Working from home

What is it about extreme weather conditions that brings about the urge to make do and mend, become more self-sufficient and cobble together thrifty meals out of an unlikely assortment of ingredients? At least for some reason it does with me. After a lightning dash into Malmesbury yesterday to find the Co-Op looking like something from the pre-Perestroika Eastern Bloc with shelves empty of milk and bread and a few sad looking tins of things like butter beans and jars of Picalilli, I grabbed a few ill-thought-out impulse items and drove back home as the grey, slushy road behind me turned to impenetrable white. Thank goodness for Debbie and the Village Shop.

The Met Office is advising people not to travel, unless it's a life-or-death emergency, said a voice on the radio. I looked at my tins of tomatoes, my jar of mayonnaise and the packet of two sad Little Gem lettuces I had bunged in as something of an afterthought - well, I suppose we might be still stuck snow-bound by the time it comes to salad-weather - and wondered whether this was life. Or death. Meanwhile, I realised we only had a couple of days worth of dog food left.

There are other irritations to contend with. School is closed and my husband is working from home. I'm not sure whether this shouldn't be 'lurking' from home - I feel (possibly irrationally) that my visits to the biscuit tin are being monitored, and apart from anything else, it means two extra mouths to feed and the cold weather seems to make everyone hungrier. I busily rummage through the freezer and unearth several tupperware boxes from which the labels have disappeared - if indeed there have ever been labels - and come up with a clever idea for frozen-pea soup with crispy bacon croutons. It's a miniature triumph, albeit one that results in several bowlfuls of washing up. It is then that I discover that 'working from home' also means an implicit exemption from washing-up duties.

The dog needs to go out, but I remember the radio warning, concluding that technically, I suppose, dog-walking is travel, and not life-or-death. My husband looks at me with an expression somewhere between disapproval and dispair, dons another few layers and takes the lead.

I put the radio on for company, only to find it has inexplicably re-tuned itself to Geoff Boycott in Durban. Geoff is pondering why everyone in snow-bound Britain doesn't just get on a plane and fly out to Cape Town for a fortnight of blue skies, balmy evenings and the seductive thwack of leather on willow... Silly me, what was I thinking? I supposed the small matters of a dwindling post-Christmas bank account and a total lack of interest in cricket were just piffling details...

* * *

Halfway through the afternoon (and many hours of washing-up later), the dog comes back shivering and encrusted with several large snowballs that need to be cut off with scissors. Then Alex bowls in, fresh from a morning of igloo-construction with a couple of friends who drip noisily through the kitchen to the sitting room where they commandeer the TV and the PlayStation. Tea, cake and biscuits are demanded, and as the sky starts to look a bit dusky I suggest it might be a good idea if the friends think about going home, then the idea of a sleepover is mooted. A small Homer-like yelp inadvertently escapes my lips; we have three large potatoes, a jar of horseradish cream and the Little Gems (which I'm saving in case we're in danger of succumbing to scurvey). Plus the remains of a tin of Quality Street - just the round penny-shaped ones that get stuck in my teeth, for some strange reason. And the Mystery Freezer Food, of course.

Mention of the Mystery Freezer Food thankfully sends both boys scuttling back to their homes. One is a vegetarian and doesn't want to risk the (admittedly strong) possibility of it being something mince-based, and the other has sampled my cooking before. Another freezing day has (almost) been survived. The forecast is for more of the same tomorrow.

A quick browse through an old copy of BBC Good Food and I realise I have the ingredients for Chocolate Hazelnut Torte. Tomorrow's lunch sorted.

* * *

The pic is of the triumphant pea-and-bacon soup, although I'm afraid you can't see the bacon because I'd eaten it. I had to wait until my lurking-from-home other half had left the room, or he'd have thought me very odd taking a picture of my lunch. The bacon, I'm afraid, was just too tempting...

Rain

The rain came at last. Of course it did – it’s cubs’ camp this weekend. And I have a car-boot sale in Malmesbury.

“When d’you think it’s going to rain,” asked Bernard as I passed him in the allotments on Friday.
“About six o’clock.” I didn’t even need to look up at the gathering grey cumulo-nimbus clouds overhead. The cubs would just be arriving at the camp site in Bristol then. The rain came at 5.55.

I am not a happy camper – I hate cub camp. The only thing worse than being at cub camp under the endless rain, wind and drizzle, baked beans and billy cans and compulsory activities, is not being there and worrying about my 10-year-old boy who’s been looking forward to it for weeks. I’ve had two sleepless nights and made at least five phone calls, just to check he’s ok. He is – apparently he’s having a whale of a time, but I send over an extra blanket with Georgina’s husband Jeremy, just to be on the safe side.

To take my mind off it, I’m doing the car boot sale. My car is stuffed to the gunnels with what can only be described as a load of old cr*p. Unfortunately, there’s no room for a gazebo or an umbrella – I’ll just have to hope the rain eases off. Of course it doesn’t – it’s cub camp, isn’t it.

My pile of old cr*p looks less appealing than ever under the rain. A woman in a raincoat meanders over and picks up a digital camera.
“How much?” she asks.
“£4?” I suggest, without much conviction.
“I’ll give you two.”
I haven’t the energy to haggle.

Simon, who has the stall next to mine – ingeniously covered by an oblong of tarpaulin perched on two canes – takes pity on me and offers to buy me a coffee. I feel I need to reciprocate and fish in my purse for 50p to buy a bag of home-made biscuits from his stall. There's an ominous rumble of thunder, then a Cluedo game catches my eye.
“How much?” I ask.
“£4.” It’s noticeable there is no question mark after his answer. By 10.30 I’m 50p down.

I sell a stuffed sheep for 20p, and manage to somehow wangle 30p for some lipglosses disguised as cup cakes, and things at long last are looking up. Then I spot another woman selling plates, and it’s downhill all the way.

Back home, my husband asks how I got on.
"Umm, well - you know," I shrug.

It's official - Great Somerford's long-awaited cuckoo is back. As far as I know, it hasn't been spotted yet, but I'm reliably informed by two villagers that they've both heard its unmistakable call whilst out walking towards the Red Hatches over by Peter's Wood yesterday. Perhaps summer really is on it's way... Although not if the weatherman on the lunchtime news is to be believed. He tells us we're in for gales and deluges over the next 24 hours...

Mind you, we do need some rain. I don't think it's rained properly for about six or seven weeks and the river's the lowest I've ever seen it. Sid Jevons got a call last night to say that the best part of a herd of cows had waded across and were now in his meadow. Apparently it often happens when the water's low. The fishing club have done their best to take out most of the branches that fell into the river during last week's high winds, but it's still not very much more than a trickle coming down over the wier.

"I've heard they're taking water out at Malmesbury," someone whispered to me, conspiratorially while I was out on a dog walk the other day (unfortunately, like the river, I cannot reveal my source). I nodded sagely, giving my nose a knowing tap for good measure thinking it probably best to humour such eccentricity - but apparently it's true. Malmesbury is allowed to extract a certain amount of water upstream from us. They obviously don't have the same problems with cows.

There's still enough water for a dog to take a dip - just.