Indomitable

My gran died on Saturday. This was a shock, of course, but not really a surprise... except that it was, a bit. The thing is, she'd been in ill health for quite some time, so it was never going to be too surprising. And yet, we'd been told that she wasn't considered end-of-life, and then she was gone.

Emotionally, that makes things a bit of a mix. She had had a pretty miserable last couple of years, and she was clearly suffering, so her passing is something of a relief. At the same time, it would have been nice to have been able to visit some time in the last couple of years, and it most certainly would have been nice had her four children been able to visit in hospital. Alas, Covid made those both impossible.

One additional sadness is that the funeral, which is likely to be in the next few weeks, is also likely to be the final gathering of the extended family. Indeed, the circumstances are such that I may well already have said a final goodbye to several of my cousins without even knowing it. And that's a shame.

But that's for the future. For now, I'm going to remember my gran, who so often seemed to be in the background allowing granddad to do the talking... but she was always there, supporting everything.

Loft Storage

We have recently had our loft hatch replaced and a ladder fitted, giving us access to a considerable amount of storage space. (The loft was mostly boarded in already, so the storage was always there; it just wasn't easily accessible.) This gives rise to the key question of what to put up there. And there are a great many candidates.

But...

Honestly, I don't want to put items up into the loft, because for most things that are going up there, if you're putting them into that long-term storage, why are you keeping them at all? (Of course, a lot of that is a reaction to the state of affairs at my parents' house, where things have just gotten on top of them such that even tackling the clutter becomes a horrible proposition.)

The other issue that I have is that that space will necessarily be quite cold, and may well be subject to damp and perhaps even rain. That limits the choices of what to put up there - either the things being stored must be resilient against such things, or they need to be thoroughly sealed.

The upshot of all of that is that there are some things that want shifted up the stairs - some items that we don't use but can't for various reasons can't get rid of, and some items that are already effectively in long-term storage and just need properly sealed. And, finally, some things that actually do see some use but can usefully be placed close to the opening for access on those occasions they're needed (our luggage, for instance).

And there are some things I still have to resist being moved.

Experimental Cookery 2022: Honey(comb), Chocolate & Raspberry Cranachan

For Burns' Night we had the traditional haggis, neeps, and tatties, and the cranachan for dessert. It was highly successful.

The method for this came from this month's Tesco magazine, although literally every ingredient was a swap from that recommended, some minor (ordinary oats in place of their Finest range), some more major (cookie for tiffin). Though I suspect it was all a difference without much distinction, since it amounts to "a bunch of nice things mixed together".

It was all very nice. We'd probably have it again, though we tend not to do desserts very often so I couldn't really say when.

#3: "Wildtrack", by Bernard Cornwell

#4: "The Thorn Birds", by Colleen McCullough (a book from The List - seven to go)

Baking with Funsize #6: Jammy Cut-out Biscuits

This was an interesting one: the effort of putting the dough together was of little interest to Funsize, but once it had come together she thoroughly enjoyed cutting out the shapes. Unfortunately, I rolled the biscuits out a little thinly, which meant that they came out a little over-baked. But they tasted fine for all that.

(I should take a moment to thank one of Funsize's uncles, who helped complete the biscuits when I was distracted - Funsize had great fun adding the jam and sticking them together.)

Next up will be the long-delayed lace biscuits with lime cream, I think. The next biscuits in the book have some elements that don't inspire me, so I'm inclined to go back and fill in the gaps, but that will likely be not next week but the week after.

Around the World in 80 Days

Over the past few weeks, LC and I worked our way through this series, the BBC's adaptation of Jules Verne's classic novel. I'm not going to say much about it, except to note that I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was fairly light, but that was appropriate to the material, and it was given just enough 'bite' to be interesting.

It may well benefit the series that I haven't read the original story. But that's fine. And I'll certainly be interested to see how they segue into a whole new novel with the same characters. But that's something to look forward to.

Rules, not Guidelines

The longer Boris Johnson remains Prime Minister, the more apparent it is that something fundamental needs to change in Westminster. If the parliament is to continue to function, whoever is Johnson's successor needs to bring in some fundamental changes. (Of course, I don't believe Westminster is capable of making these changes - that is, after all, the precise reason I support Scottish Independence.)

The fundamental problem is that Westminster operates on the assumption that those involved are fundamentally honourable. As a consequence of this the place has very few strict rules, and an awful lot of conventions, guidelines, and other mechanisms.

The problem with that is that when someone comes alone with no respect whatsoever for conventions, the whole thing falls apart.

The notion that the Prime Minister is the final arbiter on whether someone has broken the Ministerial Code is a major problem. This means that when a minister is found to have bullied staff, the PM could (and did) casually ignore the report and leave her in post. Even more absurdly, the PM is now being investigated... and will then be able to rule whether he himself broke the code (spoiler: he absolutely did, and he absolutely will exonerate himself).

But, of course, even the fact that he's having to be investigated is itself shocking. It's practically inconceivable that these parties would have happened under Theresa May or Gordon Brown - for all their faults, both were without question serious figures well aware of the need for leadership, especially now. It's also inconceivable, although for different reasons, that it would happen under either David Cameron or Tony Blair - both are sufficiently media savvy that they likewise would never let it happen. (And Major and Thatcher were creatures of a different age. The scandals were utterly different there.)

The consequence of that is that the system has broken down. It needs to change.

And the change is pretty simple: where there are standards of behaviour that are expected, but that are covered by conventions and guidelines, these need to become rules with proper sanctions. Suspected breaches of those rules need to be conducted by an entirely separate body, with the power to demand answers, access any and all documents, and issue sanctions. And any such investigations have to be triggered automatically - no more of this business of the government choosing when and what to investigate, and assigning their pet civil servants to the job.

I have no confidence that any of this will happen. But it must.

#2: "The Nature of Middle Earth", by J.R.R. Tolkien (one for the fanatics only!)

Baking with Funsize #5: Viennese Biscuits

Returning to the Usborne "Children's Book of Baking", on Saturday Funsize and I tackled Viennese Biscuits, which consist of two biscuity blobs with chocolate sandwiched between. These were our most successful bake so far, especially as Funsize really enjoyed laying out the biscuits and spreading the chocolate. The only downside, such as it is, was that the biscuits don't keep, so had to be eaten quickly. Oh, such a shame!

We actually skipped the Lace Biscuits that were, by rights, the next bake we should have done. That leaves us two potential 'next' bakes. I'm inclined to go for the jammy biscuits next, but we'll see...

Dear Media: Bloody Sort Yourselves Out!

Yesterday we were notified that a friend of ours had an issue with the thermometer in her baby box - it had been giving a false low reading which, had she trusted it, could have caused serious problems. She also noted that there were some press stories about problems with the included thermometer. So I went to check...

What I found were two stories, one of which was locked behind a paywall, and the other of which was a repeat/summary of the first. Both had a lurid headline damning the Scottish Government over a cavalier attitude to the safety and accuracy about the included thermometers.

The reality was rather more prosaic: an update to advice had indicated that in-ear thermometers should not be used with very young children (under four weeks), the Scottish government had switched to an under-arm thermometer, but they had waited to use up existing stocks first. There was no indication that the original thermometers had general problems, needed a recall, or were otherwise problematic - and certainly no justification for the panic-mongering headline.

Of course, the reason for this all comes down to one word: independence.

Scotland's media is almost universally opposed to independence, and therefore loathes the SNP government. As a consequence of this every single action of the SNP government, even if it is completely unrelated to independence, and even if it is a massive social good like the baby boxes, must be torn down, trashed, and denigrated at every possible opportunity. Nothing can be good, or work well; every flaw must be magnified to the ultimate degree.

With the consequence that the media are utterly and completely unreliable. "News" in Scotland is useless.

(That, incidentally, also applies to our one and only pro-independence newspaper, the National. For the opposite reason - they can't criticise the government, but must instead act as cheerleaders.)

The thing is, on most topics that really doesn't matter. We just factor the complete bloody uselessness of the media into our calculations, completely ignore them, and move on. But this was a very serious matter of public health - if those thermometers really were faulty, we needed to know. And, equally, if they're not then it's frankly dangerous for the media to try to promote a panic about them.

There's a line there, and it has been crossed. Hence the title of this post.

Experimental Cookery 2021: Chicken Dim Sum

This one was our main meal on Hogmanay, but I didn't have a chance to update the blog at the time and so it carries over into the new year. It comes from Jamie's "Fifteen Minute Meals" - I certainly make no claim to authenticity! And, the final thing of note, was that this was a chance for me to try out my latest toy, being a set of bamboo steamers.

This was a quick and easy meal to prepare, although it did have the usual chaos of too many things happening at once which is a feature of the 15MM book. A calmer approach is probably more beneficial here (and in general) - better not even to try to hit that benchmark.

I did find that the dough was rather tricky to work with. Having watched some videos online I'm pretty sure I see my problem (much more flour on the rolling surface), but will confirm next time I do this. My other key mistake was that I didn't steam the buns for long enough - they need at least 12 minutes.

The end result, though, was rather nice. We'll certainly have this, and some variants, again - the steamer proved to be extremely easy and convenient, so I'll be looking for options to use it more often in future.

And that's about that, really.

#1: "Sly Flourish's The Lazy Dungeon Master", by Michael E. Shea

Books of the Year 2021

As part of the end-of-year round-up, I can once again present a list of books read in the past year.

Here is the list:

1. "Sharpe's Siege", by Bernard Cornwell
2. "Starsight", by Brandon Sanderson
3. "Tasha's Cauldron of Everything", from Wizards of the Coast
4. "William Shakespeare's Star Wars: The Merry Rise of Skywalker", by Ian Doescher
5. "White Oleander", by Janet Fitch *
6. "Tome of Beasts II", from Kobold Press
7. "Sharpe's Revenge", by Bernard Cornwell
8. "The Alchemist", by Paulo Coelho *
9. "The Star Wars Book", by Pablo Hidalgo, Cole Horton, and Dan Zehr
10. "Sword of Destiny", by Andrzej Sapkowski
11. "Sharpe's Devil", by Bernard Cornwell
12. "Exploring Eberron", by Keith Baker
13. "Blood of Elves", by Andrzej Sapkowski
14. "The Gates of Athens", by Conn Iggulden
15. "The Dwarves", by Markus Hietz
16. "Thomas the Tank Engine: The Complete Collection", by Rev. W. Awdry **
17. "Sharpe's Tiger", by Bernard Cornwell
18. "The Good Earth", by Pearl S. Buck *
19. "The Poisonwood Bible", by Barbera Kingsolver *
20. "Time of Contempt", by Andrzej Sapkowski
21. "Sharpe's Triumph", by Bernard Cornwell
22. "Firefly: The Ghost Machine", by James Lovegrove
23. "A Murder of Quality", by John Le Carré
24. "Kane and Abel", by Jeffrey Archer *
25. "Baptism of Fire", by Andrez Sapkowski
26. "Children of Húrin", by J.R.R. Tolkien
27. "Sharpe's Fortress", by Bernard Cornwell
28. "The Diviners", by Margaret Laurence *
29. "The Last Druid", by Terry Brooks
30. "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare" *
31. "The Killings at Kingfisher Hill", by Sophie Hannah
32. "Sharpe's Trafalgar", by Bernard Cornwell
33. "The Hobbit", by J.R.R. Tolkien * **
34. "Tower of the Swallow", by Andrzej Sapkowski
35. "Sharpe's Prey", by Bernard Cornwell
36. "The Mists of Avalon", by Marion Zimmer Bradley *
37. "The Massacre of Mankind", by Stephen Baxter
38. "Warlord", by Bernard Cornwell
39. "The Notebook", by Nicholas Sparks *
40. "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes", by Suzanne Collins
41. "Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft", from Wizards of the Coast
42. "Rebel", by Bernard Cornwell
43. "Firefly: Generations", by Tim Lebbon
44. "Broken Homes", by Ben Aaronovitch
45. "The Summer Tree", by Guy Gavriel Kay *
46. "Troubled Blood", by Robert Galbraith
47. "Lady of the Lake", by Andrzej Sapkowski
48. "The Monogram Murders", by Sophie Hannah
49. "Copperhead", by Bernard Cornwell
50. "The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants", by Ann Brashares *
51. "Season of Storms", by Andrzej Sapkowski
52. "Closed Casket", by Sophie Hannah
53. "Troy", by Stephen Fry
54. "Incompetnece", by Rob Grant
55. "Battle Flag", by Bernard Cornwell
56. "The Time-Travelling Caveman", by Terry Pratchett
57. "New Spring", by Robert Jordan
58. "The Bloody Ground", by Bernard Cornwell
59. "Good Omens", by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman

So that's 59 books in total. That includes 12 books from The List, one of which was a reread. There are 4 RPG books, and either 4 or 5 re-reads - I think I've read all the "Thomas the Tank Engine" stories before, but I'm not absolutely certain about every single one. There are 2 books for Funsize/Surprise!. One of the things I need to do more of next year is reading to Surprise! - I read to Funsize almost every single day, but need to do the same for both.

There were a number of really good books this year, but I'm naming "Kane and Abel" book of the year. Special note should go to the Sharpe series, and also "The Time-Travelling Caveman", since this is the third time I've read the very last Terry Prachett book. And also Shakespeare, of course, mostly because it represents the final book in the UK side of The List.

Sadly, there have also been some stinkers this year, but I'm not going to name a particular one as the outright worst. However, I need to make a special mention of "Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft", which was the book that knocked the final nail on the coffin of my love for D&D. In isolation it wouldn't have been enough to do that job, but it did serve as a final straw.

And that's that. My goal for 2022 is another 60 books, ideally including all eight remaining books from The List (US side) - it would be nice to finally have that done.