Sorry for the lack of a post yesterday. I have an excuse though!
It's been a quiet-ish weekend. Yesterday I walked from here to the city to go to the Bank to deposit some funds. I probably should have checked before I went that at least one of the branches of the bank in the CBD would be open on a Saturday. As it happens, no they weren't. So, I was sort of stuck for activity. Rather than just wander around aimlessly, I decided to go to the office and do some work. It says something about how I'm feeling these days that I didn't go to it with the sort of dogged endurance I usually would have done - kind of like a zombie, but without the same spring in my step. I actually felt, well, kind of like it'd be cool to do. I went to the supermarket first to get fixings for lunch and the groceries I need for the week (more on that in a minute). I did have a bit of a sense of pride as I got the groceries and realised I'd been able to bring the grocery bill in a bit under $15.00. This is why Joni sometimes calls me Scrooge!
I got to the officer about 1pm and worked reasonably solidly and pumped out three letters of advice, a couple of briefing letters to medical examiners, a request for surveillance and a number of briefs to counsel. I got distracted reasonably easily I'm afraid ("hey, let's bring up the wikipedia entry on Douglas Haig...") but stuck at it till I'd done what I came there to do. I was able to put a good dinner together with some of the groceries I'd bought, and was even able to put a bit aside in the communal fridge for lunch on Monday. Anyway, before I knew it it was 2:30am when I came to shut down my computer. I decided to walk back to the sharehouse, as the trams had stopped running and I didn't feel like spending a couple of hours (no, I'm not joking) trying to hail a cab. So, up Bourke Street I walked. The key to walking though the city at that hour, by the way, is to keep your walk brisk and your face expressionless, and not to make eye contact with anyone. That way, you just kind of pass (semi-intoxicated) people by like a ghost and don't get any grief from them. And for Lord's sakes, no matter how hot the drunk chick over there is, don't check her out unless you also want to deal with a drunken boyfriend who suddenly wants to be Sir Galahad and defend his maiden's honour.
I stopped part of the way at a pub/poker machine venue called the Welcome Stranger which (so far as I know) never closes - picture herewith. I didn't need a drink, and I don't gamble (the reason for this is a story I'll share some other time). But I needed dollar coins to operate the washing machine at the sharehouse, so I stopped in to get my remaining $10.00 note converted to dollar coins. I wound up getting back to the house and crashing into bed about 4:30am.
As a result of the late night, I slept far later than I intended to (10:45am!) and was too late to get to any of the morning Masses. So I attended to a few things until midday, when Joni and I had arranged to skype. It was a great skyping session. She'd put the DVD of "Annie" on, and every so often Grace would sing "tomo'ow, tomo'ow". Grace does indeed seem to have adapted well: she'd acquired a few sets of Mardi Gras beads and was playing with them like they were the most awesome thing she'd ever had! And Rachel was moving all over the place, and never seemed to put her teddy bear down. And the coolest thing of all: Joni was sitting on the floor using the iPad to skype. Both Grace and Rachel came over and hugged the iPad and tried to kiss it. I don't know if that was spontaneous, or if Joni has taught them to do it, but either way, it was the sweetest thing they could have done. They'll all go to see some of the parades tomorrow. I can't imagine the loot they'll attract: Joni's told me that little kids are kind of bead-magnets when the Krewes go past!
Which reminds me: I need to figure out what to give up for Lent. Any suggestions? Maybe alcohol, perhaps.
After skyping I went downstairs to attend to a food issue. Inspired by the Land of Milk & Honey blog, I'd decided to try my hand at baking bread, the idea being that if I did, it'd be cheaper than buying rolls to make lunches and maybe even fun. So I'd bought a kilo of self raising flour and a bag of oats (to add body to the putative bread and also to make the flour last longer) and googled up some instructions as to temperatures and the like. I mixed it all up and tried leaving it to "rise" before sticking it in the oven. I don't know what I did wrong, but rise it did not, and after about 45 minutes I decided just to stick it in the oven and see what happened. Half an hour later I was chatting with one of the housemates and went to get it out of the oven. I folded up a teatowel and decided I could lift it out one-handed, it being only a smallish ceramic dish. Ah, I thought, the towel's wet; that should help keep my hand cool. I remembered my high school science teacher saying water can be a good conductor of heat. Unfortunately, I didn't recall this until I'd already picked it up. Specifically, I remembered it about a nanosecond before the heat hit my right hand. I kind of freaked out. I didn't want to drop it, and I went to grab the dish with my non-tea-towelled left hand before my brain cut in and said that would be a whole bunch worse. After what felt like half an hour I got a sufficient grip to put the dish down. Fortunately, the housemate I'd been talking to turned out to have been a chef in his past life and was very clear on what to do: stick your hand under a cold tap for a few minutes, so you'll seal the heat off from spreading deeper. He also saw me trying to gauge if it was done with a skewer by seeing if dough stuck to it from inside the loaf, and said there's a better way of checking: stick the skewer in and leave it for a few minutes, then test it on your forearm to see if it's hot on the inside. If it is, it's pretty well done. I tried a slice of the loaf as it cooled before bagging it up - I think it came out well, with a pleasant oatey taste to boot.
The balance of the day I spent getting caught up on laundry and ironing the few clean office shirts I had left. I flipped on the TV while ironing and caught the pilot of "Two Broke Girls". It seems like a reasonable sitcom, even if it does seem to be a bit of a cookie-cutter "Odd Couple" show. Still, it shows at least as much promise as most of the other stuff on TV so I guess it'll go in the "if I'm flipping channels" category.
Before dinner I went for a walk up the Merri Creek trail to get some air and some sunlight, and had gumbo and rice for dinner. Then back up here, some paperwork and cleaning up, and writing this post with Clifton Chenier on the speakers. Incidentally, I discovered that in an iTunes accident I erased most of the Kenny Chesney music off my computer. Exasperation!
Early night tonight to try and get my sleep cycle back on schedule.
Hope your weekends are all going well.
See you tomorrow!
No comments:
Post a Comment