Outdoor cooking.

Song of the day: “Somebody to love” by Anne Hathaway (original by Queen, of course). Yep, it was there, inside my head when I opened my eyes and greeted the rather abysmal day of wind and clouds…which led to horrid rain, which is still coming down right now.

But, be that as it may, who gives a fig about the weather? It is so very changeable that one can only complain about it for a bit and then it’s gone again…boy, do I hope that this is the case here, ‘cause I am not liking the cold right now.

So anyways…yesterday involved finishing the window for the bathroom, which is looking downright pretty right now. There are still some finishing touches to see to, but other than that, it looks good. More light too, since the new frame is much more delicate (still sturdy, don’t you worry) and actually fits for a change. Yep, I’m most pleased with the end result. Besides that, little sister and I had a lot of fun putting the last bit in. Hah.

Big brother worked on the gate some more (finishing touches too) and both yesterday and today, I worked with our tenant who actually appeared to have fun doing her exercises. Sitting up on the bed is the present goal, and it’s going splendidly, if I may say so. Also moving her left fingers individually, which is going well, too. We were both thrilled with the progress.

Got quite a bit of writing done after the day’s work, too, and that is the best news yet. I even nodded off (just resting my eyes, as I assured the “slave driver” many times, hah) in the middle of a sentence, but was properly revived afterwards to get a solid six pages down. Gotta say that I like where the story is going at the moment. Forming a solid relationship between the two protagonists is always a pleasure and the “love” scenes…oh my, I’d say I celebrated with a cigarette, but since I gave them up three weeks ago (Jeez, time flies) I can’t actually do that.

As to quitting smoking…still not a big deal. Yes, I’ve had a few occasions when I thought “I really want a cigarette right now” but not in such a way that I had to fight some epic battle over it. I still haven’t licked out an ashtray, which means that I might have to pay up on the bet. Hmmm. Did I forget to mention that I betted against myself at the start of this (terrible of me, I know, but I thought I was gonna fold in record time so I might as well get something from it). Well, anyway. I didn’t do anything horrid in an attempt to find a cigarette, so I’m gonna have to hand over the dough sometime soon. *sigh*

But back to the update…the dogs are seriously disliking the rain (I do fully agree with their state of mind) and showed their displeasure when it started back up this afternoon. I’d just finished up lighting up the vat, (you know, those post Armageddon movie images where they burn fires in old dinky oil barrel…that’s the image you’re looking for, hah) which was a pain, due to the moisture in the air. The dogs immediately clustered around it, having chilled considerably while I was busy with our tenant.

So, there I was, knowing that we’d be working on one (or two) projects through the day, when it suddenly hit me. Fire, growling stomach: Cook dinner on the vat! Hah.
We got this really ancient cast-iron wok from the ‘40s or something, which was rusting away in the “igloo” cleaned it up, and hung it over the flames. Next I threw in a mix of potatoes, carrots, cauliflower, onions, garlic and leek…smelled delicious, in case you’re wondering…and then threw over sunflower seed oil with green herbs (basil, oregano, pepper, provincial mix and chives) to let it simmer for ‘bout half an hour. Some salt and sugar got added to the wonderfully scented mix, and when stuff got really hot, I added water, milk and two cans of white beans in tomato sauce. Suffice it to say, we had a rather nice filling meal standing around the brightly burning vat, dipping bread in the sauce that had formed and burning our mouths for the effort. Hah.
Excellent!

Funny note for the day is that when I asked little sister to come check out the vat with dinner on it, she looked at me all startled and said: “but it’s raining” in rather cute way. She did come out, however, so it was really funny from where I was standing. Of course, cleaning the wok afterwards took longer than the actual cooking, which I didn’t find funny at all.

Temperatures dropped considerably during the course of the day and the rain didn’t help it any either, so at some point before nightfall, I headed for the house (my poor dogs in tow) and decided to do some cleaning prior to starting on writing.

So, with this day’s blog over and done with (yes, it is over, don’t you worry) I’m going to open up the manuscript and see if I can add a few more pages.