CATCHING UP FROM CAMBRIDGE

I haven't been online much these past days, due to working late into the evening. By the time I get home and have dinner, it is after 10pm and then all I want to do is sleep. That must mean I am getting old!

Thursday's big news was the snow. Yes, you read correctly - it SNOWED here:



On Thursday morning while I walked to work I had been composing that day's blog entry based on a theme of "a good day to spend outside - if you are in Bali". In other words, it was stinking cold here. Undoubtedly Kim (who lives in Edmonton) is chuckling at my complaint, but I am an English wimp. Ray, of course, was thrilled with the white stuff and as of today (Saturday) I can confirm that it has remained cold and if we get any precipitation tonight it will probably fall as snow.

Nothing too exciting to report from Friday so I will take the opportunity to talk about my "new" oven. Yes my friends it has arrived, but it is a mixed blessing: the thing works (big improvement) but it is only slightly larger than an Easy Bake Oven (major pain in the butt). The oven capacity is literally 12 x 12 x 18 inches, making each of its two shelves capable of holding one dinner plate with no room to spare on the sides. My hopeful visions of conquering the country with homemade buttertarts are growing dim and I am barely hopeful that I will manage to make enough tarts for Ray and myself. With an oven this tiny, I will only be able to bake 9 tarts - at most - at a time. At the rate I eat those little puppies, it's almost a losing venture from the start.

It's also worth noting that it did occur to me, with Christmas around the corner, that it's a good thing we're heading home for the holidays for yet another reason: there's no way I could fit a turkey into this teeny oven. Optimistically we are looking at a chicken; more realistically, a cornish hen.

Today (Saturday) was great because it was my first Saturday off in a month, meaning we could leave the alarm off this morning and sleep in. Didn't wake up until nearly 10am so I must have been tired! We spent a lovely, relaxing day at home and wandering about town. On today's jaunt, I finally remembered to take some more pictures of the mysterious "chicken duck" that I mentioned a month or so ago:





As you can see, this bird is like a chicken on land but swims like a duck. The folks who first named this species apparently had little more imagination than I; it is known as a Marsh Hen. Entirely appropriate, but you'd think that if you had the chance to name a species, you'd come up with something more creative. I will keep this thought in mind if the opportunity ever arises for me! In any case, the marsh hen is one cool fowl.

While stalking the marsh hen, we came across many of Cambridge's mallards and geese:







These birds are VERY FAT and are not at all afraid of people; in fact, any time a person stops near ducks or geese in Cambridge they can expect to be accosted by the cheeky beggars as they frisk you for food. I get a kick out of this personality trait when I'm not trying to get through the flock on my cycle!