Peas, peas, good for the heart!

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Feb 082013
 

Mushy Peas

After previous post, my reader e-mailed me to enquire about something I mentioned. “What on earth,” he asked, “are mushy peas?”.

Well, if you take some dried marrowfat peas, soak them overnight, then boil them with a bit of salt and sugar until the form a thick lumpy mush, voila, you have discovered the delights of mushy peas. A couple of tips for those planning to prepare this culinary delight: a little bicarbonate of soda will result in mushier peas, and keep an eye on the water level while simmering them:

Mistreating Mushy Peas

Keep an eye on the water level

Mushy peas are traditionally served with fish and chips, or pies. Around these parts (Nottingham) you can also go to the local chippy and get chips with peas on top. This is known colloquially as ‘A Mix’. They are sometimes eaten on their own, perhaps with a little mint sauce, particularly at outdoor events such as Bonfire Night. Mushy peas are also strongly associated with Nottingham’s Goose Fair which takes place in the during the first week in October. In fact you will often hear people say that they are going to the fair, just to get a portion of mushy peas! “Forget the rides and the stalls, we’re here for the peas m’duck”.

So that’s mushy peas, nutritious, healthy, low fat and yummy. If you get the opportunity I urge you to try this quintessentially British dish. Just be warned however, that mushy peas are known for their ‘wind producing’ properties, so don’t go overboard – no matter how tempted you might be.

Aren’t we missing a day?

The observant reader may have noticed that there appears to be day missing. In fact there isn’t. Yesterday’s post ended-up being rather personal. It  talked about a close friend and, to be quite honest, it was more than a little gushy. So I made it private.  Chances are there will be other private posts in the future. The whole purpose of this blog is to write for my own benefit. The only reason I’m doing it in this format is because it’s a motivational trick. If I imagine my reader sitting out there and tutting if I don’t produce a post , then I’m more likely to write something. Thankfully my reader has a high codswallop threshold, so I can write almost anything and he won’t tut. Having said that, there are things that I don’t want him to know and those things I’ll keep private.

I did My Homework!

My son asked me to help him with his maths homework this evening. It was just about factorising an equation (and an introcutory type question at that) but I couldn’t for the life of me remember how to do it. I had to ask my daughter to remind me. Thankfully it all started flooding back as she patiently explained it all to me.

When I was at school, all those many years ago, I would have had no problems in doing it. I used to love algebra and juggling the letters about to get to the answer. So much so that I even played with equations in my spare time. For Fun! Sad, I know, but true. Since leaving school, however, the factorisation of equations hasn’t really played a huge part in my life and as a result I had become just a tad rusty. . All of which has given me another idea for my 50B450 project. HeadSwill comes-up trumps again.

And with that we’re finishing more or less where we started! (cue schoolboy snickering at the lame, and rather obscure,  fart joke).

Fireworks Spectacular!!

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Feb 062013
 
Fireworks #1 by Camera Slayer

Fireworks #1 by Camera Slayer

500 words! It’s a lot to think about at this time of night! But I can’t let it slide, not at this early stage of the game. I want to go to bed! It’s been  long day. Up early to take my wife to hospital for some tests. Then to work after having had a day off yesterday. Busy day there, then home. Grab some dinner. Then visit a friend, who’s got stuff on her mind, for a heart-to-heart  Back home late and sit in front of the computer and attempt to bash out 500 words because I promised myself I would. I wanna go to beeeeeeeddddddd!

To cap things off, I haven’t been able to do my Photo a Day for my 50B450 project, because a) it’s too late, and b) my camera seems to have been tidied away somewhere and I can’t do anything in this crappy light with the camera on my mobile. Oh well, I don’t suppose anyone will notice if I miss a day. Mustn’t let it happen too often though otherwise it”ll take me several years to get a picture every day for a year!

When I die (he said changing the subject abruptly) I’ve decided that I want to be cremated, then my ashes stuffed into a big rocket which will be fired off during my wake. I got this idea just before bonfire night, the night we in England celebrate some Guy attempting to blow-up The House of Parliament in the 1600s, or not succeeding to do so, or something, anyway there’s fireworks and bonfires involved, and mushy peas.

So yes, It was just before Bonfire Night, and I drove past a funeral parlour. Directly outside, tied to some roadside railings, was a 20 foot banner proudly proclaiming “FIREWORKS SPECTACULAR!!“. “Yes,” I thought, “That should most definitely be a thing”.  I would really, really like to make it a thing If I can.

The biggest problem I think would be getting the local authorities to agree to it.  I’m not 100% sure that they will approve of having someone’s ashes being spread far and wide by an exploding big-ass rocket. They’ve probably got some sort of health and safety rule about it or something.  The neighbours might object too. Mr Poskitt at number 32 doesn’t want to be wiping powdered Adam off his car before he goes to work the next morning.  We may have to hold my wake in a field in the middle of nowhere, which in itself would be cool.

I just thought I’d share. And interestingly while doing so I came-up with and idea for a post for tomorrow! You see this stuff works – albeit a touch Blogceptiony at the moment.  I’m not going to tell you now what it is, but it’s going to be a good one. Something that may shake civilization to the core! The emphasis in the previous sentence should be placed on the word ‘May‘ which should be read as ‘Definitely will not‘. You will have to tune in tomorrow to find out what all the excitement is all about.  Ooh, a cliffhanger! This is getting exciting!

Ill, and thoughts on organisation

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Feb 042013
 

Day 2, how exciting.

Actually today has been a day of more-or-less nothingness. I’ve been feeling unwell and mostly all I’ve done is sleep and feel sorry for myself.  Oh well, back on track tomorrow hopefully.

So, after banging on about how easy 500 words is going to be yesterday, My mind is now blank! Not feeling terribly creative, but I promised 500 words every day, so 500 words is what I’m going to do – even if it does end-up being a bunch of tosh. In fact you’d probably be better off ignoring today’s post altogether.

Actually, I’m feeling rather disapointed. After a few days of furious activity, I feel that today has been wasted. Why does illness always seem to strike at completely the wrong time? I missed going to The Spring Fair at the NEC yesterday, something I was really looking forward to, but at least I was able to do some work on my personal projects. But today has been a total washout. So Frustrating!

We got our new fridge/freezer today, so that’s a good thing. We had our old one for about 10 years and it was looking rather sad and tired. The seals weren’t up to scratch and the freezer compartment wasn’t large enough for a growing family. So out with the old and in with the new. It is nice having nice shiny new appliances, even if it does make the rest of the kitchen look a bit tawdry and sad. That, as they say, is how they get you.

I’ve been thinking a lot about organisation of my personal life since yesterday. Specifically the tools that will help me force a little order into the chaos.  At the moment I’m leaning towards a combination of Astrid for Todos (while researching this, I’ve come to realise how much I hate how ‘Todos’ looks as a word) and Evernote for general note taking and stuff. I’ve also come across Freedcamp which is a free project management application. This could be very useful for when I get into planning my 50B450 project.

Thing is, I don’t want to get too bogged down in the tools and methodology of getting organised. I’ve tried the getting organised thing several times before and I get so wrapped up in the systems, reading “How to get organised” blogs, and the software, that I don’t actually get round to doing the things on the nice pretty lists I’ve created. Give a procrastinator a reason to put things off and they’ll grab it gleefully with both hands.

I suppose that’s what ‘Getting Organised’ means to me. Overcoming my strong inclination towards procrastination, and eliminating the “Oh crap! That needs to be done NOW!” moments. I don’t lead an incredibly complicated life, it’s just that there’s always ‘stuff’ that needs doing and doesn’t get done until the last moment, if ever. I feel as though the ‘stuff’ is controling me, rather than the other way round. That’s a feeling I’d like to get rid of.

Of course, my procrastination is the real problem. I need to treat the disease and not the symptoms. In order to do that I think some thinking and soul-searching is needed to understand exactly why it happens. Otherwise, the shiny tools and wotnot won’t help at all. Having said that, I mustn’t use reflection and self-analysis as a way to procrastinate!

An introduction

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Feb 032013
 
Writing

Photo By jeffrey james pacres

Thought I’d try my hand at writing 500 words per day. Other than the length of each post, this blog serves no other purpose – except perhaps to allow me to play with the WordPress software.

So, before we start properly, let me lay down a few rules for myself (these are subject to change at any time without notice):

The Rules!

  • Each post must contain a minimum of 500 words (more is OK)
  • There should be a post every day
  • Padding is frowned-upon
  • Each post should be done in a single session

Initially at least the goal is quantity rather than quality. As Jack Cohen said: “Pile it high and sell it cheap”, and he did all right for himself.

Why Write 500 Words a Day?

The main reason is to write. Pure and simple. I have become aware that I rarely write very much beyond the occasional Facebook update or Tweet and I feel the same is probably true for many people. I think this is a sad state of affairs. At one time I used to write pages of stuff – Diary entries, notes for roleplaying games, short stories and what have you. None of it any good, but I was writing all the same. It’s something I’d like to get back into doing. It’s fun, it’s relaxing and, let’s face it, there can’t be very many cheaper hobbies.

I’ve recently begun and “Fifty things to do before fifty” project and as a result I’ve been dabbling with a number of things, juggling, learning the harmonica and I thought now would be a good time to start such a project as this, while I’m feeling motivated. I think I’ll keep the two projects separate. Actually while writing this I’ve just thought of an addition to my list – Get something published. I could use this blog as an aid towards that goal. Writing on a regular basis has to improve my writing skills which makes the possibility of getting something published more of a reality.

Which brings us very nicely to another reason for doing this – brain dumpage. Get things out of my head and written down. There’s nothing terribly exciting swimming around in my cranium, but maybe writing it down might spark ideas – like, indeed, the “Get Something Published” idea above.

So that’s the plan. 500 words is a an easy target to aim for and shouldn’t take-up too much of my day and by setting myself a goal will help towards actually doing it. By making it a daily post I will have to think about what I’m going to write – I don’t want it all to be random ramblings. So I expect there’ll be an eclectic mix of half-baked opinions, stuff that’s caught my attention and whatever – similar to an old-fashioned retro style blog – like the ones before the word ‘niche’ started to be used.

And I’ve just realised how easy 500 words is to achieve – the current word count is (drumroll) 492 words! Perhaps I should think about upping the limit. We’ll see how it goes before deciding. No doubt things will change and evolve as time goes on, but for now I have a starting point.

One thing I must do is get back into the habit of jotting things down. Either carry a notebook around, or perhaps try using EverNote - I always have my phone with me. Thinking about it I think I’ll do both to begin with and see which works best for me.