Spring

Why is it it feels like a lifetime when you're waiting for something, but after I've been and done it, it feels like a flash. I took this on Wednesday 18th, while waiting the time to pass before I went to Ben's work for him to take me to the airport.

I went to the flood-ravaged Far North, passing the township of Kaeo, which has been flooded for the third time this year, and where powers-that-be and residents are seriously considering moving an entire town; Northland was wet while I was there and we had the southerly (cold) wind; Wellington last week was warmer, though we did have some wind in the evenings; Nelson, which is furtherest south of all three places (i.e. cold) has been cloudy and foggy/rainy, but otherwise warmer.

With neighborhood cats doing their thing outside our bedroom window all night; it must be spring.

I'm Leaving Ben...

But just for 10 days. I'm going up to the Far North of New Zealand to help a weaver reorganize her studio, then to Wellington for 3 days to look for an outlet for my weaving; all I want at this point is just one more outlet, but we'll see how that goes.

It would be nice if Ben could come along, but a weaver's gotta do what a weaver's gotta do.

Meanwhile, y'all keep safe, eat well, sing loudly, and see you when I get back!

Learning to Play the Ukulele

Apologies for a particularly crappy photo. I'm not supposed to be blogging at this juncture...

I signed up for a six-week course learning how to play the Ukulele at the Arts Council. This free course was designed to prepare Nelsonians to participate in the audience participation portion of the Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra concert sometime in August or September.

But for me, it's more sentimental, because Dad can play the ukulele. In my house, Mom can sing, and play the piano and read music, but Dad can't sing, so we always saw Mom as the musical parent. But the fact is, Dad's ukulele and harmonica skills surpasses Mom's, or anyone else's musical prowess in the family, and he's bloody good and versatile.

When I was little, he used to play all kinds of songs on the ukulele and would try to sing, and I used to dance to his music all the time. I confess I learned to mimic Hawaiian dance at an early age. His harmonica, we just listened in awe. Ben actually started recording and video-ing his harmonica-playing in the last few years, but we should have done it decades ago when his lungs were in a better shape. At times he would hold two harmonicas vertically and play one song using two of them. He still likes his harmonica, but he's nearly 80 and runs out of breath after just a couple of songs, whereas we kind of had to beg him to stop after a couple of hours in the past. He played a little on Tahuna Beach at sunset last time he visited, and I hope that was memorable for him.

During Lesson One on Sunday, (and it's only for half an hour, which is a jolly good thing because the strings are murder on my tender fingertips) we learned two cords, and I couldn't believe how many songs we could sing with just those two. And I hadn't realized that this instrument is built with the sole purpose of accompanying singing. Nice!! I'll miss the Lesson Two, but I know what they are covering, so I'll be right. The teacher is Jane from the Nancies; three guesses as to which one Jane is here.

The green one is the Arts Council ukulele I was allowed to borrow to practice. The coconut one was bought on the Cook Islands in 1993 when we holidayed there; there, people make their own out of a coconut shell and a bit of wood; the strings are fishing lines of the same width. People on the Cooks laughed when I said I wanted to buy a ukulele; they told me to make my own; but another tourist told us there were two for sale at the luxury resort, so we went there and got this. It goes out of tune easily even in the middle of the song, but because of the metal part at the bottom, it gives this old-fashioned radio-like muffled sound, which sounds so warm and balmy. When Jane experimented with it, it sounded South Pacific and dreamy.

House for Sale ?????

I woke up this morning to find this sign on our yard. We're the yellow house, we're quiet, but have a messy yard, and no, 44 is not on the market.

And if we could add our wish to the list, buy this and live here, rather then renting it out. Like I said, we're messy outside (and inside, too, lately), but we're quiet. If you are a weaver, we can start out own group!!

I'm Thinking Walden Pond!!!!!

So, we lost a boat race, and the Government immediately forks out $10 million just to hold on to "key players", on the same day they announced they're not investing in cervical cancer prevention, and how many million sailors do we need to buy? We're going to have a huge inflatable rugby ball near the Eiffle Tower during Rugby World Cup, which tells the story of New Zealand by projecting images or some such; this is headed by a man how does good PR work, I hear; the bill, $4 million, dirt cheap and fun for everybody in comparision.

Then we keep getting things like tornadoes and floods and now around half of the top of the North Island is dotted with towns that are flooded, cut off because of land slides, has no power and/or no phone, and it includes parts of the country that can least afford it; one town just finished cleaning up after the March flood!! So the government, two days later, forks out half a million. HALF a million, folks. And this is Labour Party, the supposedly compassionate one; this is the one that accuses of National of Americanizing New Zealand politics.

The thing that most distresses me is when we first came to NZ, we were amazed at how the government and politicians were close to the real people and seemed to grasp the thinking of the nation. I don't know if things have changed drastically in the last 12.5 years, or if Labour and Helen have been in power for 7.5 years and completely lost it after maybe 5 or 6 of them, (and I used to be so achingly proud to have her as our Prime Minister) , or if indeed the divide between the poor and the rich is so vast that some people just don't get it.

Lordy. I'm going to go look for my weathered copy I bought in my high school days and try reading it again.

Saying No to Toastmasters

I'm still a newbie there, you know, and I've volunteered to build a web site, because there's a nifty free host for Toastmasters Clubs. But I already told you I found myself a VP (well, almost; I still need to be voted in next week) last week. And then I felt I was expected to go to meetings outside my own little club, to attend Area stuff and such.

I was panicking because that all sounded a little too much time away from the loom, and considering the length of time I spent getting this weaving thing to progress, I didn't want to bury myself in the Toastmaster madness. So I told the Powers-that-be, who just happen to be two of the nicest, kindest people I know. And I was told I can pick and chose what I participate/volunteer.

Phew. So I'm back to working on the web late at night and working on the loom during the day. It really pays to talk to people and explain what the situation is: I'm starting to learn to say "No" at this ripe old age, but it sure is better late than never.

He's my soul mate but I don't want his bug

Ben's been under the weather since Sunday, and he stayed home yesterday, Monday. I was busy so I worked in the basement studio all day, not exactly avoiding him, but trying not to catch whatever he has.

Well, at 4:13AM this morning, I woke up coughing and have been ever since. Yes. Yikes....

And I'm tempted to say, it's been unseasonably cold, but that's not true. For one thing we don't get really cold temperatures around here, and for another, I think I'm just feeling the cold more as I get older. I think this has been a relatively normal winter in Nelson, though every year I say it's a particularly cold winter. And up north, there have been tornadoes and floods, and down south, snow and ice.

Love, love, love you, Ben, but please don't feel you need to share your bug with me. I already wasted over three weeks this winter, remember?

Merisi's Milchbrot

A while back, I was raving about the brioche served at breakfast at Saltwater Cafe here in Nelson; at that time, I asked around for a bready brioche recipe, as mine recipe is sweet, cakey, heavy and dense, and I think unsuitable for slicing, toasting, and eating with gooey eggs.

Merisi in Vienna sent me this recipe.

I can report to you that this is an easy recipe that produces good results. I was in a rush, so I didn't cream the butter and sugar but threw cubed butter in, so my surface came out a little rough, and because I had never baked a recipe with sugar but not salt, I did add a pinch of salt. I used bread flour (high grade/strong flour.) Next time, we should photograph it before it's all gone! Thank you, Merisi.


INGREDIENTS:

350g flour (gluten rich, if possible, otherwise simply knead longer to develop the gluten)
1T active dry yeast (or 1 cake fresh)
1/8 liter milk (the dough should be soft, but manageable, add more milk if needed)
40g sugar
1 egg
50 g butter

1 egg beaten with fork for glaze

Optional flavoring: vanilla bean, rum, orange or lemon peel, or a small amount of saffron.

PREPARATIONS:

The dough needs to be kneaded or beaten, until it does not stick to the bowl anymore. Cover with plastic film.

Let it rise at a good warm room temperature for 1 to 2 hours. The dough should almost double in size. Once you have put it in a form, let it rise again for about 1/2 hour, covering with buttered plastic film.

The dough should be nice and plump when ready, when you put a finger in the dough, it should not bounce back anymore.

Preheat oven to 180°c, about 10 minutes.

Brush dough with the beaten egg, careful not to let anything trip down to the bottom, because this will inhibit proper raising once in the oven. You won't need all the egg probably.

Bake at 180°c for 30 - 40 minutes; the time depends very much on your oven; it is ready when you knock on the bottom, and it sound hollow, as with bread.

If you are not sure if the temp of your oven is correct, check after 15 minutes; if it browns too fast, lower the temp.

Good work!

Soaking raising in rum and adding them to the kneaded dough is also a treat :-)

Kate's Gluten-Free Chocolate Mousse Torte

My friend Kate brought a mean Chocolate dessert to a Writer's Retreat, and of course I had to have the recipe right away. Instead of working on her story, she wrote down two recipes. These are seriously chocolaty, and heavy; I just thought I'd warn you.

INGREDIENTS:

Torte:
200g dark chocolate (In NZ, Whittaker's Dark Ghana 72% is the best and cheapest, rather than cooking chocolate. Of the 250g block, use nine of the 11 rows to go in the torte, and save the two rows for topping or sauce.)
125g unsalted butter

4 eggs, separated
1t vanilla essence
1/2C sugar or castor (superfine, not powdered) sugar
1C almond flour

1/2C castor sugar

Topping:
375g dark chocolate, melted
300ml cream


PREPARATIONS;

Preheat oven at 180c. Grease a small or medium-sized cake tin; line the bottom with baking paper.

Melt together chocolate and butter; stir every few minutes.

Add the egg yolks, vanilla, the first 1/2 C of sugar, and almond flour and mix well.

In a separate bowl, whisk egg whites until stiff peaks form. Gradually whisk in the second 1/2 C castor sugar until the mixture becomes glossy. Do not whisk any longer than you need to.

Fold the egg white mixture into the chocolate mix. Pour the mixture in the cake tin; bake at 180c for 55-60 minutes. Start testing after 50 minutes as this torte burns easily. When baked, take the torte out of the oven and place on a rack; let cool.

Topping Options:

For the over-the-top topping, mix melted chocolate and cream and smear over the torte whilst still in the tin. If you prefer, let the torte cool slightly and extract from tin, then smear all over with a knife. If desired, reserve some toping, warm, and serve as sauce.

For a more modest topping, melt the leftover two rows of chocolate with a small amount of cream, and spread on top of the torte.

A more elegant option is to dust the top with icing (powder) sugar and/or cocoa powder.

Serve with cream, ice cream, or yoghurt. Kate served this with unsweetened European/Greek style yoghurt, which was absolutely heavenly.

Leftover torte can be frozen.


ALTERNATIVELY...

Brace yourself for this one. Instead of using almond flour, just can just... do without flour altogether.

INGREDIENTS:

200g dark chocolate
200g butter
4 eggs, separated
1 cup sugar

PREPARATIONS:

Follow instructions as above. For this torte, all the sugar is mixed with egg white.

Bake at 200c for 35-40 minutes. The torte rises quite a lot while cooking, then collapses and cracks on cooling to form a dense chocolate torte. This one burns more easily, so keep an eye on it.

Kath Bee Turns 42

Yes, it's my friend Kath Bee's birthday today; she turns 42-years-young.

Gosh, I don't remember being 42. I do remember turning 40, and then 46, for the second time. The entire year I was 45, I thought I was 46, so a few days before my second 46th birthday, I thought it didn't add up, and figured I'd have to repeat 46. Ben thought that's a good thing, that I wasn't prematurely turning 47, but like I said, I had to repeat a year.

Anyway, back to Kath. She's the funky kids' songs writer, but I'm looking forward to some of her grown-up songs as well. I've had the pleasure of listening to her live quite a few times, and if I'm not mistaken, she sings as duo Zilk at the Waimea Estate Winery this Sunday, 9 July from 12.30 - 3:30. Am I right?

Kath's blog is Songs for Kids and on her MySpace, you can listen to four of her songs. JB has posted about her, too.

I was Thinking of Taking a Leave of Absence from Socializing...

I've been going out of my mind because it feels as if I have so little time for work lately, and I'm terribly behind. Ben looked at me this morning and emits his knowing, soft laugh, saying: "You're so busy this year, you had to go join the Toastmasters!"

This afternoon, I went to an executive meeting of our group because I'm the Webmaster. Our president Nick is going overseas, and for a year, he did just about all the work that needed doing apparently, so the executives, consisting of two long-timers, three who have been there about a year, and lil' ol' moi, had to reassign the jobs Nick used to do... and I kept saying, "I could do that", one after the other, because they were simple jobs and, if the blurb was right, these jobs can all be done semi-automagically though our new website. And I left the meeting as VP Membership. Dang...

It's an illness, you see. I'm sick. It's called volunteeritis. But I like these new friends of mine. Even though I feel like a total idiot, because until April, I thought Toastmasters was a gathering of strange folks, like the Masons...

Dang...

If you're into this soft of thing, the New Zealand (and I'd imagine all over the world???) Masons have a web site. Whowoodda thunk it 10 years ago.

Not that I Need it Right Away, But...

How do you type the "Euro" sign on the keyboard? Not that I need to know right away because I'm not heading that way any time soon, but just thought I'd ask in case I get lucky...

Rain, Rain... And did I Mention Rain?

I've said I like rain; I especially love downpours and the torrential stuff; New Zealand does them well. But I don't like drizzles and fog; they are too girly for me, and we're getting a fair amount of these, which is unusual in Nelson.

Yesterday, after I finished my workout at the gym, I had the choice of running to the bus stop and catching the 2:30, or leisurely walking and catching the 2:50 (it's the only time of the day when there's more than one bus going my way in the hour; something to do with the school bus schedule and buses needing to be moved closer to schools.) Anyhoo, I got the 2:50. And it started to rain a bit while I waited at the terminal, and by the time I got off, it was pretty heavy. By the time I got to Tosswill's mild incline... you get the picture. If not, here.

Lordy...

Of all the things one does at Toastmasters, you'd think a prepared speech would be the easiest, because, in our club, we have four to six weeks lead time. I still procrastinated, but finished writing it yesterday in good time and started to practice it; this morning, I sounded really good in Ben's car. Then I went to the venue, prepared my visuals, and started to feel nervous. By the time I started, my mind was blank, and I had two significant length of utter, deafening silence.

Lordy.

The subject was a familiar one (yup, something to do with weaving), and I have been visualizing the speech and the order of the visuals, but in two places, my mind was completely blank. The thing that disappoints me is I thought this, of the three I've written so far, was the best-written script. But in retrospect, if I couldn't remember the organization of the script, and which section is coming next, clearly it wasn't good writing.

I used to think I was a OK singer, then I took some singing lessons, and I sounded terrible. I used to think I was a good public speaker, and Toastmasters is proving me wrong. So, getting older; does it mean we get bad at things we used to be good at, or does it mean we are no longer delusional about our own strength and abilities.

Really, it was seriously bad. And that, after Ernst gave me probably one of the best introductions I've heard in our club!!

About the only thing I dread worse than giving a speech badly is evaluating others, and guess what I get to do next week? You got it!

PS. I got soaked walking home from the bus stop today. Lordy...

Gym

So, this week is a new month and it's after the pledge period. I still intended to go three times a week, but not feel guilty if work takes precedence. (I have 13 more days before I go away for 10 days, and still a few projects remaining.)

Having said that, it was lame of me to not go yesterday, because if I had prepared for today's Toastmaster speech over the weekend, I could have gone to the gym yesterday. Whatever, you must see this sign in Zsolt's blog.

It also reminded me of a sign in the dentist's office I used to go to in St Paul, which read something like: "If you don't like cleaning your teeth, don't worry, they'll eventually go away."

Yikes... gym and dentist...

Rain, Fog, and Rain, and a Bit of Sun, and Rain

Yesterday started out foggy; when I got up there was no Richmond, and then even my neighbors disappeared. And the rest of the day it was raining and gray.

This morning, for just a few minutes, we had a double rainbow, the smaller one being almost complete, and it was still raining. And Richmond is back.

[Note to self: study how to shoot fog and show the strange atmosphere. Don't just do B/W, either.]

I usually love rain, and enjoy being locked up in the house, just me and my work, but I've been anxious; I'm so terribly behind in work.

[Note to self: stop posting boring photos.]

Speechless...

I was listening to National Radio while measuring a warp, and something this young chap said made me think.

In Japan, people with beautiful handwriting and/or writing skills, and a degree of humility, are respected and seen to be intelligent. In the American Midwest, articulate speech and a degree of assertiveness is respected, at least as a student; I think oratory is still important in that country.

In New Zealand, it doesn't matter if you can't get up and talk, as long as you can do your "thing" well. In fact, articulateness is sometimes seen as "self promotion", and that's a very bad thing; just getting down and doing your thing "quietly" is a lot more respectable.

No wonder some days I just want to stay in bed.

Lordy....

OK, my bank, again.

This week, a new superannuation/government-scheme came into effect. To meet those requirements, no doubt, my bank (and probably all other banks) changed their Internet banking procedures/screens.

Before last week, if we logged in, we could see the balance of all of our accounts on one screen, including the available balance (immediately accessible amount.) Since last week, to go view the balance of our retirement account, we have to go through two more screens from the initial balance screen. AND the available balance of that account doesn't show up anywhere, any more. That's regress for you.

I emailed them about four times in the last week; first time, no reply; second time, that they will ring me; third and fourth time, that "the available balance to your retirement account cannot be seen currently." Duh!!

Not that it matters much because we've been eating into that retirement money for the last several years to subsidize my weaving, so there's not much in it. Still, this is the bank that is normally rated No 1 or No 2 in New Zealand for Costumer Services.

The part that bothers me the most is that when I fill in the on-line form to ask/complain, I clearly state that my name is Meg, but they insist on writing to me as Megumi, and nobody calls me that. Geeeeezzzzz.....

Anybody Know a Good Ficton??

I've been so disillusioned by fiction I don't recall reading anything interesting in over a decade; the only ones I remember are Franzen's The Corrections, (loved it), and Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, (second half, very disappointing.) I did enjoy the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, but they weren't enthralling or meaningful, just fun. It got to a point where I don't even browse in the fiction section of the bookshops lately, but I do love a good novel.

Please recommend fiction you've enjoyed in the last, say, five years or so. I don't read horror, science fiction, or fantasy, and not a fan of war stories, but I'm good with contemporary, historical, or political thrillers. I'm also a fan of short story collections. Oh, and I'm an extremely slow reader.

I appreciate the recommendations; thank you in advance.

Far and Wide???

My chatter has spilled over and across the Tasman Sea; I've made a guest appearance at Ms Alaphabet Soup's blog in Melbourne, West Island, Australia. Thank you for asking, Ms Soup.