Good morning and it is a cold one here…I have sox on for the first time in 8 years, leggings, a t/shirt and a sloppy jumper…My hands were cold but between typing and kneading the bread they have warmed up somewhat…
I am seeing beautiful images of newly laid snow and I know for many of you it is much colder but I am used to warmth and 11 degrees is cold for me…hence the sox…
Show business and the music industry is well known for being fickle…such is life you could say…it was back on the 1st January 1962 and the Fab Four aka The Beatles travelled all the way from Liverpool to the Decca Studios in London for a recording audition.
Being nervous, the audition didn’t go too well and a few weeks later their manager Brian Epstein was told ” they didn’t have a future in the show business”
As it is debatable who made that decision I am sure they lived to regret that error of judgement or maybe it spurred the band members to step it up a notch…The rest is history…
Subsequent signings, among others, included the Rolling Stones, the Animals, the Moody Blues, the Small Faces and Tom Jones all who all had/have long careers in the industry…
Did you know?
J.R.R. Tolkien Day on January 3 is “The Lord of the Rings” author’s birthday and you’re encouraged to toast him in celebration. You may remember from the story that Frodo toasts his Uncle Bilbo on Bilbo’s birthday every year. Now, over sixty years after the trilogy’s original publication, The Tolkien Society asks fans to honour Tolkien’s birth, which itself was January 3, 1892.
Conservation Corner:
A hundred years ago, cargo bikes were the standard vehicle for many trades and deliveries. In actual fact, cargo bikes are still the norm here in Thailand and even hand-pushed carts are still used…Whether its to bring round brushes and brooms or to sharpen knives and garden tools or to collect bottles and cardboard a hand cart is still in daily use…
It seems like Copenhagen are calling themselves the cargo bike capital of the world…
Did you know?
The arrival of liquid soap and its wasteful packaging has caused a downturn in the sales of bar soap…The arrival of covid-19 has seen a surge in sales all these adverts promoting washing your hands properly with bar soap has helped …both the sales and the environment.
Between 2014-15, sales of bar soap fell 2.2 per cent compared to overall market growth of 2.7 per cent. But now, following decades of decline, bar soap appears to be back in the game. Sales of bar soap have climbed by nearly 3 per cent over the past year, according to data research by Kantar Worldpanel. And sales of bar soap grew faster than both liquid soaps and shower products over the period. “For the first time this century,” Kantar Worldpanel’s strategic insight director, Tim Nancholas, said, “barred soap is making a return.” Seriously, this really is cause for celebration.
Going from despairing at the waste in the world I am now becoming optimistic and although Covid-19 is scaring me with increased infections it is also giving me hope for a less wasteful future when I see changes like this…
Bloggers Corner:
This is one of(so) many of my favourite tunes…Here the old and the new have been remixed…
I love it! First seen (by) me over @ Smorgasbord Magazine...
National Soup Month:
I love a bowl of soup my favourite since I was a child has been tomato soup and although here we have beautiful soups like Tom Yum Goong…I still love a bowl of tomato soup…
Ingredients:
- 8 or 9 tomatoes, cored and quartered
- 3 red bell peppers, seeded and quartered
- 2 small yellow onions, cut into wedges
- 6 cloves garlic, unpeeled
- 5 cups homemade vegetable broth
- ¼ teaspoon smoked paprika
- ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- salt and fresh ground black pepper, to taste
- olive oil
Let’s Cook!
Tomato and Red Pepper Soup.
Preheat the oven 375F/190C
Grease two baking sheets and place tomatoes skin side down on one, then lightly coat the peppers and onions in olive oil and place on the other baking tray also throw the unpeeled garlic into the tray…Pop it in your preheated oven for about 45 minutes.
When the tomatoes and peppers are roasted heat your vegetable stock in a pan big enough to take the tomatoes and peppers. Add your roasted tomatoes and peppers to the vegetable stock and simmer for 15 minutes.
Tomato and red pepper Soup.
Allow your soup to cool slightly and then either using a stick blender or your liquidiser blend to your desired consistency…Taste and season.
Serve with a swirl of cream or natural yoghurt if liked…
Enjoy!
I love Christmas Carol’s and New Year Songs…I heard this version of Auld Lang Syne on Songs for the New Year/cliveblogs…by Mindy Smith.
Pop over to Clive’s as he has a few other New Year songs which I hadn’t heard and some Abba if they are your choice…something for all tastes…
New Year Resolutions:
I gave up making them years ago as I never kept them and many things like if you smoke pledging to give up ..you don’t as something like that you have to really want to give up so a new year pledge to me is pointless…
Most New Year’s resolutions fail. A study from the United Kingdom’s Royal Society of Public Health found that “quitting smoking is the most difficult resolution to keep.” Only 4 % of those who attempt to quit smoking unaided remain smoke-free one year later. Another study, from the University of Scranton, found only 8 % of people who make resolutions meet their goal. This is known as “false hope syndrome.”
However…Coronavirus: Smokers quit in highest numbers in a decade.
Myself, I completed a dry November and intend to complete a dry January…December was not dry…I am also committing to Meat-free Mondays and cooking more plant-based meals…I have gradually been cutting down..not out …meat… part of my personal drive to reduce my carbon footprint and take another step forward in my pledge to be more environmentally friendly…read my story in my new column over at Smorgasbord Magazine starting on Wednesday, January 20th 2021.
These are not New Year Resolutions but lifestyle changes...helped by one’s other half who continues to astound me every day with his newfound thirst for health aided by his first electronic device…yesterday he was extolling the virtues of drinking green tea…This is a meat and two veg man who has never listened to me or tried any of my drinks he just drinks English tea and now he is exploring ginger and green tea and after years of me trying to get him to quit smoking now he has done his own research…he has said he is giving up smoking…Which proves it is never too late to learn…
Thank you for popping in today I hope you have enjoyed the first Saturday Snippets of 2021…as always I look forward to your comments as you all know I love to chat…Thanx Carol xx
Retired? No one told me! 