Cookbooks

 In my living room I have a whole bookcase just for my cookbooks.  There must be over a hundred books!

All cookbooks!

Some are ones I collected in the 1970's.  A weekly magazine that I bought the binders for and made into books.  I kept them at my parent's house until the last visit and loaded down my suitcase with them.

The complete cook

I don't think I've made anything from them but they are good to read.

Another one I found was a free gift from a flour company when I was in school.

Free booklet from a flour company

This one I've used a lot.  Simple baking recipes.  

Then I have Jamie Oliver, and Gorden Ramsey books and even a Martha Stewart book that my husband gave me for Christmas one year.  

Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsey books from charity shops

Martha Stewart book

 

I love reading these books.  I sit and read them like a novel.  As much as I love these books, trying to get the ingredients can be difficult.  But still interesting.

The books I use a lot are the Japanese books that I buy from the recycle shop.  It's a challenge to understand them but through using the translation app on my phone and the kids I can pretty much figure the recipes out.  I end up with notes in the books which helps a lot.

One of my Japanese books with my notes.

I should start collecting family favorite recipes and keeping them together.

As the weather cools down my thinking is turning to more and more to cooking and baking.  Just wondering how to make comfort food more healthy and healthy food more comforting!!

This past week I made cottage pie and a full roast dinner with Yorkshire puds!!  I've also made a big bowl of hikji seaweed salad that goes nicely with the Japanese lunches we've had.

Wondering what to make for today's lunch.  

It's Not Me

 The past few weeks have been awful for me.  I've been depressed (more than usual), crying at every little thing, brain fog, aches, and pains.  

I couldn't figure out what was wrong with me.  Yesterday was the tipping point, I was watching the Last Night of the Proms, all the patriotic songs. I was tearing up, when Jerusalem started I lost it.  I've listened to these songs many times and I'm always moved but not sobbing.  Then I got a message from a friend about sending money through Western Union, I went to the home page but couldn't make heads or tails of it.  I realized that recently even following simple recipes has become harder and harder. I used to be able to follow recipes in Japanese but now even English has me rereading them many times.  I ache all over, my joints are painful, feels like the flu.  This has been going on for the past few weeks but I couldn't figure out why, I'm eating healthy, most of the time, I'm getting some exercise and sleeping okay most nights.  It hit me last night that I had stopped taking the medicine for cancer!!  The medicine has something to do with hormones, when I started it I went into the menopause.  From nothing to full-blown menopause symptoms.  I think my body got used to the medicine and now that I no longer have to take it I'm experiencing some kind of withdrawal.  Just figuring that out is a load off my mind.  I really thought I was losing the plot!! 

I really don't want to go on other meds if I can help it, so am going to try and see if there is something more natural that I can use.

I'm just glad that I figured this out.  Having a reason for feeling like a crazy old woman helps.  Talking about being crazy I finally lost it with the cats the other night.  They were sleeping on the mattress, again.  I was desperate for the toilet so ran across the mattress, which made the cats bounce up and down, waking them up.  They gave me really dirty looks, honestly if looks could kill!!  Even Sam, who loves to be petted and cuddled gave me bad eyes.  This cracked me up, so 3 a.m. I'm sat at the top of the stairs, laughing so hard I ended up crying, still desperate for the toilet but unable to move!!  All part of my crazy life!!

Snuggled on the mattress

With David!

Weather

 It has cooled down so much the last couple of days!

Last week the highs were still 32 or 33C.  Yesterday and today just 27C.  Last night it dropped to 19C. Guess who's happy!  I can't believe how alive I feel.  The hot humid summers are really too much for me.

Yesterday I moved a lot of furniture out of the house, nothing really heavy but difficult to hold.  This morning I cut down some of the trees here, swept out the garage, and made a nice lunch.  Now I ache and feel tired, but it's a good tired.  The kind of tiredness that one gets from working hard and getting things done.  I have a couple of lessons to do and of course cleaning but I don't feel that I can't do it.  I'm hoping that this month I can really get things moving along.  

Next month Hannah has teacher training in an elementary school in the city.  She is excited and nervous.  She is busy preparing her lessons.  It's a lot of work for her, plus she has her usual classes and 2 part-time jobs.  Some days she leaves at 7am and isn't back until 10pm.  We message during the day, she asks for cat photos, so I send her some.  It's hard to believe that she is so grown up.  This morning she had to wear her suit, another interview at the school, she had on her contact lenses and makeup,  I just stood wondering where my little premie had gone to!  She has a crazy sense of humor.  Yesterday morning she was laughing at the crows, they sounded like they were swearing, calling 'Feck, feck, feck'. This cracked her up!!

The cats have taken over the mattress I'm trying to throw out.  It's in the upstairs corridor, leaning against the wall.  Last night the cats pulled it down and have gotten comfortable on it.  

Comfy cats

It takes up the width of the corridor so I have to run over it.  It's like an obstacle course getting to the stairs!!

Feeling Better

 First of all a big thank you to my friends who sent me messages and talked to me (or rather listened to me moan!), also to the people who left comments on here.  I'm deeply grateful to all of you.  It's so easy to get stuck in my own head, following the same script, the same negative thinking.  Hearing different ideas, and different points of view really helps.  I can stop, slow down and think things through.  This helps a lot.  

A few things have happened that have made me see things in a new light. One was a documentary that I came across the other night about the housing crisis in England.  I know that documentaries pick up the worst cases and then milk it for emotional effect but if these cases are the reality then England is really in a bad way.  The one that hit home was of a 52-year-old lady who was fighting breast cancer.  Her husband had left her but she had a job so she could keep up with the mortgage payments.  But then cancer hit and she had to quit her job because of ongoing treatments.  She spoke to the bank, explaining her situation, and asked if she could pay less until she could get a job.  The bank refused and evicted her.  I get that banks have to make money and the interest on the loans is one way but what happened to compassion?  Couldn't the bank say that she could have 6 months and then revisit the situation?  She was put in a share house but felt unsafe and left so she is now sofa surfing.  She went back to see her house and it's sitting empty!!  We've been asked to leave this house but we've been given 2 years (just over one year now) which helps a lot! 

We went to the house today and got a big shock.  The house behind us has been empty for over 20 years.  The yard was overgrown with bamboo trees, that was the reason the toilet tank broke!  Everything has gone!!

Behind the house

Looks like they are going to build houses.  I'm hoping that they will have city sewage put in and that we can use it too!!  The fact that the bamboo has been taken down is a big relief.  We could have done it ourselves but the fact that it was on somebody else's property would mean a lot of trips to the city hall to find the owner to get permission.  

Managed to throw a lot of stuff today.  I was talking to one of my students, and she told me it took her two weeks to clean out her mother's house, I've been working on this for three years.  I realized that I was spending too much time thinking about how I could use things, that I didn't want to waste stuff.  No more, there is nothing there that I really like, one chest of drawers, maybe one kitchen cabinet but everything else is not my taste.  So I'm being ruthless, it's all going.  My plan is to get everything out of the house then hire a truck to take everything to the trash place.  Metal we can sell for a few thousand yen, the rest is to be burnt or sent to the trash place.

I talked to the house and told it I was going to bring it back to life, that we would make it a happy place.  My dream is to have BBQs and invite friends, to hear laughter in that place, maybe to hear children shouting and running around.  I'm sure I'll get hit by negative thoughts again, that I'll feel overwhelmed and broken by all this but for today I feel good.  It's not going to be easy but I've got this. And I have wonderful friends who care enough to give me a kick up the backside when I need it!!

Being Frugal

 Trying to get out of my miserable state.  Crying every day isn't helping at all.

If I can't make more money then I need to be able to save as much as possible.  I came across a video on YouTube about frugal living and thought that it might help or give me some tips on saving money!

The first tip was not to eat out.  We don't eat out, the only time in the past 3 years we ate out as a family was for Hannah's birthday.  Hannah and I have eaten out a few times, when we go to see musicals we usually get some lunch but nothing expensive.  I guess for some people eating out two or three times a week is normal and that would be a good way to save money.

The next tip was to cook from scratch and not have food waste.  Most of the time we do that as well.  I will admit that the past summer we had more instant foods or obentos, it was just too hot to cook.  With the weather cooling down cooking will get easier.  Also in the cooler months making a big pot of soup or stew and having it at lunch and dinner really helps.  Also, I need to be more careful with food waste, not buying stuff to rot in the fridge, one problem that I do have!  

Another tip was to bake from scratch.  Again something I do in the cooler months.  I'm making an apple crumble at the moment.  I prefer homemade sweets,  I can control the amount of sugar, also I think that corn syrup is really unhealthy.  It's used in most cookies and cakes because it gives the product a longer shelf life.  Using sugar or honey is better in my opinion.

She went on to suggest wearing an apron when cooking or cleaning to protect your clothes.  I wear aprons if I'm dressed for teaching or going out.  My clothes are either for hanging around the house, so doesn't matter if they get soiled or for teaching/going out.  When I buy things they are for teaching/ going out but as they get tatty they get demoted to hanging around the house.  The last demotion is being cut up for cleaning rags!!  I almost never buy clothes,  I have two or three things that are really nice for going to the theater.  I need shoes, the ones I have I've had for about 5 years and have holes in them.  But I haven't seen anything I like at a price I can afford.  

Our biggest expense are the cats.  Food and cat litter add up.  David and Hannah pay for that, also Hannah pays for vet bills.

As it cools down I won't need to run air conditioners but I'm worried about the cold weather as gas is very expensive.  

Does anybody have any other ideas?

Apple crumble

Desperate Measures

 I never thought I would have to beg for help!

I managed when Hisao died to keep us afloat, through cancer and getting the kids an education but this move has broken me!  I'm crying every single day because I don't see how to make the money we need.  The kids are helping as much as possible.  This month I'm short for the rent and that is with David buying food and cat food, Hannah paying for the vets and the other two buying things that we need, gas for the car, food sometimes and paying their own medical bills.

If I could get more students that would help but since the pandemic we haven't recovered.  

I know that moving will mean not paying rent, which is good, but having to take out a loan is the same thing.  I'm beyond angry at the state of the house, it's not liveable at all.  I've tried to be positive about it but I'm just stressed.  It's sad that the only place I like in the house is the outside bench, that's the only place I feel comfortable.  

So I've set up a crowdfunding campaign.  I don't know if this will work but I've got to try, I have no other ideas on how to make money.  That's not true I have plenty of ideas but no money to start them!!   

Here is the link to my campaign.  One Year Before We Have To Move | GoGetFunding

Hope that works!!!

Made A Start

 This past weekend I've managed to make a start of sorting things from this house.

It's sad that we are moving to a place half the size of where we live now and therefore have to downsize a lot.  Besides books, we don't really own a lot of stuff.  I've never collected nick-nacks or ornaments,  I don't have many soft furnishings, just a change of bedding and extra winter covers.   The kids have their things, again a lot of books, their own computers but not a load of stuff.  But even the bit that we have is too much!  

I was able to give a lot of children's books to one of my friends.  I was happy to do that as I know English children's books can be expensive.  I like to feel that I can pass on things that will be well-loved and used!

Sunday I spent the morning emptying the top cupboards in my kitchen.  These cupboards are too high to be useful, I need a step ladder to reach them, so things that I don't use get put up there.  I haven't looked in them for a few years.  Most of the things were trash, old plastic containers, a broken coffee maker and other bits and pieces.  I did find an old tin of beans and a cup soup.

Beans from 2012

 

cup soup from 2014

looks like it was nice!

I also made a chicken pie for lunch. I've been wanting to eat chicken pie for the past few weeks but it's been too hot to make it.  Sunday started off rather cool, warmed up by the afternoon but not a sticky heat.  It was nice to bake, one of the things I miss in the summer!!