First class

Yes, I'm boasting but this is my personal blog and so the ideal platform to announce the fulfillment of a life time goal. I'm currently traveling first class on a train. Curiously the ticket was one pound cheaper than a standard ticket. I don't know why. Anyway, item ticked off and time for me to enjoy this complimentary decaf coffee and WiFi

C90 go

I'm on the train, which seems to be the only place I blog from nowadays. There is someone here using a personal stereo with an actual compact cassette tape in it. Not sure why. Is this the follow-up to the vinyl revival? Did wonder if it was a cool case for an iPhone but it looks real. Also doesn't seem to work that well.

Churros

I found a churros stall near the town hall today. They were okay, though I have had better in Santiago del Compostela (I'm so international)

Project Pernod

I've done my ironing this week but decided to blog about summat else.

A film that I really like is "Withnail & I" and I also like to play the drinking game. Nothing fancy, just drink the same as they drink when it comes on screen. Not quantity obviously. But it requires a bit of preparation to stock up beforehand. and I often find that I'm not totally sure of all the drinks that they imbibe during the film. Sherry for definite. Beer. Two large gins. Cider. Rum. whisky. But what are they drinking the night that they play cards with Monty? Some cloudy white stuff? Pernod I reckon. So I bought a bottle of Pernod. Haven't played the game for a while and no immediate plans to do so. Felt frankly rough after the last time and the bottle of Pernod has been hanging around for too long.

Project Pernod is to finish the bottle. It's been a journey full of surprises. Pernod with water is okay but not super enjoyable. Pernod with lemonade is quite pleasant. I wouldn't recommend Pernod with chocolate soya milk. The best I have found is Pernod with cranberry juice. Called a "Good and Plenty" apparently.

And when I've finished this glass the project will be completed.

My lovely gf hates Pernod, even the smell.

Afterthought: is the picture over photo-shopped? The filters on android now are too tempting and easy to apply for my limited self restraint

Ironing times

My time is 21:53.94 Lap times: 1. ‎2 ‎21.44 2. ‎5 ‎18.75 3. ‎3 ‎16.80 4. ‎6 ‎11.68 5. ‎4 ‎45.26

As we enter the third week of kitchen-less living my focus on immaculate sartorial presentation is shifting more towards damage limitation. Still can't bring myself to wear a non iron shirt without giving it a bit of an iron though. For the non iron thing to work the shirts need to be tumble dried apparently.

The Kitchen

One of the big advantages of renting rather than buying a house is that you don't have to do stuff.
I don't really like doing stuff to houses. The new kitchen is being fitted by Przemek. I'm not really enjoying paying money do have somebody else do stuff to my house either.
The new kitchen will make it all worthwhile when it's done.

Ironing times

Five shirts. First lap took longer because of setting up the ironing board. I wouldn't have thought of posting this, but the stop watch on my new phone lets me post to Blogger so here you are.

Let's see if i can beat these times next week...

My time is 21:56.91 Lap times: 1. ‎4 ‎53.95 2. ‎3 ‎06.58 3. ‎4 ‎17.50 4. ‎9 ‎38.87

National Vegetarian Week

It is apparently National Vegetarian Week. The canteen where I work had a special dish on the menu to celebrate. Something I saw on this bus, however, suggests that some may take it further than that

For charity

It troubles me when people do stuff for charity. Not all stuff - i imagine that all sorts of caring, cleaning, and assorted volunteering goes on. But when people charitably undertake to do fun things like abseil down tall buildings, skydive and what have you, then I start to wonder if they're doing it because they want to and the charity thing is to defray the expenses.
Not that the charity minds I suppose, they wouldn't get anything if the fun didn't happen.

But I mind. If I'm persuaded to donate a quid to a worthy cause then that's one thing but I begrudge donating 50p for someone's adrenaline rush.

Olga's empanada recipe

You will need:

500g flour

1 small cup of warm salted water

1 heaped tsp of raw / fresh yeast

1/4 cup of olive oil

What to do:

1. mix the yeast and the water

2. Add to the flour and mix slightly

3. add the oil and mix - Firmly until it looks like smooth pastry dough

4. Rest for one hour

5. Make into empanadas (semi-circular pasties with various fillings)

Note:

I have never made this

AVI to MPEG to WMV

This is one of the posts where I mention some details of an obscure tech process which is likely of interest to no-one apart from myself, but may come in handy when I want to do it again and can´t remember what I did.

It all started when I wanted to download some video for my iPaq, which only plays WMV files.

I found a freeware AVI to WMV convertor --> http://www.boxoft.com/avi-to-wmv/

But it actually produced MPEG files which wouldn´t get picked up by the "update library" function and couldn´t be played

2nd step was a freeware MPEG to WMV convertor --> http://www.winff.org/html_new/

Success!

Coat hooks

We used to have four (4) but now we have twelve (12). Still run out though

Airline hand luggage sizes

Apparently most airlines including british airways have the same size limits: 56 x 45 x 25cm
Some have smaller limits though, I understand that ryan air only allows 55 x 40 x 20cm and first choice only allows 45 x 35 x 20cm

Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

Recipe: Tofu Marengo

Ever since getting a name check in Red Dwarf I've wondered about this
dish. Due to a hearing error I thought for years that it was made with
meringue, and thus not easy to make a vegan version of. Happily the
confusion was resolved earlier this year, and I've since had a couple
of goes at it.

I found a couple of sources regarding the dish:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_Marengo
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/chicken_marengo_on_94849

The second attempt (pictured) was the most successful. This time I
abandoned the attempt to fry the tofu in flour, I just fried it in
olive oil till crispy, then stabbed each slice a couple of times to
let the sauce penetrate it. Didn't have any thyme so used tarragon,
oregano and bay leaves

So what other favourite meals of famous generals should I go for the
develop the theme?