Monthly Archives: September 2004

Accident

I had an accident on the M1 on the way home from work. I probably shouldn’t say anything about it here, sub judice and all that. I wasn’t hurt, and two other people are being checked for whiplash. I’m not sure if my car will make it.

Had quite a long wait in the recovery truck because he was called to an additional accident on the way to taking me to a railway station. The second accident looked a lot like mine, only with much more expensive cars.

Whilst sitting in the truck listening to Radio 1 I heard the news:

  • police were appealing for motorists who drove straight past the body of a badly injured woman on a road to speak them
  • news was reported of a 6 hour wait for police to respond to a woman hiding in a kitchen cupboard because her husband was about to kill her; she was killed by her husband
  • Ken Bigley’s captors released another video of him in a cage, bound hand and foot, and weeping

It put my accident in perspective a bit.

Pavarotti Loves Elephants

Pavarotti Loves Elephants. By Joel Veitch, rathergood.comTee hee.

Interesting panel meeting this afternoon, looking at problems of student domination of housing in Nottingham suburbs and at the ‘evening economy’ of the city.

Got home, cooked bangers and mash, and showed Paul how to make bread. Chopped some chives and parsley into the flour and made herb bread this time. Hopefully that will lead to eating less jam…

Popped around the corner to print members’ newsletter, popped around another corner to pick up an insert for it, and now just need to stuff the buggers.

Legally Blonde

Just watched Legally Blonde for the first time. Had already seen LB-II, so it was nice to see a bit of Ursprung.

Afterwards, I cleaned out the fishtank, a job I’ve been putting off for, erm, months. Haven’t done it since we moved, which is four months. Took a surprisingly small amount of time. Maybe there’s a lesson here? “Prevaricating makes dull jobs easier”?

Was watching TV because there’s nothing to read in the house. I lost the most recent Private Eye tidying up for the landlord. There’s a Computer Shopper but I don’t want to open that right now. I finished Stupid White Men earlier (OK, but I preferred Al Franken’s Lies and the Lying Liars who tell them: a fair and balanced look at the right.)

I’ve read all the detective fiction I own. Maybe I should get back on with reading E. David’s French Provincial Cooking: I’m not sure why I stopped reading that.

I’ve got plenty of Council reports to be getting on with, but somehow they don’t appeal.

I’ve got really bored with the internet recently: I’ve caught up with all my newsgroup and cix messages, read all the boards on outintheuk.com, checked today’s Dilbert, looked at the witty people’s pictures on B3ta, and then I feel I ought still to be able to waste more hours out there. I really miss the days before IRC died.

Phoned the bank earlier to set up instalments to pay for this year’s choir tour: 25th Anniversary. We’re singing in St Paul’s Cathedral for a week. Can’t wait.

Bed, I spose. Will dig out E. David first.

Chinese Community

Today, the Chinese Community Association who are taking over the management of a community centre in my ward, had an open day for people who live nearby. There was Chinese food, Chinese film, a Chinese raffle, ear-bending Chinese karaoke, and a party atmosphere.

This gorilla was a raffle prize. Here he is in a bag getting ready to go home.

There was also a competition to see how many wet marbles you could pick up with chopsticks. Women and children had to do 10 to win a prize, but men had to get to 20. I couldn’t resist…

I eventually managed 23 marbles, but it’s trickier than you’d think. They were even threatening to put detergent in the bowl as well to make it even harder!

Coming home, I bought some more oranges from Mr Sheikh. I seem to be juicing hundreds of them but hopefully it’s good for me and hopefully the peels are good for the compost. We’ve also almost eaten one of the loaves already so they can’t be too bad.

Members’ newsletter… must lay it out tonight. Now!

Bread

Well, those two loaves look perfectly respectable. Obviously they’re too hot to taste right now. The cottage loaf splatted a bit further than it was supposed to. (Actually, what is the point of the extra bit on top? Doesn’t it just make it harder to slice / do owt useful with?)

Initial jottings

I’m tired this evening because I’ve done a lot today. It was a delivery day, so I spent hours with my council colleagues posting Lib Dem leaflets through people’s letterboxes in the ward I represent, and the ward next door. An hour of heavy rain interrupted our usual leaflet-lunch-leaflet schedule and we didn’t finish til gone six.

At home, Paul prepared for a night out on the tiles with a mate, and we installed our new compost bin in the garden. I managed to kick over an earthenware pot he bought for the garden and upset him. He left hours ago, and since he went out, I’ve caught up with news and e-mail (including continuing some long conversations with my mother that I started yesterday, feeling a bit guilty that I haven’t spoken to her much lately.)

One of the things I asked Mum last night was her recipe for bread. I can’t believe how simple it is. Very few ingredients (special flour, warm water, yeast, salt, a little oil.) Making it is a simple case of chucking it all together and kneading for a while. I made it about an hour ago, and it’s proving now over a radiator in the kitchen while the oven pre-heats. I should maybe wait until it’s finished cooking before I decide whether it’s all that simple or not.

Another thing I’ve spent hours on this evening is setting up a webshop to sell tshirts and stuff. Or two webshops really: here’s one that takes a quote from a Simon Hoggart article in the Guardian. “Who on earth is Ed Fordham?” Many Lib Dems will know who he is: one of the many talented people who get other people elected by dint of hard work and near-genius, so I hope he won’t mind the t-shirt design. The other one takes a design I threw together in an idle moment during the Leicester South by-election and merges it with the Tough Liberalism theme emerging from last week’s Lib Dem conf.

I’m set to make a profit of about 50p on each t-shirt I sell. I’m not expecting to be able to retire any time soon, but my mind is buzzing on how to promote the designs. Private Eye smalls? There’s already a message on Cix!

Hope to have a little more success than the shop that’s been on cafeshops for a year or two with the contraversial slogan that Skegness rejected in favour of bracing:

And now it’s midnight, and the bread has only just gone in. Maybe there’s time for designing newsletters after all.