homemade tandoori chicken. That was accompanied by corn on the cob, a cheese plate and crudites. Katy went mad in her own inimitable way with the puddings.

It all went down smashingly. I’m really happy with how the chicken turned out, and I do have to say that a small-ish BBQ (by North American standards) filled with 18 sausages, 8 burgers and 10 chicken breasts was an impressive sight to behold. Smelled bloody good too :) I think I’m finally hitting the bottom of my gas cylinder. Not bad considering that I’ve had it for 4 years now… The weather gods were clement and we had nice breaks of sunshine and the wind kept it to just a nice temperature. It got a bit chilly near the end but people were stuffed with enough calories so that it didn’t matter. Juanan kept mentioning how unfair it was that he’s the one with the reputation as a big eater when compared to the bottomless pit that is Flo’s gullet :) Lennart says that it’s because Florian has a better PR machine :D

Pictures are online here: http://www.flubu.com/various_pics/BBQ_sept_2009/

I’ve come to the conclusion that BenBen finds us boring. He’s been uber-grumpy in the last week or so. I took him into Saffron Walden on Saturday while Katy was having a jaunt with Donna and I didn’t hear a peep from him while I was at Waitrose, or the butchers or the market. And, of course, he was flirting with all the preeeety laaadiiiies he could charm (he’s going to be a heart-breaker, that one). As soon as I got him home though, where it was just me, he was less than thrilled. Same thing for the BBQ. He loves being passed around and was all giggles and charm. When people left, grumpy baby. QED, we’re boring. Katy says that it’s impressive just how much he doesn’t mind being passed around, even when we’re not in sight. I was in the kitchen getting food ready and Katy was in the dining room setting things up and the beastie was quite happy with Leen or Anna. It’s what he’s been used to, I guess. He’s been going to nursery since he was 3 months, so for him, it’s just another preeeeety laaaady to charm :)

Once the beastie was asleep for the night, Beckie came over to keep an eye on him and we went to see Moon. It’s a good movie, if slightly creepy in the beginning. I don’t think I’d buy it, but I was happy to see it and I’d recommend it for a good sci-fi movie with an old-school feel to it.

Moon (2009)

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Weekend redux, and today is going to be another one of those days…

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The weather gods were clement and the BBQ we had planned for Saturday went off without a major hitch. At one point, I was juggling 12 sausages, 7 burgers, 6 koftas (with pita!), 2 ears of corn, asparagus and a large mushroom. Apparently, I have mad grillin skillz. We fed (and overfed) everybody who came and people seemed to have a good time. All good.

We went into town in the morning and bought 20 pounds of meat. I kid you not. The butcher had very good deals on so we left with 5 pounds of stewing steak, 5 pounds of minced lamb, 5 pounds of minced beef and 10 chicken breasts. Hopefully that’ll last us for a while :)

Sunday was a bit rougher, morale-wise. I spent part of the day making purees for the beastie. I’m not in my happy place at the moment. I seem to have misplaced my happy place. I miss my happy place. These days, I’m anxious and stressed and scatterbrained and fairly useless as a husband, father and general human being (yay!).

Katy woke me up at 2am this morning because I was snoring very loudly. I was in the middle of a deep sleep cycle and I couldn’t get back to sleep at all. In the end, I got fed up of staring at the ceiling so I went downstairs and had a cup of tea and watched bad late-night/early morning TV.

So yeah. I’m tired, irritable, and generally not in a good mood today and I don’t see it improving in the short term. But it has to, cause I’m not happy any more and I miss that and things need to change because the status quo can’t carry on.

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I do not need another allergy

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Last monday, Tolstoy paid me a visit while I was in the bathroom. I gave him a quick scratch on the head and a stroke on the back and my hands immediately became itchy and red. † I figured that he’d been rolling around some stringing nettles or something of the sort – it happened before, so I didn’t really give it a second thought. Except that the itch didn’t go away. I’ve been putting steroid-based cream on my hands for the past week and it still itches like a mofo. And now, something has spread to my elbows, back of my knees and top of my feet. I went to the doc this morning and she says that this are all classic signs of eczema. Damnit, Jim, I don’t need this shit right now. The “consensus” right now is that it’s mild, and might go away by itself considering that it appeared so quickly and that I should just keep my eye on it. We’re going to wash all the bedding and keep the cats out of the bedroom for a while and see what happens. In the meantime, I *must*not*scratch*!!!!

In other news, I went for my yearly eye exam and my prescription changed, but not significantly and my eye pressure is still very good. This makes me happy.

In other other news, the gold cross that I’ve been wearing since I was 18 broke this morning and I don’t think I’ll be able to fix it. This makes me very sad :(

† Wikipedia tells me that this is dyshidrosis (aka dyshidrotic e., pompholyx, vesicular palmoplantar dermatitis, housewife’s eczema) and only occurs on palms, soles, and sides of fingers and toes. Tiny opaque bumps called vesicles, thickening, and cracks are accompanied by itching which gets worse at night. A common type of hand eczema, it worsens in warm weather.

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Week in review

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Not a lot to report for this past week. Work’s been up and down. I’ve been working on cleaning up code written up during a recent student project. The code does some very nice things in truly god-awful ways. I shouldn’t be too harsh about it, as it was from a student who’d never programmed in Java before. Still, it gives me nightmares and for the first time in a very long time, I feel stupid because I’m having a hell of a time trying to wrap my brain around what it does and how it does it. It really doesn’t help my morale when a coworker just looked at the spaghetti mess and said “oh yes, it does this here and that there. it’s quite simple, actually”. Bastard :)

On the home front, the BenBen has mastered the art of sitting up unsupported and his first tooth has broken through. More are hot on its heels. The clever beast managed to barf on me this morning and, as I put him down to clean him and myself up, he kicked my tea cup off the coffee table. Triple-score points!!! Otherwise, he’s generally in a good mood these days and he’s discovering new foods at a good pace. The ladies at the nursery are impressed in his ecclectic tastes. It’s not every baby that likes asparagus and olives, apparently.

Some lads from work came and helped me move the old sofa into the office. It took two tries and a bit of swearing, but we managed to get it to its final resting place with a minimum of pain or injury to either myself or the house. It smelled of cat wee so we nuked it with the odor remover and washed all the covers. The office is starting to look nice and usable now. I borrowed some homeplugs from a guy at work and I can now connect the SunRay console to the house network. I haven’t tested it out yet but it’ll hopefully mean that I can work from home on the days that I need to stay at home. I have to say that I’m impressed with the technology. I’d never heard of it before but they allow you to create a home network using the electrical wiring in your house. Very clever. I’ve ordered my own set and they should be in next week.

Katy and I have been on a Sopranos marathon. We’re starting season 3 now. Brings back memories of watching it Michel and tearing large chunks of the floor in that apartment in Montreal (hee hee hee, screw you Mister Silver!!!) We went to the Saffron Screen to watch Star Trek. I really, really liked that movie and it’s one of the few Star Trek movies I’d consider buying on DVD. Beckie, our babysitter, had an easy night last night but I think that she’s going to be a life saver in the months and years to come.

On the cooking front, we managed to have only one BBQ this week but that’s because the weather was mostly crappy. I made beef koftas. They were nice. I took the beastie for a walk to town to pick up stuff from the market. The fruit and veg stall is going to be beneficial to our budget, but the butcher and the bread stall might hurt our wallet so it might be a mixed blessing. I made spahetti with a creamy bacon and seafood sauce. Very, very nice. We’re going to have to buy more of that seafood mix from Aldi.

I poached some chicken breasts in some apple juice and some herbs for the beastie. I whizzed some up with some mixed root veg (swede, parsnip, sweet potato, carrots) and some leek. It’ll complement his lunches of pasta with meet sauce and chicken with veg and cous cous. It seems that I’m cooking more for the beastie than I am for us :)

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Weekend redux

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The family went to Saffron Walden on Saturday to pick up some veg from the farmer’s market and have a peek at the French market that was being held on the common. Nothing spectacular, but the food looked nice. Will and Donna came over on Sunday afternoon for a very carnivorous BBQ. I’d made sausages, burgers and home-made lamb koftas. I have to say, the kebabs were a brilliant success. Combine lamb mince with tumeric, chili powder, cumin, coriander powder, paprika, ginger, salt, pepper and minced onions and form onto soaked bamboo skewers. Grill on the BBQ and baste a few times with reggae reggae sauce until well done. Serve in olive oil-basted pitas that have been toasted on the BBQ with some fresh, home-made tzaziki. DELISH! This is a perfect way to cook lamb mince because the fat renders out and you’re left with a juicy kebab that’s not floating in fat.

I spent part of Sunday putting up a curtain pole and a shelf in the master bedroom. We moved our stuff over from the guest bedroom and slept in our new bed for the first time. It’s going to take a bit of getting used to. For starters, it’s a lot higher off the ground than our previous one and we’ll need to jerry-rig something to prevent our pillows from falling through the headboard all the time. Still, comfy. We didn’t sleep all that well because there were no curtains in the room so we both woke up at 5am with sunlight streaming into the room.

The beastie is getting to be a handful at times now. His nap pattern is shifting and he’s alternating between tired/grumpy and awake/entertain-me-now mode. It’s going to be a fun few weeks until things settle down. Still, could be worse. My cough seems to want to clear up – finally – but Katy is still feeling under the weather. If she’s still not right when we come back from Leicester, I’ll nag her to go to see the doc.

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And lo, the 7th seal is opening…

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We have been notified of the first member of staff that has contracted swine flu. The person works in the EBI and was at home when they first recognised symptoms. They will obviously stay at home and away from campus for the duration of their illness. Their close colleagues and contacts in the EBI have been informed of the case.

It’s the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine.

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Been a trying weekend…

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Health matters have been problematic in the last two weeks. I’ve just about gotten back all the mobility in my foot but I now have this stupid phlegm-y chest cough. Katy had a migraine last Wednesday that left her vomiting for most of the night and part of the following day. I stayed home from work and managed to catch either a 24-hour bug or a touch of food poisoning. The result of which was I was puking my guts out Friday night and was completely useless on Saturday. I was back on my feet – mostly – on Sunday but Katy is still feeling out of sorts. She went to the doctor today so hopefully that’ll be on its way to being sorted out, but with the beastie being difficult because of his teeth these days, it still promises to be a bumpy ride for the next few days. I’ve already taken a lot of leave time so I’m a bit conflicted about staying home, but at the same time, if she needs it, family comes before work. Still, I just wish things would settle down for a bit and the universe would give us a break.

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