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There has been DESTRUCTION on the Bradshaw homestead but I don’t have photographs of that yet. I don’t have photographs of my dad Chuck Norris-ing the shite out of a wall, no, or of Matt manipulating crackers with his now claw-hands like Kiddo’s rice-eating scene from Kill Bill II (Four and a half minutes of respectful panpipe for Mr Carradine when you’re ready), or pictures of how impossibly large our garden is now, so obviously instead I’m going to talk about SOUP. Now. My soups are more NUTRITION PUNCH than taste sensations, but they’re almost certainly edible. This one was good, and manchego and sesame? Well, that’s very cosmopolitan. Oh, hush.

Antisocial Soup with Manchego and Sesame
… Which is a nicer way of putting “Soup Made from Stuff I Found in the Fridge That Was Nice by Accident”

First heat;
A little oil of your preferred variety
Two chopped cloves of garlic
Couple of teaspoons of sesame seeds until they are golden

Then add;
Half a green cabbage, roughly chopped
Head of broccoli florets
Dijon mustard! A pint a spoonful; you pick the spoon. It’s my taste fixation of the month and it’s going in everything. Might add something, might not.

Cover and cook on a low heat, or an approximation of “low heat” if you’re on an Aga or similar beast.

When the broccoli is cooked, or if you are me “when it is slightly warmer”, throw some vegetable stock at it.

Then add;
A few good handfuls of leftover curried bean and lentil salad, comprising:
Mung beans (they’re not just a punchline!)
Green lentils
Kidney beans
All cooked up with some Chinese curry seasoning on Tuesday

Whiz it all up.

Finely dice and add a still-good heel of manchego (it’s a recession soup).

Season a bit more. It’s a nice, delicate flavour. It won’t work if you don’t like vegetables or if you’re accustomed to being hit in the face with chicken stock.

Feed it to your proto-husband. Yeah, I know. Beans and cabbage and cheese; I don’t learn. Does anyone want to take Matt for a couple of days?

Before I go to bed, here is some other stuff I’ve been consuming lately;

Tickley Feather
Maupassant
Black Moth Super Rainbow
Dijon mustard by the jar
Blackcurrant jam
Inaccessible drone, yeah?
The Mountain Goats. I’m going through a Goats-using stage again. I go off them for months at a time and I’m all “Huh! It’s just ten-a-penny acoustic stuff and the production values are frankly patchy* and Darnielle sings through a nostril“, but it’s darn well not, I know very well that it’s not; I’m wrong and I’m sorry, Mr Darnielle, please take me to your bosom and let us never fight again.

*No, cleverdick, I don’t mean when he was singing into a boombox. I mean this weird chorus on No Children, that sort of thing. AS YOU WELL KNOW.

Oh yes, good grief, and I had my first WEDDING NIGHTMARE last night. I mean, “it’s the morning of the wedding and I’m shopping for a dress” scenario, not “I’m marrying who now?” scenario, so don’t go returning your theatrical hats. I think this means we should send out the invites already. Mm.

Or; how things are going generally

get some wedding rings

Did this.

(A short insight:

Matt, presenting rose gold man’s ring in shape of snake: So, what can you tell me about this?

Jeweller: It’s a rose gold man’s ring shaped liked a snake.

Matt: Thank you)

Observations about rings: Everything looks a bit Elizabeth Duke on paper, whereas on the finger only around ninety five percent of it does. Rings are largely horrible. I will be wearing something very plain and restrained, which will be offset nicely by my MASSIVE COCKTAIL ROCK. The snake is being melted down, unfortunately.

find something for M to wear that isn’t a) a cape, b) shorts or c) channelling David Carradine

Progress is limited. Things Matt has threatened to wear thus far:

1. Swastika tiepin

2. Ruffles

3. “Shiny maroon”

4. “Jewels on my shirt collar”

5. Mentioned looking for inspiration via Google image search. When asked who was inspiring him in particular, said “David Carradine”. He doesn’t even read this blog.

lose, like, 20lb

Progressing. I have real live non-Tesco Value scales. I have a fridge full of pickled items. I have a gym membership. I have 144lb. Herp! I brought a two-litre Diet Coke into the house for the first time yesterday; felt like I’d bought crack.

pick some readings

Yeah so check this out;

Is love pleasure, is love merriment?
No, love is longing constantly;
love is persevering unwearedly;
love is hoping patiently;
love is willing surrender;
love is regarding constantly the pleasure and displeasure of the beloved,
for love is resignation to the will of the possessor of one’s heart;
it is love that teaches us: Thou, not I.

- Hazrat Inayat Khan
Gayan, Vadan, Nirtan

Chipper! Your basic two options for readings, you see, are either in this opened-in-the-bathtub vein, or a drippy, flowery, dolphins-and-Sanskrit sort of flavour that makes me do a sick. And whilst I’m not a great proponent of barfing rainbows in front of my sniggering in-laws, if the alternative is the apparently serene suggestion that the wedding itself is just a cake-related formality before the long hard slog unto resignation and longing and dull patience and the complete disinclination to crack a smile until it’s forced upon you through grim partnered rigor mortis, then bring on the dancing Care Bears.

Good grief, if marriage is such a thankless slog then you’re doing it wrong.

… So I’m really thinking about breaking out the Ogden Nash (“Somehow, I can be complacent / Never but with you adjacent”?) and Robert Fulgham (“And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together”. I HAVE SOMETHING IN MY EYE).

Or Lear. Lear would bring the house down.

* which is just a hair above hi-fi nerds, raw dogfood evangelists and BPAL enthusiast shut-ins in the Blogger Credibility Index, for those keeping score at home.

Stand back, I’m going to try CONTEXT!

On May 19th your gracious host Tweets,

Hello trees! Hello sky! Hello bi-monthly compulsive @LushLtd online blowout! Goodbye, mortgage money; Mama’s got a sultana soap habit.

… So here’s what I’ve been washing myself with lately. Ho! I love the internet.

Herbalism: YOU GUYS. SHUT UP. This smells like vinaigrette. I would have full sex with a good vinaigrette . If you know me you will be aware that I basically have a palate receptive to vinegar, crunch, citrus and burnt, so I don’t care if this brings my face out in leprosy, I love it already.

Sultana of Soap: Guess which Dire Straits positive proto-husband picked this out? Good call for him, actually - very creamy and moisturising. Only micro-quibble is that dried fruit is not strictly necessary and arguably rectally hazardous. I will say no more; you wouldn’t want me to. I ordered three “by mistake”. Arf.

Sandstone: I am an exfoliation thrillseeker, so I love the idea of this, I love the sherbet lemon smell, I wish it did not dessicate me so. Oh well. Replace the sultanas with sand in the above and we’ll talk.

Sweetie Pie: A solid “Alright”. It smells like You Snap The Whip, which I could probably eat in a sandwich, but I don’t really “get it”. It’s a soap! It’s a jelly! It’s both! It’s neither! It’s fallen out of my hand again! It’s stuck in the plughole! It’s 7 am and I am not quite firing on all three intellectual cylinders and I do not need this kind of attitude from soap!

For my next trick I shall become a MAC cosmetic fascist! You know that’s gotta give a girl a leg-up in the league table marked “Rad and Delightful”

I haven’t written since 9th April! I’m sorry; Web 2.0 spreads me very thin. This is what’s been happening, as filtered through the medium of Twitter and links:

I should get my SPF on, I don’t get ID-ed AT ALL since I got a Mum Haircut. I cry bitter tears into the skin of my forehead

“My new hobby is shouting out incorrect catch phrases to celebrities. Saw Ainsley Harriot and I shouted ‘Awooga’ at him. He looked confused”

Man why you even got to do a thing.

“ive had 594 apples! thats 99 apples 6 times! math!”

V. Important Concern 30/4: New YYYs stuff growing on me like a virulent skin condition despite none of it being even slightly good. Sigh.

Re. Carrie Prejean: “Gays manufactured her, they can dismantle her. They can start with a spackle knife”

Man I am not having a good hair experience this morning. I look like Cadfael.

titien; n., A person who must seemingly natter to remain conscious (Fr. titein: clattering garden whirlygig designed to drive away gophers)

This excites me. Geek is showing, Y/N.

Barman at the D&P makes origami dinosaurs! Still smells of piss though. (The venue, not the barman)

Ploughman’s Lunches are always misconfigured. What am I going to do with a 6:1 cheese:bread ratio?

In my old age I’ve become slightly fixated on flapjacks.

EVERYONE SHUT UP! SHUT UP! THIS SONG IS ALL ABOUT ME.

A plumber’s van labelled “JK Beardsworth” is inordinately funny but I definitely can’t articulate why in just 140 characters.

Oh, bless your heart, local news.

My crap superpower: fidgeting.

Can you sprain an eyebrow?

Ambition Not to Carry Out #5478953: On the 14th I’m going to see how many members of @themaeshi I can lick.

I am so into the entire oeuvre of Shulamith Firestone right now. Sorry, misspelled “Eastenders”.

This Crystal Antlers EP is like full sex, Lynne

I know three chords! That’s two more than [insert whoever you think might be funny].

One whole hour of sleep. ONE. Gngngnnnn, frrtttnn and other consonants.

The Rebetthew superbot matrimonial amalgamation completes in 4 months, 4 hours. Should have stopped us when you had the chance, puny humans.

Stop it, Au Revoir Simone. I knows what I likes and it’s “dirge & screaming”. There will be none of this “beautiful pop” rot. Gah. Sirens.

Class! One thousand times: “I must not be passive-aggressive via social networking sites”.

… So that’s super. I was going to take pictures; in fact I was going to pelt round my domicile in an exciting double-time video, but I haven’t done either because I had to go out and eat an enormous heap of curry for the second time in four days, recession and waistline* be damned.

In other news, please sponsor my boss to carry a bed through a river.

* I haven’t eaten any beancurd for FIVE DAYS.

Edit: I wish we could get married in a museum! Stupid British venue laws.

Post-Google Edit: Okay, I wish we could get married in a museum a) outside of London, and b) minus the inclusion of tepid wedding packages of the chive wigwam variety.

Now then.

Here’s a little courgette seedling that’s throwing shapes on the windowsill;

Here’s what Matt and I get up to when we run out of DIY;

(I think Joe’s crossed us off his dinner party list for that, which makes me sad);

Here is “enthused”;

Here is “three terrible hours in a Zurich traffic jam”;

Here is “Hooray, Kakelofen!”;

Here is what we listen to when we do DIY, generally;

Herp

Here’s that Flickr account I said I wouldn’t get;

Derp

That’s you up to speed!

Working hard all weekend and already preparing for spring, I present to you our raised veg and herb beds. Complete with plum slate pathway.

Raised Veg Beds and Plum Slate Pathway

View Down the Garden