Tag: food

Sunday Post #4
sunday post

Sunday Post #4

Cassie1 Comment

The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted at the @ Caffeinated Reviewer. It’s a chance to share news~ A post to recap the past week on your blog and showcase books and things we have received. Share news about what is coming up on our blog for the week ahead

Life
It has been a very busy – but very fun – week.

Wednesday, as I mentioned earlier, Li and I went to Exeter for the day. We went to the museum, Yo! Sushi, Waterstones, and Build-A-Bear.

Thursday I had my ADHD assessment – they said they had ‘no problems’ in diagnosing me and that some of my scores were ‘off the chart’.

I followed this up with a free taster massage at a place in town because my shoulder’s been aggravating me. It feels like there’s a huge knot and it’s resting on a nerve, making my fingers go tingly – definitely feels muscular. I went for the taster session because I’ve never had a massage before and I’m generally not a fan of people touching me, but I was in so much discomfort that I was willing to get it done. It was heavenly, I could move my neck and arm without things going crack, and I’ve already signed up for a full hours massage after payday.

Today is Li’s birthday, she’s streaming some Stardew this morning and we have a lazy afternoon planned.

Blogging
I have posted catch-up posts on Weekly Wednesday Blogging Challenge and Book Blogger Hop so I am now up to date on both of those – and hoping to stay on top of them, at least for a couple of weeks. I even managed a Stacking The Shelves yesterday.

This coming week I am aiming to stay on top of the Top Ten Tuesday, Weekly Wednesday, WWW Wednesday, and Book Blogger Hop. I also want to post some drive-by book reviews – I’ve read 25 books this year and have written nothing about any of them. I don’t know if I’ll do all 25, or just the 5 I finished in April.

Depending on how time-consuming work and study are, I would also really like to write a post about my thoughts on ‘classics’.

Cooking
I always cook more when I’m at Li’s and this week has been no exception! My meal plan runs Saturday through Thursday, so thinking back to last weekend:
Saturday – Sweet & sticky chicken noodles
Sunday – Honey & mustard sausage traybake
Monday – Cheesy tomato risotto
Tuesday – Mango chicken couscous

I really want to get my food blog back up and running again, so I can share recipes and ramble excitedly about food!

Reading
This week I have finished The Queen Of Nothing and Diddly Squat: A Year On The Farm.

I have also been reading From Memory to Written Record: England 1066 – 1307, The Hanging Tree, The Night Watch, and Skandar & The Unicorn Thief.

I’m about 85% through Skandar so should finish that this week and the next one is due out at the end of the month

Studying
I am now 87% of the way through my module which is a little bit terrifying! There are only 6 weeks left until my End of Module Assignment is due.

I’ve just finished a unit of work on Childhood in Ancient Rome which was actually really tough because there was a whole section on infanticide and exposing children.

Next week’s work is on mass entertainment in Roman life – gladiatorial shows, chariot races, and plays, and the social aspects of them: which social groups attended the shows, where they sat, and how they reacted to what they saw

My next assignment is due on the 27th of April and is 1300 words arguing either for or against the statement Ultimately it was wealth that determined social status in ancient Rome

Watching
Masterchef came back this week which makes me very happy. Star Trek: Picard continues to be fucking fantastic. It’s been a very disjointed week so there hasn’t been a whole lot of TV watched to be honest, other than a couple of Midsomer Murders while working.

Next week I’m hoping to catch up on a couple of shows – Carnival Row, Grace, School Spirits, Spencer Sisters, and A Town Called Malice. I’m 4 or 5 episodes behind on each so that shouldn’t take too long. There’s also the last Celebrity Bake Off and this week’s episodes of Race Across The World & Masterchef and the Picard finale!

Weekly Wednesday Blogging Catchup & What I’m Reading Wednesday… On A Thursday
weekly wednesday blogging challenge · www wednesday

Weekly Wednesday Blogging Catchup & What I’m Reading Wednesday… On A Thursday

Cassie3 Comments

Between work and health and school and just… life in general, I am a stressed and struggling llama right now. I have been hiding in books this last few weeks, lots of reading but no spoons to do any writing about the reading. Hell, over the last two weeks, typing has hurt because my hands have been so swollen and I’ve had to get two extensions on my Julius Caesar assignment. Co-codamol, naproxen and CBD have been my BFFs

Today, I actually feel like I have a little space in my brain and the pain levels are dropping off so I thought I’d catch up on some Weekly Wednesday Blogging Challenge questions that I’ve missed over the last few weeks – not all of them or I’ll be here all day but definitely a good handful of them.

My favourite food is a stuffed crust pepperoni pizza
Don’t get me wrong, I love cooking. And you can’t go wrong with some savoury mine and cheesy mash, or a good spaghetti bolognese, or a macaroni cheese, or a Full English.  But there’s something about a pepperoni pizza hits home in a different way. 

My favourite subject in school will probably come as no surprise to many people becuase it was history. From learning about the Romans and Vikings, to Medieval and Tudor times, to GCSE history and the history of medicine. I’d always planned on doing history at university – there was a history of science, medicine and technology degree that I really wanted to do – but it wasn’t to be, continued to love the subject and read all the non-history books about the times that I loved. And now I’m doing my Classical Studies degree and it’s amazing!

And, in a related question, My Favourite historical personage to read about isn’t generally a single person, but it’s all things related to the Plantagenets, the Wars of the Roses and the Tudors. Pretty much the whole British monarch from Henry II through to Elizabeth I. 
I have a book out the library right now on St George,  because I saw it on the shelf and realised I didn’t know much about the legends, or if there was an actual person they were based on. 

And then, even though it’s a Thursday, we have WWW Wednesday which asks:
What are you currently reading?
Mary Beard – The Roman Triumph
Andrea Penrose – Murder on Black Swan Lane
Chris Smith – The Naked Scientist
AF Steadman – Skandar and the Unicorn Thief

What did you recently finish reading?
Sarah J Maas – A Court of Mist and Fury
Mira Grant – Chimera
VE Schwab – Gallant
Jeremy Clarkson – Diddy Squat: A Year On The Farm
Talia Hibbert – Damaged Goods

What do you think you’ll read next?
Holly Black – The Wicked King
Talia Hibbert – Untouchable
Ransom Riggs – Library of Souls
Sally Rooney – Beautiful World, Where Are You?
Ruby Wax – A Mindfulness Guide for the Frazzled

Stacking The Shelves #4
stacking the shelves

Stacking The Shelves #4

Cassie6 Comments

I am feeling so fucking proud of myself right now y’all. I did a whole bunch of HUGE things in the week. Admittedly, I’m still exhausted and hurting but like beaming with pride.

Wednesday, we drove back down to the retail park just outside of Exeter and went into Currys. Li had been stealing my Switch and she’d moved onto my island in Animal Crossing, but she really wanted her own Switch. Because I’m an amazing Llama, I said that as long as she can afford/transfer me the monthly payments, we’d get her one on my Curry’s credit account. We sensibly waited for the Boxing Day sale, and there was an amazing bundle with 3 games and a memory card but the check-out process was just Not Working. We spoke to various customer service people but couldn’t get it to work. So we toddled to an Actual Store. Fucking annoyingly, that bundle wasn’t on sale anymore, and it was back up to well over £400 which we couldn’t quite afford. But she did get a Switch, a memory card and Animal Crossing.

Thursday was the biggest day. So I’d pre-booked us a table at Yo! Sushi in Exeter for 2pm, and we’d decided we were going in on the train a few days ago because of the noise Eliot had been making. And we’d decided I was going to have a treat in Waterstones because I legit cannot remember the last time I went to an actual bookstore. Way before the pandemic. To say I had a bit of a shopping spree would be an understatement. I spent close to £200 on books. I bought SIXTEEN books – though one of them is a guided journal and one of them was a drawing book for Li. And without trying, I managed 7 fiction and 7 non-fiction!

My poor credit card is curled up in the corner crying. And I earned enough Waterstones points that I had £20 credit so I maaaaaay have just also ordered

I’d grabbed a Yo! Sushi gift card in their sale – it was 20% off and I’d already said to Li that there was no budget for sushi, we could eat as much as we want to. We both love the place, neither of us has been to one in like 5 or so years. I got a £100 gift card and… well let’s just say that we earned enough bonus points in that one trip that dessert was free! LMFAO We ate about £60 worth of sushi and I tried a whole bunch of new dishes – and only one of them I didn’t eat because it was a weird texture. We will definitely be going back again, and I want to go to the Exeter museum as well so I think we’re planning on pencilling that in before I head back home at the end of January.

And then, because that apparently wasn’t enough books or something, I’ve also been to the library and checked out:

Although, to be fair, these were all reserved before Christmas.

I’ve had a bloody brilliant week, even though I’m still hopped up on co-codamol and naproxen a couple of days later. But I have all the books to read, my reading journal for 2023 is set up, and I’m super excited!

life

Yuletide Greetings

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Happy Yule y’all, and blessings for the New Year. Or, as Li puts it – Merry Everything and a Happy Always 🙂

It’s our second Christmas together and we’re still figuring out what that looks like for us. We’ve both spent many years alone and had our own traditions, we’re still blending them and working it all out. And of course, with her dad still in the hospital, we’re now changing it up again tomorrow because we’re going to have her mum over.

But we’re going to be making beef in the slow cooker, potatoes roasted in bacon fat, honey-roasted parsnips, Yorkshire puddings, pigs in blankets, and probably carrots and peas. We have Christmas cake and Christmas pudding and mince pies… and more cheese and chocolate than you can shake a stick at. I have next week off work and I believe the plan is essentially chilling, studying, reading and gaming. A whole lot of relaxing after the stress of the last few weeks.

Tonight we’re doing the Icelandic thing – we’ve bought each other like giant hoodie robe things, they come down to the knee and they’re lovely and snuggly. Li’s has the Grinch, mine has sleeping pandas. We’re snuggled down on the couch, Li is currently partaking in Toy Day on Animal Crossing: New Horizons. Later, we’ll make ourselves large mugs of hot chocolate and settle down with books and/or gaming. Li bought me Love On The Brain and I bought her World Of Warcraft: Sylvanus

I also treated myself to Harvest Moon: Light Of Hope in the Nintendo festive sale. It was 70% off, what was I supposed to do? LOL

weekly wednesday blogging challenge · www wednesday

Weird Food and What I’m Reading Wednesday

Cassie6 Comments

It is now Thursday that I’m getting round to posting this – but I did at least start writing it yesterday (Wednesday). The evening got a little busy, I got hyperfocused on completely my ‘Adult’ Autism Assessment referral form (the irony of hyper-focusing on something relating to being ND is not lost on me), I lost track of time, and then it was bedtime. But hey ho, that’s the way it goes.

This week’s Weekly Wednesday Blogging Challenge asks about weirdest food you love and I’m actually already grinning about this because it’s a Thunder and Lightning. Anyone who isn’t from the West Country is already confused so allow me to explain:
You take a nice thick slice of fresh bread, a good spread of butter, a generous spread of golden syrup, and then a dollop of clotted cream on top. (If you’re Cornish and do it wrong, you can always put cream on first and then drizzle the syrup, but I’ve always done syrup then cream because that’s the correct Devon method.) When I was a kid, my dad used to pair it with an ice cream float.
And now I’m hungry LOL

Can I also just say I’m looking forward to next week which is all about fanfiction – and fic just happens to be one of my favourite things!

WWW Wednesday
What are you currently reading? Mira Grant – Symbiont. And it’s keeping my attention well enough that it’s the only book I’m really reading right now. I usually jump around between 3 or 4 as you know
What did you recently finish reading? Joanna Hickson – First Of The Tudors
What do you think you’ll read next? Natalie J Case – Thanátou