To my drilled nose (healing nicely thank you – really not that bad at all, just a lingering sore throat and strange “dangly” sensation like a tonsil trying to escape) we must add Keith’s extracted tooth. It is now incumbent on Mum to bite her tongue whilst Lachlan pokes a finger in his eye for the full suite of defective sensory organs. In a moment of post extraction weakness Keith called for a “soft dinner” so I am in the midst of preparing the nurseriest of nursery teas (pea and ham soup with soft egg and white bread sarnies followed by rice pudding and fig compote). I am quietly cock a hoop as “soup and pudding tea” is one of my all time favourite things and for some reason we never do seem to have it. I suppose it feels a bit like cheating (though why?? it is not as though the entrée inspectorate will descend on ropes from the ceiling without warning and audit my roast and pie frequency). Anyway – I feel fully justified for once, what with medical justifications, and also the bonus points garnered during the seven hour oddesey marinading, then roasting, a shoulder of goat yesterday. I have uploaded a recipe should anyone be minded to try it. The meat was (eventually) delicious and, despite serious commitment to seconds all round, we had a huge amount left over so there’s a curry, a separate tub of slices for a pilaf and a vat of stock heading for the freezer. I am now firmly in team goat….
It has been both soggy and frosty and not very conducive to gardening efforts. Keith and Mum made a spirited effort at pruning a crabapple tree yesterday but I restricted myself to watching admiringly out the window, putting the kettle on and making a fall back emergency cake for when the second Christmas cake runs out. In my defence I used wholemeal flour and wore my running trousers all day thinking I might make it to the gym. I did not. Today, however, whilst Keith was enjoying the pliers, I donned the new trainers, made it to the cycling machine and threw in a few weights and a bijou Jogette. The performance was such that I attracted a squirrel fan club. Dog walking has received a little more commitment though. Most days Mum and I have hauled on the wellies and sogged and slithered around the highways and byways. Down by the Hirsel lake the geese and swans are making the most monumental racket, with much wing flapping and flying off in a huff. There’s not much growing in the hedgerows yet, other than hazel catkins and lost hats and gloves. Deer are very much in evidence, wafting in from left and right and floating over the fields to taunt the poor hound (who makes a half hearted, rather token, effort these days before shrugging and returning for a consolation gravy bone). I think they know we’re not much of a threat, as often they will stand for an age on the brow of the hill, watching us with interest.
Instead of gardening and exercising, I have been lurking in the Garrett with a bag of salt and vinegar peanuts, my sewing and Timothy West narrating Trollope (The Way We Live Now). Having spent a couple of days clearing up all the post Christmas mess (and finally wrapping Ishbel’s not posted presents) the floor space proved too tempting to leave alone. Sue had shamed me by carefully ironing the most stained of cashmere jumpers which had found its way into the wash rather than the bin (it is truly ancient and worn for gardening but rather loved none the less and the back was fine…). I had a bright idea to use it as a weskit lining (the Trollope influence is strong at the mo), having cut out the stained bit. I’m rather chuffed with the results, though my wardrobe would have been less overstuffed had I just moved it from ironing pile to bin..
