Wow!

Yesterday I went off to the fish shop on the Mean Machine, my electric mobility scooter. I soon wished I’d taken our camera. The view across the bay was stunning.

It was one of those crystal clear winter mornings. The sky a brilliant azure. An occasional cloud hung across it, white with a purply underside.  As the Lakeland fells neared the sky the sky became more yellow.

 As for the fells themselves. The lower foreground ones were a deep darkness. Through a dip in the land stood proudly the higher fells behind. The snow had largely disappeared but a thin coating remained, enough to emphasise the contours of the fells. The snow itself shone luminously. At the lower heights they were purply, echoing the colour of the underside of the clouds.

The tide was largely out. The Bay was miles of largely brown sands with a brilliant azure band as the waters of the Kent made their way to the sea, reflecting the azure of the sky as they went. The water was incredibly still, more like a plate of glass rather than a river.

It was literally breath-taking.

On my return trip I was surprised to find I had to traverse a depth of golden sand to get back on the promenade. Clearly the recent winds had blown a lot of sand on the pathway. As I continued on I noticed benches, seat deep in sand, yet to be cleared away.

I passed a couple of walkers, tourists I suspect, armed with a camera. I couldn’t help commenting I wished I’d had such foresight.

Morecambe Bay, seen from Morecambe, really is a fabulous spot, well worth visiting on a day like yesterday.

The garden latest

The sky is clear bright blue. It’s cold out, though not as bad as yesterday. Then the world was white with frost.

The garden is once more on our mind. On Monday we interviewed a potential gardener to give us a hand in keeping on top of the weeds. Al, our old gardener, has now retired.

We liked the new woman. She seemed observant & full of energy. She clearly knows her plants, which is encouraging. A neighbour, Steve, said he would send someone he knows around for the job. This person hasn’t arrived yet, despite a couple of weeks going by. We’ve decided if he doesn’t arrive by the end of the week, we’re offering the job to Di.

Yesterday I had a further stroll in the garden with Linda, our home help, pointing out some of the things Di had noticed – the buds on the clematis, the bluebells that weren’t meant to be, the daffodils shooting up in the wild patch. At one point Linda tapped the soil in the raised beds. A dull echo resounded, like hollow wood. The ground is frozen solid. I tapped again today. Still frozen.

This morning as I peeled the potatoes, I noticed some tits & sparrows in the holm oak hedge-to-be. They’ve finally found the fat balls & were flitting to & fro. The seed feeders are also hanging near this hedge-to-be. I wonder if the smaller birds have finally decided they should risk the dive, that there is sufficient shelter for them in the evergreen oaks. It should be okay as they are no further away than an old hedge they’ve replace.  I hope so as the nesting box they usually use is also there. I’ll be glad to see these small birds flitting around.

Of course it may be a case of the need for food is so desperate in this frozen world they feel any risk is worth taking.

Pie making

I’m once more pie-making, once more with minced beef as the basis of the filling.

I can’t help remembering an old employer of mine who loved pies, positively fantasised about them. I could never quite understand his enthusiasm. Then I realised his wife never baked pies so he rarely had them. They had become a special treat, whereas we had pastry fairly often, both savoury & sweet. These days I don’t bother making puddings much but still savoury pies appear quite frequently on our menu.

I’m struck, too, that you can see I was attracted by one of those bogof (buy one get one free) promotions for minced beef. As I’m using up from the freezer at the moment, I’ve got the challenge of varying what to do with all the mined beef I didn’t use at the time of buying it. Still this is the last bag for a while.

The next thing to use up is puff pastry – a pie perhaps, or vol-au-vents. The next meat is chicken thighs – sounds like the potential for an interesting filling. However, whatever I do will wait a while as we will be going shopping, getting in fresh ingredients. It’s just nice to have an idea of what I might do. 

A Smiley pie - an old favorite.