It’s been a bit of a strange day today – as I mentioned last night, we had to dart off first thing this morning to sign some papers for the Settlement of our Doncaster apartment, and then we were supposed to be dropping by and picking up my favourite eldest daughter, only she messaged us this morning saying that she wasn’t feeling the best so could she take a rain check please? So, we didn’t pick her up as planned, but we did go on to The Glen to pick up a few sundries, like Flipper Food, because until the Vet gives her the all clear, she’s not allowed to have the large bowl of Pussy Biscuits (kibble) that she always had to graze on when she got a bit peckish. I used to top it up and tidy it a bit every night because she’s a very messy eater, but I don’t think either of us really realised just how much of it she used to eat (though we certainly did notice on the days when she’d munch her way through half a cereal bowl’s worth of Pussy Biscuits!) so of course, without this “nibble bowl” always available, she’s been getting very hungry and we’ve had to feed her extra tinned food to compensate. Honestly, she’s just so much more betterer now that she’s had those teeth removed, and the crater of infection that was under the worst of them all healed and healthy again – she’s become much bolder – and more demanding (something neither of us thought was possible!) she’s even decided that maybe “Mummy” isn’t all that bad, after all, and is now stalking me for pats, when “Daddy” isn’t available! She’s a funny old girl…. 🙂 However, on Friday she’s going off to have her two-week checkup after the surgery, and if the vet gives her the “all clear”, she can have her bowl of Pussy Biscuits back again – though whether she’ll be able to crunch them up or not remains to be seen – she’s still got all of her upper and lower “fangs”, but only one full set of molars left with which to grind up food. The Pussy Biscuits which she likes are quite big – they were specifically designed to “encourage” cats who didn’t like chewing things, to exercise their teeth and gums. We originally got them for my beautiful, sweet Gingee, because he didn’t like to chew his food, and then kept on getting them for Arty, who wasn’t interested in exercising his teeth and gums, either. It was quite amazing to watch them chasing, catching, and “vacuuming” up and swallowing these Pussy Biscuits whole, because they’re almost a centimeter in circumference! Flipper, on the other hand, absolutely loves to stand there and crunch and munch them, getting both her jaws working hard! Hopefully, after Friday, she’ll be able to do so again! So… where was I? Oh yes, doing the shopping, instead of picking up my favourite eldest daughter! After we’d finished the shopping, we decided to have an early lunch at The Arena, there at The Glen, so as to give ourselves a clear run at whatever we were going to do once we got home – the upshot of which is that neither of us feel much like having any dinner at all tonight! 🙂 I know it’s only four thirty at the moment, and I don’t know about Julian, but I think that I’d be quite happy just to have one of those weird Chia Pods for dinner, and maybe a fig or two, if there are any ripe enough to eat hanging over the back fence…
I did play a bit of WoW when we got home – I started on the first couple of quests in Deepholm with Arisnoë, and was quite annoyed to find that this time, Blizzard have truly outdone themselves in the vague and obscure quest instructions department! I had to not only Google them, but I had to dig really deep into what Google did have available on them. Even Julian couldn’t find out much about one particular quest, where you had to locate three “clues” – we could both find two of them, but neither of us could find the first one! I’m happy to say, however, that I finally found it – more by good luck than good management! By the time I’d completed that first quest chain I was so exhausted that I quit out of the game, thinking that I’d make a nice, early start on tonight’s blog instead of continuing to bash my head against that lovely hard brick wall that is Blizzard’s warped idea of “quest instructions”! Unfortunately, I hit a snag there too, because I found a new Template/Theme-thingy, which naturally, I had to try out… and you see the result before you! What do you think of it? (Please like it! It cost $93!) I thought it looked interesting, with a static “header” on the left, and scrolling text on the right hand side – the menu slides out over the top of the header, and the “widgets” (calendar, archives, etc.) are down the bottom. [Listening to at the moment: Louis Barabbas and the Bedlam Six – “Memoir Noir” – well worth a listen!] It took me about 20 minutes all told to knock up the static header, and maybe another 20 minutes to get everything looking and (hopefully!) working properly – and even so, I still started on this nice and early! So get used to it – it’s here for a while! 😉
Food stuffz: well, I had a small-ish bowl of pasta with tomato sauce and some grated Parmesan cheese for dinner last night, and one of those Chia Pods for dessert – Vanilla flavoured this time, which is quite bland, but it’s still very nice… for lunch today I had a BLT on dark rye bread, which was very nice – but they were a titch heavy-handed with the mayo, and the accompanying “salad” was dressed, so I didn’t eat it (I think I said the other night that I like my salads naked!) and… for dessert… I had a piece of “Orange and Clementine gluten-free cake”, which was delicious! It reminded me of steamed puddings my mother used to make when I was growing up – I still have the recipe! 🙂 It’s a basic sponge pudding mixture, but when you’re “steaming” it, you grease the pudding steamer, and put two large (very large! “generous” might be a better term to use…) Tablespoons of whatever jam you have to hand, in the bottom of the greased pudding steamer. Pour the sponge pudding mixture on top of the jam, put on the lid and seal the pudding steamer. Cook for (however long it takes – from memory, about 20 to 25 minutes, but please don’t quote me on that!) When cooked, remove the lid, place a plate over the top of the pudding steamer, and invert – carefully lift the pudding steamer off and “Viola”, as the French say! A delicious steamed pudding, the hot jam steaming, and trickling down the sides of the yummy pudding! 🙂 There are as many “variations” as you have imagination! Mum used to use Golden Syrup, raspberry or strawberry jam, and for the “variation” that the Orange and Clementine cake today reminded me of – when we were all out of “sweet” jams and Golden Syrup, Mum would grate the rind of an orange (we always had fresh oranges in the house) and mix the resulting zest into the basic sponge mixture, then she’d use marmalade in the bottom of the pudding steamer – it was my absolute favourite (with the Golden Syrup variation a very close second!) Anyway, that’s what the Orange and Clementine cake tasted like – even the texture was similar! Ahhh… nostalgia! 😉 As I said earlier – I don’t think we’ll be having much dinner tonight! 😉
Weigh-in this morning. Well, so much for the pasta for dinner! Mind you, if I hadn’t had the pasta, I’d probably have ruddy-well lost weight again! I went from 62,4kg to 62.4kg – in other words, I stayed the same! Arrgggh! What’s a girl supposed to do to go up – just a bit?! Anyway, I’m sure to go up a bit more tomorrow – a BLT on dark rye is not to be sneezed at, and neither is a lovely, densely-textured piece of Orange and Clementine cake that reminds one of childhood desserts. I didn’t do my second treadmilling this afternoon because I walked the length and breadth of The Glen, twice – from David Jones to the Fresh Food market (so-called!) on the far side of Woolworths – so I’m hoping for “great improvements” when I hop on the scales tomorrow morning! (who’d-a-thunk it! Winter complaining that she’s not putting enough weight on, instead of weeping and wailing that she can’t lose enough, fast enough! 
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And so to tomorrow – in the morning Julian will be picking up my favourite eldest daughter and taking her to Deakin – she needs to sign up for various Student “things”, and Julian needs to pick up the dry cleaning. However, he won’t be bringing her back here after she’s done all her joining and signing, he’ll drop her off at her place. She’ll be coming over on Friday! 🙂 I’ll probably keep plugging away at the Deepholm quests – which reminds me! As you know, my clever biggest little girl got herself into the Alpha testing of the next World of Warcraft expansion, “Legion” – and they’re bringing in the Gnome Hunters, at long last! (*Winter claps her hands with delight*) They’re also introducing a new Class – Demon Hunters – which I might try out, the way I tried out the Death Knights when they were first introduced, but I doubt that I’ll stick with them as they’re more of a melee Class than a “stand back and pick-em-off one at a time” Beastmaster Hunter (which is the way I prefer to play, coward that I am! 😉 ) Anyway, once again, that’s about it from me for tonight! Do look in again tomorrow night, to see if the pasta, the BLT, and the Orange and Clementine cake have done their job or not, and whether I’ve come to terms with taking Arisnoë through Deepholm, despite the ridiculous and sketchy quest details! Until then though, please continue to bee as good as you can, remember to believe in yourself, and you can dream without fear, and don’t forget to keep cool – or warm – depending on what the Melbourne weather throws at you, to always drive carefully, and to look after yourselves – but most importantly, don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂
My Word! 