Beautiful Bleakness...

My Tuesday winter walk

What do you need for the perfect snow day? Snow of course! Plus the freedom to be able to ditch your planned day of work to have exciting winter fun. BOTH things happened for me on Tuesday. How marvellously serendipitous! 

Once I'd clocked the weather and calmed my inner giddy goat, I reshuffled my To Do list and made space. What for? Well, how about a winter walk? Tick! Layering up to resemble the Michelin man? Tick! Back home to drinks, PJs, and fluffy socks? Tick! (Can you sense my glee even now? I LOVED it.) The rest of the day left me feeling present and mindful. I might have spent it watching winter films between mugs of tea (Eddie the Eagle, Downhill, You've Got Mail, and the non-wintery but still good, Snake Eyes) but I was hyper aware of how brilliant each second felt. Snow. It really does something to me. 

Will Ferrell might be having
a breakdown in this scene,
but Downhill's snowy vibes
still make me happy. 

It lasted a day. There's still the last bit of yet-to-melt white in the corners of the garden, but the thrill has waned. For one perfect Tuesday, however, I had a ball. 

Writing News

It's nearly time to declare this manuscript DONE. Last week I bought a ruler. One of those metal ones that makes you feel architecty. (Just me?) I printed out all 349 pages, started at the top, and with the ruler under each line, read my story aloud. It's the best way to check every little thing. The ruler slows you down, and detaches you from the vibes. It forces you to spot every letter, space, and punctuation mark on the page. It's magic.

A partially obscured
opening paragraph.
But look at the
ruler of dreams! 

By this point, there are barely any typos or missing words. (I spotted two!) But what I did notice were the times I'd put the punctuation at the end of someone's speech OUTSIDE the speech marks instead of inside. It's a teeny thing but it happened a few times. Thanks to my trusty ruler, I mopped them all up.

Claudia is EXCELLENT
in The Traitors.

Culture

As I said above, Tuesday Snow Day was also Film Day. If you want me to fit loads more than usual into twenty-four hours, make it snow - I'll leap out of bed early doors, be back from a walk by nine, and do four films back to back! Apart from that, there's only one programme I've been watching. The Traitors. Oh my diddly days. If you're already on it, you'll be as obsessed as me. It's that kind of show. I don't know anyone who watches it and feels indifferent. It hooks you in, like a drug you can't get enough of. As my sister said last week, the wait from the Friday episode to the following Wednesday is way too long. We're all addicted and we need more. So when it ends on Friday, I don't know what I'll do. (Perhaps rewatch Season One? I've forgotten enough of it by now!) FYI, Julia Raeside wrote this Substack piece about how ethical it feels, compared to other reality shows. She makes lots of sense.

Oooh, the spice, the
warmth, the pungency!

Food and Drink

It's the same every January. After all the (excellent) beige food at Christmas, I crave spice and heat. For two or three meals a week since then, I've made Thai green curry. Of course this goes with all the usual caveats. I'm not Thai, this is not an authentic recipe, there are far better ones online, etc, but here's what I've been doing. 

Whizz up some spring onion, garlic, ginger, chilli, fresh coriander, spinach, cumin, turmeric, ground coriander, lime zest, lime juice, and lemongrass paste. There's your curry paste. Heat it up in a bit of olive oil, and add some protein (I usually use salmon or tuna steak cut into chunks.) Add some stock, a bit of coconut milk if you like, some cornflour to thicken if you prefer, and serve over rice.

Ta da! It's easy, full of veg and heathy stuff, and tastes fab. I've eaten it fairly consistently since New Year and not got sick of it. At some point, I guess, I'll be craving a cheese board and party food again. I'll be sure to let you know.

Out and About

On Friday I had my first cinema visit of 2024 and saw Mean Girls. It was such a laugh. Loads of callbacks to the film  great music, and regular LOL moments. I'm a fan. Then the following day was - as God intended - devoted to The Masked Singer. Like The Traitors, it's a TV format that works ridiculously well. And it's suited so perfectly to January Saturday nights. It's daft, it's overblown, it's sparkly, and it keeps you guessing week on week. But this is the Out and About section, so let's get back to that. The previous Saturday, I went out for tapas. I had a marvellous time (thank you Bar Carouse) and ate the loveliest food, (Camembert mash! Can you believe?) but I still watched The Masked Singer as soon as I got in.

The beautiful bleakness

The older I get, the more I love January. Look, I know the snow's given me a lift this week, but hear me out. I love the bleakness of everything. The dark nights, the candles on the coffee table, the need to wrap in layers. It fills my soul with actual joy. If this is not the case for you, hang in there. I believe we're getting longer days now. While I whoop at the current weather, there's always that to focus on.

Have a lovely week, folks.