Auntie B's Birthday

Saturday was auntie B’s birthday. I won’t embarrass her by telling you she is 71. It was one of ‘those’ occasions because she has been in hospital for 8 weeks and a care home for the last two. She has cancer.

Auntie B and I were always close, as was the case with Auntie O. Auntie O was my godmother and Auntie B was my brother’s godmother but it didn’t matter because the both treated us as if they were godmothers to us both. Auntie O passed 11 years ago. I miss her still even though I know she visits. I feel her presence at times and to be honest I don’t really know what to do. So I just smile at her.

Auntie O worked office hours and Auntie B worked mornings and evenings so they could look after my grandmother between them. Auntie O came home for her lunch when she worked nearby so it seemed as though theirs was a house filled with activity. Someone was always coming or going. My mother is from a big family so there were different cousins, aunts, uncles and friends all passing by and dropping in. The front door was never locked.

Auntie B taught me to knit. She was an Aran specialist and made it look so simple. Her catchphrase was its only plain and purl twisted around. This meant that I never panicked over a pattern I knew it was only plain and purl twisted around. I have a strange way of holding needles and sometimes it looked like I could lose the lot. Auntie B knew it didn’t matter. Once she was happy with the tension, I could hold the work as daft as I pleased.

Auntie B‘s evening job was in a local corner shop.  She was a wiz at adding up bills in her head. She had the register perfect to the penny every night at closing. The owner trusted her so much she was allowed to bring me with her when I spent summer holidays with the aunties.  There would be an outcry over child labour now but then as an eight year old I was perched up on a stool behind the counter serving customers their cigarettes and chocolate, milk and bread. The only job I wasn’t allowed to do was cut the cooked meat. I longed for the day I would be old enough to use the meat slicer.  Then, I thought, I would be grown up.

If I had no plans on a Friday night or if I was staying of a weekend to save money for something I spent them with the aunties. We would order pizza and sides, hire a movie (on video tape then) and have a great laugh. By then my Gran had died and they had moved to another part of their town. There were fewer callers, my cousins grew up and forgot about their aunties who were as good to them as they were to me and my bro. Eaten bread is soon forgotten. But selfishly I had them all to myself.

Auntie O had retired and bought a good car so they came to ours on a Monday and Thursday. I made sure I got home from work and by then I knew how to wind them up and Auntie O especially used to get tormented with jokes. One Christmas she fell asleep in the chair so me and bro covered her in Christmas decorations, took photos and took the decorations off her again. Then I sent a photocopy of each photo to her in the post every day for a week.

Auntie B had a bad heart. She had rheumatic fever as a child followed by chorea. Neither of these are heard of now.  This damaged her valves and made her weak for years. She had endless hospital appointments and Doctor’s visits. Auntie O was in good health. Or so we thought.

She took ill and cancer was discovered. She lasted 6 weeks. Auntie B was on her own. So every Sunday she came to me for the day. Mum and Dad had turned native and gone to live in the country growing organic fruit and veg so me and B got on with city living. She would come in to me in work and we would go for lunch. Then the heart got worse and she needed surgery. Two valves were replaced and the third was repaired somewhat. But she was fine. She stayed with me for two weeks and refused to eat anything but spring rolls and chips from the local take away. I still have issues with spring rolls!

Auntie B wasn’t feeling so good. Her consultant wanted to run tests. I told her to agree. She wouldn’t.  I talked to her again but no. Then she caught a virus and was hospitalised anyway. This is when the cancer was discovered.
She had a 7 inch tumour removed from her bowel. Then she got an infection which put her back a lot. Then her blood pressure dropped. This was set back number two. She was very weak and lost a load of weight along with her strength. Then to her consultant’s surprise she bounced back. She bounced back so much she began to give out to the nurses if they didn’t meet her exacting standards. They didn’t know B is a fireball so they sent a psychiatrist to access her for Alzheimer’s as she was telling them to effing be careful with her if they were rough and effing answer the bell when she rang. She realised from the questions what was happening and asked did they think she was effing losing it. She told them at 70 years she had earned the right to be forgetful but she wasn’t crackers yet!

She is in the care home to build her strength up for her chemotherapy. She sees her oncologist on Tuesday. I wish him luck. Mum as her older sister is going with her. She doesn’t swear so much with mum. My money is still on Auntie B.

On her birthday every year we order too much Chinese food and I get a cake and we spend it together.  This year, we came to the care home. It is such a great place. They have a coffee shop on site as there is a walk into the mountains by the home so it is full of residents and their visitors along with hill walkers and strollers. We arranged a cake and surprised her. My brother, his wife and the angel child were there as well as my cousin and his family and my Uncle F. Dad was master of ceremonies. We had a great time.

Auntie B kept some cake for the nursing staff and told them to leave some for the night shift. She got teased about a night carer she gets on with and she said yes she needed her eye candy! She is irrepressible.

She told me she has to beat this because she wants to enjoy the angel child growing up. She won a championship medal for camogie and taught each of us how to hurl. She really believes she will make a good fist of beating it as she knows how to win at a tough team sport. I can’t argue with that.

She is also planning a new kitchen as she says she needs a split level cooker on account of the fact she can no longer bend or stoop. And she says she is bored with her cupboard doors. She has started to swear at us when we torment her and she has got into trouble for walking around on her own. I have a feeling she may be around to teach the angel child a bit about hurling yet. I think she may have a few other plans too.
 Wishing you many more birthdays Auntie B.
Keep Smiling

My Mate wants an E Reader

Quite by accident I read Wuthering Heights on my iPhone on Friday. I didn’t plan to. I was looking at apps and updates and I managed to find myself looking at a particular app I installed a while ago. I don’t actually know what I did but I navigated myself on to the first page. It’s a long time since I read Wuthering Heights. 

This made me think about the e reader phenomenon. I have looked at it and as a computer illiterate I left it at that. My friend wants one. He is a computer genius and loves gadgets so much that when he finds a new one he buys one for himself and one for his girlfriend, regardless of if she wants one or not.  He is waiting to buy an e reader, as he reckons the price will go down.  He also reckons that as well as a price drop a few other things will get tweaked and then they will be an amazing piece of kit.

It’s a funny one, the e book thing. It seems that some people are embracing it with literally both hands. Some of us know the technology is there but it’s for computer lovers and not us just yet. And then there are those who will never go for an e book no matter what the deal is.

E reading has its plus side. First there is the price difference. E books are less expensive. Then as was the case with my Wuthering Heights I didn’t have to pay anything. The app is free and because the book is out of copyright I can download and read for nothing. There is a second app I have installed which was also a free app so I have plenty of free reading

The environmental issue comes next. There is no paper used or glue or ink so it is clearly greener. The only energy requirement is electricity to charge the reader. The charge isn’t that much so that’s all good.

There is a convenience factor. An e book can be bought and downloaded pretty quickly. From my limited knowledge which was gleaned from a talk at the Writers Centre Dublin,
http://www.writerscentre.ie/, a lot of e book readers buy their e books for the speed of access to their purchase and one woman, described as mature, apparently buys a couple of e books a week.

Next has to be the ease of travel. The difference in weight in your bag between War and Peace in paperback or on an e reader is quite significant. It would be the difference between having a sore shoulder or not. A school in the West of Ireland are bringing in a scheme where iPads will be used with the School books loaded on to them from the next academic year. The local credit union are offering loans to parents for the scheme as it will cost €700.00 for the package. The kids interviewed were thrilled. Especially as the current schoolbag weighs the equivalent of a two year old child and this weight is carried by 13 year old children.

Having said all of this the paper book is still a thing of beauty. There is something so cool about walking into a proper bookseller and browsing around. What do I mean by a proper bookseller? It is a proper book store, owned by a book lover and staffed by book lovers. Instead of these big outlets with top sellers pushed at you with offers and discounts and staff who are only there to move units and as fast as possible, you get a piece of tranquillity in a small corner of book heaven.
 You feel the calm energy as you walk in. Other customers are in their own place seeking the pleasure of their own favourite genre and there is no rush or hurry, no music or narrow aisles forcing you to grab and get out. These booksellers know their people and often know what you are about just by looking at you.

Very often a beautiful pearl is to be found in these places. You are wandering around and there is a book you never knew existed. A  single little gem waiting for you. I never fail to go into one of these wondrous places without finding such a book.

There is a lovely feeling to walking in and finding a lovely new book, paying for it with inked paper and opening it in your reading place. There is the smell of new paper and fresh ink the feeling of this new piece of art in your hand.  It’s the curling up on the sofa comfortably with the book of the day, your new best friend. It feels like a unique human experience, sharing Authors thoughts and being part of that journey from the author’s imagination to the physical presence of their work in reality.

Even a second hand or used book has energy of its own. As well as the authors energy there is the previous reader’s energy coming from the pages. I even like marks notes in margins and underlines. It brings to me how this book was part of someone else’s life for a while.
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Am I anti e book? No.

Am I unimpressed by the e book phenomenon? No.

Has it a place in the joy of reading? A resounding yes.

However the written word gets to people so they can love it, hate it, discuss it, debate it, recommend it, is all that matters. I will probably be reading more on the iPhone.  I will still be hanging out in my favourite booksellers promising myself I will only buy the one book this time and never quite managing it. I will always find the little booksellers gem that is place on the shelf just for me. I could still find that gem in the e book store on line without a doubt. As long as writers write and readers read there is room for all formats. 
  
Keep smiling

Meditating and me

I’ve been feeling a bit wired today. There’s nothing terribly unusual in that what with Auntie B still in hospital and going down with an infection after her surgery. Then I’ve been settling the dog into his new routine, aging hippie style. Veggie food is growing on him. (A bit) Mum is not having a great week pain wise and now her brother is in hospital in the U.S so she is worrying about him. Dad is a bit tired which is understandable and one of my friends is going through a strange phase and I don’t know should I slap him or hug him. (Slapping him is in the lead right now by a mile)

What I have been doing lately when I have been a bit under the weather is go to my blog list and read a few of the blogs there and lo and behold I always manage to find something there to help me feel better.

Tonight I found on Superior health awaits you, (superiorhealthawaitsyou.blogspot.com) three lovely relaxing video clips. Then I found my answer.

Scorpiomoonrose, you are not meditating enough!!!

I’ve been quick fixing you see. I have been getting by on short meditations or meditating at times that are really worse than useless.

I must be practising meditation for over twenty years now. For about the last eight I have taken it a lot more seriously. I have learned some Qi Gong and have found the mediation in standing poses have brought me on leaps and bounds. I was always a tiny bit mercurial I suppose and I found that working with Qi Gong has calmed me down considerably. It hasn’t taken the edge off my tongue though; I still can be quite direct.

I do a Qi Gong routine first thing every morning called the eight pieces of brocade followed by my mediation poses. At first the standing meditations were difficult. I found my mind wandering off but then I read somewhere that in order to calm and empty the mind when it wanders off, bring it back by simply counting to ten. Surprisingly enough it works. It does centre you. Also there is six poses in the series so having to change your stance helps to keep in the right zone.
Where I have been falling back is on the longer meditations I use a few times a week in the evenings. I have some apps on my iPhone and I have some great C.D’s that I use.
Most of the meditations are around half an hour long but they must be the shortest half hours in the week.

What I have found with meditation practice is how in tune you become with the world around you. I found I noticed birds singing all the time. I would see maybe a leaf dancing in the breeze and I felt in that moment that I am part of everything in this world.  The most noticeable was how much happier I am.  Off the back of this I found the good relationships improved and the unhealthy ones were re evaluated. Some came to their natural end and others reached an understanding and shifted to a better place. The most important thing for me was a feeling that I am a free spirit, free to be myself and also free to change whenever I need to. I don’t need to accept anything as my lot. I can acknowledge that I have learned something new; I can take this new lesson on board and do what feels right with it.

I started writing again as part of this process and I think it has helped so much with how I write and how I see as a writer. I also find that I can go to a deeper place to find what I need emotionally to build the character or the scene I am working on. In some ways I meditate on what I am trying to create and I have a more effective creative process than I had before.  Sometimes I thought I didn’t know what I was going to write and by just centring I had a head full of words in no time at all.

In this crazy world of ours and in times when the card game of life has dealt you a hand that could be better at least by meditating and having this time to yourself you can embrace the reassurance that when the cards are dealt again as they are throughout the days and weeks and seasons of this life the next hand is going to be a royal flush!

And I may not have to slap my friend after all.

Keep smiling.

The Cool Cream Hero

I know I don’t usually appear so soon again especially after being missing for so long but this is the beauty of owning a web book (I’m showing off now). That and the fact I work in Dublin City Centre and the Queens visit has led to a lock down, I am spending my lunchtime blogging instead of gadding around the shops.

I promised I would relate my experiences making skin cream.  I was a bit nervous until I had the run of things but in honesty the lovely people at www.aromantics.co.uk  make the kit so easy to use.

I originally found Aromatics by accident. I saw an article in the newspaper saying they sold Aloe Vera powder and I thought it woI promised I would relate my experiences making skin cream.  I was a bit nervous until I had the run of uld be useful. My Mother was having allergic reactions to different lotions so I thought the powder would be worth a try. So I checked the website and saw all they have on offer.

I decided on the skin cream starter kit and sent away for it. My initial reaction was to buy everything on the website but I controlled myself and went with the skin cream kit.

When it arrived I really had not expected everything to be so organized. The pack has each ingredient already weighed and bagged which is a huge help. All the necessary oils are included along with a proper thermometer. Also included is a bag of plastic jars to put your newly made cream into. All I really had to buy was two stainless steel bowls, and I just used my usual cooking pots as a double boiler. I almost forgot but I bought a cheap as chips spatula as well.

I bought glass jars off the website too as I am not a big fan of plastic but I used some glass jars that were destined for my local bottle bank which worked out fine.

The instruction leaflet is very straight forward and easy to follow. I’m not usually good with written instructions but these were really good and clear.

The easiest thing to do is lay out the ingredients for each stage. There is a water stage and a fat stage with ingredients for both in the pack.  For the water stage you need to use spring water, which isn’t in the pack. All the ingredients for the fat stage are there. There is a third stage to add ingredients and then the last stage is optional, you can decide to add scented oils if you wish.
 
So I took up my position at the cooker. I used the ancient chocolate melting method, with the two bowls over a pot each of hot water. For the fat stage the ingredients are added in the stated order on the recipe leaflet and you just watch them melt. For the water stage the ingredients are added to the freshly boiled spring water and mixed. Then it’s just a matter of temperature testing to make sure both are at the right levels at the same time to add to each other. I had to move the mixes on and off the heat to get this right but it’s not a hassle.

When both mixes are ready they are added together. At this stage you have to be a bit careful. The fat mix is carefully added to the water mix in a steady stream and mixed well as you go. I had an old hand mixer for this and because the ingredients are so safe washing the mixer in the dishwasher and using it again on food would be fine.
 The only reason I bought special bowls was that I read somewhere that certain cakes don’t mix properly if there is anything in the bowl you are using. I am fussy with my cakes but that is just me. I would say that it is perfectly fine to use your own bowls if you are cool with that.  Then the waiting begins again for the mixture to cool to the right temperature for the next ingredients

These ingredients are mixed in as soon as the cream reaches the right temperature as per the recipe leaflet. At this stage the cream is cooling and is the right consistency. It actually looks and feels like moisturiser.

  Finally, when the mix has reached a lower temperature again, you can add any essential oil you want. I divided the mixture and made one half patchouli scented in keeping with the aging hippie thing and the other half I made rose scented because Rose is my favourite scent.

I found the easiest way to fill the jars was with to load an old icing bag with the cream and pipe it into the jar. I’m sure a sandwich bag with the corner cut out of it would work fine too. After that my batch was ready.

The longest part the process is the cooling. You spend a good bit of time watching to get everything to the right temperature and that does mean a bit of hanging around. I found it an evening job really because I just think while it is such an easy process I wouldn’t want to stop and leave it while I had to do something else.

The finished result is a lovely soft cream. It is very light but unlike other light creams I have used in the past it doesn’t soak into the skin to nothing. I use it as a face and a body cream and it is lovely to use.

I have a bit of a skin problem, nothing major I am just prone to dry skin in some areas and spots at other times. Also I get some mad itching if I eat certain foods and the cream has been perfect for all of these as they have flared up. Best of all for me is that I know exactly what is in the cream. There are so many weird chemicals in some of our cosmetics such as hormone unbalances and strange metals so I know exactly what I am putting on my skin.

It’s the old saying, taking care of me inside and out!

I haven’t simplified the process, it really is as easy as I say. The time consuming part is just the temperature watching but the process itself is very straight forward. If you can cook a meal, you can make skin cream from this pack.  I would say to anyone considering giving it a go, go for it. The aromantics website is a great site with loads of helpful stuff so there is nothing to fear.

Go on, give it a go!

Keep smiling.

Life and other Sagas

It is nearly a month since the aging hippie last put in an appearance in blogspace. It wasn’t supposed to be that way but life has an annoying habit of taking up my time.

A small series of sagas have taken place and seem to have grabbed my pal, father time, and whisked him past me at breakneck speed while I stood there with my gob open thinking it can’t be Sunday yet!!

Saga one.  Not cool.

My aunt was rushed in hospital on Easter Saturday. She wasn’t in the best of fettle for a fortnight but seemed to be getting better in herself. Then, she took a bit of turn and as a result has had surgery. She is doing fine considering. Apart from thinking there was a bomb scare at the hospital and she had to stay in her bed, thinking the man beside her is a homeless man who gets into any bed for a rest and mistaking her bed control for her pain killer pump and sending herself up to great heights she is ok

I am close to auntie b and as she has been in shaky health for a few years (2 valves replaced in her heart and a few minor issues) I keep an eye on her. She taught me how to bake as a kid among other stuff and you don’t forget the good people in your life. She has been a great support to me since mum had to move in with me due to her being wheelchair bound from side effects of a certain drug. Mum and Dad live in a rural area so the local hospital wouldn’t be great which is why I insisted they take temporary lodging with me.  It’s been interesting!

Saga two. Kinda cool.

When mum and dad moved here Auntie B took their dog. My dog, Shankly, was alive at the time and was too old and ill to cope with a younger fitter dog tearing around his garden. No one thought mum would be ill for so long but her dog was happy with B. As it happens two of her neighbours would borrow him for walks as one, a lady, felt safer walking with a dog and the other, a gent, likes to walk in the park but fears being mistaken for a pervert walking alone. (So much for our society)
When my darling dog passed, B kept mums dog as he had his friends. But in the light of saga one I now have Spud the dog. He is good mostly but when he gets bored he resorts to kleptomania. His favourites are socks from the washing machine and dad’s cigarette lighters.

Saga three. So cool I could explode with happiness!

My brother came home three days after Easter with the latest edition to our family. He and my sister in law adopted a little boy, aged one. Not only am I auntie at last I am a god mother too. It doesn’t get much cooler than that. He is an angel child. And the best thing to happen to us since ……!!!!

Saga four. Birds

This is a little off chronologically but I have been minding my brother’s budgie since he and my sis in law had to go and get the angel child. I have my own albino budgie, paisley, who is hilarious and now I have Suarez on a temporary basis. These two feathered lunatics are priceless and will deservedly get a blog of their own.

With me so far?

I have my semi invalid mum with me, along with my dad who divides his time between here and his home, an aunt in hospital who is scatty after surgery, a kleptomaniac dog, two deranged budgies, an angel child for a nephew who was christened last week and oh I nearly forgot I went down with a dose of norovirus for a few days in the middle of all this.  Do I get forgiven for lack of blogging?

I promise (especially to mammydoolittle) that the next blog is the skin cream making update. And I won’t be missing so long ever again. Why? Because I just bought one of those little baby notebook laptops. It isn’t great memory wise but at least I can grab it and blog on like a martini any time any place any where. Provided I can get the thing set up!

Did I mention I pulled a muscle in my ankle trying to walk in heels at the Christening.

Keep smiling.

Tasting Indian (again)

This time of year I get a bit hyper and full of ideas. I think it’s what my grandmother used to say about the rise of the leaf invigorating us all. I must come out of hibernation then drive myself and everyone else around the twist with the next scheme I come up with.

Take yesterday for example. I had my car booked in for the N.C.T. The purple princess passed her test with flying colours after much nerve racking observation from the gallery. The reason it was nerve racking was because the tester seemed to develop a bit of a thing for her, in that he tested her brakes twice and spent a lot of time checking her undercarriage. In the time it took him to test my P.P, three other cars were done in each of the lanes. But he declared her passed and said she was a cracking little car.  Bit of motor maternal pride was experienced!

On the way back I spotted a new Asian supermarket, and I had to go and check it out. I was really impressed with it. In fact I am so impressed I took a registration form so I can get details of all their offers. This is because as I browsed the aisles to the sound of beautiful Indian music, I took it into my head to re ignite my interest in Indian cookery and make friends with my Madhur Jaffrey cook book again.  I am even planning a paneer making session over Easter and will be having a go at the beloved Dal soup recipe that has been overlooked for a while followed by my all time favourite Biryani.

                                    

This is one of the aging hippie’s weaknesses. I adore a good Biryani. Each time I go for Indian food I promise myself I will try another dish but I always get drawn back to Biryani. I stand up to myself at places I’ve eaten in before and change, but if it’s a new place I head straight for the love of Biryani.

                                                     

So I will be back with my shopping list to pick up my split peas and spices, ready to cook popadoms and whatever else takes my fancy. If we don’t get hot summer in Ireland this year at least my kitchen will have an Indian one. I read somewhere that in Indian there is 2000 different varieties of rice. This is because, as part of the food culture different rice were used for different seasons or different health reasons. In order to protect these ( no,i am not getting on my soap box today about G.M) the inspirational Vandana Shiva has established 34 seed banks in 13 states in order to protect these and increase awareness of protecting our planet. Why do I know this? Because I have a rice obsession. I love the stuff.

In the meantime I shall be planning the new menus and keeping you all posted on what works or who gets their head blown off with too much chilli. I am now off to cook up another one of my ideas. I have decided to make some skin cream from a kit I bought from www.aromantics.co.uk. I will let you know in the next post how I got on with that. Hopefully I will be scented of Rose or patchouli for the next few months.

Until the next brainwave!

Keep smiling

Look What I Got!

I got a lovely surprise this week. My blog received a nomination for the Liebster Blog award!          This came to me from http:// Mammydolittle.blogspot.com.

To receive a nod like this from ‘one of me own’, another Lady blogger was so beautiful as I am not around the blogsphere very long and someone found me and liked my ramblings enough to do this. On the way I found some other great blogs via mammy dolittle such as http://muminmeltdown.blogspot.com and http://polythenepram.blogspot.com. Nice to meet you girls!

The Liebster awards are for little blogs with less than 300 subscribers in order to share the blog love and spread the word.  

So here are the Liebster rules for nominations.

1. Post Blog displaying the award and then link to who awarded you.

2. Choose your own blogs to nominate and let them know they have been awarded.

3.  Hope this gets new favourites for everyone to follow.

4. Spread the blog love.

Here are my nominees:

www.caroloates.com.

Carol has published her first book, Shades of Atlantis but first and foremost is mum to her boy Eric and she has blogged beautifully about both Eric and writing.

www.twentyorsomething.com.

I love this blog! She has a wonderful blog writing style.

www.lamusewritersandartistsretreat.com.

This is a great blog. Its fun and also a really cool family blog as well as being about the retreat. Also it’s their fault I blog, right John.

www.sarahdeming.typepad.com/spiralstaircase

This lady has some great recipes in her archives to check out as well as being one true inspiration in the last few months.

Well the weather this week has been lovely and all my little seedlings are reaching up and having a look at the world. My little herbs are doing well so that will be fun using them from their little box. I have the mint in a pot of its own as it is what gardeners describe as aggressive. This, in aging hippie speak, means mint likes the idea of owning the entire garden, and will spread like wildfire if left to express itself. So if mint lives in its own pot it is better for all concerned. I am still looking forward to the day when I infuse my own mint tea. When that time comes I will let you know how that went as it will take a few attempts to get it right. I will either smell like a toothpaste factory from drinking it too strong or end up with warm water a ‘hint of mint’.  Ne’er mind.

Keep smiling,