That was Easter?

[rattfan]

Easter is dead in the water.

It’s always quiet for me, of course, unless I’m going to Swancon and I would normally do that.  But THIS year it was going to get moved to the Anzac Day weekend, reasons unknown.  [Cost?  Profitability?  Availability of space?] .  Still, my brain has not accepted this, since it’s expected to go along for the past 39 years.  Okay, it has not been at Easter for that entire time but certainly since we lost the stable Australia Day long weekend.

So I woke up early because I’m used to doing that on a Friday, still tired because I hadn’t got to sleep till 1 am ish.  That made it easy to take a nap later in the morning!  Finished Wildhood and made some online game moves.  Also did some edits on a story for an anthology named Oz Burning.  It’s actually American;  some editors decided to do something to help us.  I’m hoping the same bunch will decide to do one for the pandemic.

Saturday (and Sunday) were pretty well rinse, repeat, except I called my mother on Saturday to check for life signs and see if the gadget I’d ordered on her behalf from Good Guys had actually got there.  It had.  M always feels the need to relate every bit of dialogue she’s had regarding some matter, so it takes awhile to get through these conversations.  And she got pissed at me for trying to make her cut to the chase at one point, because I literally could not figure out what she was talking about and required nouns.  Talking to a semi-deaf person only by phone is a pain and a half.

I dropped in on The Caff, our local coffee shop that sits next to the train station, and found them doing quite reasonable takeaway trade, with a steady stream of locals going to and from with their coffee and munchies.  Already hot and it got hotter.  We busted the records with a temperature of over 39^C, unheard of this late in the year.  Well, unheard of since 1910.

I’ve been putting notes and info into a separate Plague Year file as well as my journal, to try and keep a coherent record of everything.  I’m already forgetting times and dates if I don’t check them.  Did that on Sunday.  I’ve also moved books around.  I decided I wanted all the fiction out in the living room where I could see them, so I unloaded an entire bookcase and moved it out of the spare room and then reloaded it.  Why do books take up more space when you’ve replaced them and arranged them?   This exercise has made me decide I really could use a fifth bookcase.  It was also good to put eyes on a few books I hadn’t been certain I still owned.

Today’s project has been edging the lawn and I’ll cut the grass in a few hours.  I have to limit my sun exposure.  I’ve already pruned everything I can reach, so the garden is looking good, though I say so myself.  The veges not so great.  Where the tomatoes are seems to be too shaded as none of the fruit has ripened enough. 

The only other “food plant” right now is a sweet potato.  I used to buy them for the rats, not liking them myself, so after my last rat was gone, the potato sprouted.  I put it in the ground and it’s now a rather attractive, dark purple, clinging sort of vine.   There will also be the apples in a couple of months and I now have every expectation of still being around for their harvest.

Comments

[mllesatine]

It's not that I didn't know about the seasons in Australia being the opposite of the ones in Europe but hearing it from you is wild. It sounds like magic! :P

[rattfan]

Yes, it's the middle of autumn :-) I know what you mean. I've made several trips over to the Northern Hemisphere and the changed around weather feels very strange! Well, it did visiting the USA (winter to summer) because that was doing a heatwave each time. When I went to England, it was 22^C and raining when I left (also winter to summer) and it was 22^C and raining when I got there.

[mific]

Sweet potatoes are great as chips, sprayed with oil, salted and baked in the oven. Or just roasted or baked. Or in a variant of pumpkin pie.

[rattfan]

Well, if it actually produces anything, I'll try to make it edible (g). It probably will because I don't really care if it does or not; just wanted to give it a chance and it's a nice looking plant, so bonus.

[mific]

They're pretty easy to grow so here's hoping. I remember when first flatting, a fave indoor plant for us was half a kumara suspended over water. They grew roots into it and produced copious purple-green traily vines. Getting edibiles off them's doubtless another matter!

[rattfan]

I have to look up kumara. Never heard of them. But they sound like good looking indoor plants. I'm always on the lookout for more of those. Since I have no pet rats at the moment, I'm concentrating on the pet plants. [EDIT. Ah, I see. Local term trips me up.]

[mific]

Yeah, kumara are Maori sweet potatoes. Maybe they weren't halved in fact and were just put IN water. It's avocado stones you suspend I think!

[siyamau]

You're making me want to grow sweet potatoes now!

I wish our back yard got a bit of sun. It's impossible to grow anything successfully out there because it's completely shaded. We grow a bit in the front, but both back and front yards are basically the size of a postage stamp, so it's tricky. Got regular potatoes on the go OK though...