Guinea Pigs and Toads

It's been a bit of a roller coaster week for us here. Sadly, last week my guinea pig went to the big hutch in the sky. He was six years old which is about as ancient as I've ever heard a guinea getting to and Husband and I miss him very much.


But on a cheerier note, today is my birthday. I have been treated to coffee and cake (a rather disappointing orange and cranberry muffin. Mine are nicer...) and I've spent my birthday money on books about physics. I've become slightly obsessed with the concepts of quantum mechanics and string theory and consequently I am turning more and more nerd like everyday. If I ever start talking about Dungeons and Dragons, you have my permission to perform and intervention!

I was asked by my friend Nick for some new recipes and it was a toss up between baklava muffins and toad in the hole. The baklava muffin recipe was for my demanding sister and frankly Nick asked more politely so he gets first dibs! Here is a picture of Nick (I'm so sorry, you're going to kill me now!), he's the young man wearing a Liverpool shirt and a scowl. This was taken on a school field trip to Normandy when we were 12. You can see everyone teetering on the brink of teenage attitude. I am however grinning like a fool at the front in a frankly awful t-shirt and a nice cagoule.

Anyway, here you go:

Toad in the Hole

This recipe is based on ratios so there aren't any measurements for the flour and milk, it all depends on the volume of your eggs. This means you don't need scales, just a measuring jug. I'm almost tempted to write and equation....

2 large eggs
semi skimmed milk
plain flour
sausages
tbsp vegetable or sunflower oil

Ovenproof dish
Preheat oven to 200C/400F/Gas 6

Break the eggs into a measuring jug and note the volume, then add an equal volume of milk. Whisk them together and then pour into a bowl. Wash and thoroughly dry the jug, then use to measure out the same amount of flour. You need to make sure to shake the jug a bit to level the flour out. Now sift this on to the milk and egg mixture, beat until smooth then set aside.

Put the oil into your oven proof dish then add your sausages. You don't want a huge dish, but one in which the sausages are quite snug. Once the oven is to temperature, put the sausages in for 10 minutes. This starts the sausages cooking (about which I am perpetually paranoid) and heats the oil for the batter. One the 10 minutes is up, open the oven and pour the batter over the sausages, close the door and don't look at them for at least 30 minutes. If you must look only do so if you have a window in your oven door. Opening the door (well actually to be correct it's the subsequent closing) knocks the air out of the batter and you're left with something really depressing.

Once it is cooked and monstrously risen and delicious looking serve any way you wish. Husband likes too much gravy and mange tout.

I felt the earth move...

As always, without fail I get to February and start yelling at the outdoors. Mainly things along the lines of 'Oh can you just warm up a bit please!' and 'Alright, it's cold I get it, stop showing off!' By now I've just had enough of winter. Being bundled up in hats and scarves and gloves and ear muffs and coats and ponchos and wellington boots and vests and jumpers and tights since November is starting to grate a little. Now, I'm not asking for hot weather, Lord no. I've a whole litany of complaints about the hot weather too, just you wait. What I'm asking for is some light at the end of the tunnel. Preferably some light that will promote lots of lovely Vitamin D in my body, leading to much better skin. Which is whole 'nother raft of complaints. Well, as the outdoors seems to be plodding along with it's season at it's own rate I decided to inject some colour into my word through the medium of brooch and badge making. Hmm, diverse. I'm not entirely sure what on earth I'm going to do with these, but if there's anyone that thinks that they'd like one, let me know.

The first design is slightly South East Asian in it's shape, but very stylised. I think they're really fun, and I love the way the colours play with each other. My personal favourites are the red/white colour way, which is very Maltese. Probably why I like them.


This next one is from a fantastic brooch kit I bought on this 'ere tinkleweb. This website is yummy and I bought rather more that I should have. But I don't think you can have too much ricrac, yes? The design is a pansy and I love how they come together. You look at the petal pieces and just think 'How the Bejeesus does that work then?' Once you start playing with them, it all comes together. It's so fun.


The last badges were just me playing about with scraps whilst watching the most amazing documentary about nuclear fusion. 'Er, really?' I hear you ask, but yes really. It was presented by a rock star sort of physicist driving a bright red Mustang around California and saying complicated things and trying to make BIG ideas seem like normal size ideas. Such ideas were:

1. Temperature on the surface of the Sun: 6000 degrees Celsius
2. Temperature at the core of the Sun: 15 million degrees Celsius
3. The amount of energy released by the Sun in a single second could power the United States for 100 years
4. They can create stars in a lab.

Now, why this made me want to create badges I have no idea, but there it is. Maybe I could sense that it was probably something that Mr Brain-Box Physicist wasn't able to do, at least not without a lot of theorising, hypothesising, mathematicising and probably some cursing about felt/thread vectors. I however just jump right in, get the felt and the thread and go nuts.


Oh and just in case anyone was wondering, that's reading as in the verb, to read. Not the town in Berkshire. Which is not sexy. These went down very well with my coworkers and I think I may begin a range of '...is Sexy' and ' I heart ...' badges. A selection of dork like statements including

• Quantum Mechanics is Sexy
• Indexing is Sexy
• I heart Beethoven
• I heart Folk

All suggestions gratefully received. The more dork like the better.