Unobtainable furniture

I was watching Upstairs Downstairs tonight. It's fairly rubbish - embarrassingly so at times - but I fell in love with this kitchen cupboard. I love it, I want it, I'm never likely to ever source one though or, if I did, be able to afford it. A girl can dream.

Baggergate overhaul no. 1

So, we've been in our new house on 'the-street-formerly-known-as-Baggergate' since November, and things are finally starting to take shape. Going unfurnished has meant lots of trips to the fabulous Community Furnite Store, abusing the kindness of family, buying unwanted furniture from departing friends, and an unhealthy Pinterest obsession with house decor.

My favourite achievement so far is our shelves: a sure sign of my impending middle age. The premise was simple. Buy some plywood shelves and cover the undersides and front with wallpaper. Turned out after some digging that someone had (unsurprisingly) already thought of this.

Problem number one: I got back from the timber merchants to find a tonne of real wood shelves from the 1960s in the skip at work. Consider some of them dutifully salvaged (with permission!). Fortunately for my sanity, they weren't long enough for the alcove we wanted, so the original plan went ahead.

Problem number two: I am rubbish at putting up shelves and the struts are too close together. Ho hum. They've not fallen down yet!

And finally...

Last night was my very first appearance on television in a local regional news programme on BBC. The slot didn't disappoint, with atmospheric music, helicopter shots of sweeping landscapes, re-enactors in a bloody battle scene, and moody midnight shots in a graveyard.

It's a shame that we didn't manage to get our results done in time for the finished piece. It's a bigger shame that I didn't get my roots done before filming, and that my overriding feeling coming away from it was "why can't York University afford any chairs?".**



** In all seriousness, the filmaker did a lovely job, and it was a fun project to work on. We'll be writing it up soon!


*

My job is weird because...

...today I am x-raying joints of pig that have been bludgeoned by replicas of Egyptian weapons (daggers, axes, maces).

What I have learned is that even meat that is only a few days old can permeate your nostrils in an unpleasant way that you'd not thought possible. Barbecues are not top of my list right now.

Of apples and fire monsters

Having lived in metropolitan areas for most of my life, York's embarrassment of apples has come as something of a shock to me. It seems like almost everyone here has an orchard in their back garden. So, having volunteered harvesting fruit with Edible York's Abundance project for over a year now, I've finally got around to thinking about cider.

After an abortive attempt at using a mini home press loaned to me by the project, I was about to give up with only a litre of juice and a busted shoulder to show for it. Fortunately, Saturday was Apple Day at St Nicholas Fields, and I cheekily took my fruit along on the off-chance I could get it pressed by them. It was a lovely day - I stuffed myself silly on a variety of apple desserts, and failed miserably at the longest apple peel competition. To top it off, it just shows that if you don't ask, you don't get, and now I have a gallon of juice waiting to ferment, as well as some left over for normal un-alcoholic drinking purposes.

It wasn't perhaps so cheeky, as I did spend much of the day over a hot brazier making caramelised apples for the general public from Abundance apples. Whilst doing so, I totally fell in love with Bernie, the "Fire Monster" upon which I was cooking. He was made by this chap here who does sell them to the public, but sadly has no web page as yet. Since then I've been hinting heavily that a Bernie of my very own would be a highly appropriate Christmas present.

Sloe-lazy

The best way to get fully matured sloe gin, apparently, is to forget to put enough sugar in it, then not drink it because it's grim, fully intending to get around to sweetening it up, but inevitably never getting around to it.

This is why I have a small bottle that I made last year, which lies undrunk on my shelf. Well, NO LONGER! Today I have actually gone and got off my arse and sorted it. The sugar should all be dissolved by the time we (*fingers crossed*) move into a new and exciting house, and shall therefore get polished off in one sitting come the beginning of November.

So now, what to do with those gin-soaked sloes? Never one to miss an alcoholic opportunity, I'm going to try this recipe for sloe sherry. I don't even like sherry, but I can't not try!

Caution: Actual Archaeology Content

This last weekend me, two colleagues, and some intrepid volunteers went to carry out some geophysical and topographical survey on a prehistoric site up near Lockerbie. It didn't start well, when I realised that my tiny Toyota Yaris didn't fit the Bartington magnetometer in his less-than-capacious boot. Cue a traumatic evening trip to Halfords to purchase roof bars. The next morning we realised that jute twine probably wasn't the best method of attachment for a three hour journey, and that four people, their luggage, Barty, the resistance meter, and the DGPS and tripod would be a bit of a squeeze. Still, to give everyone their dues, we got it all in, and Rolf (Yaris) made it all the way to Lochbrow farm with minimal issues, bar a couple of hills.



Once there the weather was predictably dire, but we braved the cold and wet, and the beginnings of Hurricane Katia for the advancement of science.

The site was found via cropmarks by Kirsty as part of her PhD thesis, and also fell within an area predicted by Dot as likely to contain prehistoric activity. So, we dutifully attacked it with all the methods known to man, in the hope that the timber cursus we already knew about, and its context, would be elucidated somewhat. Luckily for us it was, along with a few surprises, both positive and negative, which we'll be writing up soon for your delectation.