Living in the UK again

The Italian giant onion seeds have finally germinated. They have a long way to go before they will barely fit in my hand but acorns and oak trees eh?  This Labrador is a very different kettle of fish. I like different, it’s good. He is like the black Labrador I know who lives in Oxford now as he like cuddles and he doesn’t eat things I don’t want him too! But the chocolate one is lovely I am missing her already. There was a day of overlap where they were together. They got on ok, but the chocolate one wanted to be super friendly and this one wasn’t so sure he wanted to reciprocate her advances! Back at his this house, he loves helping me eat my breakfast and as the chocolate one does he spits out the apple pips after eating an apple core. He has a bit of a drooling problem, but nothing as bad as the St Bernard. He also doesn’t like walking in straight lines, he zig  zags.  But no dog is perfect and humans even less so. At night he loves leaning into me and resting his hea...

I always enjoy looking after the chocolate Labrador. She is so easy. A dog sitters dream sit. She is easy on the lead, doesn’t pull, likes to play but isn’t demanding it all the time and loves long walks. This one is a bit odd as she won’t go up stairs in any house. I think she has been taught she mustn’t go upstairs and she obeys that rule. But if you take her on a bridge where there are steps, she will go up them. But she doesn’t like confined spaces, and really doesn’t like kissing gates. But like all Labradors she is obsessed by food. Anything is fair game that’s on the floor, but she won’t normally steal food off a low table for instance. A lot of her toys are missing limbs, when you hear the toy being ground down by her powerful back teeth you know another limb is about to be amputated. She is so friendly with other dogs, and will walk away if they don’t suit her friendly manner. Her main bad thing is eating dog mess. Not any old mess, sometimes she will pass it by, maybe it’s no...

It’s been cold and wet and not the best weather for walking dogs, or gardening for that matter. The towpath at Henley is the best bet when it’s like this. You can start at Marsh lock, head into town and go further along if the weather is behaving itself. The path is tarmac and quite good. I borrowed the chocolate Labrador to walk with a friend who was dog sitting one of these doodle dogs. The two have met each other before and got along ok. After stopping in Henley at the Hot Gossip cafe, we carried along and saw this very odd robot lawn mower doing its thing alongside the tow path. It seemed a bit small to be cutting the big patch of grass. I have booked a couple of visits to the local Reading theatre called the Hexagon. It’s not a very pretty newish urban building but inside it’s quite good. The trips aren’t until June and November. I am seeing Gunter Steiner, one time F1 boss and a journalist called Jon Ronson. At home I have been making a few meals for when I am dog sitting, but al...

I love sticky toffee pudding, and I fancied the idea of a date cake as an alternative without the hassle of the sauce. So I made a new cake for me, which had dates and walnuts in it. It’s made in a loaf tin, I find these cakes when they rise above the edge of the tin can get a bit over cooked as they have no protection from the heat from the oven. Most of the round cakes I make don’t rise above the edge of the tin you see. Anyway it came out ok, I had a slice, it felt a bit over baked. I put it in the cake tin, and the following morning it had softened and did not have that over baked as it had done, so it was ok after all.  St Marys church in the centre of the village has a lovely churchyard behind it. At this time of the year it’s a swathe of snowdrops. Snowdrops don’t like their soil disturbed so churchyards are perfect for them for obvious reasons! I put this photo on Facebook, on the local village group and loads of people liked the post and said they would go and look. A frie...

It took a week to recover from that sickness bug. I felt exhausted, had real trouble eating, even  having a can of soup, and it really dragged me down. My neighbours and friends were kind, and bit by bit I recovered. I forced myself to clean the house, for obvious reasons, and by the time of the TRHA AGM I was on my way back, with just a perpetual belching and flatulence being my final symptoms! I did have the pleasure of looking after the chocolate lab for an afternoon and evening, I left her about ten PM. A friend came round and saw me at her house for a chat that was nice. She is a lovely dog, owned by a very special family. I have started to go around and see some of my friends now I am better, a few more to see this week. I made this ginger cake with grated stem ginger, it’s really light and fluffy and tasty too. I gave some to one neighbour when I went to see them, as I walked away from their house, another neighbour was putting their recycle stuff out, and they had most of w...