Moog's meanderings

..to eat a whole packet of biscuits. Bleurgh. They were yummy, though! Sainsbury’s Free From Stem Ginger Biscuits (gluten free, dairy free) for anyone who’s interested.

I use amazon and e-bay from time to time to buy stuff, especially if I want to get hold of a second hand copy of a book or something. I had never sold anything though – I figured that with my manic existence that it would be rather too much hassle having a load of stuff out there for sale and then having to pack everything up at the whim of the buyer to send and having to actually go to the post office every time to send stuff. However, I bought a textbook to help me with the techie work I was doing at the University, never got round to using it and as you all know decided that the work wasn’t for me and quit. So no need for the book anymore. I put it on Amazon Marketplace a couple of weeks ago and have now had an e-mail saying it’s sold!! How exciting!!! So today’s job is packing it up nicely and making the trip to the post office to get it sent to the nice person who’s giving me money for it. Hurrah!
Ok ok, so I bet all you people out there are veteran internet sellers, but this is my first attempt and it’s quite exciting, so please bear with me!! )

Been a bit busy the last few days – long day in London on Thursday, Friday at the Hospital (My consultant thinks I should take up yoga?!), Saturday visiting relatives, Sunday at Church, shopping (exchanging a dodgy kettle), cooking, walking, sorting,…

London was good overall. I went to my meetings and things then met Mr Moog at the Turing Lecture (anyone who’s interested in Software might be interested in watching the recording on IET.tv. It was given by Grady Booch and entitled ‘The Promise, The Limits, and The Beauty Of Software’). I actually enjoyed it a lot even though I am from a completely different area of Engineering/Technology.
We didn’t leave until after 8pm to get the train to Basingstoke (where hubby had left his car) and then had to drive up to Brum. We weren’t home until midnight, and I was shattered.

Saturday with Mr Moog’s grandparents was lovely. It was great to see them and hubby managed to make a significant improvement to their computer by adding some memory. It made such a difference, Grandad was very impressed. They have two cats, and once again I was reminded that I want one too. So far hubby’s been holding fast – we don’t have a catflap (or anywhere we can put one – back doors are french windows really, double glazed top to bottom), I stopped working and cash is more than a little tight so we can’t really afford one, etc.

Sunday was a bit of a wierd day. The kettle-exchanging was fine, no quibbles. Church was good, I made a recipe out of my Gluten free French Baking (will add link later if I can find one) book which turned out to be really yummy: Raisin Brioche (even better with mum’s plum jam on it!!), but somehow we didn’t really relax and were really drained by the evening.

Hubby left early again today. I have had a quite constructive day doing washing and ironing, as well as having a visit to the dental hygeinist who told me that my brushing technique was quite good but showed me a couple of areas that I could improve. Currently I am working my way through three generous slices of brioche covered in plum jam. Yum!!

I have just got back from a walk in Cannon Hill Park. It was a fairly short walk and it was pretty cold. The sunny morning had turned into threatening looking ?snow clouds by the time I’d had lunch. It was invigorating and I very much enjoyed it, especially as I have never (in my memory) been in Cannon Hill Park. It’s one of the best known and biggest parks in Birmingham. One end is opposite Edgbaston Cricket Club, and the Council hold lost of events there throughout the year if the posters around the city are to be believed. I should really take more notice of these things and make an effort to get along to some of them.. My mum is from Birmingham (and my grandfather still lives here) and she tells me that she remembers walking me round Cannon Hill Park in a pram when I was tiny!
It’s funny really. We never intended to be living in Birmingham, it was circumstances (and perhaps a little divine intervention through said circumstances!) that we ended up here. My brother and his wife were already here – again it was circumstances (jobs, really) that led them to live here too. Having lived in Swansea for 7 years, I desperately didn’t want to leave – especially to move to a Big City. However over the 3 years we’ve been here I have grown to like it and appreciate what it has to offer. I especially love the fact we have the Symphony Hall and the CBSO. I am trying to persuade Hubby to take me to hear Elgar’s ‘The Apostles’ in June. Those in St. Paul’s Choir, Swansea may remember singing ‘The Spirit of the Lord’ from The Apostles some years ago and although it pains me that I can’t join in anymore, I still love the music and enjoy hearing it and being absorbed and moved by it.
So, Birmingham really is ok. I am very happy here, and so is Hubby. There are lots of parks and green things. We have lovely neighbours too, which always helps!

Pictures from allotment (as promised):

Hooray for gardening! I love watching things grow, there’s something satisfying and wondeful about being able to play a small part in God’s creative process (even if it’s only shoving a seed into soil, and then watching the rest happen).

Since the summer, some of my friends will know that I have followed an exclusion diet which meant that I didn’t eat some very common things (alcohol, gluten, dairy, soya, tomatoes, and lots of other things that can cause allergies or other problems). I started by exluding everything! And yes, at the time it really did seem as though there wasn’t anything left that I was allowed to eat!!! Just fish, rice, fruit and vegetables (although not certain fruits or vegetables). As a result I vastly changed my eating habits and in the process lost over 2 stone in weight. I progressively felt better in myself, more energetic, and in that time have been very well, healthwise. I am now at a stage where the only things left that I have not re-introduced back into my diet are gluten, peanuts and strawberries. So now that I am back onto bacon, potatoes, tomatoes, etc. etc. and have more gluten free cookery and bakery books (and have discovered that the Cadbury website has a helpful facility that allows you to find out which of their products are gluten free) I have been getting into bad habits again, since Christmas really. Looking back on the last week, I have had few meals which included green veg and haven’t managed much fruit (apart from a large bowlful of fresh chopped fruit at breakfast time). Perhaps this is why I am feeling a certain lack of motivation/energy and slightly less bouncy than I have got used to feeling?

I have been advised that green veg is not only good for you (which we all know!) but it makes you feel full and satisfied. And I have found that to be true! How about this for a healthy breakfast (or light evening meal): Poached egg on a bed of spinach. Yum! And it keeps you going until lunch. )

So, from now on I will make a concerted effort not to get back into old eating habits and to maintain the newer ones.

This morning my breakfast consisted of a bowl of chopped fruit (kiwi, banana, plum and blueberries), some live natural yoghurt and a boiled egg. I have spent some of the morning making soup from scratch out of celery, carrots, onion, leek, courgette, fresh ginger root, veg stock (from powder) and herbs (parsley & cumin). It seems to taste ok considering I just made it up as I went along!! And hopefully will provide hubby and I with concentrated veggie goodness to perk up our sluggishness.

The weather today is good – sunny if a bit windy. Planning to spend some of the afternoon down at the allotment (pictures may make it here later). Perhaps fresh air and exercise will help too?

Japanese class wasn’t so bad. I did manage to revise a bit of Katakana in the afternoon and managed to fit in a trip to the pool as well. I think the revision helped, but I need to fit in half an hour each day to keep it going otherwise I am going to get left far behind now that we’ve started on Kanji. A lot of the others have already started, some claim to recognise 50 already!!! Anyway, we started off yesterday with four. Sun, Moon, Tree and Mountain. It’s quite interesting and fun actually, seeing how the characters pictorially represent the particular thing. The confusing aspect of it is that there are two ways of saying each one: the Japanese name and the Chinese name (Kanji coming from Chinese characters). These are pronounced differently and therefore in sentences can be used for different things. I can see that this could be quite confusing!! But so far it’s quite cool and I hope that this will give me some motivation to work on it and improve!

It’s Wednesday again. Once again I have not done anything towards learning any Japanese. Hopefully going to revise some Katakana between now and this evening (and go swimming). If I can tear myself away from the computer and stop reading other people’s blogs!!!

Sushi making last week was successful. Mum helped me to make it, which was amusing and good fun. Dad had been rather suspicious of the idea of this foreign food, but actually loved it and really enjoyed eating with chopsticks!!

Thursday was my birthday.. Yet another year. Not the Big Birthday celebrated by Hubby a little over a month ago – I have another year before I catch up I went into the big city for lunch with my brother. We had a lovely relaxed time. I don’t often get to spend time just to sit around and chat with him (especially considering we’re only living a few miles apart) but it was really nice. We went to La Tasca: my current favourite restuarant because not only do I love tapas but it also marks GF next to the menu items that are Gluten Free. We had Tapas for a Tenner (all you can eat) which was an absolute feast. Mr Moog got home at about 7pm that evening so we had a picnic in the living room (having overdone it rather at lunchtime!) and I even had some presents to open!!

Friday involved lunch at the Uni where I no longer work, with a few people it’s good for me to keep in touch with careerwise (not that I have one of those at the moment, but keeping bridges well maintained seems to be a sensible thing to do). Mr Moog had a meeting with his external PhD supervisor, which I sat in on. It was time well spent, I now have a much better idea what’s going on with it. Very useful as I suspect I will have a significant role of supporter/helper/bouncer of ideas/proofreader/general dogsbody over the coming months and year(s) in that respect.

Weekend was good too. We went to see Grandad on Saturday to find out why his antivirus wasn’t updating properly. All seemed fine after a complete reinstallation. It turned out that my parents were joining him for lunch, so we all ended up going out for a pub lunch. An unexpected enjoyable day out. So we didn’t get around to measuring the allotment…

Sunday we did measure the allotment. It’s a shame we only had time to do that because the weather was perfect and we could have done much, but we were due at the NEC in the afternoon. The IET sponsors the Formula 1 in Schools competition, and the finals took place at the Autosport International Show so I was there representing my Institution. It was good fun! Mr Moog and I both went, and had the opportunity to wander around the exhibition as well as being at the prize presentation for the competition. I am not a big F1 fan to be honest, so really did find the schools stuff more interesting than the rest of it. The work that these small teams of schoolchildren had done was just amazing!! They had really worked hard and had had to understand a lot about aerodynamics and all sorts of things I wouldn’t have know about if they’d bitten me at the age of 11!! What an eye opener.

So, another Monday is upon us. I feel very proud of myself as I have given the living room a clean the like of which it has not seen in a very long time. Others may well relate to the ‘cleaning frenzy’ that occasionally occurs when rooms get to a certain condition and the inclination is right. This morning was one of those times. I possibly would have done the whole house, but the living room took me nearly 2 hours (it really is clean) and I can’t face any more just at the moment. I think it’s time for lunch……

Here’s the link to the recipe for the shortbread I was raving about a couple of posts ago ) You have to scroll down to the 2nd recipe listed. It’s called Gluten Free Lemon Shortbread. Yum!

I succeeded in doing some useful things yesterday – I planted the pansies (not violas after all) into two hanging baskets, which I then left in the garage because I didn’t think they’d appreciate the strong winds. Planning on hanging them outside today… I also made soup, went through a backlog of e-mails and committee related stuff and dealt with a lot of it and watched TV all evening.

Today my Mum and Dad are coming over for lunch, and I am making sushi for them. Dad’s a bit suspicious of the idea, so I hope he likes it!!

Now I have to go and make a quick attempt at doing some preparation for my Japanese class tonight – first of the new year, as I mentioned. I had lots of good intentions of doing some learning over the break, but I am sure you can guess how much I have actually managed….