Eyeballs

Howdy, table. Haven't seen you in a while?

I think the overwhelmed, bunny-in-the-headlights feeling of the last couple of weeks has finally subsided. Maybe it’s the effect of the May Hill Experience, or the galvanising effect of being a mere few days away from the Big Test of actually having people come to my house, or maybe I’ve just been feeling under the weather and now I’m not.

Whatever. It’s all getting good again, and the proof is on the table. Or rather it isn’t. I haven’t cleaned this table properly since {mutters} because that’s how long it’s been since the table was clear enough to clean. Now I’m going to make a sincere effort to keep this clean and clear routinely (not quite ready actually to add it to my bedtime routine, but maybe soon – maybe after the Big Test). The fruit can stay, but that’s it.

In other news, it’s MAY, which has the distinction of being the beginning of summer, the month with my birthday in it, and generally the time of all good things.

It’s an auspicious time, I think, for renewed spirit and energy to be unleashed on the world and mine is still very focussed on FLYing. This month is “Get Moving in May” month for FlyLady, which means that she will spend the month exhorting all her Dear Friends to get moving and spend 15 minutes a day doing some sort of exercise. You know what, I think I’m going to join in. I know it’ll be good for me. I don’t mean that I will be doing jumping jacks or press-ups or anything else too dreadful. I’ll be doing things like walking up May Hill, and digging at the allotment, and where necessary perhaps a peaceful, internet-led yoga-style* stretching routine.

(* Everyone says you can’t do yoga without an IRL teacher, because otherwise you might be doing it wrong and how would you ever know? I say, yoga-style stretching exercises done incorrectly (but cautiously, you better believe it) will still bless my limbs and spirit. So ner.)

Friendship bowl

On Sunday I had two friends come round for a couple of hours and made them a butternut squash and green pepper curry with rice, which was nice.

I just slip that in there, as if having a couple of people round for lunch is something I do all the time and not a radical departutre from my hitherto very insular life, led under the thumb of Can’t Have Anyone Over Syndrome.

Even though the 8-week plan isn’t quite completed, and even though I was at the dodgy end of a week or so’s slippage – I still felt pretty relaxed and comfortable about the whole thing. It was a good dress rehearsal for the Big Test, and a successful one at that. Go me!

The recipe for the curry was super easy and I’ve written it out and put it in the back of my FlyBook. I’m gathering recipes I like together, so I can repeat them at will. I’m not sure yet whether I will get back my “who needs recipes” vibe, but either way this is a good way to get me back in the swing of feeling comfortable with proper cooking.

Eyeball cake?

Today I made a grape upside-down cake. It was kind of experimental. I had some grapes that were starting to get a bit musty and needed using up, and some fond memories of childhood upside-down cakes involving other fruit (mostly pineapple rings) – so I found an upside-down recipe, stewed the grapes a little, and produced the most horrible-looking cake ever.

Also, I may need a cake tin of smaller diameter: ideally this cake would have had double the mixture for a tin that size; but then I would have had twice as much cake; and we had enough for 6 helpings as it was. To my mind, six helpings is already quite enough in a family of two.

However, it tasted just right, especially when served with dollops of custard, so I’m choosing to blame the grapes, as unsuitable for this treatment. 🙂