Today is the 5th of November, which means I will have been here approximately 17 days. More then the usual 2 weeks I would have spent here if I’d been working a normal job with holiday allocation.
I’ve been asked, ‘How do you spend your days when Winston is away working?’ Well, I potter around. These days, I think Potter means Harry Potter to the younger generation. For those of my peer group, to potter around means to ‘to be gently active doing various things in an almost aimless manner’. So, that’s what I’ve been doing! I’ve been baking and making and working out and reading. I’ve watched TV episodes and films of interest. I’ve been writing my essay length letters, and trying my best to amuse and inform those who’ve been reading them (thank you!). I’ve been busy in my own way, and for now, that’s okay.
When Winston is around, we both potter together! But we also go out and hang out with mates and relatives, we have good conversations to get the brain waves moving, and we go either window shopping or shopping.
I’ve noticed since I’ve been here that random strangers will walk and say, ‘Hi, how are ya?’ on the street even if the reply they get comes four steps after they’ve gone past. First of all, why not contract the phrase to ‘Hi!’ so they can be sure of getting a reply almost instantaneously? I find the random greeting thing weird because in London, most people will avoid eye contact and saying hi to strangers, just in case that stranger turns out to be a really odd human being who might end up stalking you or worse! Here, I just reply with a small smile and nod of the head, or a little ‘Hi’ back. It’s foreign for me to do that, but when in Rome, do as the Romans do!
I’ve made and cooked a few things since I last emailed! I’ve made homemade empanadas with a corn masa dough encasing a savoury lentil, onion, thyme and spam filling, and I made chocolate cookies from scratch.
Making empanadas is a little time consuming and fiddly, and I’m not sure if I’d do them again. However, the ones I made were very nice taste-wise, although Winston did say I should have put more meat in them. Unfortunately, when baked, the dough shell cracked a fair bit on five of them, so I didn’t take any pictures of the finished product. However, I took a picture of them pre-baked. The one at the top left developed quite a big hole so I had to patch it! The only one that didn’t crack was the one on the bottom right. Once baked, the dough is reminiscent of a Jamaican patty.
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| Shiny because they were brushed with oil! |
As for the cookies, they were chocolate (one of my favourite things to enjoy in a sublime moment of decadence) nutella peanut butter cookies, made with wholewheat flour.
I made 30 cookies in total, and they have a slightly chewy texture with a moreish flavour.
The only convenience food item that I have tried so far is Rice-a-Roni. It’s par-boiled rice with small bits of pasta shaped like rice to which you add a special seasoning, water, and either oil or butter. I tried the broccoli au gratin flavour. This is what the packaging and rice-a-roni looks like:
You add oil (as per the first rice and pasta bits picture above), and cook it in the microwave until the pasta turns brown. Then you add special seasoning and water, and cook it the rest of the way in the microwave for 15 minutes. The process looks like this:
It tastes okay, and is relatively healthy as long as you use a little bit of olive oil. For a fuller tasting version, butter can be used, but I’d rather not use that.
I also tried an Almond Joy chocolate bar. It’s basically like a Bounty bar, but with a roasted almond to top the bar off. After abstaining from chocolate for so long, it was a pleasure to have it.
Recently, Winston and I bought hair clippers. Who’d have thought cutting his hair would be fraught with stress and difficulties!? I had told him I’d cut hair before, but I neglected to say I’d cut only Belle’s hair when I was younger. He thought I meant I’d cut male hair before. It took several hours, and I got so stressed that I became overly emotional at points and escaped to a different room for a brief respite. He was being very technical and protective of his hair, but in the end we resolved the issue and he had his hair cut pretty well. However, a lot of it came off before I perfected the fade. He’s actually allowing me to cut his hair in future so I can perfect my hair clipper technique. Maybe I’ll actually be very good at wielding them in future, and it means I could cut Danny and Pa’s hair thus saving them lots of money, hehe!
We saw a 4x4 car’s left front door wrenched off its hinges the other day. My goodness, it was loud, and the funny thing was that the owner came out to check the damage and just went ‘Oh mah gawd, what happened?’ It looked like he might have been a shade drunk, and his student mates were in the car with him. The car was going into an underground parking garage and the open (!) door hit the entrance pillar. The driver heard a noise, but he didn’t stop- he kept on going, which is why the door came off. I dread to think how much such damage could have cost, because I think he also gouged the entrance pillar.
Winston finally got his iPhone 4S in white, 16GB. It’s a sleek marvel that is marginally thinner then his old iPhone 4 (the latter will find its home with his cousin in the Philippines, lucky kid!).
We’ve been playing with the Siri (Artificial Intelligence Assistant) function, but it won’t recognise my British accent when I ask it questions. When I say ‘Winston’ it thinks I’m saying ‘Allen’, and when I ask the question ‘Is Winston as mad as a hatter?’ Siri understands it as ‘Is Winston as mad as a hoster?’
By the way, I’ve called Winston ‘Hank’ twice, completely by accident. One was when I asked Winston to play a movie, and once in relation to food. Thankfully for me, Winston didn’t get pissed off but he did notice my mistakes and made me pay for it by teasing me for a bit! Phew!
Anyway, it’s time for me to go now and potter around!
Until next time,
Jen:)
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