Stuff for today

Well, as you can see, our nectarine tree is in bloom. Provided we can keep the birds from eating them all we should have a pretty good crop. Nectarine cobbler is definitely in our future :-)

Things are looking up in the job market, I hope. I don't want to go into any details just yet--don't want to jinx things!--but please do send good mojo my way if you are so inclined.

I'm trying a new recipe from the Unofficial Harry Potter Cookbook: chicken & ham pie. I bought a whole chicken & cut it into pieces since it was a lot less expensive than buying it pre-cut. I will never do this again. Cutting up a whole chicken is DISGUSTING, especially when you have to cut through bone. Yuck. It's well worth the extra money to not have to do that.

I'm also making another steamed chocolate pudding, which I fear may be a Fail since for some reason, even though it says to cook it for 3 hours, I set the timer for 2-1/2 which is the cook time for the treacle pudding. I didn't realize the error until I tried to turn it out onto a plate after cooling. Mostly cooked pudding remained in the bowl, and a pile of chocolatey goo ended up on the plate. Sigh. I scraped it back into the bowl & am boiling it for another 45 minutes (I'm adding some extra cook time to get it back up to temperature), which I hope will salvage it. I've been craving this all week & it would be a shame if it's not edible.

Last weekend Ralph & I went to a Dickens Festival in Riverside. It was OK, but not as much fun as I'd hoped. We did enjoy watching Jeffrey the Juggler (who was a friend of Ralph's years ago at Ren Faire), and the costumes were lovely. I also liked the musicians. But the dealer area was kind of small, and the play we started to watch was both dull & difficult to hear (the microphones didn't seem to be working, and the cast was relying on them rather than projecting). I think my favorite part was playing some of the children't games. Ralph skunked me at jacks, which I should have anticipated since he is also a juggler. There was also a game there called "Graces" which consists of using two sticks to toss & catch a hoop. I did better at that than I expected. Still, it was a free event and I enjoyed it enough to be interested in going again next year.

While we were there, we also wandered through an antique store & found a bunch of Happy Hollisters books. If I'd had the money I'd have bought several of them, since I know I'm missing quite a few of the titles they had there, such as "Ghost Horse Mystery," "Monster Mystery," and "Swiss Echo Mystery." Ah, well, perhaps when I do have the money they'll still be available. They were pretty well hidden so perhaps I'll be lucky.

I finished the pair of socks I was working on. Since each ball of yarn was enough to knit a full pair, I've got enough left to make another pair. I've already cast them on & am halfway through (just finished turning the heels this afternoon). I'm using a slip-stitch pattern, almost mind-numbingly easy and yet extremely attractive if I do say so myself. I'll have to post pics--which reminds me, I *still* need to post photos of the Bloody Stupid Johnson hat, especially now that I've made two of them.