Alan Williams's Blog, page 19

Porridge Days TWTW # 96

Greetings from the allotment where I’ve been preparing the ground and planting out kale plants and sowing broad bean seed.

It was the autumnal equinox this week, and for the first time in a while I felt a little cold wearing shorts and swapped them out for a pair of jeans and socks. Porridge has returned to being my breakfast staple of choice. We’ve had some clear nights and it won’t be long before we have some frosts I think. I’m getting the plot ready for winter and this is probably the last p...

Hard Words TWTW # 95

Sometimes these words come easily and sometimes they don’t. This week the words are a bit lost. I’ve had quite a busy week, although much of it was mundane things and really there should be many, many things I could write about but the words just aren’t there, so sorry if this weeks post is a bit on the boring side.

 

I thought I was going to have a quiet week workwise this week (see below), so I booked a day in my diary to go out and take photos. Something I’ve been meaning to do for a while. ...

Do As You Would Be Done TWTW # 94

I’m getting this ready to go out a day earlier than planned and writing this on Saturday. I doubt that I’ll do much more this week, that I can’t tell you about next week, so I will be hitting send sooner rather than later.

This week has been pretty busy for me but it’s mostly been mundane things rather than anything exciting. It’s just been a week about getting things done, rather than doing things. If you know what I mean? I did take a film camera out mid-week, but that roll of film is only hal...

Shifting Focus TWTW # 93

Greetings. The photo above is one from the roll that I sent off to be developed last week. This weeks blog is a bit image and camera talk heavy, so if that’s not you bag, feel free to skip those bits.

It’s not all been cameras this week, if I was still working, I would have said that it has been a short working week because of the Bank Holiday but I don’t really pay that much attention to those now. I was reminded that I haven’t reviewed my goals and targets yet this year. They were set before ...

If Life Gives You Green Tomatoes TWTW # 92

Greetings from my kitchen, where in between typing these sentences I’m making Green Tomato Chutney. It’s 8am and the smell is amazing boiling down the mix of tomatoes, apples, onions and sultanas to a thick pulpy mix.

This is a little bit of therapy, making something from home grown produce that will take well over an hours to prepare, but will keep me going in chutney for some time. More details below.

Click to view slideshow.

I decided yesterday to pick the remaining tomatoes on the allotment...

Switcheroo TWTW # 91

No – Don’t Panic! It is still only Sunday. I thought that I would switch things up this week and post this weeks update on Sunday. It might become a permanent change.

It’s really a recognition of how my routines have changed over the past few months. It used to be that Sunday mornings were my time for doing things for my Mum, a regular date and time, shopping, cutting lawns or whatever needed doing.

Now that she’s in long term care I don’t have that same commitment, the time and date have shifte...

If Life Gives You Blackberries & Apple

If life gives you blackberries and apples, make stewed blackberry and apple.

We’ve been enjoying a healthy crop of blackberries for a few weeks now, but the bramley tree has only just started providing ripe fruit (apples are ripe if they come off the tree in your hand with no effort – if you have to tug leave them be).

On Monday this week we had both, probably the last of the blackberries and the start of the apples. So I rinsed off the blackberries and put them in a pan with a little water (abo...

More Than Meets The Eye TWTW # 90

Hot enough for you? This week has been a little bit unbearable at times, at times it reached 36.6ºC in our back garden, it’s a bit of a sun trap but that’s a bit ridiculous. Then again I’ve been talking about climate change professionally for most of my career to date so it comes as no surprise, unfortunately the time has really passed when we could have done something about it. The best we can probably hope for now is working out how to live with it. That and the other extreme weather; rainfall...

It Could Be Gas Masks TWTW # 89

It’s been a hot week, temperatures in the high 20’s and low 30’s most of the week, and also humid. At the time of writing we’ve been waiting for forecast thunderstorms, but haven’t had any. We did take advantage of the hot weather to wash some of the dogs toys. It confused Ruby a bit as she couldn’t quite work out why we suspended them from the washing line – was this some new kind of game?

This week has been a bit busier than last. I took Wilson back to the vets at the start of the week for his...

If Life Gives You Blackberries, Make Crumble TWTW # 88

If last week went quickly, then this week seemed to hang around a lot longer, different things happening but mostly mundane stuff, not a week of excitement. Perhaps that’s why it doesn’t feel like time was passing very quickly?

Austin Kleon wrote about how the coronavirus has changed the perception of time.

Time is running out for me to see comet Neowise though. I’ve had a few tries this last week, and although I’m pretty sure I did see it one evening, the light pollution is so bad here it’s har...