If it's a day, that must be a castle

Five castles, one cathedral, several views. In forty-odd hours.

Culminating this morning in Durham Cathedral, where we climbed the tower.

325 steps.

Three Hundred And Twenty-Five Steps. All of them going upward. (And then exactly the same number coming down again. Gravity helps, but not enough.)

I'm tired now. And disinclined to work, despite numerous unfinished urgencies. Even uploading photos to Flickr (and I still have 600-odd photos from Provence to work through) feels like too much work.

I might play with my new router, but that I was out when it tried to deliver itself so now I can't pick it up till Monday.

I might do something useful downstairs, go back to sorting out that cupboard (having spectacularly failed in the throwing-things-out dept last time I approached it, and thus still having a dining-room full of Stuff), only, well. Tired. Well tired.

I could read a book, maybe?

Whittle by whittle

In which I surprise myself, by clearing out a little more of that cupboard, and getting rid of some stuff.

The last of the manky carpet is gone. (Also, the exposed wall no longer feels damp to my hand, so that's good, I think.) So have some objects surplus to requirements, which I think good enough to go for back-alley freecycling. And some leftover half-rolls of wallpaper have gone in the recycling; I don't know if they technically count as 'paper' within the meaning of the act, but I face no repercussions if they don't.

Little by little, then - but that's enough for now. Let the space breathe a little. I am making bread, because I have none, and planning to drink wine now. And maybe watch a movie. *wants spaceships and rayguns, please*

Meanwhile, in Toronto...

I had an e-mail this morning from an old friend in Toronto, whom I had put in touch with a new friend in Toronto; and I was sitting here thinking about them having a nice time in Toronto, and wishing there was maybe an SF con in Toronto so that I would have an excuse to go visit - and then I saw this.

SFContario.

Alas, I think it's too soon, I'm too broke, etc etc. Still. Maybe you-all will go and make it a huge success, and then they'll do it again next year, and we'll be able to go too? Maybe...?

In other newses...

Potatoes: for some years now, I've been cutting up new potatoes into chunks, tossing them in oil or butter in a casserole dish, adding herbs or garlic or onion or whatever, slapping the lid on and leaving them in a low oven until scrummy.

Today, I added half a shredded Savoy cabbage to that mix.

Om-nom-nom. (As it happens, I had leftover coq au vin to go with; but you don't need that. Put some bacon in there, put an egg on top: that's a dinner. One more variation on the colcannon/bubble & squeak thing.)

Even better than potatoes: klwilliams is coming for Christmas! And New Year! And my birthday, and Phantoms...

*plots*