Sour Sweets, American cookery and foot massages

I was hoping to post this blog update in a happy mood, after all, we have peas! Yes, that’s right, the sweet peas that Jeff and I planted a few weeks ago have sprouted and they’re not about 2 inches tall – this has all happened in the last 5-6 days as when I checked last week, there was nothing to be seen.

So why not the happy mood? As I just found out I failed my ITIL exam by one mark, ONE mark! Talk about being gutted. I don’t usually fail at things so I guess this is a chance to deal with it and try again – Jeff has been very supportive, however I won’t deny I have an overwhelming desire to say ‘I told you so’ as I really did think I failed it. It’s not the end of the world, I know – however it’s never nice to be told you didn’t pass.

It’s a bit of a downer after the lovely night we had last night as well – I popped over to Jeff’s house after work, however he wasn’t back yet as he had been delayed getting some tryres for his car. This wasn’t an issue, so I made sure all the bird feeders were topped up and was quite happy to see that the tree he has out the back, is flowering – I’ll try and take a photograph of it at the weekend, it looks really pretty and I imagine the birds are happy as they have some extra cover for when they hop onto the bird feeders to scoff all the seed!

I also checked on the tulips and the sweet peas and the tulips have grown loads (again, I’ll try and take a photograph at the weekend) I’d say some of the tulips were about 3 inches in length so we obviously bought good ones back from Amsterdam. I can’t wait to see if all the colours were correct and we do actually have some blue and black ones. I suggested to Jeff that we now start leaving them outside during the day as they are currently still in his garage and really need natural light if they’re to grow big and strong!

When Jeff got back we went shopping for bits and bobs as we were cooking something new that night – ‘Lemon cod with basil bean mash’ http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/7189/lemon-cod-with-basil-bean-mash I know, ‘What the hell is basil bean mash?’ We had no idea, and trying to find frozen soya beans in the supermarket proved a bit of a pain as well! We (and by that, I mean ‘I’)- also bought some sour sweets as I had a real craving for them. Jeff has a very odd reaction to sour sweets and finds them really hard to eat, which I, of course, find really hilarious. He had one as he was a good sport, but declined any more. If you haven’t had any, I’d urge you to try and find them – they’re really morish!

With the sour sweets and dinner purchased, we headed back home and started cooking – Considering we both thought the basil bean mash would be absolutely vile, we were pleasantly surprised – it was certainly edible, so much so that we didn’t actually use the sweet potato we had bought as ‘backup’. That being said, Jeff thought it was lacking in flavour, so I think if we decide to do it again, we’ll put in more garlic or another flavour to make it more interesting.

Jeff and I then watched some TV – tonight we decided to shy away from our usual repertoire of ‘The Biggest Loser USA’ and ‘Embarrassing bodies’ and actually watch some cooking programs. Oh Dear God – ‘The Barefoot Contessa’ Ina Garten. I’d never even heard of her until last night and we watched a couple of her shows. How much fat is in each recipe? I don’t deny certain things of hers look interesting and she seems a very friendly woman, almost like an American Nigella Lawson, but if you ate all the stuff she cooked, you’d not be able to get through doors unless you turned sideways. That being said, we were lucky enough to catch a show where she did a low fat ‘chicken chilli’ – something you don’t really hear about in England, so Jeff and I recorded her program on his Sky plus and we’re going to try and recreate it on Friday night. Neither of us have ever tried to cook a recipe from the TV before... so it could be ‘interesting’....

After that, I asked Jeff to rub my arms as they were really hurting from the Personal Training session I had in the gym on Monday night. Jeff is a fantastic masseur and whilst he really helps me, I always feel guilty as he’s not really the type who likes being massaged. However, he did agree to let me rub his feet – which was quite funny as I really don’t mind feet in general (I know some people are really squeamish about them) so I managed to get him to let me rub various creams and things into his feet for about 15 minutes whilst pulling stupid faces. He did say it felt nice and I’m hoping it helps – I find most guys don’t tend to care as much about hard skin or nice cuticles as women, although maybe that’s just a false stereotype...

After that, it was time to head off home – this weekend should be really great as we’re heading to London to listen to a classical music concert in the evening. I think our plan is to head to London early afternoon so we can spend a good few hours ‘exploring’ and grab some food.

-Molly