The cloud hung over us, a smooth grey blanket pouring steady rain.
But out on the edge, near the mountains, the sky was clear—a thin sliver between cloud and mountains. So as the sun set, for a few minutes, it sat in the gap.
Gold rays of sunlight lanced across the plains, setting the trees on fire and casting immense shadows from every obstacle.
And forming a perfect double rainbow so bright it hurt to look at it.
The next time someone gushes about how they’d love to live in a quaint old cottage like ours, I’m going to make them do the maintenance on ours for a year. I reckon they’ll stop wishing for a quaint cottage pretty fast.
Yesterday I washed the outside of the house (because if I don’t do it once a year, the dirt and spiders claim it as their own). When I wash the house, I always check for spots that need repainting or repairing. Most years, I can get by with limited painting on the worst areas of the house.
This year it was clear the entire house needs to be scraped and painted.
And there are some weatherboards that need replacing.
And some windows that need a bit of glazing work.
*sigh*
Where’s Bob Vila when you need him?
Actually, forget Bob–I want his staff.
While some of them are painting, the others could be fixing the leaky roof, replacing the rotting piles, and doing something about the damp floor in the dining room. Insulation would be nice, too.
Oh, and while they’re at it, maybe they could build us a big new addition.
Then we could bulldoze the old part of the house, and…
Hmm…
There are dozens of variations on this tart available on the Internet. Here’s my version. This is best served at room temperature, outdoors on a hot day with a glass of white wine.
2 medium to large red onions
2 Tbsp olive oil
2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 tsp brown sugar
500 g chevre or other soft goat cheese
3 eggs
¼ – ½ c chopped fresh parsley
salt and pepper to taste
pastry for a single crust 10-inch tart (I use my favourite pie dough recipe for this)
Line the tart pan with pastry and allow to chill in the refrigerator as you prepare the filling.
Cut the onions into strips, and sauté on medium-low heat until they are well cooked and beginning to turn golden. Add the vinegar and brown sugar and continue to cook until most of the liquid has evaporated. Set aside to cool.
Beat the eggs in a large bowl. Add the cheese, parsley, salt and pepper and mix thoroughly.
Spread onions in the bottom of the tart and top with the cheese mixture.
Bake at 200˚C (400˚F) for about 40 minutes until firm and browning on top.
Cool on a rack and serve at room temperature.
Middle-aged woman,
Five foot two and three-quarters.
Hot.
Enjoys ice water,
Swimming, and
Standing with my head in the freezer.
Fleeing
Scorching summer sun.
Seeks
Shade.
I had a lot on my to-do list today—Painting the office, washing the house, fixing a tap, weeding the garden, laundry…
I also hoped to have a chance to work on a new short story, a jeans jacket, and a rug.
But when it hit 33˚C (91˚F) by 10 am, and my paint was skimming over in the can and drying instantly on contact with the wall, I knew something had to be done.
Something drastic.
I called the kids for a meeting.
“It’s hot,” complained my daughter.
“Yes. It is. Should we go to the beach?”
The vote was unanimous, so while I put away paint brushes and ladder, the kids gathered boogie boards, towels and togs.
In five minutes, we were on the road.
It was a brilliant day for swimming—big waves, a gentle sea breeze, sand hot enough to peel skin…
And the chores will be there tomorrow.
We are blessed with a wild, pebbly beach just four kilometres away from home. On that beach is a sampling of the geology of New Zealand, polished and rounded from the sea.
At first glance, the rocks are all nondescript greywacke.
Look more closely, down by the waterline, and you find a veritable rainbow of metamorphic rocks.
Brick red rocks laced with white,
Green serpentine, mottled to look like miniature Earths,
Translucent quartz,
Smooth pebbles black as night,
Chalky white rocks like petrified marshmallows,
Improbably pink rocks flecked with sparkling quartz (said to be the sweat of one of the early Maori chiefs in the area, produced when he challenged the taniwha in the Rakaia River).
When we first moved here, I brought home a pocketful of colourful stones every time we went to the beach.
I quickly realised I couldn’t keep doing that, or I’d end up with hundreds of jars full of rocks.
Now I allow myself one rock each beach visit. One rock that speaks to me. A rock that is more than all the other rocks on the beach.
The rock might bounce around in my pocket for a few weeks after I pick it up. I’ll pull it out and look at it, finger it in the pocket, feeling it’s shape, weight, and imperfections.
Most rocks then find a home in the cobble-lined drainage ditch that carries rainwater away from the house.
The very best rocks—those that whisper stories to me and fit my palm perfectly—become my writing rocks. These pebbles sit on my desk and occupy my hands while I’m contemplating a new plot or considering a character’s strengths and weaknesses. They capture the churning crucible of the earth’s crust, the rush of mountain streams, and the wildness of the sea. They tell me their stories, and I tell them mine.
Before the rain…
A week ago, I was looking at a garden struggling to stay alive, even with my regular watering and mulching. Relentless days of hot sun and no rain to speak of since early spring—things were grim.
Then, last Friday night it rained. Saturday was cloudy and rainy. Sunday, Monday and Tuesday were cloudy and misty. Four days of relief.
After the rain.
The garden responded. Many plants doubled in size in the past week. Zucchinis matured, pumpkin runners snaked into neighbouring beds, peas began a second flowering.
It will dry out again. The rain wasn’t nearly enough to make up for the drought. Already this afternoon, the temperature is back in the low 30s (nearly 90˚F).
But I’m thankful for the respite. It made all the difference to this week’s garden, and it will continue making a difference for weeks.
Sometimes that’s all we need—a vacation, a respite, a little time for recuperation, time to grow and fortify ourselves before we are plunged back into a struggle.
And now that it’s rained, my respite from weeding is over. The weeds responded as much as the crops did, and it’s back to the grindstone for me.
But I will do so with more cheer, knowing that the plants have had a break, too.
It’s apricot season, and though our tree isn’t giving yet, we’ve been buying lots of them. They began to mould today. There was only one thing to do–make apricot upside down cake!
The original upside down cake was made with canned pineapple rings, and was developed as a way to get people to buy canned pineapple. But I think it’s better made with fresh apricot slices.
Now, if only I had some whipped cream to go with this…
The days are getting shorter.
You might not notice unless you push the daylight as hard as I do. Because I get up so early, I can feel the shrinking days by early January.
It starts with me oversleeping. I don’t use an alarm, so as the days get shorter, I find myself sleeping longer. Just by a few minutes at first, but by now I don’t open my eyes until 5.15 am, and don’t bother getting up until 5.30—the animals tell time by the sun and won’t look for me until then anyway.
At some point, I’ll have to switch to getting up in the dark. At some point, the days won’t be long enough.
But for now, I’ll enjoy the extra sleep.
Tomatillo
Solanaceae—one of my favourite families of plants.
There are more than a few members of this family in the vegetable garden:
Tomatoes, potatoes, eggplants, cape gooseberries, capsicum (peppers), and tomatillos are all solanaceous plants.
Nicotiana
But they don’t end there. In the flower garden there are petunias and nicotiana, among the perennial fruits are gogi berries, and in the native garden there is poro poro.
And, of course, growing as weeds everywhere are black and hairy nightshade (these don’t get my favourite plant vote).
This diverse and sometimes tasty group of plants also includes many containing medicinal, poisonous or psychoactive chemicals (tobacco, mandrake, and deadly nightshade among them). Indeed, it’s best to be careful with the Solanaceae—even the edible ones contain poisons in the non-edible portions of the plants, or, as in the case of green potatoes, even in the edible parts. Solanine is the culprit in green potatoes—it causes diarrhoea, vomiting and hallucinations, and its bitter taste prevents herbivores from eating the potatoes. Other chemicals in the Solanaceae can have the opposite effect—reducing nausea in chemotherapy patients, and reversing the effects of poisoning by certain pesticides and chemical warfare agents.
And we’re still discovering more uses for these pharmacologically rich plants.
What’s not to like?
Robinne Weiss 