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Another quiet weekend
Oct. 9th, 2011 08:28 pmI missed work on Thursday and Friday, feeling down and out with a viral infection and a cantankerous digestive system. Much sleep was had and I was feeling better by Saturday morning, but still not up to my usual standards of weekend business. So a slow-paced, relaxed weekend was had and the housework ignored, allowed to back up for another week.
Saturday morning I slept late then wandered into town, pleased to leave the house for the first time in days. I hit up Salamanca markets in search of a new heat pack, but came home instead with a punnet each of snap-pea tatsoi and spinach seedlings. I then met up with new friend D, a lovely woman from Melbourne who owns a property here in the sleepy village of Hamilton, whom I met on the plane on my last flight back home. We grabbed sushi for lunch then wandered over to the Hobart Botanic Gardens to check out the Spring Festival (verdict: an event best left for breeders as it was rather kid-centric, but there were some interesting displays on veggie gardening that were useful). After getting caught in a downpour on the way back to the car I came home, set up the little plastic greenhouse I'd bought a couple of weeks ago and potted out the morning's acquisitions.
The evening was spend digesting a generous dinner of grilled fish, baked root veggies and sauteed greens, curled up on the couch with a Discworld novel.
Another sleep-in this morning^, then I was up and off to check out the Hobart Farm Gate market, which I'd heard had improved since last time I'd bothered. It's still tiny, over-priced and over-gourmet, but yes it's getting better and I spent far more than I'd been intending to. I came home with 5 tomato seedlings, 4 rocket seedlings and some sea-celery, a native herb, as well as 3 succulents to pot up for my desk at work, some new-season pink-eye potatoes, salad greens and a small pot of goat's curd. Nom. I also brought some usual meat from a man who's turning necessary, licenced culling of native animals into an interesting butchery business, selling wallaby and possum. I've eaten wallaby before (and actually chow down on kangaroo fairly regularly), but have not yet tried possum, so I came home with a little frozen pouch of each and will be trying my hand at possum stew sometime soon. D had success recently with a possum pie, which encouraged me to give it a go.
Hopefully you're not too horrified at the idea of eating the local wildlife. The way I see it, sheep and cattle do terrible things to Australian soils, which just aren't designed to cope with hardened hooves and close-cropped grazing. I've seen first-hand the effects of over-grazing on our delicate pastures. Added to that is the cruelty involved in large-scale farming and the colon-cancer link to beef and I eat as little meat at possible, trying hard to source sustainably raised. Since I do actually eat meat, I try to make my protein sources as environmentally friendly and sustainable as possible, happily nomming on feral deer and rabbit, or tucking into a tasty roo fillet or some organic, free-range chicken or pork once every week or two. Since wallabies and possums are subject to population control via culling on nearby Bruny Island, it makes sense to use the meat. These animals lived free, healthy lives and died quickly. I think they're going to be tasty!
After the market it was home again to do yet more potting-out of my latest veggie aquisitions. Since the weather's currently bi-polar, swinging between gorgeously warm and antarctic chills, everything went in the little greenhouse, which is rather full. This should also serve to protect my tasty seedlings from the ravages of the hoard of snails currently infesting my garden. I loathe to use poisons, so generally have a live-and-let-live policy to most garden pests. I'm happy to sacrifice a leaf here and there to the balanced garden ecosystem. This year, however, the snails have been into everything: my kale turned to lacework overnight. So I've taken to going around the garden once or twice a week, collecting up the snails I can find and causing mass mollusc carnage by the application of boiling water. I must have picked up at least 50 of the slimy critters yesterday. Poor things, I feel so guilty topping them, but when my greens are constantly nibbled back to stubs I feel I must take action.
Once the weather's more consistently warm and the snail numbers have died down I'm going to have to find room in my tiny garden for all my tasty seedlings. As well as the veggies in the greenhouse I have dill, coriander, Italian parsley, garlic chives and chillis coming up in the germinator. It's going to be crowded out there! Oh how I wish I wasn't renting, so I could dig out all the pointless ornamentals and make a proper garden out of this place (I'd murder for some citrus trees). The things I could grow! I've definitely contracted the gardening bug this year. It works in so well with the whole low-impact, sustainable lifestyle I'd like to cultivate for myself.
Gardening done, I ran away from the icy wind and rain outside, taking refuge in my kitchen and whizzing up a batch up roasted garlic hummus. Oh my! I am never, ever buying hummus again. Yum!
Leaving my kitchen untidy and muddy shoe-prints over the floor, I decided to head out for the afternoon to visit my fantastic friend N after skipping her birthday dinner on Friday night due to feeling unwell. Armed with a tub of hummus and an edible bouquet of tasty things from my garden I set off for a pleasant few hours of drinking blueberry tea and nattering. Now I'm home, fed and procrastinating about doing the dishes and cleaning the floors. Plus there's clean laundry to put away, ironing to be done and the house is in need of general cleaning and tidying. Oh how a hot shower and a night curled up with Granny Weatherwax becons...
^ I've been ridiculously tired the last couple of weeks, sleeping far more than I usually would. Coupled with the vitamin deficiency I'm getting a little concerned and will make a doctor's appointment this week to get everything checked out. It might be something, or it might be the last 9 months of frantic business finally catching up with me. Either way, I'm incredibly grateful for finding myself with 3 weeks in a row of quiet weekends and minimal commitments and I'm rather enjoying just losing myself in a book or lazing in the sunshine. Novel but nice, and I'll know I'm feeling better when I start getting bored.
Saturday morning I slept late then wandered into town, pleased to leave the house for the first time in days. I hit up Salamanca markets in search of a new heat pack, but came home instead with a punnet each of snap-pea tatsoi and spinach seedlings. I then met up with new friend D, a lovely woman from Melbourne who owns a property here in the sleepy village of Hamilton, whom I met on the plane on my last flight back home. We grabbed sushi for lunch then wandered over to the Hobart Botanic Gardens to check out the Spring Festival (verdict: an event best left for breeders as it was rather kid-centric, but there were some interesting displays on veggie gardening that were useful). After getting caught in a downpour on the way back to the car I came home, set up the little plastic greenhouse I'd bought a couple of weeks ago and potted out the morning's acquisitions.
The evening was spend digesting a generous dinner of grilled fish, baked root veggies and sauteed greens, curled up on the couch with a Discworld novel.
Another sleep-in this morning^, then I was up and off to check out the Hobart Farm Gate market, which I'd heard had improved since last time I'd bothered. It's still tiny, over-priced and over-gourmet, but yes it's getting better and I spent far more than I'd been intending to. I came home with 5 tomato seedlings, 4 rocket seedlings and some sea-celery, a native herb, as well as 3 succulents to pot up for my desk at work, some new-season pink-eye potatoes, salad greens and a small pot of goat's curd. Nom. I also brought some usual meat from a man who's turning necessary, licenced culling of native animals into an interesting butchery business, selling wallaby and possum. I've eaten wallaby before (and actually chow down on kangaroo fairly regularly), but have not yet tried possum, so I came home with a little frozen pouch of each and will be trying my hand at possum stew sometime soon. D had success recently with a possum pie, which encouraged me to give it a go.
Hopefully you're not too horrified at the idea of eating the local wildlife. The way I see it, sheep and cattle do terrible things to Australian soils, which just aren't designed to cope with hardened hooves and close-cropped grazing. I've seen first-hand the effects of over-grazing on our delicate pastures. Added to that is the cruelty involved in large-scale farming and the colon-cancer link to beef and I eat as little meat at possible, trying hard to source sustainably raised. Since I do actually eat meat, I try to make my protein sources as environmentally friendly and sustainable as possible, happily nomming on feral deer and rabbit, or tucking into a tasty roo fillet or some organic, free-range chicken or pork once every week or two. Since wallabies and possums are subject to population control via culling on nearby Bruny Island, it makes sense to use the meat. These animals lived free, healthy lives and died quickly. I think they're going to be tasty!
After the market it was home again to do yet more potting-out of my latest veggie aquisitions. Since the weather's currently bi-polar, swinging between gorgeously warm and antarctic chills, everything went in the little greenhouse, which is rather full. This should also serve to protect my tasty seedlings from the ravages of the hoard of snails currently infesting my garden. I loathe to use poisons, so generally have a live-and-let-live policy to most garden pests. I'm happy to sacrifice a leaf here and there to the balanced garden ecosystem. This year, however, the snails have been into everything: my kale turned to lacework overnight. So I've taken to going around the garden once or twice a week, collecting up the snails I can find and causing mass mollusc carnage by the application of boiling water. I must have picked up at least 50 of the slimy critters yesterday. Poor things, I feel so guilty topping them, but when my greens are constantly nibbled back to stubs I feel I must take action.
Once the weather's more consistently warm and the snail numbers have died down I'm going to have to find room in my tiny garden for all my tasty seedlings. As well as the veggies in the greenhouse I have dill, coriander, Italian parsley, garlic chives and chillis coming up in the germinator. It's going to be crowded out there! Oh how I wish I wasn't renting, so I could dig out all the pointless ornamentals and make a proper garden out of this place (I'd murder for some citrus trees). The things I could grow! I've definitely contracted the gardening bug this year. It works in so well with the whole low-impact, sustainable lifestyle I'd like to cultivate for myself.
Gardening done, I ran away from the icy wind and rain outside, taking refuge in my kitchen and whizzing up a batch up roasted garlic hummus. Oh my! I am never, ever buying hummus again. Yum!
Leaving my kitchen untidy and muddy shoe-prints over the floor, I decided to head out for the afternoon to visit my fantastic friend N after skipping her birthday dinner on Friday night due to feeling unwell. Armed with a tub of hummus and an edible bouquet of tasty things from my garden I set off for a pleasant few hours of drinking blueberry tea and nattering. Now I'm home, fed and procrastinating about doing the dishes and cleaning the floors. Plus there's clean laundry to put away, ironing to be done and the house is in need of general cleaning and tidying. Oh how a hot shower and a night curled up with Granny Weatherwax becons...
^ I've been ridiculously tired the last couple of weeks, sleeping far more than I usually would. Coupled with the vitamin deficiency I'm getting a little concerned and will make a doctor's appointment this week to get everything checked out. It might be something, or it might be the last 9 months of frantic business finally catching up with me. Either way, I'm incredibly grateful for finding myself with 3 weeks in a row of quiet weekends and minimal commitments and I'm rather enjoying just losing myself in a book or lazing in the sunshine. Novel but nice, and I'll know I'm feeling better when I start getting bored.
