The Postman Bringeth...

And then generally returns with my parcels to the collecting office and I have to wait 48 hours for access - such is life. Be it a timely delivery via the agencies of the royal mail, my dodgy flat intercom, and a late start to work, or the delayed gratification of waiting for 2 days before trudging along to a small room tucked down a dodgy side alley near the train station (that’s where the collecting office is, it’s not just somewhere I go to hang out) I just love getting post.

Since letter writing has become an all but dead art my personal post has dwindled – I get very occasional postcards, equally occasional greetings cards and fairly frequent suggestions from the bank that I might want to plunge myself deeper into debt, and of course books. Books are easily as exciting as letters even if I’ve bought and arranged for their delivery myself – the element of surprise which comes with a letter is replaced by the element of relief when the desired item turns up.

Anyway my most recent postal goodies comprise the rest of the Barsetshire Chronicles and I’m feeling ridiculously pleased with them so thought I’d share a picture. I also got a shower hose from my dad. I wasn’t expecting it, am not entirely sure I need it, and when I put it together with last year’s spanner have to wonder what he’s trying to tell me...

Actually a quick inspection of the existing shower whatsit suggests that dad might have a point, although when I (try and) fit the new one I’ll clearly have to give the taps a good seeing to with some anti lime scale stuff - my bathroom is clean and welcoming honestly, or at least I thought it was but now I’m finding lots of jobs that need doing. I wonder how susceptible dad would be to the suggestion that on his next visit he does the bathroom tiles anew? He’s generally pretty good about these things never leaving home without his tool box, I don’t think he’s trying to turn me into a D.I.Yer though – he’s always (and with good reason) very dismissive of any attempts I make in that direction.

And now that the sound of fireworks has died back a bit - it’s Diwali as well as Guy Fawkes tonight (Leicester has the biggest Diwali celebrations outside of India, or at least that’s what all the publicity stuff says) and we have a lot of fireworks which due to rain and poor organisation on my part I can hear but haven’t seen. It honestly sounds like I imagine the Western front did in 1916 with the likelihood of constant barrages from nightfall to about 3am for the next few days, the smell of gunpowder is perfuming the air, and I’m likely to develop a nervous twitch if I walk home at night but I love all of it – this is absolutely my favourite time of year to be in this city.

It’s all a bit River Cottage round here at the moment

Which could possibly double as code for ‘I’m procrastinating over housework in any way I can, and yet trying to look busy at the same time’. This is no slur on the Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall way, I don’t need much encouragement when it comes to procrastination and the lure of the outdoors in the summer is hard to resist (though in all honesty a lot of my foraging takes place in Waitrose which isn’t exactly the same as a small holding or allotment whichever way I look at it).

As hoped and hinted for, though to be fair he didn’t need much encouragement, Dad took us fishing. The weather was amazing, the fish (on this occasion) were biting, and although I spent most of my time sitting back and watching, I did get slapped around a bit by a mackerel which I think counts as taking an active role in proceedings. Dad’s current boat is best described as a fixer upper and it’s perhaps fortunate that we only discovered that the steering was totally knackered after we got back to dry land – but it adds a certain frisson to the memory and we didn’t come to any harm. My father who is a wise and talented man (who reads this) can count cooking amongst his many accomplishments, so almost before I’d managed to extract myself from the boat (low tide, high pier) he had the fish cooking.

Mackerel caught cleaned and cooked within the hour have to be one of the best things you can ever eat (Dads mantra is ‘It’s just a drop of olive oil some salt and pepper’ which is true as far as it goes, but he has that just cooked thing going on which suits sea food so well, and which takes a fair bit of practice to do properly). As today has been a day off I’ve spent a good chunk of the afternoon perusing ‘Sea Fishing’ (River Cottage handbook 6) and reliving last week’s excitements. I’ve written about this book before and am unashamedly a fan of the whole series but ‘Sea Fishing’, ‘Edible Seashore’ and ‘Mushrooms’ (soon to be followed by ‘Hedgerow’ which I am ridiculously excited about) are particularly special. I’m almost inexpressibly impressed by the combination of practical information including countryside lore - and law, recipes, and foraging/fishing tips, personality, and personal convictions.

We caught some young cod which were sadly too badly damaged to throw back (leaving behind some hungry and disgruntled gulls) and delicious as they were cooked with a little olive oil, salt, and pepper (there was a theme), from a conservation point of view they should be left well alone. ‘Sea Fishing’ is commendably clear on this point. I have a few natural history titles – descendents I think of ‘Ring of Bright Water’- where earnest men go out and experience the wilds; they swim in lakes, sleep under stars, admire great flocks of birds wheeling against the twilight sky and write about it in increasingly irritating lyrical prose. There has been a definite fashion for this sort of writing over the last few years - the other end of the spectrum is Collins excellent New Naturalist series, which I will admit is generally a little too specialist for me to read with unalloyed pleasure.

The middle ground - and I hope the future of popular natural history is River Cottage handbook territory, or at least that’s how I feel every time I read, buy, recommend, and give these books. I also think it’s worth mentioning that it’s Bloomsbury who publish these titles because credit where credits due.

The looking busy part of today’s (by now I have to say entirely successful) bid to avoid the hoover took place in the Scottish one’s garden, half hearted weeding was replaced by whole hearted cherry picking. Last year we got 4 cherries off the tree, today I managed to get about half a kilo before sending him up a step ladder to make it a kilo which I think you’ll agree is a far more useful quantity. Tantalisingly plenty of cherries remain just out of reach but I value the Scottish one above jam (or maybe a pie, or perhaps ice cream...) so wouldn’t let him get the long ladder out. At least the blackbirds will be pleased some are left, and I get to indulge my River Cottage fantasies whilst I decide what to do with the crop I have got.