On Wednesday our lovely white world began to melt.
The temperature has shot way above freezing but I am happier with frigid dry, weather.
Not for me the raw cold of a wet winter’s day.
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Staying in had seemed preferable that morning, but we had a mission.
Two, in fact.
The first of these a trivial matter of curiosity.
Which we failed to satisfy.
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One recent day Grant asked me:
“What is that thing up on the hill?”
“Thing?”
“Maybe a flag on a pole?”
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“How long has it been there?”
Good question. Surely we would have noticed?
So I had to check the archives…
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Not there on December 10th.
First evidence: 2nd January!
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Perhaps I should mention that this is not a matter of being nosy or minding other people’s business!
It’s that I have always been interested in the power of observation, of what we do or don’t notice.
Employing the zoom lens did not identify the thing.
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The best I could come up with is that it’s a bird house which was a Christmas present.
Today I put my camera on the tripod which produced a slightly better image but more confusion:
Today it has an orange roof!
Ideas?
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When we went out on Wednesday, we drove to where we might get a better view of it, only to find a man busy with a snowplow. We thought better of appearing to snoop!
So we carried on to Hannaford’s for the important part of our quest.
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Having been diagnosed with diabetes, Grant was bemoaning a birthday without cake.
So I went online and found a recipe which I mentioned as a possibility, but the response was so-so…
Until Wednesday morning just as I had installed myself at my desk…
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“Let’s go!”
Damn. “Oh, alright then…”
Because of course we had none of the required ingredients:
Cacao powder, coconut flour, almond flour…
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It was a British recipe and asked for bicarbonate of soda which I remembered from my childhood only because my mum once put bicarb into her biscuit (cookie) mix instead of baking powder.
She must have been sore distracted as she did not make such mistakes, ever.
The biscuits were edible, but different.
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Mum mostly used bicarb when boiling vegetables. I can’t say if it improved their taste, but it turned them an appealing shade of green.
And occasionally, I seem to recall, my father used bicarb for stomach disturbances.
In the States, as far as I knew there was no such thing, but then I had never exactly gone looking.
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What I have since discovered, is that bicarb is called baking soda here. It’s that stuff in an orange box that people put in the back of their fridge to absorb odours.
And apparently also cook with.
In the meantime I’d worked out a substitute.
(1 of bicarb= 3 of baking powder)
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By the time we got home with our purchases, it was late and I didn’t get caught up until supper.
Supper time is when I mentally clock off. Anything not done by then rolls to the next day. Most particularly anything that involves cooking.
But my friend was keen on that cake.
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Grumbling and mumbling as I sometimes do, I banged about finding measuring cups and spoons and instructed: “grease the cake pans!”
As cakes go, this one was no great effort as the ingredients all go into a blender. Our modest machine was barely large enough, but it did the job.
35 minutes later: chocolate cake.
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I am not fond of either chocolate or cake which I find too sweet, but the result seemed acceptable.
Half the recipe would have been a better idea, but working out the smaller measures would have involved mathematical calculations.
Math as well as cooking?
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Bat house?
I did wonder about that but it seems a strange place…not that I know alot about bats!
Perhaps that orange topped thing is a surprise birthday cake for Grant?
My husband thinks it might be a snow or rain precipitation gauge because of its funnel shape and height. It seems awfully tall for a bird house. Anyway, good luck figuring it out!
Ruth
Looks too high to me to be a bird house, unless it is for birds of prey. 🙂 Whatever it is, the owner would not be able to see into it or climb. Have you tried a Google image search? I will try, and let you know if I find out.
Glad to hear Grant’s cake was a success.
Best wishes, Pete.
Nothing identical, but a ‘Predator bird scarer’ was similar, (it spins in the wind) also a very similar bird house on a high pole.
We have a lot of hawks but I doubt anyone around here would think to scare them off. However…who knows!
Chicken farmer?
At first glance, I also thought it was a bird’s house … but it’s quite big (and high) for something like that, isn’t it? We also call it bicarbonate or soda and sometimes use it in our recipes. Well done on the cake! Our dish of the week coming Thursday is keto blueberry muffins (which are diabetes friendly) – it now looks like you have all the ingredients, so maybe you could try this recipe too. And happy birthday to Grant!
Grant thanks you!