That bloke

We had a water leak. The pipe, which supplied the tank in the loft, was embedded in a wall. Stupid place for a pipe! Luckily there wasn't too much damage. We've had dehumidifers in, and we get some restoration work covered by insurance. First they're coming to decorate one room upstairs, so today I've been emptying everything out of there. I'm writing this sitting on the floor of an (almost) empty room. It seemed quite a small room with furniture in it. Not now.

Baby birds have appeared on the lakes where we go lockdown walking. There seem to be lots more ducklings this year. The mothers are very hungry, probably because they at the top, and fewer people go up there. One duck had 11 ducklings, as far as I could count (they wouldn't keep still). Most of them have three or four but another had just one.

We didn't see the coot babies when they were tiny. I suppose we're not going as often as last year. So we missed the "tiny ball of fluff with a red face" stage. The Egyptian geese had one gosling but it was gone next time we saw them. A swan's been sitting on a nest for ages. The swan population is ridiculous. I lost count at 40. A Canada goose also sat on a nest for a long time, but apparently without result. First for this year: great crested grebe nest. I mean, first time for us. The grebes presumably did this before.

The herons have disappeared. The cormorants only turn up very occasionally. The gulls come and go, but it's strangely like being at the seaside when they're there. And the moorhens are always there but very scared of humans.

Other common birds are often hanging around: crows, robins, pigeons, wagtails, sparrows, blackbirds. The crows often stand on the edge of the lake. It's like they want to get in the water but don't dare. One time we saw a dead crow in the water. Perhaps its curiosity was too much and it tried a swim.

I mentioned that I have silent office with other family members (mostly YC - the others aren't keen). Recently we started using a timer to check in with each other on progress - it's a good incentive to actually make some progress. The Vivaldi browser has a built-in timer, so I use that. When it goes off, it makes a noise like a cock crow, so we refer to the timer as the chicken, and a period of an hour is therefore also a chicken.

Today YC was doing some composing for his course. I said what I was about to do, and followed up with "...and you're going to write piano music for a chicken."

I mentioned the advert for the Sleep Meditations for Women podcast. I must have heard it hundreds of times now, and it's really winding me up. All while offering me a way to relax, as I realised when I was vituperating at the speakers. Well, the irony makes it a bit less annoying.

I mentioned that I had a whisky advent calendar. I went from drinking whisky a couple of times in a year to 24 times in a month. First conclusion was that I'm going back to a couple of times a year: whisky is ok, but it's not a big thing for me. Second conclusion is that I was expecting more variety. A lot of the time it tasted like... whisky. A couple that did make an impression were Highland Park and Bunnahabhain. Third conclusion: given that there were examples from Scotland, Ireland, France and Sweden, I missed Japan (where I know they can make good whisky because I've had it) and England (where I've heard they make it, but I know no details).

Well, not I have 24 tiny bottles, and my SO said she wanted them for something to do with painting, so I have to rinse them out.

I had the same Nokia phone for many years. There was a ring tone composer, so I made up a ring tone, and had that for many years too. I was very pleased one day when a work colleague who sat opposite me started humming it.

Today I found an emulator for the composer, and so here is (an approximation to) my old ring tone. There's a play button at the bottom.

Black pepper: strange, but enjoyable.

I never thought of black pepper as hot like chillies, but I'm getting a tingle in my mouth. The flavour is working well.

WTF is fenugeek?

[reads side of jar] Oh, it's used in Persian cooking, in (dishes I can't pronounce). "Use sparingly".

[adds third of a teaspoon, wondering if that's sparing enough] Hmm, tastes like coffee.

[adds another half teaspoon] OK, now I have a pleasantly quirky flavour. The only thing I can relate it to is... celery?

Allspice: yum!

Following part 1, today I tried ginger and cumin. I went light on the cumin because I didn't want curried coffee, and I went light on the ginger because I thought it might be overpowering. I had to go back and add more ginger because I couldn't taste it.

End result: not bad, but not great either.

Tentative hypothesis: "cake" spices (cinnamon) seem to work better than "curry" spices (ginger, cumin, paprika), but I need more data.