Bartimaeus

While up North I saw some snowdrops, in the snow. They are always a welcome sign, heralding Spring and when I left there, the snow was thawing. There are plenty of snowdrops still to see but from the bus a park in Perth had a great display of bright crocuses. I looked forward to seeing more of those in Edinburgh. 

The day after I got back was a date firmly in my mind as an important event in my calendar. I look forward to Shrove Tuesday. I have always enjoyed pancakes, but an additional pleasure is that making them in our house is usually the job for Shane or Bryn. I can cook them but I avoid tossing them and both Shane and Bryn enjoy it. Sometimes I am in charge of cooking the filling but this time Shane seemed to be taking charge of the whole procedure. I looked in and he messed up the flip - my fault for watching, he hadn't had many other errors, the first is often not good but the others had gone well. I left the room but came back when he was almost ready to serve up the meal. This was my last chance to catch the pancake toss in action.

We all enjoyed the creamy mushroom filled pancakes as our first course and moved on to lemon and sugar for dessert. Nye had bought chocolate buttons to have as another sweet option but that requires melting them on the pancake while it's cooking, so batter was reserved for that. He was pleased to manage a successful flip himself. I am still going to use a fish slice. I don't trust my throw and catch and don't want to drop it. The turning by spatula is more reliable for avoiding folding and less risk of losing it on to the floor. 

At his work place, Bryn had announced his intention to make pancakes and asked for a show of hands so he knew how much batter to make. He had a quite a few takers, so he has plenty of tossing to do.

There was still spare batter so I had some freshly cooked for breakfast too. Traditionally this is the start of Lent. I have never been in the habit of fasting or choosing to cut out an indulgence. I wasn't planning on giving up a favourite food but I am more generally trying to not eat too many cakes. Nye doesn't make that easy by cooking delicious sweet things regularly like cookies, rocky road and banana bread. If I can't cut out treats, I can try to keep up the exercise and the brighter weather and profusion of crocuses was a perfect excuse to make several excursions to the Meadows to admire them, with a variety of companions. There is a veritable carpet of them by Melville Drive, spectacular even on a dull day.

The crocuses are particularly spectacular when it is sunny, as they open fully and shine. They are planted in semi circles and there are a few odd ones alone or in clumps.

There were a variety of sizes and colours, white, yellow, cream, pale and dark purple and striped. 

The dark purple and deep yellow ones looked the most robust, but some of the pale purple ones looked more fragile and tender stemmed. Each kind had its own character and beauty.

I know that despite their vibrancy, all the crocuses have a short life, so all the more reason to make frequent visits to make the most of this time. They aren't the only flowers out there, though they dominate.

The tubs had daffodils already open and even tulips. Flower power was surging ahead.

My friend Rhona had given me an amaryllis and it was growing apace with a tall stem and an enormous  bud but remaining shut. At the cafe I showed her it's progress. Dalmeny had an attractive display of crocuses by the war memorial.

In my front garden the lone snowdrop was joined by a couple of crocuses and a daffodil. An afternoon in the garden clearing dead leaves and cutting back dead stems and flowers revealed a lot more leaves and shoots and a surprise find. Shane had noticed his shade lenses,that he uses regularly cycling or driving the boat, were missing some months ago, but hadn't seen where they fell and had meantime ordered replacements, quite a palaver as the first set to arrive came broken and he had to try again. In-between the weather had been so dull that he had barely used them anyway. I found the missing lens under the leaves and gave them a bit of a wash.

Walks with other people gave me a chance to approach from different angles in familiar places and enjoy new views. My usual spot for crossing the Links doesn't show off the castle so well.

I had a session of more lively exercise than my many walks, with an invite to an afternoon ceilidh. There were a few French dances thrown in and a good mix of familiar and less common dances. It was quite a workout as I hardly missed a dance. It was good to have a bit of spring in my step.

It was a challenge for my brain as well as my muscles with the new dance steps and also, as most of the dancers were women, I sometimes had to dance in the position traditionally taken by a man, so a familiar dance might involve stepping in a different direction and using an unfamiliar hold. It felt like quite an achievement for my spacially challenged thinking skills.

I was pleased to incorporate exercise into my socialising and had a plan for a walk with Catherine, another spacial challenge for me to find my way to her house since I had only been once several years ago, before starting life on Bartimaeus, and then it had been with Shane taking me there on a tandem. Fortunately Catherine had supplied me with some mapping information but I still ended up at the wrong door as I didn't have her house number. We had a lovely time and were both uplifted and  refreshed by the sea breeze, the cafe, and the well overdue catch-up.

Another Spring food tradition was approaching, as February moved on. I like to give a nod to the rest of the family's Welsh connection by celebrating St David's Day with a vaguely Welsh themed meal. I have tried Glamorgan sausages, tasty but time consuming and Nye wasn't sounding enthused enough to make it worth the bother. I had a different cheesy leek thing in mind, but he more fancied leeks in a soup so I suggested the Welsh equivalent of Scots broth, cawl. It doesn't have barley in it but a goodly number of root vegetables made it a good soup for this time of year. However I  was surprised to see the late addition of parsley and lettuce in the recipe. They were both easy to get too. Lamb neck was in the recipe but that wasn't available in the nearby shop so chops were purchased in stead. It had a very nostalgic flavour for me even without the barley since I was used, as a child, to broth with a neck of mutton in it.

Obligingly the daffodil in our front garden began to unfurl on St David's Day and showed its yellow trumpet heralding in March. Soon there will be lots of them and more and more Spring flowers are appearing: primroses, periwinkles, hellebores, prunis and camelia.