Author: Seb Palmer

Some time ago I wanted to make a proper egg-mayonnaise sandwich. So I ‘googled’ the topic. Particularly important was being able to peel the eggs without totally butchering them.

I found a really egg-cellent website, getcracking.com, which sorted me out on that front poifeckly.

This very useful web resource also suggested that readers try Doro Wat, an Ethiopian chicken curry recipe that uses hard-boiled eggs. So I’m going to cook it tonight, for us, and Dad and Claire.

… much later the same day.

My own work, above; not looking quite as good or appetising as the getcracking.com example at the top of this post.

Dad and Claire did eat with us (sadly, brother Sam could’nae join us). And survived! If I made it again, I’d change it up a bit. I’d do chicken breast pieces, and brown them off earlier in the process, not huge bits on the bone and cookies at the very end. I’d add more ghee, and prob’ also more chilli, ginger, garlic and water.

If I’m totally honest, it was merely ok. Quite nice even. But perhaps not something to write home about? The ‘berbere’ spice mix – so many spices! – which smelt very fragrant initially, somehow didn’t quite pack the expected punch. Still, worth a shot. You live n’ learn!

Lovely to spend the evening with Dad and Claire as well. Plus, whenever we have guests round, an incidental benefit is that we will usually tidy the place up considerably.

I decided I’d try and make use of the discarded upper hull part of this Trumpeter 1/72 Tiger I (Early!). I figured it might be fun to see if could… open up the rear deck grills!

I started out on this idea by filing, sanding and scraping away styrene, from underneath. On a 1/35 or larger model, this might well work relatively easily. At 1/72, it was – and I knew it – asking for trouble.

The thing is, at this scale, once you’ve removed or thinned down the supporting styrene, what’s left is do perilously thin, it flexes and breaks all too easily. Which of course it did. Hence the reinforcement visible in the above photo.

Is the classic case of attempting to make a silk purse from a sow’s ear? Perhaps. But on another level, this kind of silliness is what makes model-making such fun. If the hours of messy and sado-masochistic work this entailed can be called fun!?

And all this for a piece of plastic currently destined for the spares box! How, I wonder, can I/shall I make use of it? When I’m lacking the vast majority of ç

My day kind of started, a little late, I guess, with an 11am meeting with the chap I see at CGL (change grow live). We meet in an ‘orrid little modern box, just to the right of these much more attractive municipal buildings:

I then headed home. And later, off to Ely, for to collect a free set of bookshelves, from a FreeCycler who goes by the sobriquet flustered badger! The building below is another old-ish place in March, that I decided to snap, as I pass it all the time! I love the rounded and turreted corner feature.

Sundry other chores included such humdrum delights as a visit to the chemist, and a trio to Boyes. I was entertaining the notion of making myself an oversized ‘mushroom cap’ beret, a bit like this:

Wherefore, Seb? I hear nobody at all ask. Well, if y’all must know, to wear when we go see Merlin Sheldrake do a Topping talk, in Ely, on 28th, Nov. He’s touring to promote this book:

Whilst in Ely, I collected the tickets for said talk, bought the above book for a bargainous £5, and perused many marvellous times at the excellent Ely branch of Oxfam. I got this:

… for a pal who has several other similar books be D.G. There were numerous other fab art books, many of which I’d love to have bought, including titles on Delacroix, Titian, Rubens, and a nice big version (I have a mini edition) of The Grammar of Ornament.

In the end I only got the above. Which looks terrific. They also had a wee Taschen paperbook on Picasso, which I almost got, to cut out the pics for framing. But I opted not to, as I wasn’t blown away by the chosen selections.

Whilst in Ely, near where I picked up the free shelves, I saw this intriguing old building. Looks very ecclesiastical, as well as rather dilapidated!

I wandered around Ely, in a bit of a daze. Took in the market, where numerous traders were flogging there wares. I wanted something to eat. But couldn’t find anything that appealed to me (at a reasonable price).

And then later, I was out delivering for Amazon/Morrisons, before finally getting home. And I’m typing this in a nice hot bath!

Enjoyed some lovely social interactions. From simple exchanges of smiles, to a nice chat with a member of staff at Ely Oxfam. Had a chat with mum, around 8pm. All in all, and despite feeling a bit frazzled, a good day!

I’m a fan, kind of (poss’ more in theory than in practice?) of epic war movies. This one, a box-office bomb, recipient of several Razzies, and often billed as ‘one if the worst films ever made’, intrigues me for several reasons.

Firstly, it was directed by Terence Young, best known as a director of three Bond movies (Dr No, From Russia sand Thunderball). Secondly, it stars a latex wearing Larry O’, as General MacArthur. And third, I kinda like Ben Gazzara, and he’s in it.

And also, and very importantly for me, it looks – from various stills (such as the one below) – like the action/combat scenes are proper epic…

I know very little about the Korean War. One suspects it was probably one of America’s many super heavy-handed post-WWII anti-Commie foreign policy blunders. And, from what I’ve read thus far, online, I don’t think Inchon, the movie, is the place to go for historical truth!

But the fact it’s so massively panned actually makes me any to see it more. So much popular opinion is erroneous guff! I pretty much always prefer to make up my own mind.

I’m a man. Which, bitter experience teaches me, is a crime against humanity. As a man, I find Vera Palmer (I wonder if we’re related?) very alluring. Nuff said!

Hot Damn! I love everything about this.

Woah, Nelly! I only (fairly) recently discovered this guy. I think I first came across him via (?)…

I love what he does, combining strong rhythm, with chords and melody, such that you wind up with a near as dammit complete rendition of the original – in this case Sting by and co. (guitar, bass, drums, and poss also keys?) all on the one acoustic axe!

Great work, Kent!

It’s also a timely reminder what a checking number Synchronicity 2 is. hearing this version takes me waaay back, to my mid abs late teens. Listening to all the Police records back in the family home, in Comberton. Bittersweet memories of a long lost era.

Bu that’s one of many things that’s so Amical about music, how it can be connected with certain places and times. Fab!

I’ve been experiencing extreme difficulty booking sufficient hours to meet my weekly budgeting target, driving for Amazon. There are numerous reasons.

One of these, which I only just learned about, is the capping policy they operate. As the video above explains, they cap weekly hours at a total of 24.

There’s more to it than that, though, as the video explains. One of the issues is that I don’t want to be wasting time trying to book more shifts when the app simply won’t let me.

Amazon should def’ make a change to the Flex app, IMO, such that it lets you know when you’re no longer able to book any further work. This would prevent folk like me wasting time hitting ‘refresh’ at times when doing so is purely wasting time.

So I’vw submitted that idea, via the Flex ‘feedback’ page…

Once home, after work, my chief goal was to further the work on the engine and engine bay of the Tiger I. In the above pic I’ve altered the support/base, and added more front end detail to the engine itself.

The engine sits better now. But there’s still a lot to be done.

The above ref, from a restoration project (poss’ Bovington’s 131?), drew my attention to several things: the spacing of certain objects on my engine was wrong; and I needed to add lots of pipe work.

The pipework proved to be incredibly fiddly. Frustratingly so! Superglue was involved; gluing styrene and metal. And, as ever, it was a nightmare.

One pic I didn’t take, but really should’ve, shows how the engine and pipework might go together. The moved air-filters, shortened engine, and pipes, all combine to make a compact and complex engine. It’s a lot of work. But hopefully it’ll all be worth it!?

Hopefully tomorrow I’ll get all these major bits installed. Though having said that, there’s the question of engine bay wall detail.