Saturday, December 31, 2011

New Year/Old Year -Bah Humbug

      Time is such an incongruous thing. Here it is the end of the year and we close a chapter and open a new one full of hope and optimism because of the change of a date. Dates were created by human civilization (is there any other?) but by doing so it seems we pin ourselves into the frame of our own devise. Animals, who live so in the present, are affected by forces much more immediate. They still put food aside for the winter but there is no-it’s Wednesday therefore I must do this. I prefer the animal’s plan although I make up my monthly calendar with obligations and set asides that everything seems to orbit around. Here it is the end of the year and I do delight in seeing the past three hundred and sixty five days fall behind me but don’t they anyway? So it is our own fault that we set up this system. The important thing is to let each day go and be right here and now. Easier said than done.....
      When you consider how much emphasis is placed on time and how it runs our lives it really is rather startling and I think, a bane of modern life. At 16, I must do thus and such, at 21, my life will be just so, when, if we just lived, without the preoccupation of time, we would probably be able to accomplish, relax and enjoy ourselves a great deal more.
      As I get older and assorted friends along with me we think oh, I am so old I can no longer do that thing. Well, it may be true or it may not. It is not because you are 57, or 62 or whatever. Your body responds to your mind suggestions a great deal. What if we just listened to our bodies instead of that persistent clock. Body says, okay you could do that if you practiced or got off your ass, or whatever the case may be but there is a battle that goes on with your mind that it should not be done, or could not be done, or some such nonsense. Who wins? Generally the one who is more complacent and that is a whole other matter.
 So on that note- Happy New Year and good riddance to the last one!

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

From Flurry to Flurries

It has been such a long tome since I caught up I scarcely feel like the same person. Perhaps I am not. Perhaps, from day to day we are like rivers where nothing really stays the same because of the addition of each new day of experiences.
Clearly there is much to say but I shall do it in bites. In the meantime here is some entertainment from the last junket....
A November escape

Friday, April 29, 2011

What to serve six hundred and fifty of your closest friends

  • OK, I didn't get up early but I did watch some of the wedding and it did screw up my schedule for the day. I am so very glad nothing has gone wrong-so far. Let's hope the day continues with no rain and no crazy agendas.
  • I know you are proud and not wanting to give in to your curiosity but I will provide you with a bit of an answeer to your burning question. What did the Queen and Duchess of Cambridge decide (along with hundreds of others) to serve at the lunch following the ceremony? Here is a sampling

  • Cornish Crab Salad on Lemon Blini
  • Pressed Duck Terrine with Fruit Chutney
  • Roulade of Goats Cheese with Caramelised Walnuts
  • Assortment of Palmiers and Cheese Straws
  • Scottish Smoked Salmon Rose on Beetroot Blini
  • Miniature Watercress and Asparagus Tart
  • Poached Asparagus spears with Hollandaise Sauce for Dipping
  • Quails Eggs with Celery Salt
  •  Scottish Langoustines with Lemon Mayonnaise Pressed Confit of Pork Belly with Crayfish and Crackling
  • Wild Mushroom and Celeriac Chausson
  • Bubble and Squeak with Confit Shoulder of Lamb
  • Grain Mustard and honey-glazed Chipolatas
  • Smoked Haddock Fishcake with Pea Guacamole
  • Miniature Yorkshire Pudding with Roast Fillet of Beef and Horseradish Mousse
  •  Gateau Opera
  • Blood Orange Pate de Fruit
  • Raspberry Financier
  • Rhubarb Crème Brulee Tartlet
  • Passion Fruit Praline
  • White Chocolate Ganache Truffle
  • Milk Chocolate Praline with Nuts
  • Dark Chocolate Ganache Truffle
Guests will be served Pol Roger NV Brut Réserve Champagne with a selection of other soft and alcoholic drinks.
I think it all shows very good taste, and probably tastes very good!

Sunday, January 16, 2011

3 winter poems for the morning

Cold, cold, cold
The snow fog sits on the bay 
Moves inland to etch the trees
With a silver sheen of crystals
Then moves out to sea.
Squirrels fuss with the crows 
as they search for corn and seed
Small birds and woodpeckers
Are storming the feeders
Backlit by the purple grey of the bay
It’s a busy morning in the cold.
The bay
Pink, blue, purple
with ruffles of shifted ice in blue gray
Changes by the second with fog,
Light and tide.
Distance changes
Shores recede and disappear
in banks of cloud
Emerging whitened 
with a brush of ice
Underneath the water rises and falls
Every day, every hour, every season


Saturday, January 8, 2011

Winter Ice

The tidal ice
Is breathing in the quiet grey day of winter
Accents of pops and cracks
Make it alive in the frozen current
Tok
ckrk,crck
It calls to the eagles and crows
and others brave enough to be out
gump
 crck,
Chunks of ice
Pile up on one another
Melting and freezing to island mountains
On the white plain
pik,
unmk, pin
tik 
In the night, the sounds
are musical
Bok, crtttttt
click
bax
taking on John Cage compositions
metallic and tonal
waving in the  harp of current.