Simplifying Life - Mark II

ceridwen

Hi tori - and welcome - raising my glass will have to wait a day or two - as busy in a minute tonight - but I'm planning on it. We have to celebrate whatever we can:D .

Was glad of a good start to the day - as its been another frustrating (and worse) day at w**k - still - reminding myself it wont be for ever and finding what things I can in my life to look forward to. Had a successful library hunt for things of interest to read at lunchtime - that doesnt happen that often - so got a bit of nice curling up with a good book coming up. Got a nice meal out coming up soon. Got home to find a book I've been looking forward to having a look at has turned up from Amazon and got a friend round in a minute. So - telling myself the "plus" points to think about right now - as counterbalance to the !!!!!ing and boredom at w**k today. At a very basic - 5 O.S. pleasures today level - at the end of each day there is a big wide mega-comfortable bed to sink into underneath my mounds of bedding I like - blissful comfort.

tori.k

hello all, ceridwen sound like your caught in the living to work not working to live roundabout at the mo,....i thought a article from the cornish guardian might give someone a giggle (i think its bloody priceless) it seems we are getting a new chief executive of cornwall council (we having one new council instead of four) and his starting salary is £200,000 pa_ just over £10,000 more than the prime ministers, the council leaders have defended the salary saying "its the going rate for the job".....i can sleep so much better knowing he will not be under paid...instead of the usual worrying "do i pay my council tax or feed my children.....

on a lighter note im one happy bunny,the resorce centre say they can fix my washing machine (been handwashing everything for the last month) so i can start walking the coast road on my days off instead of the housework....happy days
have a good day all!!!

sarahs999

Morning all. Feeling 'simplified' today as I have got rid of a hand blender, juicer and a pile of old magazines on Freecycle in the last two days. Am taking the advice on here to tackle one area at a time and have targetted a random cupboard in my bedroom that's hard to reach and consequently full of unused and forgotten things... planning to get it finished this weekend. Oh, and also threw away about 200 photos - I'm a big photo hoarder, but I made myself go through all my loose ones (thousands of them) and as a first purge, throw away pics that really didn't make me go 'aah, I remember that'. Two hundred's quite a good start, isn't it?! I've got albums to start putting my cambodia ones in (I lived there for four years, before the age of digital photos) and have about 900-1000 to put in. Might be able to reduce them a bit more when I start doing it. Going to make sure I label them really well as I think it will be these that will really interest my children/grandchilren - I'm sure Cambodia will be completely a different place by the time they've grown up.

Greenshieldstamp_2

Hello there,
Popped in with my cup of tea to say hello.

Sarah999
Sounds like your simplifying is going well, and I am sure the children will be delighted with the photos in years to come.

ToriK - Welcome. I am sure between us all here on Simplifying Life and old style we could just about manage with that kind of council salaryto live on?!! Bet they don't have to think about living on 50p a day or anything like that?

Mary43 - Hope you start to feel better soon. Chest infections take a while to clear up, so please take care of yourself.

Ceridwen - Have been catching up on Weezl's challenge and you mentioned the square foot gardening so hope that goes well. What are you planning to grow? I would also be interested to know please if you have lots of vegetarian cookbooks, and which, if any, you would recommend as staple ones to own. Thank you.

Down to earth - There is an interesting entry on Rhonda Jean's blog about managing time and seeing time as a treasure, as opposed to money as the treasure. I enjoyed reading it , and it might interest others here on Simplifying Life.

http://down---to---earth.blogspot.com/

Catch up again soon,
Bye for now
Greenshield

mary43

Hi Greenshield and sarah and everyone else
I've got my lemon and honey drink to hand - cough sweets also, and antibiotic not due till later - not that I've got much faith in them I have to say.
But today - having ploughed through grandaughters christmas basket and struggled with the cellophane to wrap it up, then done her birthday box of bits (total cost £11 !! :T ) I felt a bit more inspired to actually drag something out of the freezer for dinner. Haven't felt like it the past week and poor OH has come home from work and had to sort things out. Kids are very good at sorting themselves out too thank goodness.
I'm trying a bit of 'mind over matter'................have a coughing spasm - swear about it and carry on.....................hoping that works. Been three weeks now and I'm getting really bored with it.

Right now to read Rhonda's blog............she always has something really good to say. Thanks Greenshield

sarahs999

OK - I bit the bullet and did it - I asked to go down to a four-day working week! My immediate boss was OK but reluctant to give me the day I wanted (MOnday), but I figured that might happen (we often have deadlines on Mondays). So It looks like it will be Friday, if they allow it - it's going to thebig bosses nowbut for some reason, apparently, they don't like people going part time. I don't know why, strikes me as very odd, especially in this climate when it will save them some money.... please cross your fingers for me!

mary43

Good luck sarah -hope they say 'yes'..............Friday would be good and give you a nice long weekend:j

ceridwen

[quote=Greenshieldstamp;15613375



Ceridwen - Have been catching up on Weezl's challenge and you mentioned the square foot gardening so hope that goes well. What are you planning to grow? I would also be interested to know please if you have lots of vegetarian cookbooks, and which, if any, you would recommend as staple ones to own. Thank you.


Greenshield[/quote]

Hi

Right at this moment I have various different vegetables growing in every container of any description I could dredge up - tatsoi (doing okay), wintercress (also okay), lettuce (errrrr.......), mustard (doing okay), nasturtium (okay), endive (okay), spring onions (errr......), etc. First serious attempts going on here.

I've just had a specially-made 4 square feet gardening raised bed delivered and will be using that come my next round of planting. On having assembled it and found it seems to be pretty easy to do so - in fact have sent off an order for another one - so come my next round of planting I can get down seriously to how many of each type of plant per square foot - 'twas getting bothersome trying to work out how many square feet worth each of my various containers constituted - so this will make it easier. The one I just bought is:

www.v-gloo.co.uk

(errr...<cough> not cheap - £114 in fact including delivery).

Though Link-a-Bord make similar ones - but I wanted the exact size and a cover - making life easy for myself! I've been reading just how much higher in price it is anticipated fruit and veg will go :eek: :eek: :eek: - so am working on getting myself as sorted out as possible in my tiny space.

www.linkabord.co.uk

to see t'other similar ones - but much cheaper (errr....cough....I confess to "throwing money at it" getting the V-gloo ones, rather than Link-a-Bord to make life absolutely as easy as possible for myself doing this.....errr....cough...mea culpa).

Errr.....I do have just a few vegetarian cookbooks:rotfl: :embarasse . Which ones suit is going to depend on your tastes to some extent - but Cas Clarke is my favourite cookery book writer (she does both meat and veggie cookbooks for students - which, in my opinion, do just fine for the rest of us too). So "Mean Beans" is a particular favourite written by her. "The Really Useful Vegetarian Student Cook Book" by Silvana Franco is indeed really useful. I reckon those are THE top two to buy myself.

Also worth a look - see if the library has them or they are listed dirt-cheap, if you're lucky, on Amazon:

"Doreen Keighley's Vegetarian Cook Book" (it IS a 1960s cookbook - so before the era when a lot of our current foodstuffs were in the shops...)

"Cheap and Easy" by Rose Elliott - she is a popular veggie cookbook writer of the 1980s.

"Beyond Baked Beans Green - Real veggie food for students" by Fiona Beckett (she has a website - with sample recipes on which is worth a looksee). Unless she has changed her website address she is on:

www.beyondbakedbeans.com

(where she has both veggie and non-veggie recipes)

ceridwen

Greenshield Stamp

You may also be interested in borrowing from the library a copy of book I have just bought from Amazon (err...£11.45 for a secondhand one):

"Fresh Food from small spaces - the square inch gardener's guide to year-round growing, fermenting and sprouting" by R. J. Ruppenthal

I've just started reading it - initial impressions - worth having. He starts from the premise that many of us would-be gardeners have little (if any) garden to play with - but still need to grow as much food as possible. So - I havent had a chance for a good read yet - but looks well worth a borrow from the library. I certainly get very frustrated every time gardening books talk about how to deal with a tiny garden - and their definition of tiny makes me positively envious. Now - I HAVE got a truly tiny garden - tiny tiny little backyard and this guy seems to be writing from the viewpoint that this is all you have - if that! My kinda man.

I'm currently focusing on a couple of things personally. I've done the getting rid of debt and getting well stocked-up with food/cosmetic ingredients/cleaning materials. Now - I've moved on to:
- gotta get growing that food (as I believe its imperative for us all to get growing whenever and wherever we possibly can - like NOW)

- tidying up the loose ends on making sure I have a comprehensive selection of reference books (though I know I have recently found what a resource the Internet can be - I don't think its wise to rely on having important stored information on the Internet - without also having it in "paper" form). I have distinct "reservations" about the safety/privacy/durability in a crisis of the World Wide Web - so I'm personally making sure I have all important information I might need in book form - there is a leetle "bell" ringing in the back of my mind - so I'm keeping/expanding my useful books (I dont actually HAVE such a thing as a fiction book in my house - literally not one:rotfl: - apart from the odd one I borrow from the library). There is several things I think might cause noticeable disruption to t'Internet somewheres along the way....hence the "paper" backup.

Greenshieldstamp_2

Thanks for taking the time to write that down for me Ceridwen, much appreciated. I too am trying to balance collecting info./ recipes from the Internet and collecting/ adding to my book collection. Trying to be more adventurous with my vegetarian cooking and move on from the basics.

I will be growing more next year, but not got myself organised on that front yet.

Thanks again
Greenshield