Last month I talked about the fact that I was becoming housebound and was determined to change that.  Then I got COVID, setting me back into settling down.  This inertia wasn’t just laziness, although that’s what I said at the time. It was worse than that.  I won’t say I was depressed, because that’s not fair to people truly dealing with medical depression – it was more like a lethargy, a lack of interest and energy.  I had stopped exploring different parts of Orkney, I wasn’t replying to friends’ emails, I wasn’t going out for lunch or dinner, I was just staying in all day, watching movies.  You know that flower arranging evening that I enjoyed so much?  I came this close to calling my friend and saying I couldn’t come, just ‘cause I couldn’t be bothered.  (Glad I didn’t.)

I didn’t like how I was feeling, so I did what I always do when I need a boost – I looked for external stimuli to get me back up and out.  I know, I know, we should find our motivation from within.  Yeah, yeah, yeah.  But that’s not so for me; I’ve said it before: sometimes I just need to watch a video or read a book to get back up-and-at-it.  (In fact, this is one of the reasons I’m sure it wasn’t depression – true depression is not resolved with a self-help book.)  During the first lockdown, my sister told me about a book she was enjoying, The Productivity Project, by Canadian author Chris Bailey.  Some of the takeaways from that book are things I still do today, pretty much every day, which help me stay focused and productive when I need to be.  Well, last year, the same sister told me about another book, Atomic Habits, which was all the rage.  Excellent, just what I needed.  I started listening to the audiobook on my walks with Scout a few weeks ago. There are a lot of good ideas, some of which appeal to me, and some of which just aren’t my cup of tea.  But that’s the thing about these books, you don’t have to embrace them fully; you can just pick the one or two or three things that resonate for you.

A couple of the ideas that author James Clear talks about are: habit stacking and improving things by one percent per day.  Well, I spent a lot of time thinking about these ideas, and my current daily pattern, and re-listening to chapters of the book, then I decided what changes I was going to make.

And it worked.  The changes I’ve made are going to sound so mundane to you, but I can honestly say that in the last three weeks I have been busier, having more fun, and getting more done.  For example, instead of having my morning tea before going for a walk, we now head out as soon as I get out of bed (the dog, you can imagine, is delighted).  The results of this are: by the time I walk, get home & have tea, and read the news, it’s still before 9 a.m. and I’m raring to get things done, around the house, or out with friends.  This is a photo I took on one of these walks of the cathedral just before sunrise – absolutely beautiful.   We’ve checked out parts of Orkney I hadn’t seen before – this walk to the Covenanters Memorial (below) was exhilarating.  And on Saturday night, I took the bus to Stromness, had an amazing dinner of scallops, lobster, and rhubarb pie (all local) and bussed home (the bus was so I could have wine).  Well, so what, you think?  How is forcing yourself to go out for dinner a big deal – you do that all the time.  Yes, but this time, because I wasn’t driving, on the way home I saw the Northern Lights.  Wouldn’t have seen that if I’d been sitting watching Netflix.   (I didn’t get a photo through the bus window, they were just a greeny line along the horizon.  But still.)  

 1%, each day.  Well done, me.

The wall that separates my garden from the sidewalk (pavement) is about 4′ tall. All of my rooms have windows facing toward it (well, not the bathroom, but my bedroom, sitting room, and kitchen do), but because of the shrubs and the hedge, which are anywhere from six to seven feet high, it is quite private. But, that’s all changing.

My landlord has spent hours this week (and I do mean HOURS) cutting away all the hedge that is growing up, along, and above the wall. He had tried to hire someone, but like so many tradespeople here, the gardener was very hard to pin down. So he’s doing it himself. He has spent anywhere from 3 – 8 hours a day for the last six days carving away at the branches and foliage of the ivy and rosa rugosa (I think) – he must be exhausted. I told him to take all the money he’s saved not hiring a gardener and go on a holiday – he deserves it.

This does mean my house has become much more open to passersby. And it really isn’t as pretty as it was. You can see on the left what the wall looked liked before – that foliage went all the way along the wall. And the photo on the right, from the other end, is the denuded version. But it has to be done (and prob should have been done years earlier). That is a true drystane wall – no mortar. It’s made up of two carefully arranged walls with a hollow space in between, and capped with more stones. Plants like these can do a real number on drystane walls; over time the branches will force the stones down. So, sad as I am about losing the pretty green foliage and cosy privacy, I completely understand why he’s cutting it all away.

Below is today’s weather tweet from FM 101 Milton – I verified with The Weather Network.

I laughed, and I laughed, and I laughed.

Just went to the supermarket to get my groceries for the weekend. I wanted some broccoli or cauliflower to make a nice warming gratin, plus some lettuce and cucumber for salads.

Got to the store – opening the car door very carefully with a tight grip on the handle – doors fly off easily in this weather. Walked to the produce section – all the shelves were bare. Duh. Trucks can’t get supplies here because the ferries can’t run in these seas.

Decided on frozen pizza instead – not quite the same thing. But still, it’s the things you don’t think about.

This afternoon I hosted a mini tech-workshop for some of the people in my walking group. Over the past couple of months, more than one of them has grumbled about something with their cell phone (excuse me, ‘mobile’) or tablet. They all sounded like easily solvable problems, so I suggested a couple of hours at my place to work through some simple steps around email, downloads, and photos.

I figured we could have tea or coffee after – my sitting room, which is where my desk, laptop, and monitor are holds six people comfortably. I could have picked up some cookies (biscuits) to go with the tea, but I decided to make a couple of things instead. I made Scotch Teas (which are called flapjacks in Scotland) because they’re so easy and my women’s group seemed to enjoy them a few years back. And I wanted to serve something Canadian, so I made Nanaimo bars. It wasn’t easy – ingredients here have different names: semi-sweet baker’s chocolate is called dark cooking chocolate, there is more than one type of icing sugar here, and they don’t have graham crackers. They use crushed digestive biscuits for pie crusts. And any online recipe I found for Nanaimo bars was all in cups and here people use weights, so there was a lot of converting going on.

But that wasn’t the hardest part. The hardest part was that I’m an idiot. (I may have mentioned that before.) I got the crust layer done and in the fridge, and started on the custard layer. The recipe called for using a hand mixer to combine the butter, icing sugar, and custard powder. But I don’t have one. I have a whisk on the end of an immersion mixer. Even as I was putting together, I said, “Don’t do it.” I said it out loud. I’m guessing you don’t really need the photo to demonstrate what happened next. Sigh. Then, and only then, did I remember I have my aunt’s beautiful stand mixer. Twenty minutes later, Nanaimo bars all done and chilling in the fridge, and kitchen clean (well mostly – I may have icing sugar mixed in with my pepper shaker for the next few weeks). And my guests seemed to like them. I have to take their word for it; I don’t like coconut, so I’ve never had Nanaimo bars (still haven’t – sent the guests home with the extras).

The actual Why-does-my-mobile-do-that workshop went very well. Everyone seemed to go away with at least one problem solved – except Barbara – we still have to figure out what’s wrong with her Messenger. Another time.

All in all, a lovely way to spend a blustery afternoon.

Today is my first bag of chips/crisps of 2023. I decided to make it a good one: Lightly Salted Crinkle Cut Crisps (aka Plain Ruffles Chips) with crème fraiche and caviar. Delightful.

Mary, one of the ladies in my walking group, took me to a flower arranging class last night. I’ve never tried flower arranging, but said yes when she asked (after all, what the heck else am I doing on a Thursday evening in February?). She told me to bring an oblong container and £3, so I dug out a plastic bento tray, and gave it no more thought. Until I saw her yesterday at lunch time, and she started checking with me: did I have oasis? No? She’d bring me some. Had I read the email she’d sent? Did I need any branches or stems? Had I gone and bought some flowers? Would I like to borrow her secateurs? Then she got home and started texting me: was the oasis she had enough for me? Did I know where to park? I should get there early to get a ‘good table’. Did I have a way to get my arrangement back to the car? Really, it was becoming most stressful, clearly this needed more prep than I had realised. So, I took some kitchen scissors and headed out into my rather barren garden and cut some stems from shrubs, and grabbed some tulips at the supermarket.

Well it turned out to be an excellent evening – over 30 women, all ages; there was a ‘meeting’ first, then a demo from a local expert, then off we went to make our arrangements. Then tea and goodies. I ran into a few people I already knew in town, met some new people, and I’ve been invited to a lecture series at the library later this month. I really wish I had gone the first evening that Mary invited me months ago, but I kept forgetting and she felt like if she kept asking me it was nagging. I am so looking forward to going again next month – this was exactly the sort of social event I’d been looking for.

Anyway, here’s the result of my work – it was meant to be an ‘L’ shaped theme.

I’ve mentioned before how cold this cottage is. There is forced air heat in the kitchen and sitting room, but none in the front living room, the bathroom, or the bedrooms. I suppose I can’t really count the bathroom, as it does have a heated towel rail, which I leave on all the time but without hanging any towels on it, because if I hung towels on it, the air in the bathroom wouldn’t warm up. The house isn’t insulated, because the guy who installs insulation got sick last fall. So even tho I set the thermostats in the kitchen and sitting room to 25°C, those rooms only heat to 17°C unless I supplement the forced air with something else. In the sitting room it’s a small electric heater (what we would call a space heater), and in the kitchen, if I want it to be warmer than 17°C, I turn on the oven and open the oven door.

I have a oil space heater in my bedroom, which I turn on a couple of hours before going to bed, but I don’t sleep with it on all night (all the Brits I’ve talked to agree with me on that one). So I wake up to a very cold room.

I’m used to it now and have gotten into a routine. I keep the ‘lounge around the house at breakfast-time sweats’ under the covers beside me in the bed, so they’re not frigid when I put them on first thing in the morning. Then I get out of bed and turn the heater on in the bedroom to low, so when I come back to get properly dressed for the day the room will be comfortable. Then I turn that heater off.

I come out and turn on the forced air thermostat in the kitchen (I don’t heat the kitchen at night), and the one in the sitting room, if it has inexplicably gone off (it doesn’t go off every night, or even the same night each week – it just does its own thing). I turn on the little heater in the sitting room and go and make my tea. I drink tea, read the news, and wait for the house to warm up.

I spend my day in either the kitchen or sitting room (if I go out I turn off the space heater, of course), and in the late afternoon I will suddenly notice I am very cold, and realise the sitting room thermostat has shut off. Yes, my landlord has suggested (quite sensibly) that I go online and learn how to work the timer, but whatever, I just get up and press the on/off button and things are fine again. Every day.

In the evening I turn the bedroom oil heater up to full, so when I go to bed my room will be nice and toasty.

I bought a thermometer to see just how cold the house is:

Today is the last day of chip-free January (yippee!), so I thought I’d share some info about my favourite food group: snacks. I mentioned how much I love Walkers (or Taytos, but that’s only in Ireland) Cheese & Onion Crisps. That’s the most common flavour of crisp in the UK. Many of the other flavours are similar to Canadian flavours: salted (what we call plain), salt & vinegar, and, hmmm. . . maybe not that many. I know we have lots of flavours of chips back home: Sour Cream & Onion, Ketchup, Dill Pickle, All Dressed, Barbeque, etc.. I can’t tell if there’s more flavours here or that they’re just different (I’m not counting the bizarre Christmas Dinner or Pigs in Blanket flavours that come out only at Christmas – I’m still not fully over that experience). But there’s Paprika, Roast Chicken, Roast Ox, Haggis, Chorizo, Tomato, Sweet Chilli, Pheasant, Ham & Mustard, and of course, Worcestershire. And those are just from the major producers – I haven’t touched on the niche market producers with their Truffle, or Iberico Ham, or Chardonnay Wine Vinegar crisps.

But really, it’s British snack food that fascinates me. It’s quite different from Canada.

Skips are prawn flavoured crackers, shaped nothing like a prawn, but instead like a clam shell (association of ideas?). Yum. Quavers are sort of like a potato curl with powdered cheese. Again, yum. I know I have seen Pork Scratchings back home, but they are everywhere here, and come in all sorts of flavours. Wotsits just seem to be Cheesies – I haven’t tried them.

Then there are the three that I buy the least but love the most. Well, sort of. The first is Twiglets (it’s the ‘sort of’ – I have a love/hate relationship with Twiglets). The first time I bought Twiglets, I didn’t look too closely at the packaging. When you see them in the store, the main things you see are the words ‘Twiglets’ (obvs), and ‘oven baked’ (also obvs, they are pretzels), and there’s a picture of the dark brown pretzel sticks on the bag. So, I bought a bag of the chocolate-covered pretzels and took them home, thinking, “well, I don’t really love pretzels or chocolate, so it will be easy to monitor my intake of these.” Yes, it is indeed easy to limit my intake of Twiglets. Because they’re pretzels covered in Marmite. Not chocolate, Marmite. Have you ever tasted Marmite? You’ve heard the song lyric, ‘ gave me a vegemite sandwich’, right? Same thing. A paste made out of yeast extract, the waste that comes from beer-making. They dip the pretzels in this delicacy, bake ’em and bag ’em and sell ’em to idiots like me. And I can’t believe I’m saying this, but . . . I do kinda like them. I usually have a bag in the house (mainly because it takes me weeks to finish a bag of Twiglets) and when I want something crunchy but don’t want to eat more crisps, they’re a good alternative. Apart from being high in sodium, they are actually among the healthier junk food choices out there and I’ve developed a taste for them.

And then we have Bacon Fries and Scampi Fries, my faves. Oh dear. The Bacon Fries are shaped like little strips of streaky bacon (sort of like Purina Beggin’ Strips, but smaller & crispier. And for humans.), and tasting vaguely of bacon. With their big brother, Scampi Fries. My youngest sister remembers both of these from her years in England which is also when I first came across them, and like me, will pick them up if she sees them in the Best of Britain store in Mississauga. The Scampi Fries are like little square hollow pillows and are supposed to taste like the scampi that come on a plate of scampi & fries. Scampi & fries are on pretty much every pub menu in the UK, and refer to a very specific way of serving shrimp: battered, breaded in electric-orange bread crumbs, and deep-fried. These little Scampi Fries pillow snacks are also electric-orange, but there the resemblance ends – they don’t really taste of anything identifiable. That could be because there is not a single natural ingredient in these snacks. They are made of chemicals and they taste like it. And I don’t care – I love these little things. LOVE THEM! Thank God they only come in these peedie wee bags – I never allow myself to buy more than one bag at a time.

But tomorrow is February. Happy sigh.

Every year at the end of January, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) holds a national garden bird watch, where hundreds of thousands of Brits spend an hour of their weekend counting the birds they see in their garden, and reporting it in. It’s been going on for over 40 years as a way for the RSPB to understand how bird populations are changing and how to plan their conservation efforts.

I heard about it after the fact last year, and by chance this year, a friend mentioned it yesterday morning. People are asked to spend one hour over this weekend to observe and count the birds they see in their garden or park, and then to report in to the RSPB using their postal code as a location identifier. Over 700,000 people participated last year. 700,000!

I want to be part of all things British (well, maybe not all things – I still don’t get the whole carpeting in the bathroom thing), so this afternoon I set up a cosy wee corner in my sitting room, with the stereo on and a cup of tea beside me. I had my Birdwatch Tally Guide and I watched. And learned. What did I learn? I learned that when winds are 40kmh with gusts of 57kmh, birds wisely hide in trees and bushes. And that maybe I should have picked a different time & day this weekend to become a twitcher.