The “Isn't Life Great” thread

[Paul_B]

Since moving into our new home in the seaside village in Cumbria at the end of a road to nowhere last year I've had many positive moments. Whilst not now I still think I'll mention them because they are moments when I had no doubts we've made the right decision to move here. Moments that made me think to myself I belong here! I hope you have had that feeling too, it's special.

Sat at the dining room table I sensed somebody was looking at me. I turned to look out the window and had an eye to eye moment with a fox. A long moment but wow! Second best fox encounter possibly best. That was a few weeks into our new house too.

The next moment I cannot remember the details. I only remember the feeling and what I said to my partner. I had an overwhelming feeling that we were where we were meant to be. I do mean overwhelming too!

June this year I took the dog out onto the embankment of the estuary we live on and far heron after heron as I looked around. A few times there were heron like birds but I think they're little egrets. There's a few missing around this area.

I find that living where I do I have had many feelings of it being right. The events leading to those moments went

 

[Paul_B]

A photograph of a tree with "fruit" on it that needed identifying on the family WhatsApp group only for my partner with no gardening or nature expertise identified when nobody else had a clue, even a very knowledgeable gardener. It was a walnut tree with green walnuts in aplenty on it. My immediate comment was a request for a jar of pickled walnuts for Xmas! It was on their dog walk route. Here's hoping they give pickling a go! You pickle them when green right?

 

[lou1661]

You pickle them when green right?

Yes….. but prior to the formation of the shells, around my way that’s June time.

 

[Broch]

Sitting out in the sun, breakfast of pancakes and home-made blackcurrant jam with coffee; bliss

 

[TeeDee]

Sitting out in the sun, breakfast of pancakes and home-made blackcurrant jam with coffee; bliss

Pancakes-You do surprise me Broch! I do enjoy a nice pancake.

 

[Toddy]

It's a beautiful cold crisp and sunny day here
Absolutely lovely. It's bramble weather

 

[Woody girl]

Second to last farmers market of the season today.
Lots of nice goodies, cheese, honey, apple juice, among them, and a new handmade journal to go with my hand made pen.
Beautiful warm day, lots of dogs to say hi to, I'm covered in dog kisses, and almost out of dog treats!
Found a dozen field mushrooms on the way home.
More washing is drying on the line, and more blackberries to be picked after lunch.
I love autumn, and the foraging opportunities it gives me. Seeing those jars on the shelves full of late summer goodness is the most satisfying, and comfortable feeling.

 

[saxonaxe]

It's a beautiful cold crisp and sunny day here
Absolutely lovely. It's bramble weather

22C and Factor 50 sun cream here, Toddy...But..the season is the same. A walk down the back lane this morning was fruitful.

Further down the lane where the sun catches the hedge is the Berry hunting ground.


Now, if I knew how to make pastry, but evaporated milk or Ice Cream will be fine....

 

[Toddy]

You have flour, butter, sugar .....maybe some rolled oats or flaked almonds ?

Just make crumble

 

[Toddy]

My Dad said, coming home from the war on a troopship, that seeing that beautiful damp cool green island ahead, after the thirst and heat of N. Africa and the Med, and knowing it was home.....seeing @saxonaxe 's photo of his back lane, minded me of one of mine and there are brambles here too Other ends of the island, but quintessentially home.

 

[saxonaxe]

" Just make crumble "
I have tried to make pastry and it came out of the oven looking a lovely golden brown, it was however..err... hard. Eventually I just used it to replace a broken paving slab....

On the subject of happiness. When I was a Merchant Seaman there was a condition known as 'The Channels'. This was a feeling amongst the crew that after months away from home, we would soon be home. Everyone cheered up, hard times, bad weather etc: were all forgotten as we sailed from the blue of the deep Ocean into the green, sometimes grey seas of home waters. A sight of the Lizard, St David's Head or anywhere green would get people going to the rail for a first look at home.
Years later sailing home in my own boat after months away, I still got The Channels when land fall was not far off.
Happy times..

 

[Toddy]

I'd never heard it called that, but it resonates, doesn't it ?

He said they could smell cool, moist green air ahead. They could see that mistiness in the air that said home
Funnily enough, when I was little and old men who had only ever used sail, sat and blethered with my Dad in the small boatyards up and down the Clyde, and they talked of smelling Blighty on the wind, and knowing home was within reach again. One old fellow, who only had one leg, said sailors were like salmon and knew their home ports.

 

[Toddy]

" Just make crumble "
I have tried to make pastry and it came out of the oven looking a lovely golden brown, it was however..err... hard. Eventually I just used it to replace a broken paving slab....

For the crumble, there are dozens of recipes out there, but if you're without scales, and just doing it quick like, then

I mug of plain flour and a good pinch of salt
A third of a packet of butter
A half mugful of sugar, brown if possible.

That's the basic small crumble mix....sort of enough for a small pyrex dish...multiply up as necessary. You can enrich it with more butter and sugar, but that's just personal taste.

If you like a sweet crunch on top, then a couple of tablespoonsful of rolled oats/flaked almonds mixed and a shake of spice of some kind,and a couple of tablespoonsful of brown sugar, mixed and spread over the top, is excellent.

Let the butter sit somewhere where it'll soften up enough that you can quickly cut it into the flour with a knife. (or 10secs in the micro) You can rub it in if you like, but we're after quick and easy here.
Stir through the sugar, you can add nuts if you like, and spread it over your fruit....it's good if the fruit's hot, it sort of steams the crumble and cooks it properly....and then spread the crunchy topping over it.

Bake in a middling hot oven until the fruit is cooked and the crumble is golden brown.
You can dot it with little bits of butter on top of the crunch and you'll make crispy toffee tasting bits too.

Works in a dutch oven, works in a clay oven, works under a grill if you're careful, even works in the micro, but it's a bit soggy unless you have a grill to toast it off.

If your fruit's looking a little thin, you can add some of last years jam to it, and you can stir some cornflour through to thicken the juice up too.

It's funny stuff is crumble, it can be as simple and messy as you like, or as trim and 'just so', but there's never any left It's the Mum's quick pudding

 

[saxonaxe]

Thanks Toddy, I might just try that Crumble recipe, seems pretty straight forward.
I blame my late wife. She used to get nervous if I went into the kitchen, she said I was dangerous, and banned me after I set fire to the gas stove while trying to fry Steak. I didn't know they put a piece of paper which stuck under the meat in the plastic tray, and I didn't look either, so it was a surprise when the frying pan caught fire......


After weeks at sea I can definitely vouch for the fact that a land smell is one of the first signs of 'home'.
Even after relatively short voyages the smell of the land can be detected. My first land fall was as a 16 year old first trip Deck Boy to Cornerbrook in Newfoundland where we loaded rolls of Newsprint for the Sydney (Australia) Times.
We were only about a week out of Avonmouth, but the smell of the Pine forests and later the wood pulp Mills ashore could be detected 12 hours offshore.

 

[Woody girl]

Life is good, when the ice cream van pulls up outside your house, every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, summer evening, for 20 + years, and the Mr whippy is waiting for you, with an extra swirl of ice cream, and two flakes, cos you are the last customer of the day.

 

[Woody girl]

Duck race on the local river today.
Everyone enjoying themselves with hot dogs(in both senses), a gin bar, and a ridiculously dressed compare with a duck on his head, and giant blue flippers on his feet.
Not my thing, so I weebled on past and kept filling my basket with blackberries. 4 lb collected today.

 

[Broch]

Total joy - part of tonight's dinner:

 

[oldtimer]

Off to our place in France for a month tomorrow. It's the first time we've been back since Brexit and covid. I could moan about the many problems these events have caused, but prefer to think positively of how they remind us of the sense of adventure we used to feel when we started to travel together in Europe before the UK joined the EC and when it felt as if we were going to a strange foreign country rather than the second home France has been to us for over half a century.
Looking forward to catching up with old friends. Hope our French hasn't rusted beyond repair!

 

[Broch]

Bon voyage! Have a great time

 

[Paul_B]

A warm, Spanish swimming pool at 10:30pm, floating on my back and looking up at the stars! Not cold at all, just chilled in the relaxed sense.

Mind you I'd had my first mojito about 730 before dinner and an amstel chaser. Might have explained part of the chilled feeling. Although the buffet dinner between was more than enough to soak up those drinks. Don't know how I still floated tbh.

BTW this is the third package holiday both my partner and I have had. First for our son. We had one holiday each on the same two Spanish islands as kids. All other holidays were camping or rental places all done independently. Same with ski holidays.

So it felt a real adventure for me and our son. My partner has lived overseas probably half her independent adult life. It felt another world to me. Things like the feeling they don't finish things. Roads with footways alongside that are all nicely tiled with nice kerbstones but the other side just bare and u finished with just countryside outside of them after a bit of a drop. Other things like cables running above the ground floor along rows of buildings. Strange to a simple English man like me.

Different indeed. On landing we could see what looked like rough, round boulder walls forming rectangular plots with a set of steps up from the road and a kind of path laid between them. Like they're laid out for housing to be built on them.

Loving it all!