Another family meal, another creamy pudding. Since the Co-op shop was hacked there have been shortages on many shelves but a vast oversupply of sell-by-date cream. A1 served up a delicious beef stew and A2 concocted a creamy courgette gratin for the vegetarians. We enjoyed it all and scored our usual substandard 9 on the GSQ.
A2 is reading The Last Weekend by Blake Morrison.
Tag: quiz
Sunday Lunch
We had chicken and/or vegetable creamy pasta for lunch, followed by this strawberry sponge cake which was snapped up before it could be snapped, and scored an improved 10 on the GSQ.
A2 is reading The Cuckoo* by Camilla Lackberg.
Dejeuner en Famille
Dinner with the family in their lovely new house: salmon, salad and cherry cake for afters. What a treat!
Faye was our quizmistress and kindly gave us a score of 9.
A1 is reading The Vinyl Detective: Underscore by Andrew Cartmel. No proper recipes this time, but more on Vinyl Detective Macaroni Cheese, which is now credited to Sam Wong’s article How to Hack Your Macaroni Cheese in the 23 Nov 2022 issue of New Scientist (behind a paywall, but free to Leeds libraries members).
A2 is reading The Girl in the Woods* by Camilla Lackberg; child killers and child-killers, with 17th century witch trials added in.
Family dinner
Another Sunday dinner of spaghetti followed by a trifle decorated with leftover Easter eggs, at which we scored a sorely disappointing 8 on the GSQ.
A1 is reading Burn After Reading by Catherine Ryan Howard.
Easter Monday
We had chicken bacon broccoli and cheesecake for our family meal and did the last two weeks’ quizzes, scoring 13 on one and 10 on the other. Here’s the cake:
A1 is reading The Alaska Sanders Affair* by Joel Dicker. A2 is reading Burn After Reading by Catherine Ryan Howard. Another book about a Writer.
Blueberry Lemon Cake
Our pudding after our family meal of roast pork, stuffing, potatoes, Yorkshire puddings, broccoli, sprouts, carrots and gravy, after which we generously allowed ourselves to score 10 on the GSQ.
A2 is rereading Attack of the Unsinkable Rubber Ducks by Christopher Brookmyre.
Sad Kiwi Fruit
No wonder; it’s no fun being chopped up and mixed with a load of common fruits.
We had porky vegetables and cheesy courgettes for our family dinner, followed by parkin with custard, and scored 10.5 on the GSQ.
A2 is rereading Boiling a Frog by Christopher Brookmyre.
Like the Circles that You Find
Another day, another circular object. Today it’s the trifle completing our family meal of spaghetti and sauce, surrounded by tabletop clutter. We scored 10 on the GSQ, better than the last few.
A1 is rereading The Cut and A2 is rereading Not the End of the World, both by Chris aka Christopher Brookmyre.
Critters of the Day: Women
Yes, it’s International Women’s Day. We had a family lunch of kedgeree (with boiled eggs for the fish refusers), ate a blueberry cake and scored a substandard 9 on the GSQ.
A1 is rereading When the Devil Drives by Chris Brookmyre. A2 is reading The Fourteenth Letter* by Claire Evans, which was weird and unbelievable.
Feeding Time
We had meat and vegetable cottage pies and broccoli for our family dinner, followed by Aunt Celia’s lemon pudding, did this week’s and last week’s quizzes and scored a disappointing 9 on one and a disgraceful 7 on the other.
A2 is reading The Foot on the Crown by Christopher Fowler; an origin myth for London in a Dark Ages Game of Thrones setting.
Robin Hiding
Here’s a glimpse of the elusive bird that has been tormenting us with its vanishing tricks. One day we’ll catch it in the open.
We had macaroni cheese, vegetable and fruit salads and a sad-looking but tasty brick-like air-fried courgette cake for our family dinner and scored 12.5 on the GSQ; thx everybody and happy birthday eve Bob.
A1 is rereading Not the End of the World by Christopher Brookmyre. A2 is rereading Machines like Me by Ian McEwan.
Trout for Dinner
Our family dinner was rainbow trout with almonds, fried potatoes, leeks and courgettes, with parkin and custard for pudding.
We scored a reasonable 10 on the Guardian Quiz.
A2 is reading Picks and Shovels* by Cory Doctorow, a crime novel where the crimes are financial but a few people get beaten up nonetheless.
Head Scratching Time
Thanks to channelling our brainpower, we scored 12 on the GSQ tonight after our delicious dinner of roast chicken and apple crumble; our best score this year so far.
Ai is rereading The Sacred Art of Stealing by Christopher Brookmyre. A2 is reading Trapped* by Camilla Lackberg and Hendrix Fexeus; a special unit in the Department Q/Peculier Crimes mould recruits a mind-reader to solve a series of murders committed with stage magic equipment.
恭喜发财
Happy New Year Everybody! May the snake of fortune wriggle through your world bringing you happiness and better quiz scores than the 7.7 we achieved tonight.
The food: egg fried rice, veggie noodles, jellified belly pork, rainbow chicken, sweet and sour pork, har gow, siew mai, jiaozi, fish egg balls, stewed eggs in various substances and of course the snake cake. Would have had spring rolls but A2 absent-mindedly steamed them.
A2 is rereading The Secret Life of Mr Roos by Hakan Nesser.
Mellow Yellow
First supermarket daffodils of spring, as a decoration for our family dinner of spag bol followed by peach cobbler, at which we strained our brains to the point of pain and still only scored 8 on the GSQ. Damn you, Thomas Eaton!
A1 s rereading Dead Girl Walking by Chris Brookmyre. A2 is rereading The Inspector and Silence by Hakan Nesser.
Considered Trifle
A post-birthday pudding after our family lunch of curry, rice and naans which has left us bursting out of our trousers. We scored 10 on the GSQ, later upgraded to 11 when we checked that the four Chinese gentlemen flowers were also the four flowers in mah jong like we said.
A2 is reading Midnight and Blue by Ian Rankin. Third book in a row in which the hero hangs out in a library.
Snowy Sunday
We’ve had 13cm of snow today and next-door’s kids have made a very traditional snowperson on the traffic island.
The family slogged here through the wintry weather for a dinner of meat loaf with potatoes, sprouts and pico pizzas for the mini people, followed by a reprise of last year’s Christmas pudding ice cream bombe.
We missed the Quadrantids and yesterday evening’s occultation of Saturn by the Moon due to the miserable weather. And oh dear, we scored 7 on the first GSQ of the year. The snow is turning to rain and we’ve registered over 50mm so far this month. Things can only get wetter.
Critter of the Day: Turdus merula
Not a very pretty name for this handsome blackbird.
We had pasta, parkin and delicious Ethiopian coffee for our family lunch and scored 11.5 for the last quiz of the year, bringing our average to 10.2268518518519, a step down from last year’s 10.2756346153846.
A1 is reading Nobody’s Hero by MW Craven, another violent and thrilling outing for Ben Koenig; thanks, A2! — who is reading Orbital by Samantha Harvey (thx A1); 24 hours on the International Space Station watching the drama of the cosmorama, incorporating 16 days of the sun burnishing the oceans and 16 nights of lights fringing the coastlines while the astro/cosmonauts on board divulge a bit of backstory and have high-flown thoughts about the geography and meteorology of their home planet and a typhoon winds up over the Philippines. A short but engaging read.
Bob Unboxing on Boxing Day
The Bobster enjoys a present.
We had the family round for Boxing Day, with a repeat of our Christmas Day meal (but pico-pizzas for the veggies). There were even more prezzies, including the traditional coffee, some rather lovely pictures and about 500 tomato seeds of many varieties — thanks, G,D,F & B!
And unlike last year, we managed a flaming pudding by using calvados rather than brandy.
We scored a traditional 10 on the GSQ.
A1 is reading The Enigma Girl by Henry Porter (thanks, A2!).
Carrot Cake
Carrots and other festive veg are 8p/kg at loss-leading supermarkets near us so we had this nice cake and a lovely stew containing various underpriced vegetables for our family dinner, caught up on last week’s quiz (saving this week’s for next time) and scored a creditable 10.
Bottoms Up
Storm Darragh is raging outside but our rain gauge is blocked and serving as a useful drinking source for the birds.
The family braved the storm for our family dinner of stroggers and sticky toffee pudding and we scored 11.5 on the GSQ. Yay us!
A2 is rereading The Readymade Thief* by Augustus Rose.
Brioche, Banana, Blueberry and Booze Bread and Butter Bake Again
Another iteration of this cheap, simple and tasty pudding which followed our family dinner of pork in cider with carrots and peas with pizza, salad and chips for the youngsters. We were ill last week so we had 2 quizzes to do and scored 9.5 on one and 13 on the other.
November was below averagely rainy and sunny and our second coldest November of all time.
A1 is rereading The Readymade Thief* by Augustus Rose. A2 is rereading Have Mercy on Us All by Fred Vargas.
Red/Squirrel
A critter surrounded by autumn colour.
We had chicken ham broccoli and apple crumble, plus omelettes for the veggies, for our family dinner and scored an unexpected 10 for our guesses in the GSQ.
A2 is reading Ink Ribbon Red* by Alex Pavesi which was unmitigated rubbish. Like anybody’s idea of 30th birthday party fun would be to order their guests to write stories about killing each other, and like any of them would bother.
Raspberry Bakewell Cake
The finale to our delicious dinner of beef stew and sprouts at which we scored a disappointing 8 on the GSQ. Still averaging over 10 though.
A1 is reading Wash This Blood Clean from My Hand by Fred Vargas.
Heaven and Hell
Thank you for the beer Gez. We had shepherd’s pie and Parkin with custard for our family meal and scored a mighty 11.5 on the GSQ.
A1 is reading Judgement Prey* by John Sandford. A2 is rereading This Night’s Foul Work by Fred Vargas. Can’t believe that any cat, let alone a fat indolent creature that has to be carried everywhere, would run 35 kilometres on the scent of a missing person.