Friends!

My new car makes me feel as though I’m driving in a hotel room.

I did some shopping and then had a good long nap before idling the rest of my day away. However, I baked some cookies with which to spoil myself today and tonight with my friends. I also spent a lot of time watching Sheba and treating her; she has lost another pad off her foot. I reckon she chews them off when a sliver or a burrowing seed gets into it, poor baby.

Although I didn’t get up terribly early yesterday, had a good nap and did little, I was exhausted at six pm. I had to force myself to stay awake until seven, when I got into bed to read a New Yorker. My reading lasted about fifteen minutes, and then it was lights out and had a good long sleep.

I was up shortly after four this morning and got right to work ‘cleaning’ a pound of huge juicy Prawns. I’m excited about a new recipe I’m following to make Prawn risotto that begins with cooking the heads, tails and shells. Once they’re cooked, I’ll be straining out the body bits and using the sauce as the base for the dish.

Then I de-leafed about twenty-five Brussel Sprouts. They are one of my favourite vegetables. I’ll be frying some Shallots and then the leaves and lots of Pistachios and serving it as a side dish. For a salad, I’m making one with dried tomatoes, radish and capers following a recipe by mt favourite chef: Yotam Otolenghi.

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What a nice break: The sky is clear and fill of bright inspiring stars. We’re in for two days of nice weather and I look forward to tidying up the shed now that I’ve burned a lot of the wood that was in there. It also means the ground will stay dry and that’ll make caring for Sheba’s sore foot much easier for me to husband.

Tonight, is my dinner with three wonderful friends, Jay, Eoin and François. E&F are a couple I met though our dogs and Jay is the brother of a dear friend, and former neighbour, Kelly. My entire experience with them is here on Gabriola; the same, of course, is true of my dog walking friends, Di, Judith and Regina.

These wonderful people are God-sent; with all our community events cancelled and friends from Vancouver unable to travel, they really enrich my life.