(no subject)

[jadesfire]

1. Today is the last day of the Snowflake Challenge, which has been all kinds of fun. It's got me back into the habit of posting here, even when I don't really feel I have anything to say, and I've got out and met a whole host of new people, which is definitely good for me. Yesterday's posts were especially good, with a bunch of people posting challenges, and me thinking "Huh, that's a good idea". I need to clear my desk this morning, but once I've done that, I think I'm going to take some time to approach my work year in the way I've approached my personal and fannish one. It's been useful for clearing out the cobwebs!

2. In fairness, my head feels mostly full of cobwebs this morning. J and I are both still ill, and while we slept better last night*, I've got a lot of catching up to do. *snore*

3. Today I'm having another run at a Whole 30 month. While it didn't feel like it was doing me much good in November, once I stopped doing it, I realised it had, in fact, been doing me a whole lot of good. I'm not thinking it of 'not eating a bunch of stuff' but more as 'going back to eating the good stuff.' Having done it before, it doesn't feel like as much of a hard reset as last time. This time around, it's more like acknowledging that what I eat affects how I feel (I'm slow on the uptake, okay?) and that maybe eating things that are good for me would be a good plan. But unlike a lot of people, I have no instincts about this, and need a framework to help me work it out. It'll get harder in the middle of the month, but at the moment, I'm feeling pretty determined.

4. Despite previous flake-outs, I went ahead and signed up for a genprompt_bingo card, this time with the express purpose of combining it with my "Prompts I want to write" spreadsheet. I write better with more restrictions, and making me put the two things together is, I hope, going to help. Also, if I write a long enough story, I can probably get a line just with one fic!

Belief	Mutation / Transformation	Imprisonment	Empathy	Sufficiently Advanced Technology
Tension	Hindsight is a Wonderful Thing	Habits and Routines	Bread and Circuses	Venerable
Speech-deprived	Affection	Wild Card	Strength	Siblings
Evening	Fission	Victorious	Race Against Time	Mind and Body
Ambiguous	Fire and Firelight	Plate Tectonics	Touch	Heatwave

5. I grew something!



For Christmas this year, I bought mushroom growing kits for James' Mum and Aunt, and since they were on 3 for 2, I saved one for myself. I'm not noted for my ability to grow anything but chillis, so this was fun to attempt, and I got the shiitake kit, as they're more expensive to buy.

This is the first harvest! We got about 250g of mushrooms, and the substrate now has a rest in a dark place, before coming out for the next round in a week or two. We should get 3 harvests altogether. They weren't exactly hard to grow - put on windowsil, occasionally water - but it's still very satisfying to have mushrooms for breakfast that you grew yourself.

Comments

[alithea]

Oh, the mushroom kit is a good idea, I love mushrooms! Plus, the Boy may be less unenthused about my frustrated gardener tendency to fill the flat with pot plants if at least one of pots contains stuff he'll get to eat ;) I did grew tomatoes inside one year but they made the most awful mess, shredding sticky residue everywhere.

[jadesfire]

Yes, I had a similar experience with aubergines, which turned out to be...er...let's go with "a little bigger" than I'd anticipated! I'm now banned ;)

I've had good success with Chillis in the flat as well. Our living room is west-facing and quite sunny for most of the afternoon, and as I had to hand-pollinate them, it felt like actual gardening :D Mushroom kits are pretty widely available - we got ours from Dobies.

Also: Yes! to being a frustrated gardener. One day!

[alithea]

One day indeed!

My living room is southwest facing so similarly bright - my house plants love it. I expect I'll end up in Dobbies at some point before the spring, so I shall investigate, thanks.

[jadesfire]

Aha! As someone who has heard of them, maybe you can help with a family debate!

Is it "Dobbies" (Harry Potter style) or "Dough-bies"? We have a 50/50 split over here!

[alithea]

Dobbies as per Harry Potter, I believe :)

[jadesfire]

That is the Aunt and Grandma view. J and his father's view is the other. Maybe we have a male/female split here, because I'd say Dobbies as well!

[philomytha]

I've always been curious about those mushroom-growing kits. That looks really satisfying, and a pretty respectable harvest.

Chillis have as yet defeated me. There's a tragic-looking plant in my baby greenhouse, but no actual chillis. Still, I have more seeds and another spring is coming...

[jadesfire]

The box itself is pretty small - probably only 40cm x 20ish - and it ended up rather neglected at the start of its life for various reasons. It'll be interesting to see how many I get from a second harvest, done properly this time.

My most successful chilli plant, George, was a supermarket reject that I nursed back to health. Bless him, he never did know what season it was, and faithfully flowered and fruited about every 6/7 months for nearly 3 years before he finally gave up the ghost. I was doing pretty well with a second plant until aphids imported on a kind gift of thyme did for it, and my third died of neglect while I was on holiday. With the advantage of a warm flat, I might give it another go this year, or just steal seedlings from J's aunt (minus the aphids this time!). Good luck with yours!

[bardsley]

You inspired me to sign up for genprompt_bingo, so thank you. And congratulations on growing something! That's a great accomplishment.

[jadesfire]

Woot! There are some great prompts on the bingo cards - hope you have fun with them :)