(no subject)

Nobody can fairly claim that Punkin doesn't work hard, at least toward goals that suit the Punkin.

Through dint of much persistence, she found a new tactic guaranteed to wake up the humans, while simultaneously being very pleasant for Punkin: if feet and ankles are sticking out from under the covers, you tooth and lean your head against them. A single toe would do, in a pinch. The human makes odd noises--possibly dreaming of giant squid, though that could have something to do with being in the middle of The Skinner--and will quickly jerk into an upright position and some semblance of consciousness.

It's hard for humans to resist the rubbing teeth. Argh.

And now for some Twitter

• 21:38 @arkadyrose Thanks for the pointer to the donation site. #
• 21:39 @baughman_in_va Got that form out yesterday. Hopefully second time's the charm in this case. :/ #
• 21:44 @arkadyrose Punkin alerted me to a mouse in one cupboard (full of gluteny stuff I. forgot about), it ate 1.5 kg pasta and 4-5 biscuit packs! #
• 21:47 @arkadyrose Hope patching the hole fixes the draught. Suspect our mouse was a cat escape in the first place, no obvious holes around. #
• 21:50 Good headway on kitchen cleaning I'd been avoiding, this evening. Making apple crumble will have to wait for tomorrow! #
• 21:53 I.'s out before 6 am again tomorrow, for the buyout induction thing snowed out last week. May sound callous, but earplugs are good at 5 :) #

Automatically shipped by LoudTwitter

Kitchen and food stuff, apparently

It's time for some rest, hand cream, and pain relief. I've been messing around in the kitchen again, since Punkin woke me up from the allergy-induced nap.

Rather unusually, I found a bit of good design* to complain about in there. The counters and sink are actually set up at a reasonable level for average British female height. This would be much more useful if I were not about 5'8", with T. rex arms and an existing RSI problem with hunching my shoulders forward to compensate. (At least I have not picked up a name from the arms, at any rate.) That sink would be about 6" higher, in Racheltopia.

No wonder that's annoying, taking a better look while checking on the food in the oven. Without rounding my shoulders, the counters are just about wrist level on me. Closer to 9" higher would be good. Bah. Frequently I'd like to be taller, but not in that kitchen. The ability to change size at will would be really cool.

OTOH, the house is filled with yummy food smells, particularly welcome on a cold, rainy day. Besides the apple crumble--with an added experimental cream cheese layer under the oaty stuff, which would have worked better with thicker non-spreadable cheese--we have some savory foil parcels in there. The lemony cheesecakey layer mostly ended up on the bottom, but it should still taste OK. I'm tempted to try to pick up some more of those riper than usual, giant Bramleys at the market, as good as they tasted and smelled. They are at least a lb. each, probably more, so not much peeling effort involved either. :) In the interests of easy food with the oven fired up already, I also wrapped up some thinly sliced potatoes, onions, and celery--yeah, I'm still liking the mandolin!--with chicken breasts, some butter, a liberal dose of Puszta seasoning (I was not about to link to a Lidl shill blog for that), and a little dried rosemary off the bush out there. Add some "steam fried"** frozen veggies, and we'll be set.

They're both almost done, and I'm sniffing at the air like Feist. :) vatine is on his way in from Liverpool Street, so we can attack them soon. With any luck, he will get a chance to pick up ice cream. We've got an ice cream maker on the way, in the interest of more sugar free options (though Frank's Diabetic Vanilla would work tonight, hideous name or no!), but it's not here yet. I'll risk a little sugary stuff with the sharply reduced sugar dessert! I do miss Kroger's selection, mostly aimed at low carbers or not.

______
* Statistically speaking, at any rate.
** That's what Ming Thing calls it, at any rate. Back home, we just call it "fried", even with roughly a teaspoon of fat involved per pan. :)