Tag Archives: soya cream

Monday 30th September 2019 – IT’S BEEN …

… a pretty rough day for me today.

What didn’t help matters was that I couldn’t sleep last night. 01:30 and I was still struggling away trying my best to drop off.

At some point I must have done, I suppose, because the alarm awoke me at 06:00. Just in time to catch the vestige of a nocturnal voyage disappearing out of my head, so I grabbed the dictaphone and dictated it before I forgot. The only one from last night, apparently.

For a change, I remembered the medication and then I grabbed a quick breakfast so that I could take the kids to school. And then down to Hartland to take Hannah the lunch pail that she had forgotten.

Back at the tyre depot there wasn’t a great deal to do today. In fact, I just mauled around a few sacks of feed when customers came a-calling. My new gearchange cable is a Ford main agent part and won’t be in Woodstock until early tomorrow morning.

At lunch-time I went off to buy a sandwich from the Irving garage by the Trans-Canada Highway and then went back to the garage. Where I fell asleep not once but twice.

That was the cue for Rachel to send me home as I was clearly in no fit state to do anything.

Once I’d regained my second wind I made a start on adding the blog entries for the second leg of my voyage across the Atlantic Ocean. To see how far I’ve advanced, you can go to THIS LINK and work your way forward.

There were just Hannah, our visitor and me here for evening meal so I made thin-fried potatoes with carrots, onions, garlic and chili with herbs, and vegan burgers on baps with cheese. And it was all so delicious, especially when followed by one of my chocolate soya desserts left over from Montreal.

Talking of Montreal, I have (rather regrettably) booked my bus back to Montreal, Much as I dislike the idea, I suppose that I ought to think about going home some time soon.

As well as the bus, I booked a room in Montreal for the night that I’ll be staying there before I fly out. I saw the ideal place – and for $20 CAN too. A bed in an 8-bed dormitory in a hostel for women. But they wouldn’t let me reserve the place.

Instead, I’ve booked a room at one of my previous haunts in the rue St Hubert at the back of the bus station, seeing as there was a place on special offer. But then I remembered that that’s the place that doesn’t offer breakfast, by which time it was far too late.

So that’s that. My route from here as far as Brussels is now arranged, for better or for worse. And I’m going to be having a hard time leaving, I reckon. One thing that I’ve always been wary about is putting down roots, especially in places where it’s clearly impractical, if not impossible.

And emotional attachments are the worst of them all.

But onwards and upwards, hey?

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Thursday 14th December 2017 – SO FAR TODAY …

… I’ve managed to go a whole 24 hours without a single disaster. That makes a nice change for recent times doesn’t it?

And I’ve also done 198% of my daily activity too, and that has to be a good thing.

We started off last night as we mean to go on, and that meant an early night. And to guarantee a decent sleep I switched on a “Bulldog Drummond” film. Always does the trick, that does.

A bad attack of cramp at 01:3à wasn’t quite so good, but that’s the kind of thing that happens. Soon back to sleep and right through to the alarm as well.

The morning was quite leisurely and included a shower, and then at 10:30 it was out to the shops.

I’d previously forgotten the Kruidvat – but not this time. They have pick-and-mix sweets and they are all labelled as to their allergy rating. I treated myself to a couple of hundred grams of gelatine-free gooey sweets. And they were delicious.

At Zeeman I bought a black jumper for €7:99. I don’t have enough jumpers back at Granville and another cheap one will do me just fine.

But of all of the shops that I went into (and there were dozens) I couldn’t find a cake tin. I don’t know what’s happening to the world.

Alison turned up and we went for a coffee and a wander around the shops looking for Christmas presents for her entourage. And we called into the Loving Hut for another pile of Vegan cheese and some spray-on vegan cream.

I then took my leave and headed off to the hospital.

A new place to visit. No longer do I go to the Day Centre but to the Haematology unit. And there, the girl fitted the vampire bat to my catheter port and extracted the blood in a matter of seconds.

But the thing there is amazing. They don’t call out your name – your photo appears on the TV screen thing next to the room which you have to visit. That’s new technology!

The good news is that – rather surprisingly – the blood count is UP – from 9.2 to 9.5. And also that the protein loss is DOWN – and that’s even more surprising. Professor Janssens is pleased with me – so back in another 2 months.

Back into town again in the rain where I again met Alison. And we went to la Cucaracha – the Cockroach – the new Mexican restaurant. My taco or tortilla or whatever it was stufffed with spicy mushrooms in tomato sauce with rice was absolutely delicious and I’ll make this at home sometime.

We put the world to rights until her bus came, and then I walked back here, stopping to photograph all of the lights. But the camera on this phone is unfortunately pretty useless.

I’m now going to try for yet another early night. It’s quite cold out and my room isn’t as hot as I would like it.

Curling up under the covers is what’s called for in a situation like this.

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Saturday 1st April 2017 – CALL THAT A …

… Division d’Honneur match?

I’ve seen more exciting and more competent teams playing down in Division 2 of the Puy-de-Dôme League than what was served up here at Granville tonight.

La Patriote ST Jamaise were pretty miserable – another team that spent far too long hanging on to the ball instead of playing it out wide or over the top. But as for US Granville, they have to be one of the worst teams that I have seen. Far and away the worst at this level.

They had a red-headed guy playing right-back who was thoroughly, totally and completely useless. He was substituted after 30 minutes and judging by his contributions up to that point, he was on the pitch for 30 minutes too long.

But the centre-forward – a big bulky 20-stone guy that would make Akinfenwa look like a lightweight – I’ve never seen anything like it. He was easily the worst player that I’ve seen on a pitch in a competitive match. He didn’t run after the ball – just a leisurely saunter around when he could be bothered to move – and never looked as if he was going to do anything at all. US Granville could have played without him and no-one would have noticed the difference. Xavier, who used to play up front for Pionsat’s 3rd XI will be the first to admit that he was playing up front to enjoy himself rather than in respect of demonstrating any skill, but I would have had him on the field leading the attack any day of the week rather than this guy.

It goes without saying that, being the worst team that I have ever seen, Granville were 2-1 up at half-time. Two free kicks, two shots at goal, 2 goals. But honours were restored in the second half as La Patriote ST Jamaise scored two more goals – one from a dreadful defensive howler where they all stood around waiting for the keeper to come halfway up field to head a ball away. I hardly need to mention that he headed it just as far as a La Patriote ST Jamaise attacker who calmly lobbed it over his head into the net. And the winning goal was … well … I estimated about three yards offside from my perfect position in line with play.

But US Granville can’t complain. They were dreadful.

I’d had a much better sleep today and a steadier start to the day. With a few things to do (loads of files to update) and then I went for a walk around the market. Nothing of interest unfortunately, and the prices are, well, not what I’m accustomed to paying.

But going for a walk to buy bread, I found a notaire with a few letting properties in the window. One looks quite suitable so I have an appointment to see that on Wednesday.

This afternoon I was chatting to a few people on the internet and then Caliburn and I went off to LeClerc for a look around. Strawberries at €0:90 for 500 grammes and cheap soya cream too – that will make for some exciting puddings for the next few days.

There’s an electromenager bit there too and prices seem to be reasonable. That’s one-up on Montlucon.

Afterwards, I headed for the footy and then came back here for tea.

It’s a late night but it’s Sunday tomorrow so no alarm. Let’s see how well I can sleep.

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Saturday 17th December 2016 – WHILE YOU ADMIRE …

christmas decoration leuven town centre belgium december decembre 2016 … the centre of Leuven all decorated up for Christmas, let me tell you a little about what I have been up to today.

It’s Saturday and as you might expect, I’ve been out and about late this morning, doing my shopping ready for the weekend.

And I took the opportunity to go for a walk up into the centre of town to see what was going on.

In fact, there was a good purpose for going up there.

christmas decoration leuven town centre belgium december decembre 2016 I wanted some vegan cheese and some spray-on vegan cream from the Vegan shop ready for Christmas. But although the door was open and there were people there, the shop wasn’t open for customers yet.

I can’t believe how much money Belgian shops turn away with some of the silly ideas that they have. After all, I wasn’t going to hang around for another hour.

christmas decoration leuven town centre belgium december decembre 2016But I can’t believe how empty the town centre was today. I was expecting the place to be teeming with people seeing as how close we are the Christmas, but it was more like an early Sunday morning up there rather than a late Saturday afternoon.

It wasn’t all that cold either. It doesn’t seem at all like Christmas right now and I’m clearly missing something somewhere

christmas decoration leuven town centre belgium december decembre 2016The decorations in the city are rather half-hearted and that doesn’t add too much to the festive atmosphere. I was expecting much more than this here in Leuven, to be honest.

All in all, I wasn’t out all that long. A quick lap around the Delhaize (where they had some grapes alredy bagged up on special offer) and my wasted trip to the Vegan shop, and that was that.

chrstmas carol sung in english flemish accent leuven town centre belgium december decembre 2016But there is one thing that I do have to say – and that concerns the barrel organist whom you might have seen in a previous photo.

I don’t care what anyone says, Christmas carols sung in English with a Flemish accent sound far too much like Goldmember for my liking. I was trying my best not to burst out laughing as I listened.

So my early night last night must have done some good somewhere for despite having to go off down the corridor at one point, I ended up being awake, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed (well, sort-of) and out of bed at all of 06:02 this morning.

I’d been on my travels too – something to with kids in the snow in Northern Labrador (i seem to be stuck here right now, don’t I?), but sometime later, it was a morning of really heavy snow and I was on my way to work. It was to a new job in a new office. And I was admiring the snowmen that people had built in their gardens. It was Shavington, on the corner or Rope Lane and Main Road by the Co-op where I arrived next, and here I fell in with two people who were to be my new colleagues. One of them I recognised immediately – he was someone with whom I’d worked in an office previously. We started to chat and he told me a little about my new place, and that he was getting married – to someone that I knew – that morning so we would have the day off anyway. But he was already making plans for a subsequent marriage, and it all sounded rather weird to me.

After breakfast I did some stuff on the website and then went off into town to buy what I need. And that took me nicely up to lunch.

This afternoon I went for a coffee and a really good chat, and that took a good few hours, we had so much to talk about.

I had a crash out when I returned, and then I had a little treat. The Welsh Premier League matches broadcast on Sgorio aren’t accessible to people living outside the UK, but someone “shared” it on his social networking site and by this method I was able to see the game.

The first this season, I reckon.

I missed tea tonight – I couldn’t summon up the energy to make it. Instead I’ve had a relax and now I’m going to have yet another early night.

Tomorrow afternoon, I’m going off on my travels, I reckon.

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Wednesday 26th December 2012 – Happy Boxing Day.

02:45 it was that Cecile left last night – nothing like a good evening with pleasant company – and by that time I was well ready for bed.

And so this morning, having remembered to switch off the alarm, I managed a lie-in until all of 09:45.

After breakfast, part II of the DVD marathon continued, and continued for most of the day too.

Lunch was the usual salad butties, and the Boxing Day dinner was the reheated leftover veg from yesterday, fried in an olive oil and mustard sauce of my own making (delicious, even though I say it myself) with a vegan burger.

Pudding was, as you might expect, more Christmas pudding and the left-over vegan cream.

How about that fr a nice, lazy Bank Holiday? High time that I had a lazy day like that. Does me the world of good.

But tomorrow I suppose that I had better start back to work. No peace for the wicked.

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Tuesday 25th December 2012 – THE FIRST NOEL…

… the Angels did say was at about blasted 07:45 this flaming morning.

That’s because despite it being a Bank Holiday and accordingly a Day of Rest, where nothing ever moves before perishing midday, Brain of Britain here forgot to switch off his sodding alarm clock, didn’t he?

Still, the early start gave me plenty of time to relax and open my presents.

Lots of DVDs, CDs, books and computer stuff. All a man could desire – except for Kate Bush and Jenny Agutter of course, but you can’t have everything.

And once breakfast was out of the way I sat down for the start of my marathon DVD session.

Lunch was the typical Christmas Day lunch – nibbling on bits and pieces, and then having had a suitable repose, I prepared the veg for the evening meal.

Boiled potatoes, roast potatoes, carrots, endives and sprouts – all cooked in the steamer.

Cécile came round in the late afternoon, just in time for Carry on Don’t Lose Your Head.

Not my favourite Carry-On film but one that she would understand, with lots of visual humour. High time, given the state of globalisation in the world today, that I started spreading around the spirit of Carry On humour.

So a few more films, a Christmas meal (the aforementioned plus seitan slices in onion gravy, Christmas pudding and vegan cream followed by coffee and Christmas cake), and a good chat, she went home and I went to bed.

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Saturday 16th June 2012 – I HAD A DAY OUT TODAY.

In fact I went to Montlucon.

And even though I had a late-ish start I was still out and round and back earlier than usual.

The impetus was that you my remember me receiving a text to say that my new front door needs picking up, and if I didn’t get a wiggle on I would lose it. So offI went to pick it up.

It’s not very substantial at all, being just a sheet of double-glazing with a wooden frame around it, and it’s not going to be used for ages yet. But the reason why I chose it when I did, for those of you with short memories, is that it’s the same style as the windows that I bought for the house and the range was discontinued at the end of March.

The fact that it was the cheapest double-glazed door has nothing whatever to do with the argument, of course.

My luck was in too. At the Amaranthe health food shop there was some soya cream that had gone past the sell-by date and so they were giving a carton away to each customer. That will do very nicely for a mushroom and onion fried rice later in the week.

At at the rubbish shop (NOZ, for the benefit of the foreigners) they were selling a load of flavoured rice milk at just €0:75 a litre. There’s a nice long sell-by date on those and so of course there are now none left in the shop.

Almond-flavoured rice milk on my breakfast muesli – that has to be the way to go.

dammi multi vitamin fruit drink noz montlucon allier franceAnd Dammi if I didn’t find some of this on sale at NOZ as well.

It’s a multi-vitamin, multi fruit drink. And I had a good look at the list of ingredients and, sure enough, it contains vitamin B12. being a vegan as you know,
I have lots of issues about my vitamin B12 intake so I’m always on the lookout for different food items that might contain it.

And with a name like this, it ought to be good too!

It was piping hot too – hottest day of the year for me and so I really fancied a swim, but I had left my swimming trunks back at home. Never mind – Auchan was having a sale and so for €5:00 I treated myself to a pair of new ones.

I took the plunge and went to the Centre Aqualudique at the back of Montlucon. I’d heard a couple of good reports about it.

And it was certainly a far cry from Neris-les-Bains – tidal pools, a fast-flowing current, bubble-massage seats in the pool. And many more people there than at Neris so there was much more to see.

Ohhhh yes – I still chase after the women. The problem is though that at my age I can’t remember why.

€5:00 admission though – and that’s quite a difference from €3:20, and nothing like as intimate. I’ll just have to save the Centre Aqualudique for special occasions such as midwinter when it’s far too cold to be at Neris-les-Bains.

At the Brico Depot I bought 4 demi-chevrons and 3 sacks of sand. And you might be wondering why. The demi chevrons because I want to put shelves up in this cupboard downstairs and I want to do it the next time the weather is bad, without having to wait for a trip to the sawmill for the wood.

And the bags of sand?

There’s some sealing joints that need to be made on the roof of the lean-to that I fitted earlier this year. I’ve no sand here and so I need to dig out the Sankey trailer, change the wheels, trundle down to the quarry, load the trailer, bring it back here and bag up the sand.

With having the sand here I can have the job finished before I’ve even changed the wheels on the Sankey.

But I hate the people at Brico Depot. I loaded up Caliburn and then went off to pay for it “you need to bring your vehicle here” said the girl in the office. Walking 20 metres was clearly too much for her.

And so I brought the vehicle to the door and she came out – and then started chatting to a fork-lift truck driver.
“When you can spare me the time, if it’s not too much trouble for you” I said, and so she shrugged her shoulders to the driver and slumped over to me to check my load.
Yes, the staff at Brico Depot needs a collective smack in the mouth. It’s just like being back in Belgium and how I hate that country.

Back here I sat down to watch a film and the next thing that I remember was that it was 20:00. A long time since I’ve crashed out like that too.

And for the football we watched a team of bouncing Czechs pole-axe their opposition to advance to the next stage of the UEFA Nations Cup.

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Friday 31st December 2010 – Happy New Year everyone.

And this year seems to have gone out with a whimper. I managed once more to sleep right through the alarm clocks – all of them – and so it was rather a late morning start. But once breakfast dissolved itself I set about chopping some more wood.

gibson EB3 bass guitar ibanez acoustic bass guitar pile of kindling wood woodstove les guis virlet puy de dome franceNot that I need it (I’m rather overflowing up here right now) but with needing some space in the lean-to and being depressed about the general overall quality of the stuff, I’ve stood some more outside and covered with some more of that clear plastic roofing stuff. The idea being that if ever the sun reappears, it might dry out the wood under the sheeting.

I also chopped up a huge bundle of kindling as there was plenty of that in the way too and it needs to be moved on.

Once that was done I connected up a couple of batteries to the Rutland WG901 wind turbine on the barn roof. We’ve had quite an amount of wind just recently and it seems to be a shame to waste whatever electricity is generated, especially when I have a few batteries loitering around and doing nothing. I’m planning to move the solar panels and the main batteries up that end in due course, but that’s not going to be for a while, until I get a huge load of 32mm saddle clamps.

Arno’s bed is now moved, and once we finished he invited me back home to look at his house. He asked me if he could give me something for my diesel, which was nice of him, and so we settled on a nice hot shower. I explained my difficulties about having a shower, to which he retorted “Yes – you aren’t a member of the OUSA Executive Committee any more” – keen reader of my blog is Arno. But a shower meant a lot to me just then. Nice and clean for New Year, and it saves me having to drive all the way to Neris and paying €3:00 for an entry. So that was fine by me.

I’ve also finally managed my Christmas dinner this evening – it was warm enough to stay down in the verandah for the one hour and 45 minutes it took to cook it. A slab of soya protein, with vegan sausages, roast potatoes, sprouts, chicory, carrots, broccoli and some thick gravy. Over a week I’ve been waiting for this, and it was well worth it.

What was even nicer was that it was followed by some Christmas pudding (I got to that today as well) and soya cream. And that was lovely too. It was just a pity that I’ve had to wait all this time to get to it.

And so that’s the year all done and dusted. And for 2011 I wish every one of you exactly the same as you wished on everyone else for 2010. 

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Thursday 10th June 2010 – Look what I’m having for tea!

home grown strawberries les guis virlet puy de dome franceYes, strawberries. The first of the year, and all grown with my own fair hands too in my own garden.

Unfortunately there aren’t not all that many. It looks as if the local wildlife has been helping itself to them but nevertheless there were five left, and these, together with some soya cream, is a sure sign that summer is here at last.

Or is it?

rain fall in wheelbarrow les guis virlet puy de dome franceIt was raining again this morning and although it stopped for several hours, at about 18:00 it started up again in earnest and it’s still chucking it down now.

A quick look inside the wheelbarrow will tell you everything that you need to know about the amount of rainfall that we’ve had this last couple of days. Remember that this was empty just a couple of days ago when we were shovelling all of these stones around.

Liz came round this morning with my beans and vegan cheese and that’s good news. There are also some tins of curry and so it’s back to my Saturday night ritual again. We had quite a chat and it was a shame that she had to go.

And after that I carried on with the tidying up outside. Now that I have a hardstanding (or a wetstanding, or a notwithstanding) I’m moving over there everything that was propped up against the side of the barn. In a couple of weeks we’ll be putting up a scaffolding against the barn in order to do the barn roof, and I’ve been waiting years to do this. For many reasons actually – not the least being that I can finally move the solar panels off the roof of the Luton transit and onto the wall of the barn.

I’m tidying up a few other things too so I’m clearly not well. And when it clouded over at about 17:50 I called it a day and came up here. In fact I crashed out for half an hour.

In other news, I see that the new Conservative Government is planning to remodel University education. The Minister has considered several University models, including major part-time suppliers, ans has decided to try to remodel things on the lines of that well-known supplier of distance education, the … errrr … University of London.

As I said a few years ago when they set up a committee to consider part-time degree education and it consisted of staff from that other well-known supplier of distance education the … errrr … North Staffordshire University, the days of the Open University having any kind of significance and playing any kind of major role in shaping Government policy, these are long-gone. The OU has lost its relevance and has received yet another kick in the teeth.

Increasing prices and tuition fees brought an angry response from the National Union of Students. But of course they are a small-minded militant body made up of kids still wet behind the ears. So where was the response from the Open University Students’ Association – that body of 180,000 grown-up and mature students? The answer is of course “nowhere”. Either no-one considered the OUSA to have any relevance (which is a damning indictment of OUSA) or else whatever OUSA did say was considered to be not worth reporting (which is a damning indictment of OUSA).

It seems that OUSA has outlived its relevance too. But we all knew that, and a long time ago. A couple of years ago when the Labour government considered the idea of increasing costs and reducing subsidies, the response of that grown-up and august body of mature students was to … errr … sign a petition! I mean! We did things like that in Primary School when we were 10 and 11. Was that really the best that OUSA could come up with?

I once worked in a multinational multi-government organisation and we used to receive petitions from all kinds of people in all walks of life, on a regular basis. And do you know what we did with the petitions that we received? Well, we never bought any toilet paper, that’s for sure. That’s how petitions are treated in organisations such as that.

And the strawberries were delicious!

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