Category: General

Posted in General, humor, humour

The Pedometer and what it means to me

Posted on by Nuntius

For years I have wanted something that would tell me how far I have walked, or how many steps I have taken.

Once years ago, I bought a pedometer which strapped on my wrist. After a while, it seemed not to be very accurate and I lost interest in what it was telling me. I think it broke: or I broke it. I can’t remember.

So, just recently, I informed My Beloved of 63 years (plus those nine courting years, including 6 in the teen years) that for my birthday I would like a pedometer. OK, she responded, but you will have to choose one. Now this was different, because for the past umpteen years, we have not given birthday or Christmas gifts to each other – oh, occasionally, I might have given in and surprised her.

Now some of our friends have Fitbits. And everyone to whom I talked never mentioned the word pedometer. I thought I must be a dinosaur asking for a pedometer: so was the name Fitbit being adopted like Kleenex as a generic word meaning what I used to call a pedometer? This thought had me starting to search Google for Fitbits.

Oh, they come for your wrist, for your ankle, as a pendant or as an attachment to your belt. Or as a clip-on to your pocket. I had had no idea how many of these Fitbits there are. But then I discovered that there are many fitbits (with a small f), but that they are not called fitbits with a small f, but Fitness Trackers. Oh.

But my friends all had Fitbits, or they said they did. Oh, my! I quickly came to the conclusion that all our Fitbit friends were wealthier than My Beloved and me. The price of Fitbits seemed astronomic: over $300 Canadian. To count my steps?

But wait, the ad said, all the things that a Fitbit can do:

  • Tracks steps, distance and calories burned
  • Syncs automatically to your computer or select bluetooth 4.0 smartphones or tablets
  • Set goals, view progress and earn badges
  • Share and compete with friends throughout the day
  • Free iphone and android application
  • Sync stats wirelessly and automatically to your computer and over 150 leading smartphones

No, no, no! I do not want to sync to my computer; I do not want to earn badges – I have enough; I do not want to share and compete with friends. I JUST WANT TO COUNT STEPS.

So, next was the Omron at little over half the price of a Fitbit. However, in Canada we work in metric and I found one review which told me that it could not be changed to metric. Throw the Omron out!

After looking at a number of similarly expensive machines – and it seemed to me that the smaller the machine, the more costly it is – I concluded that I could not have a birthday present.

But wait! What if I changed my term of reference for Google? How about simply asking if there were such a thing as a Pedometer. And, suddenly, there burst on my screen a zillion pedometers – including my friends’ Fitbit.

And there, alongside the Fitbits were much less costly gizmos. Including one called a
One TweakIMG_20180401_1657465

The One Tweak does a few simple, but one particularly essential one for me: it counts steps. Yes, it also stores a daily and up to a monthly total. And a total memory mode. It also counts calories (which I ignore in more ways than one), the distance in kilometres (yes, it does US standard, too), and exercise time. It does not sync with my computer; it does not share and compete with friends; it does not earn badges! It does what I wanted a pedometer to do: count steps and tell me how far I have walked.

And it clips to my trouser pocket – facing inside the pocket. Or, when I’m doing exercises first thing in the morning, to my underpants. That’s probably too much info. Imagining me in my underpants and a shirt doing exercises. One Tweak doesn’t care – it works anyway.

The photo shows that today, Easter Sunday 2018, by just about 3 minutes to 5pm when I took the photo and put it in this post, I had walked 1,652 steps – most of them at church this morning. Yes, we had a Sunrise Service at 5.30am starting with fire in the parking lot, then candle-light in the church, following which we men’s group provided breakfast of fried eggs (three at least for most), sausages (two for most, but three or four for some), one pancake each, tea, coffee and OJ or apple juice. And then, after an hour and a half break during which My Beloved and I went home, set the alarm for 9am, woke to the alarm, we returned for a more traditional Anglican (C of E or Episcopalian, depending on your country) service at 9.30am.

Oh, yes, my One Tweak tells the time – and in metric! Or 12-hour AM/PM if you prefer. I don’t.

How can you refuse to buy and keep something from Amazon Prime when it arrives with the enclosed card:

IMG_20180401_1659505

I have now had my One Tweak for about a week and how much did it cost? Canadian $80. And I am totally satisfied with it – well, almost: the numbers are rather slow at getting towards my first target of 5,000 steps. I wonder how I can get it to speed up!

 

Posted in Dining, General, humor, humour

One More Year and Still Going…. and What a Difference a Meal Makes

Posted on by Nuntius

10th day of March this year of 2018 marked my 85th birthday. And did a year make a difference? No, and but for a few minor health issues dealt with or about to be dealt with, I still feel as fit as last year – or the year before.

So, what made the 10th special were three great happenings? A great hotel, a great theatre, and a great dinner.

First, I had found a good weekend rate and we checked into the Prince George Hotel last Saturday afternoon. Right on check-in time of 3pm.1

We didn’t have more time than to dump our belongings, few though they were for a one-night stay, open the bottle of wine in the room and have a glass each, before we had to leave and go to the Neptune theatre for what turned out to be a totally brilliant performance of The Mountaintop. This short, only one hour-twenty-minute drama was a tour de force for the two actors comprising the cast: Tristan D. Lalla as MThe Mountaintopartin Luther King, Jr. on the evening before assassination day, and Letitia Brookes, as Camae, the flirtatious and temptress room-service waitress. They held us spellbound for the entire eighty minutes with lots of humour and leaving us with a vital message that we, as human beings, still have a long way to go to get racial integration.

Lalla was the mainstay of the entire evening although both of them received three call-backs for their intense and often humourous rendition of their parts. The playwright is a Memphis, Tennessee woman, Katori Hall, the director was Jamaican-born Torontonian,  Ahdri Mandiela, and the cast were Canadians.

Prince SuiteFrom Neptune, we returned to the Prince George only to discover, in the shortened version of this tale, that Atlanta daughter, Jenny, had found out where we were and had had us upgraded to the most luxurious suite in the hotel, the Prince Suite. Mind, you, I later discovered that she, as only she can, wangled and wrought wonders with the staff to reduce the cost astonishingly.  Not that that mattered to us, as she had taken care of the stay and thrown in dinner for us, which My Beloved and I had previously reserved in the very good hotel restaurant, Gio.  I had been particularly careful not to tell any of our family and only one friend, and she not until around our check-in time, where we were going to stay and eat. But the wiles of Jennifer Anne are hyperacute. The following day, we walked out with zero on our credit card. Oh, she does something like this every year on our birthdays, for she can do a two-for-one, My Beloved’s birthday being eight days later, tomorrow, in fact. My Beloved and I believe it is wonderful that she is able to do this for us and we are annually very, very grateful.

We dressed differently for dinner, discarding our casual theatre garb for more formal dress. Except that I had intended to wear a navy blazer, grey trousers, blue shirt and red tie. Only I forget to put the blazer in the car. What did I say at the beginning of this post – I was that day 85, so we will ascribe the forgetfulness to a sense of joyful achievement. So, I was left with a red cashmere sweater and a red tie. It worked, sort of.

Table plant
Interesting table plant – do not know it.

Chantel, with whom Jenny had worked regarding the restaurant, was not our server, but came over to the table and welcomed us and told us she had enjoyed working with Jenny. Our server was Hannah and she was just wonderful, hiding our wine, Trapiche Iscay, and suddenly appearing with it just as the glasses were getting low.

While we were sipping our wine, Hannah brought some lovely soft bread with oil and balsamic vinegar – always a winner for both of us.

My Beloved started with a squash soup, roasted and pickled squash, chili oil (only a dash, please asked My Beloved), cinnamon, and crème fraîche all of

Squash Soup
Squash Soup

which was truly tasty and filling, so that when it came to her main course, she opted for another appetiser of Pork and Beans. Yes, you may well smile, but when they arrived, the plate had three strips of caramelized pork shoulder, navy beans, molasses and pickled Brussels sprouts (which neither of us had seen before). Very, very good, she declared!

IMG_20180310_1958467.jpgBetween the appetisers and the mains, Hannah arrived with what I can only describe as a very tasty amuse-guelle in a porcelain Chinese soup spoon. Although Hannah explained what it was, I have no recollection of her description.

 

IMG_20180310_1938400My appetiser was something I had not seen on a menu for years, although it had always been a favourite of mine: sweetbreads. No, that is not a form of sourdough bread; it is – usually – either the thymus or the pancreas of a calf or lamb. Mine were described on the menu as breaded sweet breads, focaccia, mushrooms, pickled egg and tempura enoki mushrooms. Oh, how these sweetbreads brought back so many far-off memories of delicious ones, especially creamed, eaten with my parents during or after the war (WWII, not WWI), as during the war meat was scarce or unobtainable, but you ate every part of an animal. When creamed, they are soft and tender and these at Gio, although soft in the middle, were spoiled a little by the fried breading. Nevertheless, I enjoyed them immensely. I have had them since the war, certainly dining somewhere in North America with My Beloved, but it was a long time ago and neither of us can remember where or when.

 

IMG_20180310_2000573Back to my main, which was three delicious large Digby scallops with rye spätzle, corned beef, chestnuts, kale, brown butter cream, capers, squash purée and crispy sauerkraut. Wow! What an aggregation! But it can be described as par excellence.

As my family all know, I am very partial to the large local Nova Scotian scallops from around the town of Digby.

 

IMG_20180310_2044000Following this wonderful dinner, we ordered our digestifs, Cointreau on the rocks for My Beloved and a Chocolate Coffee, consisting of kahlúa, bailey’s, crème de cacao, grand marnier and chocolate with whipped cream on top for me, the Birthday Kid.

Suddenly out of the somewhere, Hannah appeared with a chocolate dessert.

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As could be expected after such a sumptuous course, we retired to our Prince Suite and just sat, relaxed, sipping the last of the previous room’s bottle of wine, when, lo and IMG_20180310_2205505behold, a doorbell rang and who should appear but a room service server with a plateful of our favourite Stilton and glasses of Port. Oh, and a few grapes, but who cared about them.

Pizza

So, what a difference a meal makes? Yes, yesterday, I undertook to create a cauliflower crusted pizza  It was a lot of work cooking and shredding the cauliflower, grating Parmesan and Mozzarella, lots and lots of it, chopping salami, pepperoni, ham, mushrooms, cooking bacon and chopping it, cooking the base, then assembling it all with store-bought pizza sauce and a layer of cheese, then layer upon layer of meat, mushrooms and bacon, separated with even more cheese.

Well, we had a very good appetiser of shrimp in avocados, but the pizza left a lot to be desired. Could it really be called pizza?

Could it be compared to Gio’s dinner? Yes – it was edible, but will not be repeated.

Of course, neither may the Prince George adventure and experience!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in General, humor, humour

I’m behaving like an old car…but…

Posted on by Nuntius

You know how your old car develops little maintenance problems and you have to get them fixed before it will run properly again?

First, you have a rear right turn light out, so I, being totally car illiterate, have to take it to the service garage.
You get it fixed, only to hear squeaks coming from somewhere under the hood (or bonnet). Back to the fixer of everything cars. It needs a new belt, he says. OK, what’s that? It’s the belt, he replies, that you don’t want to get your fingers anywhere near when you are filling up the windshield washer.
He fixes that, but the very next day you hear more squeaks, but not from the belt. (Oh, I am now an expert with auto terms and I can say belt, sort of knowing what it is.) So back to Mr Fixer. Oh, he says, that sounds like rotors. Hey, my car is not a helicopter: it doesn’t have any rotors. No, he says, a rotor is the thing in the wheel that the brake pads grab to slow you down.

So you get new rotors: they never come one at a time, always in pairs. At least that’s what Mr. Fixer says. After paying him a minor fortune, you drive off feeling happy.
A week later, I see water under the front of the car. I open the hood and, now I am an expert, even I can see there is a hose (yes, I know that term – I have several in the garden that spout water in various places leading to a little spurt at the end instead of a good jet) and I see water dripping from the hose that leads to the radiator (I know that term, too, for in olden days, My Beloved and I had an apartment in Winnipeg equipped with something that looked like the thing under the hood, which I broke by leaving the window open at night, only to have the minus thirty degree air come in and bust it, thereby flooding the apartment below). So, Mr. Fix-it fixed that.

All of that cost some dollars, but more to my point, they were all minor maintenance issues, which many an old car has.
And that is how I am feeling these days.

Back in November (2017), the fainting, going unconscious, episodes about which I had written and many of you knew about as long ago as five years were getting closer together. Short story: my pulse would drop to 30 beats per minute and leave those funny little billions of cells in my head with very little blood, so they shut me down and these episodes became a daily event. That’s when the cardiac specialist inserted a pacemaker in me. Great! Now I do not pass out. Well, not because of low pulse rate. So, I checked off No. 1 maintenance.

Second maintenance was a cataract operation to my left eye, which left me able to see half of you, as the other eye had not had an operation – until two weeks ago. Now I see you properly and you all look beautiful – or handsome, if you are a male.

Third maintenance issue: last fall, I arranged with a plastic surgeon, who also, fortunately, specialises in removal of basil cell cancers and the like, to have the one on the tip of my nose cut off. Some say, a smaller nose would have been better seven decades ago. So, that takes place March 21st.

Fourth maintenance issue started yesterday with a CAT scan of my abdomen. Over the past couple of months, I had been having teeny-weeny pains sometimes in my left lower abdomen and I could feel the odd lump, which, when I massaged it, would move along and disappear. At least, until it appeared later as, to put it politely, gas or poop. Now, I may not be a car expert, but I am a pretty good quack, so I figured it could be a hernia. So, also, after poking me around quite a bit, agreed my real doctor, the lovely Dr. Eve (name changed to hide the innocent), but I’d better get a CAT scan. As I have a pacemaker, I cannot have an MRI or I will disintegrate in flames.

However, before I was able to get it, another issue arose, which required a CAT scan also.  I chose to get it at an out-of-town hospital, as I knew it would take longer to get it in the main hospital in town. And yesterday, My Beloved and I had a lovely drive in the country with +8C and sunny skies to get my two-for-one CAT scan. I can’t tell you the results yet, but I’m sure my Dr. Eve will let me know next week.

On our return drive, we picked up our mail at the boxes, or as Canada Post tenderly calls them, a nest of boxes. In one of the envelopes was a demand for me to appear at a down-town hospital, where a urologist will give me a cystoscopy. Now, my quack knowledge did not encompass that technical medical word, but it didn’t sound or look like anything frightening. I mean, after all, cyto comes from Greek meaning a cell and I have zillions of them, so why would he need to copy one of my cells? But, if that’s what he wants, then he can copy as many as he wants.

But, curiosity, as they say, killed the cat. I looked up cystoscopy and it didn’t mean copying any of my cells. It meant this doctor, who from his name is obviously an Irish immigrant right out of the University of Limerick, is a newly born surgeon looking to further his experience and to take a camera right up my – yes, very private part – and have a good look around at several of my organs. When I have had my colonoscopies I have rather enjoyed watching on the TV in the op room the camera creep up my other private part looking for nasties, but I’m not sure I will be able to have the satisfaction of that in this next invasion of my innards, as they probably don’t have a TV set up in the same way. Or, maybe they do.

Well, remember the car and its maintenance? That’s how I feel I am these days, just getting maintained. But, when all has been fixed, just like the car, I will be as fit as I feel now, only knowing that there is nothing further that can go wrong — trust me, I’m a pretty good quack!

Posted in General, humor, humour, Uncategorized

What a Difference a Play Makes!

Posted on by Nuntius

Yesterday, My Beloved and I went to our excellent downtown Neptune Theatre to see
– and hear, of course –
Jonas and Barry In The Home

Jonas and Barry - IMG_20180128_1608275.jpg

It was hilarious!

The playwright, Norm Foster, a Canadian – a Maritimer, actually, coming from New Brunswick – has written 59 plays, I believe most, if not all, are comedies, and in any year has at least 150 productions in Canada. I have seen only two or three, but thoroughly enjoyed laughing through them.

Barry is a curmudgeon, as Jonas initially calls him, having come into the seniors’ retirement home on the basis that his daughter, who works there, wanted him closer so that she didn’t want to go to see him at his house, only to find that the place smelled of rotting flesh, he having died two weeks previously. Jonas gradually gets Barry to open up and meet “girls”. Jonas is quite the flirt and has a libido as wide as the horizon. (At one point, he admits to Barry that one evening, he looks at himself and sees “an old man’s penis”, small and flaccid.)

Jonas continues to build Barry’s confidence up throughout the play and Barry eventually turns into a man-about-town. And interesting to us was that Norm Foster himself played Jonas. The essence the Director wanted to leave with us at the end of the production was make yourself happy first and then others will be made happy by your attitude.

If you should ever have the opportunity of seeing this, or any other Norm Foster play, do go and see it.

And after the matinee performance? Dinner, of course. At a restaurant to which we had never been, but just 100 paces from Neptune’s door, East of Grafton, a tavern of sorts.

We, apparently, should have had a reservation, for they were full, the hostess told us, except for two seats at the bar or at one of the high tables, where the stools have no backrest. So, we were in a quandary, trying to decide if we wanted to stay in one of the two uncomfortable places or leave, when a young server came up to the hostess and told her he could find us two seats at a table for four, which, we presumed, the people had reserved and not turned up. Ah, God works in mysterious ways, even on the floor of a pub.

We ordered a bottle of Malbec, one of our favourite wines from Argentina, and perused the menu. On our way to the Neptune performance, we had glanced at the menu on the window, so it did not take long for me to decide on the Salmon Tartare and Fish and Chips. My Beloved pondered over it longer, because we could not find the Open Face Lamb Sandwich on the menu, but which we had seen on the menu on the window. “Oh,” our server told us, “that is only on the lunch menu, however,” she continued, “I will see if the chef will be able to put one together for you.”

Our lovely young woman quickly returned and informed us that the chef said he has one lamb sandwich left and My Beloved can have it. Oh, seems like God continued to work in mysterious ways in the pub!

My Salmon Tartare came with a couple of toasted slices of French bread and was more than delicious: wonderfully sushi-ish, ground up salmon mixed with some form of creamy sauce, possibly with dill involvement. My Beloved had a couple of bites and declared it to be as good as I had.

My Beloved’s Lamb Sandwich arrived.

Open face Lamb Sandwhich

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

According to My Beloved, the lamb was sitting in a bowl of bread and it did not really live up to its promise – not that I heard it promise anything – but the lamb was a bit dry, she said. Perhaps it had been sitting on a shelf since lunch.

As far as my fish and chips was concerned, I had been informed that the remoulade on the fish was unavailable last night. That didn’t make any difference to me, as I had no idea what a remoulade was, so I didn’t miss it. The haddock fillet was quite large, larger than those we have been able to get fresh recently, and cooked just nicely: that is, still a little moist inside, so it is not at all dry. And the fries, oh, they were excellent. Small, thin and well deep fried. Mmmm! I shouldn’t have had them. I should have ordered a side salad. I’m sure glad I didn’t, though.

Fish & Chips.jpg

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And to you, My Friends, I bid you bon appetit with whatever you are about to eat and leave you with the following thought……

bacon-quote-quotes-Favim.com-640819

or, Shakespeare said….

A man cannot make him laugh – but that’s no marvel; he drinks no wine.

Henry IV – Part 2 – Act 4 – Scene 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in General, winter

Notes on a Nova Scotia Winter

Posted on by Nuntius

I do dislike shovelling and haven’t had to shovel for the past twenty or so years, so this is the way I get our driveway done. Monty does a good job.IMG_20180123_1245279

However, I still have to de-snow the cars and the main back deck so I can refill my four bird feeders.

Later, same day….
……I didn’t have to de-snow both cars, since the temperature rose during the day and overnight to 9C, the rain pelted and the wind howled, leaving the parking lot – and our driveway – like this….

And the temperature is still a balmy 7.5C.

The only loss: I had to pay Monty for something nature did a few hours later!

Nova Scotia weather can range from cold and stormy to warm-ish to beautiful. The other

IMG_20180121_1501037

day, for instance, it was so lovely outdoors I got a Keurig Timmy Horton’s black decaf and sat out in the Birdcage sipping it. (Most of you know that the Birdcage is a sheltered part of a deck, straight off the dining room.) I was enthralled with the activity at my bird feeders: Black-capped Chickadees, Dark-eyed Junkos, the occasional Blue Jay, and, while I didn’t see Mr. & Mrs. Pheasant then, I saw them the next morning on our main deck (photo), scrummaging around under one of the feeders on which some of the little birds were tossing feed over the side to the patiently waiting birds below.

And it sure wasn’t long before Noisy found me. All during summer every year (because we are here at home every summer) we have a number of lovelyIMG_20180121_1517442 little red squirrels coming up to the Birdcage, along with my preferred Chipmunks. The chippies hibernate and we don’t see them until Spring. But three of the squirrels apparently stay awake and stay close by: Noisy, because he chatters and tries to drive off any other squirrels with his chattering; One-eye, because he has been around for at least three years with only one eye – how he survives jumping from branch to branch, I have no idea; and Anonym, because we haven’t named him anything else and he lives way over through the trees in our neighbour’s property. As I said, it didn’t take Noisy long to find me…..and when I wondered over to the feeder deck, there, lo and behold were One-eye and Anonym, both waiting for me to feed them by hand. It was a wonderful nature-filled afternoon and one in which definitely to thank God for all the blessings of this life.

But the day was not finished: the sunset was just splendid. Indeed another blessing!

IMG_20180110_1719457

Two weeks ago, I had to report for my 6-week Pacemaker check. Since I had had no more dizzy or fainting events, I thought it was doing well. Apparently, it was and is: I was told it was brilliant. Or did she mean I was brilliant? I don’t know. She also told me that the battery was good for another seven years. If I get a new battery then, I can make the century easily.

Have I ever published a Scribblings or a post in this Blog without mentiimg_20171217_1905307.jpgoning food? No!

So, how about My Beloved’s delicious lamb stew with cabbage and potatoes waiting to be mashed into it – yes, of course with their skins on. And a glass of Merlot to pair with it.

What did you think? That I should have cleaned off the rim of the dish? Hm! How right you are! Rotten photographer, but joyously satisfied diner.

And how does one finish off with dessert, but with a wonderful wild blueberry and apple crumble. Oh, yes, yummy! And I intentionally leave you with a large photo of it. Tip to make the crumble really crisp and chewy: add crystalised ginger.IMG_20171217_1932558

Until next time, blessings on you and all whom you love!

Posted in Dining, General, humour

It’s winter, but…….

Posted on by Nuntius

Sure, just a couple of days ago it was above freezing.
Now it is -4C and going down tonight to -11C.

And, call me a liar, I said there was no snow.
Now there is.

IMG_20171216_1017586

The sun was shining brilliantly, so I cleared the snow off the decks – no worries, it was light fluffy stuff and I just pushed it over the sides of the decks, so no lifting – and I felt wonderful. It was exciting to be back in snowland after so many years away from it.

Even better was the fact that I could watch all my friends: Mr & Mrs Blue Jay and a few others, the Black-capped Chickadees, the Dark-eyed Junkos and even a remaining pair of Goldfinches, which I did not expect to see. And from time to time, they all came to one or other of my four feeders. Additionally, the two regular red friendly squirrels came as soon as I started to refill one of the feeders. One is Noisy, because he is noisy, and One-eye, because he has only one eye. He’s my favourite and has been around for at least three years, feeding from our hands every summer, so I imagine he is very pleased to see we are vacationing at home this winter. How he manages to survive, jumping from branch to branch, never falling, with only one eye, is a wonder of nature.

IMG_20171217_1603458

The last time I was able to watch my feeders during winter, some twenty years ago, there were never any Goldfinches around at Christmas. However, I now see that they are quite common at Christmas and I am very happy. No global warming? Ha! Their colouring, however, is very dull with no yellow on the male at all, just the olive-greeny shade. There are actually two in the next picture, one on each side of the feeder.

IMG_20171217_1426125 - cropped

Now I have to admit that, aside from having to get rid of a little bit of snow, winter can be quite pleasant. My Beloved and I live in our house with five acres, basically unable to see our neighbours through the forest of trees, able to view the Atlantic Ocean in St. Margaret’s Bay from 100 metres up above, occasionally watching the lobster boats when lobster is in season as now, or the sailboats in the spring through autumn, being able to feed and talk to our avian and mammalian friends, with a feeling, even in winter, that all’s right with God’s world and we are blessed to be able to live and share in it.

Now, what’s for dinner, just to underline that all’s right with God’s world, particularly in this house at our feeding time at our feeder? First, a wonderful, flavourful beef stew, filled with carrots, cabbage, onion, herbs, garlic (how can you eat without that), with potatoes to mash into it and a glass of wine to accompany it.

IMG_20171217_1905307

But, delicious as that was, I did not finish it – it’s now leftovers for Tuesday’s dinner, for we have to be out early on Tuesday for carols at a Seniors’ home followed by choir practice at our church. And I had to leave room for dessert. Simply had to.

IMG_20171217_1932558

Oh, a so scrumptious apple and wild blueberry crumble. The apples were from our own tree; the blueberries had been handpicked by someone and frozen by My Beloved. And she has a secret for the crumble, which I shall share with you: mix in some crystallized ginger – what a difference it makes.

As I wrote above, It’s winter, but…. how could such a wonderful day; singing joyful songs in church for the 3rd Sunday in Advent; a gorgeous afternoon out on the deck with my little friends; and a superb home-cooked meal be surpassed?

On Facebook, my nom-de-plume is Nuntius Muse.

Until the muse catches hold of me again, it will be from time to time.

 

Posted in Dining, General, humor, humour

You know it’s summer when….

Posted on by Nuntius

You know it’s summer when….

  • you have experienced a daughter and grandson staying with you for six weeks,
  • a couple of friends from Atlanta arrive during that period of time
  • and your son, his wife and two teens arrive arrive towards the end of that time and overlap completely.
  • Then there is a gap of about four days before another couple arrive.
  • Towards the end of August another grandson and his girlfriend arrive for eleven days.

The firt listed event is still on-going.
The last three mentioned have not yet happened – but will. Very soon.

Wow! It’s go, go, go! Being entertained and entertaining. Which, in normal times is just routine, but My Beloved has been debilitated by some freak twist of her back, which jerked the hip around, which jerked the knee around. The daughter who brought the grandson also has back, hip and IT band problems.

Darned good job I’m healthy!Someone has to keep the flag flying.

Oh, but despite the physical infirmaties, we all seem to have been having a great time. Daughter and grandson have been helping out with many of the gardening chores, such as planting bedding plants and trimming hedges. Our guests from Atlanta felled trees, trimmed them and cut some up for firewood, thereby allowing us a better view of the bay and the islands. And also fixed a troublesome pond pump and electrical connection with the house. We thought. But now it seems we may have a leak in the liner, for the sum of the water circulating and evaporating is greater than the sum of the water entering through a float valve. Hmm!

But, of course, there is always dining with family and friends. Just a week or so ago, we dined with two other couples at the house of one of them and enjoyed a fine meal, but, more importantly, we enjoyed each other’s company and socialising.

And a couple of days ago, the friends from Atlanta, our daughter and grandson, My Beloved and I took two cars to the Rope Loft restaurant in Chester – three boys in one and three girls in the other –  and spent a lovely evening on the deck. And since I am frequently told by some of my readers that you all enjoy reading about our dining adventures, here’s what happened at the Rope Loft.

Six of us descended on the restaurant just after 5pm on a Friday afternoon when the harbour was filled with boats and the streets laden with cars. However, one of our number jumped out and enquired whether there was a waiting time for a table and quickly returned with the thumbs up. They could accommodate us immediately.


We were seated on the top deck with a perfect view of the harbour and able to watch the Tancook Ferry come in and out. Our server, Heather, was fun all evening and I’m sure one of our number (one of the four from Atlanta and we will call him our host, for he insisted on paying the bill at the end of the evening) gave her a good tip at the end of a lovely 2-hour meal. It was two hours because we enjoyed eating and drinking slowly and Heather never made us feel at all rushed. BTW there were a few tables available, anyway!!

We started with drinks, one spicy Virgin Mary for a grandson and one similar one for his grandfather, since he was one of the drivers of the two cars. As it turned out, our host had recently experienced our famous Keith’s IPA and he had fallen in love with it, so he started with one of those. His lovely wife and our daughter and mother of our grandson both had double vodkas with juice of a lime and lots of ice; a concoction daughter has been using of late.  My Beloved had a Bulwark Cider, which is on tap. We also ordered a litre of the Nova Scotia Jost’s red wine for four of us to share.
Oh…………and subsequently, another half-litre.
And I started on the litre. You can’t let red wine sit too long or the fruit flies will drink it all. That’s my story and I’ll stick with it.


We also ordered three orders of garlic cheese toast, which, when they came, were very quickly devoured as they were so scrumptious. (The pic is of one order.)

 

 

As main courses, our host ordered a dozen raw oysters, but three of those somehow fell into my daughter’s plate and another three into mine. To make up for his losses, he he also ordered the Friday special 6-oz tenderloin. While he and we all said the oysters were small, but very tasty, I did not here any particular comment about his tenderloin, so I suppose it passed the test.


Our grandson had an appetiser of smoked salmon pate comprising smoked salmon, cream cheese, capers and shallots all freshly blended on slices of fresh baguette. As a main, he had a burger stuffed with onion, tomato, bacon and Cheddar cheese with fries (he asked for no lettuce – he’s no vegan), which he avariciously inhaled, although grandmother said he had to eat it all or there would be no dessert. Which he did.

His mother had the peel and eat shrimp  – declared by her to be ‘fantastic’; the flavour and blend of the garlicky and spicy sweet roasted red pepper sauce were outstanding.


Our host’s wife had the fish cakes, which she found bland, but after adding Tabasco, she quite enjoyed them. Homemade baked beans came with them but she donated them to her spouse.

My Beloved had the 1-lb bowl of mussels – an eternal and world-wide favourite of hers, having eaten them in New Zealand, Chile, and various countries in Europe –  and, although on the small side, she said they were very good, but the excellent broth, which had a touch of lemon and garlic in white wine, was delicious.
Of course, white wine falls into the eternal and world-wide favourite category, too.
Along with red wine.

My choice for main course was the fried clams and chips. These were not on the menu but Heather told us they were available. I had been seeking a menu with these for a month or more. However, I found the batter was heavy on the clams; but the accompanying creamy garlic dipping sauce made they  very palatable. The chips were crisp and some of the best I have tasted. I am sure they double-fried them.

Our grandson had earned his dessert, so he chose the coconut cream pie. Apparently, after we all had tasted and agreed with his estimation that it was supremely tasty, he was was not left with much of it; so another had to be ordered, so we could all have another taste and leave two-thirds of it for him.

 

All-in-all, a thoroughly fine summer evening under the evening sun with a delightful setting and atmosphere on the wharf where casual or sailing garb is de rigueur. How enjoyable it is to have food and drink with one’s family and friends. What pleasures we can have in simple meals with those we love!

Posted in General

The English Langwidge

Posted on by Nuntius

I make no bones about it, I am a Luddite when it comes to the English language : or, am I?

I have been having a short emailed debate with a friend and we both agree that the English language is in the midst of changing times regarding everything about it: spelling; grammar; syntax; and even pronunciation.

Here is what I wrote to her in one email:
I said I am a lover of words. I do not like the new words funner and funnest. I dislike them intensely and those who know me best will say my use of the English language is truly English. I stick all the time with labour and centre and their ilks. And I will be using neither funner nor funnest.

I fear that some of our educators are at fault, for they themselves are insufficiently familiar with correct grammar and syntax and, furthermore, they fail in having a limited vocabulary. The TV programs to which children are addicted, particularly pre-schoolers, favour the American slang. One has to listen to any newscast to hear split infinitives, which, when I was growing up were anathema to our English teachers, or the use of ‘me’ when it should be ‘I’: “me and my friend saw the accident”.

Then, again, there is the constant use of ‘none’ as a plural, when it is singular: none of those apples is good. I drilled into my five children that none really means not one and you would not think of saying ‘not one of those apples are good”. (Oh, maybe some person would.) Neither nor is another example: ‘neither this bowl nor that is suitable for dessert’.

Perhaps the greatest influence in today’s society is texting. I get texts from people using awful abbreviations, u for you, the use of 2 and 4 for two and four, 2nite for tonight, and so on ad nauseum. When I text, I make absolutely sure that I write the text as I would write a letter to someone. I am appalled at my own children (with one notable exception, Jenny, in Atlanta) and my grandchildren using these shorthand symbols. Ugh!

I can go on with example after example of how the language, my English language, is changing. Of course, all languages change as new words have to be invented to describe new practices, customs or technologies, but the rate of change today in the basic language is very lamentable. [End of email]

I may be 82 next month, but I do not believe I am a Luddite and, until I get irate about this again, which could be sooner rather than later, when someone texts me with something like “ur 2 unreal”, this is the last on the subject.