Fin and Tutu

Are still alive - you see them pictured on a donation from a friend; a nice old lounge chair. I'll spare you the photo with them wearing reindeer ears. We're still waiting for snow here - it has been forecast to occur at the end of the week, but I'm not holding my breath. The neighbours all have their Christmas lights up but, apart from a few giant Santas, it's a fairly sedate affair. I realise that I've yet to finish the UK holiday entry – will make it a NY's resolution.

I finished my second series of yoga classes in a somewhat spectacular fashion – my face and shoulder connecting with the floor before my arms could cooperate and support my floundering body! So I've yet to sign up for further punishment – NY's resolution no. 2?

Inspired by reading Ewen's blog to mention the latest CD playing in the car (no, no iPod yet). Here's a youtube clip of one of the songs Los Angeles I'm Yours. Whilst on things musical, there's also a great photo accompanying an interview with Tom Waits on Pitchfork.

Betjeman

Nice poem from John Betjeman quoted in Writer's Almanac today. Made me laugh to read about the “20 yards” ... here's a bit more than a snippet:

The Advent wind begins to stir
With sea-like sounds in our Scotch fir,
It's dark at breakfast, dark at tea,
And in between we only see
Clouds hurrying across the sky
And rain-wet roads the wind blows dry
And branches bending to the gale
Against great skies all silver-pale.
...
The Advent bells call out 'Prepare,
Your world is journeying to the birth
Of God made Man for us on earth.'
And how, in fact, do we prepare
For the great day that waits us there –
The twenty-fifth day of December,
The birth of Christ? For some it means
An interchange of hunting scenes
On coloured cards. And I remember
Last year I sent out twenty yards,
Laid end to end, of Christmas cards
To people that I scarcely know –
They'd sent a card to me, and so
I had to send one back. Oh dear!
Is this a form of Christmas cheer?
Or is it, which is less surprising,
My pride gone in for advertising?
The only cards that really count
Are that extremely small amount
From real friends who keep in touch
And are not rich but love us much.

Fin's latest fetish

Ignored tell-tale warning of silence coupled with Fin's absence. Upon investigation, found my that he'd customised a new pair of work shoes.

No fail, no-knead bread recipe

From the New York Times, Wednesday November 8, 2006.

From Jim Lahey, Sullivan Street Bakery.

Ingredients

• 3 cups all-purpose (plain) or bread flour, plus extra for dusting
• 1/4 tspn instant yeast
• 1 and 1/4 tspns salt
• Cornmeal or wheat bran (I didn't have hence didn't use this)

Method

1. Combine flour, yeast and salt in a large bowl. Add 1 and 5/8 cups of water and stir until blended. Dough will look shaggy and sticky. Cover with gladwrap. Place somewhere warm (at least 21 degrees C) for at least 12 hours, preferably 18.
2. The dough will look bubbly when ready. Put some flour on the kitchen bench and turn dough onto it. Sprinkle with a little more flour and fold onto itself. Cover loosely with gladwrap and let it rest for 15 minutes.
3. Using enough flour to stop the dough sticking to your hands, shape the dough into a ball. Coat a cotton / linen teatowel with flour (or cornmeal / bran) and put dough seam-side down onto the teatowel. Dust with more flour and cover with another teatowel and let rise for about two hours.
4. Half an hour before dough is ready, turn on the oven to 230 degrees C (450 F). Put a heavy covered pot (casserole dish etc - I used a pyrex casserole) in to warm up. Once dough is ready, carefully remove casserole from the oven and turn dough into it. Cover with the lid and bake for 30 minutes, then remove lid and bake another 15 to 30 minutes (to brown).

Mine only needed an extra 5 minutes to brown.

All Saints Day

Finally starting to feel at home at church (Church of the Good Shepherd) - though obviously still stand out enough after 8 months to receive welcome presents from a couple of the kids in Sunday School (see pic) ... very sweet. All Saints Day today - we were asked to think of people who had died who we thought of as Saints ... three people came to mind: Yolande Peirson and Beryl Redshaw (from Holy Trinity days), and James McIntosh.

It was a beautiful warm Autumn day today. I'm not long home from a walk along the river, the banks of which are looking extremely bare - it looks as though someone has cleared all of the undergrowth and with no leaves on the trees, it's pretty sparse. I'm heading to DC tomorrow for a couple of days to assist with some usability testing. It was going to be for the whole week, but they had trouble lining up enough participants, so will be back Wednesday ... so it's off to pack.

Alba Tour - August September 2006 - Week 2

Saturday 26 to Saturday 2 September: Coldingham to Killin

We drove into Edinburgh from Coldingham the next day (27th) and after parking, found The Elephant House cafe that we remembered from last time and stopped for what was becoming our essential before-spending-the-day-walking-around-for-hours cup of tea. Enjoyed a 'highlights' tour of the National Museum after that. Fantastic collection. Then we walked back down the BIG hill to the carpark, under my mistaken impression that we only had limited time. I had somehow missed seeing the second column of hours indicating that all-day parking was available! Back up the BIG hill to find the pub which was the meeting place for the 'Rebus' walking tour. Our tour guide was mildly opinionated and enjoyed the sound of his own voice, but it was still fun walking around the streets and seeing the settings for the stories.

After a quiet night and some beautiful birthday fruitcake which Jane had thoughtfully brought from home, we drove north towards Lonmay. It was a 'funny' (read grumpy travel) day. We stopped in Arbroath, but didn't go into the Abbey (to see the Declaration) because we also wanted to get to Forfar, a little further west, where Jane had found a good place for ordering a made-to-measure McEwen kilt for Mum. We had wanted to stay on the coast at Stonehaven, and so stopped there on the way north after Forfar, as well as cramming in a quick walk down to see Dunnottar castle, before going further north again to Lonmay (just south of Fraserburgh). It was a pretty long day.

We left Lonmay and went first to Fraserburgh to see the lighthouse museum and then towards Inverness and the walked around the battlefields of Culloden before heading to Tomintoul for the night. We made our way from Tomintoul to Fort William the next day and were glad to arrive at Achintee mid-afternoon. It was as nice as we remembered from last time, in a perfect location at the foot of Ben Nevis with nothing else around except for a handy pub about 20 metres from the house.

The 31st was a big day for Jane - she was up and out at the crack of dawn to climb the mountain (Nevis is usually translated as 'malicious' or 'venomous mountain'), whilst Mum and I opted for a steam train ride to Glenfinnan and back.

Friday 1st September was a momentous day. We said goodbye to Achintee and Ben Nevis and drove to Kilfinan on the east side of Loch Fyne on the Cowell Peninsula with the singleminded aim of finding Castle Ewen after our failed attempt three years ago. We were cutting it fine, arriving around 3.00 pm in the afternoon at Kilfinan. We weren't exactly sure of the location even though Jane had done a lot more research, so we stopped in at the Kilfinan Hotel to enquire. It turned out that the hotel has a strong connection with the 'Castle'. Clan McEwen keeps a huge visitors' book of sorts there and the manager had a handy printout with directions. Getting there would take us about 40 mins walking each way - cross country. In spite of the time of day, we were pretty determined and set off. We successfully (mostly) negotiated a few small creeks, some fences and finally a bit of a bog and arrived at the cairn that marks what is supposedly the site of the original castle. In the attached Google Earth shot, you'll see (maybe) a pin that marks what from memory is about the spot.

Alba Tour - August September 2006 - Week 1 (cont)

After Paris, we had another night at Mme Roussel's in Albert, narrowly avoiding a middle-of-the-night-visit from the usual occupants (farm labourers, arriving late from ?) before heading back to Dunkerque, then Dover via the ferry, the next day. We arrived back in the UK around 2 and then drove about 200 miles up the east coast to King's Lynn. We found a cute pub called the Lattice House and I remember having a decent beer (Mum and Jane were onto Guinness at that point ... nothing like it as a salve to travel woes!) and sausages and mash. The hostel was cute, though enforcing a peculiar practice of seating all its guests at the communal table for breakfast the next day. Everyone at the table seemed kind of bemused by this (especially the group who, after sitting at a table a little apart, were requested to reconsider!).

After breakfast and a couple of return trips to the hostel (first for the road maps, which I'd left lying on the entrance table, second for Mum's parka which had slithered under the bed), we drove west to Haworth, home of the Brontes, to visit the Bronte museum there ... it was kind of depressing to read about their lives (which ended before any of them had reached 40 - makes me thankful, as I think about it, to have the opportunity to wallow in my various my mid-life crises) and the conditions in which they lived.

We meandered north-east-ish from there to the big YHA in York and collapsed in our room. We walked around the city walls the next day, visited the National Rail Museum (where we had a very tasty Devonshire tea), and then wandered to Betty's Tea Room which Jane had read about. We were sadly beyond lining up (and had had our daily quotient of scones), or would have joined the queue to wait for a table. We settled on purchasing some tea instead, before hitting the road again to head further north.

We stopped briefly at the Lindesfarne crossing and then on to Coldingham Sands, arriving in time for a beautiful sunset which we enjoyed over fish and chips at nearby St Abb's - our attempts at dining elsewhere failing miserably due to Bank holiday. Coldingham Sands was a nice, if remote, hostel, though we had to share our room with someone who had a few words to say the next morning after she'd been rudely awoken by Mum's regular 6.00 am morning conversation. Gracious as ever, I found myself easily (so easily ... sigh), pettily, retaliating that she had preceded the favour by waking us up when she entered the room the night before. I then spent the next hour or so thinking about what would have been a more satisfactory retort. The joys of travel - so expansive to one's nature.

Alba Tour - August September 2006 - Week 1

Friday 18 August to Saturday 26 August: Dover to York via Iepers and Paris

It's hard to remember back to our very eventful holiday in August / September. I think it took a month to recover once I arrived back. I flew out on the 19th of August for a relatively easy 8-hour direct flight to Gatwick. All the last minute stuff (including saying goodbye to Fin and Tutu at the kennel) seemed to fall into place OK. Jane, Mum and I didn't really have a backup plan if we somehow missed finding each other (they flew into Heathrow), so I was quite relieved when they wandered into the car rental place at Gatwick airport the next morning - after what must have been a bit of an epic trip from Sydney.

The trip from that point is a bit of a blur. We crammed a lot in - plenty of highlights, plenty of navigational glitches but no major unfortunate incidents - if you discount the sledding trip I took down a flight of stairs (sans sled) a couple of weeks in ... and Mum's bung knee from our tandem cycling trip along the Avon & Kennet Canal in Bath. It would have been nice to spend a few extra days at the posh new spa that opened there this year ... next time!

There's a problem loading pics, so just one for now: Capel Le Ferne at Dover (remember the Battle of Britain? There's a memorial there overlooking the Channel. We spent a couple of nights in Dover after arriving. While there, we went for a walk along the cliffs to the South Foreland Lighthouse - a lovely walk, followed by a quick beer in the Coastguard pub at St Margaret's Bay before the return trip.

A few more pics. From Dover we caught the ferry to Dunkerque and, after disembarking, drove through torrential rain to Iepers. After finding 'B&B Hortensia' in Iepers, we walked in the rain down to the square, had a quick meal, then joined about 150 other people who had gathered to listen to three men from the local volunteer fire brigade play the last post under the Menin Gate. It has been played at 8.00 pm every day since 1929 (excepting during WWII) - it was very moving.

The second picture is of the memorial at Pozieres. Our reason for the trip to the Somme was mainly to visit Villers Bretonneux and see the memorial to two distant relatives (of Mum's great grandfather), William Henry Hannam and Arthur Hobbs. Both enlisted in the 45th Battalion (12th Brigade, 4th Division). They arrived in France in June 1916 and fought at (and survived) Pozieres in August.

They both died six months later about three days apart. The Red Cross 'eyewitness' records provide heartwrenching accounts such as "I was told by W.H. Hannam, a cousin of Hobbs that he was killed in a trench at Gaudecourt on Feb. 19th by a shell which bled all his chest away. Probably he was buried in the trench at night. Hannam was killed at the same post on Feb. 21st. They were both old friends of mine." Of Hannam's death, one witness states "I was an eye witness of this casualty. Hannam was wounded by a [pice] of shell which almost severed the left leg, during the attack at Gaudecourt on Feb.21st/17. He died at the dressing station about 1 and a half hours after being wounded Cpl Mayne and I (both of 45th) buried him at rear of Parados near where he fell. We put a identity mark on the grave. He was about 5'6", med:build, fair 20 or 21 years." The trip through the Somme Battlefields was bizarre - there were so many cemeteries in the middle of nowhere. Every mile or so we would pass a field where smack in the middle was an immaculately kept memorial to people from some distant country.

From the sublime to the ridiculous. After the gravitas of the Somme, we took the train from Albert to Paris ... for the day. Here we are stuffing our faces after walking the VERY long Champs Elysees to view the Arc D'Triomphe (which was sadly barricaded from the world by much fencing). After lunch we queued to visit L'Orangerie, purpose built to house Monet's waterlily series. Following that, Jane managed to squeeze in climbing halfway up La Tour Eiffel (whilst Mum and I found a place to collapse for a while).

Orphans Tour

Thinking back to what's happened over the past few months (besides the epic hol - more to come on that later). Steve (work friend) was very lucky to get tickets to the Tom Waits 'Orphans Tour' in Chicago in August. We flew down on the day (narrowly avoiding missing our flight on the way there and stuck in the fallout from the terrorist scare whilst trying to get back the following day). Chicago is a great city. We stayed in the centre and had time for a wander along Lake Michigan before the concert. We had terrible seats but the atmosphere and the concert itself was fantastic. See the setlist on the 'Eyeball Kid's' blog.

And here's a few photos from Millennium Park. There's an amazing 'music pavillion' at one end designed by Frank Gehry where we sat for a while listening to an orchestra rehearse.

Fall

No, I'm not dead and no ... no blogging doesn't equate to having established a 'life' ... I just had a blog hol. Very sad to see the contents of my last post. An update for November before I go on to grander subjects. It was Halloween here last night - too cold to stand on the porch to dispense treats, so I bunkered down in the back of the flat only betrayed once or twice by Fin barking at the doorbell.

Nov 2006	Temperature	Humidity	Sunrise	Sunset
Wed 1	29.7 F (-1.3 C)	51%	6:53 am	5:00 pm

Stinking hot

You'll be relieved ... no photos, but just a 'few' words. Sitting here in my airless flat, I'm obsessing with the weather. Here's a brief history for July.

July 2006	Temperature	Humidity	Sunrise	Sunset
Sat 1	88 F (31.1 C)	56%	5:30 am	9:03 pm
Sat 8	86 F (30 C)	54%	5:35 am	9:00 pm
Sat 15	96 F (35.5 C)	74%	5:41 am	8:56 pm

The dogs seem to be coping OK. My survival tactics last weekend included going to a twins game on Saturday afternoon; the Metrodome is air-conditioned (Twins 5, Indians 2) - they're on a bit of a winning streak lately. Bad seats, so couldn't see a lot, but not a bad place to eat a hotdog and down a Summit Pale Ale (albeit in plastic).

I resorted to buying a fan on Sunday ... and got what I paid for as I turned it on and experienced no upward curve in my comfort levels. My fan-shopping expedition was followed by a vacuuming frenzy which saw me sweat about 50,000 kilocalories in the space of 10 minutes. I can highly recommend it as an effective weight-loss technique.

In spite of that minor whinge, I can say that stinking hot still has it over winter! In fact I was sad to notice (while tallying the temps) that the days are very slowly shortening. It has been so nice to be able to sit outside on the front steps with a drink and a book or to take the dogs for a late stroll.

And for those of you curious about baseball, a verse from May Swenson's Analysis of Baseball

It's about
the ball,
the bat,
and the mitt.
Ball hits
bat, or it
hits mitt.
Bat doesn't
hit ball, bat
meets it.
Ball bounces
off bat, flies
air, or thuds
ground (dud)
or it
fits mitt.

Peonies

My landlord came around a week or so back with the new lease (has a year gone already?!) and had his mother in tow. She was here visiting to do some gardening for him! A couple of beers later and I walked home with them and returned with a lovely bunch of peonies. Hadn't seen them before moving here. Such a beautiful flower with a lovely scent. They're pretty popular around the neighbourhood.

Weekend with James

Whilst James was here, we went and saw the Body Worlds exhibition at the Science Center. Not sure what I thought of it ... strange combination of art and science. After seeing a few 'bodies' I forgot that they were once living! The rest of the museum had some fantastic permanent exhibits and a great kids section where you could experiment with sound, wave patterns (Bill P and Ross Lamb would get a kick out of this), weather etc. Went to the Mill City Museum in the afternoon but decided against going in - info overload. Saw the Da Vinci Code on Saturday night. It was pretty good from an action point of view.

It was great to catch up with James - having a friend visit makes me realise how much I miss everyone and especially the Australian sensibility.

Saints v Canaries

Friday 9 June 2006 - James Turnbull arrived for the weekend 'on his way' to Boston (visiting me meant LA - Minneapolis - LA - Boston). So I co-opted Steve from work to take us to a baseball game. He suggested an outdoor game for a more authentic experience. I discovered that tailgating has a different meaning in the US ... pre-game bbq'ing from the back of your car in the carpark. Opted for the hot dogs and cheese curds due to absence of bbq. The rapidly declining temperature meant that only one beer was consumed and my hands were shaking so much from the cold that I was in danger of burning myself with the hot coffee. Crowd - 5,563 ... temperature around 54 degrees (12 C).

Wildlife Science Center

Saturday 3 June 2006 - Went to the 'Canine Carnival' with Rina. A friend of hers is the Director there. It's basically a wolf sanctuary (though they have various other creatures there too). Decided against taking Fin and Tutu - but there were plenty of other dogs there. Saw some 'cat herding' and also a lady with an assisted living dog - lovely retriever.

Ice-cream social

Friday 2 June 2006 - As part of the local community center's 'ice-cream social', the 'witch's tower' was open. It used to be a water tower and normally you can't climb it - so I made the most of the opportunity!

Incident in the park - part II

For those of you avidly following my mid-west adventures, you'll be glad to know that part II was pretty uneventful. I arrived at work on Tuesday morning and retrieved a phone message from the thin-lipped woman which was fairly subdued, requesting I fax through Fin's rabies certification. A very reasonable request, with which I complied. I then received a phone call to thank me. A short conversation ensued, giving a little context to part I. The fluffy rat (puppy) did not belong to the woman and, apparently its sibling had been 'taken' by an eagle a couple of weeks before - so she was duly a little freaked out by Fin's eagle-esque activities.

Martha Stewart science experiment

Ewen ... no references to custard please, burnt or otherwise.

Well it was Stephanie Alexander actually (but Martha Stewart had a certain ring to it). Stephanie's 'mum's red devil's cake' from p 313. Apt description. And it worked so well last time though; as I sit here with the bathroom exhaust, kitchen exhaust, all windows open, Crabtree and Evelyn votives burning, all to no effect on the burnt-chocolate-smelling smoke wafting just below the ceiling, I do recall thinking, as I poured the cake mix into the pan about an hour or so ago, that the bubbling mix had a foreboding somewhat unfamiliar look to it!

10.20 pm on a school night. Downstairs neighbours are probably on the verge of calling the fire brigade. I do hope my work colleague (whose birthday in honour of which the cake was made) will be grateful for the thought.

Thoughts of all my culinarily (word?) proficient friends (Jac, Linds, Mum) as I head back to deal with the aftermath. A beer before bedtime may be in order. I discovered a very tasty brew whilst in Washington ... Hefe weizen.

Ball game

A sweltering 35 degrees and 38 percent humidity at 5:48 ... spent most of the afternoon at the Metrodome (the only indoor baseball stadium in the US - today I was glad to be indoors in air conditioned comfort). The Twins won, though it went into the 10th inning (if I sound like I know what I'm talking about, I don't ... but had a work friend there explaining it all to me).

Incident in the park

No pic today, just a vent / rant. Took the dogs to the park this morning early, as it is getting very hot now. They had a good time running around ... until Fin met the puppy with the thin-lipped (and, as it turned out, thin-skinned) woman at the other end of its lead. True to form, Fin was over-eager in his inspection of said puppy. The woman scooped up her puppy and started yelling things such as get your attack dog away etc. Unfortunately, picking up her puppy incited Fin to jump up and, to exacerbate things, connect with the thin skin of the thin-lipped woman (not badly, but enough for a bandaid). She was pretty out of control after that, asking for my name and phone number (which I was happy to give to her). She also wanted my address, but visions of being stalked overruled the weight of her angry response when I declined. Poor old Fin didn't know what was going on - and it didn't make it easier for him to calm down while she stood there with her puppy in her arms ranting at me!

I went to the car while she pursued me - I think she thought I was going to make a getaway (sadly my overweening sense of responsibility meant that this was not an option). As I did, two other dog-owners approached me and said they'd be happy to be witnesses on my behalf. Most people at this park are 'dog' people and know that dogs will be dogs. So that made me feel a little better.

I got back to the car and tried not to laugh as I saw the empty almond croissant bag on the floor and Fin and Tutu's 'it wasn't me' expressions. As I was driving home, the whole Judge Judy scenario was playing out before my eyes which welled up as I imagined the judge ruling that Fin had to be put down in spite of my pleading on his behalf ... nothing like a litigious country to enhance my natural paranoia.

Stay tuned. I'm sure there'll be another instalment.

Washington DC

Travelled to DC for work a couple of weeks back. Flew in over what I guess was part of the Potomac. They say Washington was built on a reclaimed swamp, but I did wonder how that could be as I descended the steepest, longest (moreso than any the London tube has to offer!), escalators into where the swamp should have swallowed me, to catch the Metro into the city each day.

Hu Jintau was in town during my visit. The Chinese Embassy was very close to the hotel where I stayed and, whilst out jogging one evening, I witnessed the whole entourage as it passed - federal cars (black, tinted windows etc), armoured people movers, police cars, motor bikes and helicopters - causing a major peak-hour traffic jam in the process. Fellow witnesses included several hundred brightly clothed and musically noisy Falun Gong protestors. The drums continued beating until about 10.00 pm that night! After the protests about the situation in Darfur this last weekend, I suddenly realised that this was probably a common occurrence for the City.

I crammed in some sightseeing on Saturday morning before heading home. Took a highlights tour (which was sufficient for info overload) of The National Museum of American History and then walked the length of The National Mall; nothing like Minneapolis' 'Mall', but a park about 2 miles / 3 km long that felt, as I walked it, about five times the size of Sydney's Hyde Park. Either side are about eight or so museums, part of the 15 that make up the Smithsonian Institution in Washington - there are a couple elsewhere in the country. The best thing about these museums (besides their contents) is that they're free!

The American History Museum has exhibits covering the wars in which the US has been involved, the government, through to popular culture (Kermit, Dorothy's red shoes from the Wizard of Oz, Lance Armstrong's Tour de France winning bike) and technology - kind of a strange mix. I saw a piece of the Berlin Wall (below) - can you believe that was 1989 ... felt my age as I read that.

After the Museum, I wandered the length of the Mall, past the Washington Monument, the WWII monument and Capital Reflecting Pool (again, similar to the one in Sydney, but about 10 x the size!), the Lincoln Memorial (looking in need of some renovation) and the Korean and Vietnam memorials.

I've wanted to see the Vietnam memorial (The Wall) since reading about it in Rick Atkinson's "The Long Grey Line", a book about the last West Point unit to leave for Vietnam in 1966. All of the names of the 58,000 or so soldiers who died are engraved on a polished black marble wall, not according to Unit, but by year in which they died. What was more moving were the small shrines to memory, created at the base of the monument, each one composed of a motley collection of items including miniature flags, letters protected from the weather by plastic, flowers, dog tags and other mementos. Thinking at the same time of the people from other countries who also died (230,000 Sth Vietnamese, between 4,000 and 5,000 Sth Koreans, 500 Australians, 351 Thais, 38 New Zealanders, an unknown number of Filipinos and an estimated 2-4 million Sth Vietnamese civilians).

Flowers had also been left at the WWII memorial, where each US State is represented, I presume in remembrance of those who've died in Iraq.

Tutu's home grooming

Easter Sunday pics. Pesky squirrel of the variety that drive Fin and Tutu nuts. Before and After Tutu's home haircut. Before of Fin's haircut ... looking v suave.

Went to church at The Church of the Good Shepherd (United Methodist) where a friend (Jane) from work goes. Both Jane and her husband Chux were there and it made a big difference to how I felt about it ... the minister preached a great sermon on how to let the resurrection affect us from the inside out and it was very encouraging. Went to lunch afterwards at the Birchwood Cafe which is not far from where I live. Home to handwash all the winter scarves, hats and gloves for packing away (yay!) and to take the dogs for a walk along the river.